What is Digital Learning Day?
Started by the Alliance for Learning, and in partnership with the National Writing Project,
“Digital Learning Day will celebrate innovative teaching practices that make learning more personalized and engaging and encourage exploration of how digital learning can provide more students with more opportunities to get the skills they need to succeed in college, career, and life.” (via NWP)
This year, Digital Learning Day is on February 1. Digital Learning Day is an opportunity to start conversations, try new technologies, and showcase success. The Master of Arts in Educational Technology will be celebrating Digital Learning Day by asking our community to try something new and celebrate and share their successes on this Tumblr blog – http://dlday2012.tumblr.com/ You can start posting your stories right now! We are very excited to watch the conversations emerge over the next few weeks.
In addition to participating in the #MAET Digital Learning Day Challenge, you can start a conversation in your learning community! Celebrating and sharing Digital Learning Day is easy – The National Writing project provides resources here:
http://digitalis.nwp.org/site-blog/feb-1-digital-learning-day/3395
and the Alliance for Learning provides several Toolkits on their site:
http://www.digitallearningday.org/toolkits/
The hashtag for the day is #DLDay – time to get sharing!
I’m on the flight home from my first Consumer Electronics Show (CES) conference. Being a techie, I’m always intrigued by the latest and greatest “toys” out there – so CES has been on my “bucket list.” Due to the generosity of Scott Westerman, Clint Crook, Ryan Schram and Henry Balanon, my techie dreams came true this week.
CES is an overwhelming experience. Not necessarily overwhelming in the sense of multiple concurrent sessions and wanting to be in ten places at once (like SXSW) but overwhelming in the sensory department. I went through each and every square foot of the north, central and south halls (I missed the hotel displays.) As I combed the halls, I was looking through my “teacher lens.” Here’s a rundown of some of the great things I saw that have applications in learning environments:
(The reviews are purely my own observations, no sponsored blogging on my site.)
Carnagie Mellon Quality of Life technologies
It was great to see a university represent at CES.
“The Quality of Life Technology (QoLT) Center is a National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center (ERC) whose mission is to transform lives in a large and growing segment of the population – people with reduced functional capabilities due to aging or disability.”
I enjoyed spending time in their display – these two stuck out in particular:
PerMMA
The Personal Mobility & Manipulation Appliance was a fascinating “proof of concept” chair. The arms on the chair have a greater range of mobility over current chairs on the market. The feature that I found most ingenious was the fact that the chair was equipped with webcams so someone could remotely assist and operate the chair. The idea is that there would be call centers for the chair which is connected to wifi and someone could operate the chair from afar, giving the person in the chair more freedom and mobility.
Fitwits
Fitwits is a collaborative research project designed by Carnegie Mellon University School of Design and UPMC Saint Margaret Family Health Centers and funded by the Heinz Endowments.
I talked with Kristin Hughes who is a professor in the school of Design at Carneige Mellon. She urged anyone who is interested in using Fitwits to send her an email and she can get you set up with the materials (for free!) kh@andrew.cmu.edu The materials are beautifully designed and would be perfect in an elementary or PE classroom.
The other QoLT devices/products that were at CES can be found here:
http://www.cmu.edu/qolt/AboutQoLTCenter/PressRoom/qolt-at-ces-2012.html#2012%20CES%20Press%20Kit
Samson
This booth may have been my most enjoyable stop (not surprising with my audio background.) SO many great, affordable tools for capturing & broadcasting sound and video. For anyone wanting to take their vid/podcasting (or dissertation data collection) to the next level, you may want to check these out.
The Q3HD is gorgeous – $250
While a bit pricier than the now defunct Flip – this captures INCREDIBLE audio & video. My #1 “cringe moment” when our students do video projects is sound quality. A message can get completely lost because of bad audio. This is a fool proof camera when it comes to capturing audio w/your video. I can’t wait to get one to play more.
The Expedition Portable PA $299
Perfect tool for classrooms/pop-up presentations (and even tailgates.) It has an iPod doc & wireless mic. The battery lasts 12 hours on a single charge.
H2N $199
I wish I would have had this microphone/audio recorder for my dissertation defense livestream. Beautiful sound, great form factor.
Octa’s Whale Tail
Though the name of their product can be slightly awkward, this is a handy little device, especially for anyone that teaches or presents with a tablet. VERY comfortable to hold and secures easily onto the tablet. It even worked on my MacBook Air.
The Parrot AR drone
It’s just plan fun, and fun is good.
Health Monitors
Lots and lots of new gadgets for monitoring your health -a perfect pair for PE classrooms.
I tried out the blood pressure monitor from: http://www.withings.com/ – I could see this being a handy tool for personal wellness. There were also some cool wifi scales that paired with fitness/training apps on your mobile.
Listen to your Buds Contest
The American Speech-Language Hearing Association was at CES to raise awareness around noise-induced hearing loss. They are currently running a contest for kids between the ages of 8-18. Could be a great classroom/after-school project. The contest, open to young people between the ages of 8–18, invites submissions of audio or video PSAs in either 30-or 60-second formats. Entries must feature a safe listening message about using personal audio technology. Entries due March 9, 2012
Qualcomm & Sesame Street Augmented Reality
We’ll have to see how this one plays out. I had a lot of fun playing with the prototype.
Now, some criticism….
The big draw of CES isn’t the sessions, but the showroom floor with anyone and everyone showing their latest and greatest wares. Though I went mostly to see the gadgets, I got into town a bit earlier than I expected and I was able to attend a session of the Higher Ed Tech Summit. I attended a panel called From Dewey to Digital: Are e-books, Tablets and Digital Content Coming of Age?
I was frustrated with this session for a few reasons. First off, I made a snap judgement since I didn’t see a single female represented on the panel. Additionally, the question of Open Courseware did not come up until the very last question of the Q&A session. I believe videos of the sessions will be posted here) and I’ll be able to make a more coherent argument. My fingers couldn’t type fast enough on the iPad and I was only able to get a few tweets out.
There was 1.6 million square feet of stuff at CES. A lot of what I saw was cosmetic, there was a whole exhibit area dedicated to iDevice cases and “bling.” While Apple isn’t here – the market is certainly catering to Apple devices. Josh sent me an email me during the show asking me to keep an eye out for other mobile devices that were prevalent or up and coming. There were a lot of ultrabooks and tablet competitors, not one sticks out in particular as being good or bad, however, when it comes to peripherals, everyone (ok, not everyone, but the majority) were catering to Apple products.
Boy oh boy (pun intended.) Where are the women? Where is the diversity? If you look at the keynotes – zero stand-alone female presenters and all but one of keynotes was Caucasian. I kept a keen eye out for gender and racial equity and I was sorely disappointed. The people running the demos, men – the people standing by the gadgets looking pretty, women. See this observation from the BBC – http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16533289 In fairness, when I started “talking tech” with the reps no one ever talked down to me (which has happened in other tech environments.) I think this was the single most disappointing part of the show for me.
So – how can we change this for future generations of techies? Keep providing opportunities for young women & minorites. If you don’t know where to start, subscribe to MacArthur’s Spotlight on Digital Media and Learning which frequently posts great articles/resources for supporting diversity in technology. Here are a few new posts from
To Engage Girls in STEM, Include Role Models and Watch the Messaging
LEGO Called Upon to Treat Girls and Boys as Equals
All in all, CES was a fascinating experience. My techie cravings were certainly satisfied (I took pictures with a Nikon D4!) and I was able to observe a side of the industry that few in the educational side technology have the opportunity to witness.
Last year I had the pleasure of traveling with the MSUAA team to SXSW Interactive. It was the first time I (and MSUAA) had ventured to SXSW and we certainly got our feet wet. One of the charges in going down there was to bring SXSW to MSU. As my MAET students and alums know, I love connecting and sharing, so this challenge was right up my alley. We captured many of our experiences on the MSUAA blog – http://alumni.msu.edu/sxsw/
One of my favorite stories of connecting MSU to SXSW was my chance encounter with Clay Spinuzzi. You can read the whole story here - It’s a pretty cool example of how twitter and social media connects us and facilitates collaboration.
SO, I’m here to pre-plan and put out an all call to the MSU community – how can I (and the rest of the MSUAA team) bring SXSW to you?
First, you may be asking, what is SXSW. Here’s info on SXSW (South by Southwest) Interactive – http://sxsw.com/interactive/about
If you take a look through the programming, you will see there are many cross disciplinary connections and possibilities.
In addition to SXSW Interactive, I’ll also be attending SXSWEDU which started last year and is specifically targeted towards education. The lineup for SXSWEDU can be found here: http://sxswedu.com/
What do I need from you? You can email me or comment below – if you have no idea how your class/research connects, but have an inkling that this may be cool, that’s ok! We can skype/Adobe Connect into your class, I can interview people for you, I can connect your students to experts via twitter…the possibilities are endless. I’m here to help (and do all the work!)
On a last minute side note – I’m headed to my first Consumer Electronics Show conference next week. It was an extremely generous surprise from my techie friends Ryan, Clint, Henry and Scott. I’ll be tweeting & posting the experience as usual – but if there is anything (ed)techie you want me to check out, by all means, post in the comments below and I’ll do my best to be your eyes and ears on the ground. All things CES can be found here http://www.cesweb.org/
To my #MAET friends – this offer goes out to you too! If you see any classroom connections, by all means, please let me know how I can help!
I have been making cooking videos with my nieces and nephew for a few years now. After I posted our latest cooking show, a few friends posted that they too wanted to make a show too, so I thought I would lay out a few helpful pointers.
#1 HAVE FUN
Do not stress out. This is not easy if you’re a high stress person, rolling with the messes & spills is part of the fun.
Now, I’m an auntie doing this – I know if you’re thinking about doing this with your own kids that it can add another layer of stress. They may not be as excited and may certainly act differently. Get them pumped up – show them one of the videos here to see other kids doing it. Have the kids make their favorite recipe, or a favorite recipe of a grandparent, friend, etc. (The videos & resulting cookies make great gifts for grandparents!)
#2 GATHER THE (TECH) EQUIPMENT
I use the following to film the videos:
Tripod
Flip Cam
iMovie
You of course can use whatever you want to film and edit – Windows Movie Maker, Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere, etc. If you’re using a Flip it comes with really easy to use editing and “stitching” software..we’ll talk more about editing in a bit.
#3 SET THE STAGE AND GATHER THE (COOKING) EQUIPMENT
Get your kitchen set up so the kids have a clean workspace. You may be lucky enough to have an island, or you could set up a card table. Make sure you have decent light in your kitchen. If you can, filming in the day, next to an open window will ensure good lighting.
If you’re working with younger kids, it is be helpful to measure and set out the ingredients (just like they do on real cooking shows!) Of course, as kids get older, measuring is also part of the fun and an added life skill.
#4 RECORD THE SHOW
With my nieces and nephews, I usually give them a prompt of what to say, they practice, then we record. As they have grown up and have started to read, we make cue cards and even write a script. Once the kids get in the flow of things, they naturally start to ad-lib and the fun begins.
To make the editing process easier, I record in quick little chunks for each part of the recipe. If you leave the recording going, editing becomes a bit more of a chore. Between breaks we clean up and talk about the next scene.
I do my best not to talk on the tape at all (though, sometimes they ask me questions that are “clip worthy” and they make the final cut.)
#5 EDIT
With roots in radio and tv production, this is the fun part for me – and usually the most frustrating part for others. Don’t be afraid to cut parts that are boring! Keep it snappy – a 2 minute 30 second clip is what I try to shoot for – but with cooking shows, they usually end up being about 5 minute segments. Having a nicely edited video is what will set your clip apart from others and will make the experience so much more enjoyable for your family & friends viewing the clip!
As I mentioned earlier, Flip comes with pretty handy easy-to-use software for newbies to editing. You can always Google “how to edit video with <insert what you’re using here>” for tips and tricks.
#6 POST
Share! That’s the reason for making the video – parents, grandparents, family and friends love to see the kids!! There are many popular venues for sharing like Facebook and YouTube. My favorite video hosting site is Vimeo.
That’s it!
If you found this helpful and make your own cooking show, please share it with me! I know my nieces and nephew would love to see other kids around the world cooking and it would get them psyched up for our next show.
Here are a few more of our fun videos:
Blame it on 7 years of built up PhD stress…but this weekend I went a little nuts in the kitchen.
My #bakefest2011 started with Martha’s Cookie App and Epicurious on the iPad. Say what you want about Martha Stewart – but her cookie app is spectacular, gorgeous & intuitive. While there is a handy shopping list embedded in the app, sometimes I still like to go old school.
Then I started Saturday prepping Santa’s Whiskers and the dough for the gingerbread men and speculaas. I then whipped up a quick batch of M&M sugar cookies (requested by @ryanschram)
I woke up this morning and baked off the Santa’s Whiskers. They’re fabulous and I’m definitely adding these to my repertoire.
Next, I rolled out and baked off the gingerbread men. The last time I made gingerbread men (December 2005) I swore I would not make them again. Not sure what got into me…but I forgot how horrible it is and assume it will be another 6 (maybe even 10) years before I try it again.
I then pulled out the Speculaas dough – FAIL. It was un-rollable. Moving on! Started cracking eggs for the next rounds and came upon a bit of good luck!
Next up were the Pignoli. I learned how to make them at Zingerman’s a few weeks ago. They were not exactly the same as they were when I made them at Zingerman’s…I think there was too much egg white and honey…but they turned out OK. (Not great, just ok.)
Next, things took a turn for the worse….
I decided to stop baking for a while and moved to chocolate. I made chocolate dipped pretzels (super easy!)
Then I made hazelnut chocolate bars. These too were super easy – melt chocolate, pour into mold, set outside! Though, they were not easy to cut into squares :( Next time I will heat my knife under hot water then attempt to cut the pieces out.
I built the courage back up to continue baking. I made another Zingerman’s recipe – Cherry Sesame Biscotti. These have become my daily breakfast for the past month! They’re SO GOOD and so easy!!
Then, it was onto more ginger-y goodness. Scott really likes gingerbread, so I thought he would enjoy Jenn’s grandma’s Gingersnaps. They’re a ton easier than gingerbread, and I think they taste better! Thanks Jenn and Gramma Edna.
FINALLY I round out the evening with these Eggnogg Bars from Martha Stewart. They’re a special treat for our MAET instructor luncheon on Tuesday. They take a day or two to set up in the fridge.
AAAANNNNNDDD….done. Though after this weekend’s adventures I’m not sure how much more baking I’ll do this holiday season :) Looking forward to sharing the fruits of my labor this week with my friends and colleagues!
Today I sent the latest version of my dissertation to my committee. I say “latest” because it never feels quite finished and based upon all of the other dissertation defenses I have been to, there will be revisions. As much as I appreciate all of the congrats for hitting send, the work is not over yet!
I’ve always been very public with my work, and I feel I should be the same way with my dissertation. It’s usually a fairly hidden process, which is part of the reason the task was (is) a challenge for me. I’ve posted a proof version of the dissertation to Google docs. You can provide comments/suggestions here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/18YW9bNmPxafPeqxR-ZQcG6yg1T_9_j380yM_Q217Pzk/edit
I’m very open to your comments and criticisms as I’ll have to defend my ideas presented to the committee next week, so I figure exposing myself to the world will be good practice. Is there anything you find particularly interesting? Confusing?
My defense is Wednesday, December 7 at 1:30pm. I’m working on finalizing the location, so if you would like to come just leave a comment below or send me an email. If you do come, it would be helpful to breeze through the pdf proof here or have it on your Kindle/iPad/Pod since the audience will have a chance to ask questions and it will make the defense make a little more sense.
I vividly remember programming the above output back in second grade. I have always considered myself very lucky that I have been supported by teachers and mentors in the technical realm. My early career interests (radio and tv production and network administration/engineering) were (and still are) male dominated fields. While I never felt intimidated or discriminated against in my situations, the majority of my mentors were male. Now that I am in the educational technology realm, I still experience a lack of diversity (in gender, race and age) and do my best to support other women in technology. I am thankful for friends like Betsy Weber and Carla McWherter who were instrumental in establishing Michigan Girl Geek dinners. Additionally, Keri-Lee Beasley has started to curate a twitter list of women in ed-tech. Continually vocalizing our achievements and supporting each other at events like the Grace Hopper celebration and providing young women with technical experiences (like the ones I had in elementary school) are an important part of our social responsibility. If you’re at a loss, ask for help – I’m here and know others ready and willing to help implement similar projects in your schools – LEGO Robotics, Scratch programming clubs, DIY tech days are all simple ways to engage young women in tech experiences that can have a profound impact on their future careers.
If you’re in charge of a technical conference or group, I urge you to keep a conscious eye on the makeup of your participants. Two EXCELLENT examples that (in my opinion) represent a comprehensive group of voices is the 2011 line up of distinguished speakers for South by Southwest EDU and the 2011 MacArthur Fellows.
I am proud to picture myself in computing everyday and I urge you to share your stories and pictures. Here’s how you can participate in #picmecomp – http://www.picturemeincomputing.org/index.php?q=participate
I had a great time meeting with the International Academy Music Boosters last night. The group was looking for ways to help communicate essential information (concert dates, uniform distribution, etc.) while working on a long term strategy of better engagement with the school and local communities. (My connection to the group is that my husband is the orchestra director. :)
The boosters have set up a twitter account and a Facebook group, but like many who are new to the social “scene” they weren’t quite sure where to go or what to do. We had an excellent discussion and determined that Twitter wasn’t the best solution for their needs. This whole tech world is about choosing the right tools for the task. When you look at the actual saturation rates of Twitter use, their target populations (parents and teens) don’t have super high usage statistics. We did have a brief discussion on Twitter (went over basic terminology, use of 3rd party apps like Oosfora, Flipboard or Tweetdeck) which was helpful for everyone to get a basic grasp of how to approach the twitterverse and how to filter out the clutter or conversations that don’t interest you or your needs.
We also took a look at my favorite workflow tool – ifttt.com – an essential tool for anyone trying to broadcast messages through multiple mediums. I mentioned Remind101 as a possible solution for group text messages.
The discussion did veer off in an important direction – there were many questions and concerns about teens and social media. I suggested they check out danah boyd‘s recent work. I also forgot to mention CommonSense Media which has a tremendous repository of advice and resources for parents.
While only a few in the room had dabbled in twitter, everyone in the room used email and text messaging on a daily basis, so that’s where we headed (to get back on task.) Ultimately, we decided that a WordPress site with an embedded Google calendar was the best solution for their needs. The site would allow email subscriptions/digests and we’ll look for an SMS plug in that allows updates to be broadcast out via text message. Starting simple will help address immediate needs and concerns while the WordPress framework lays a solid foundation for future growth.
It was truly a pleasure meeting with such a dedicated, hard working and engaged group of parents (and Choir/Band Teacher Mr. Ash!) committed not only to their own children but to the collective mission of the music department at the IA – thank you for all that you do and I’m glad I could help!
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I did not use these slides much as we were talking, but I thought I would provide them here for reference.
Yesterday I had one of those milestone moments. It was my last “let’s meet one day before work” breakfast with Branon and Sean. Bran has been hired by U of M Flint as an instructional technologist and Sean is headed across the pond for a new adventure in the Netherlands. The MSU campus will be at a tremendous loss without their expertise present at vuDAT.
I met Bran 6 years ago when we taught together in the East Lansing summer cohort with Punya. We had interacted a few times before, but it was our first real “bonding” experience. I met Sean in 2008 when I was his “advisor” for the MAET program. I use the word “advisor” loosely because basically, I just helped make sure he had the papertrail cleared up to graduate :)
Sean and Bran are two incredibly influential people in my life. I have had the distinct pleasure of co-teaching with both of them. It’s a rare treat to find a teaching partner who can eloquently balance your shortcomings and accentuate your strengths. I’m trying to find the right words to express one of the other reasons I admire Sean and Bran – to have two male friends who treat you, not just like “one of the guys”, but as a person, a regular person is extraordinary.
Over the years I have watched Bran grow not only as a professional but also as a father. I remember distinctly a time when I stopped in at the coffee shop one morning, Brandon had not noticed me yet and I watched he and his daughter were engrossed in their morning routine. The memory still brings tears to my eyes. Brandon’s love for his family radiates through everything he does – not in an overly “gushy” way, but in the most natural, loving and inspirational way that I have witnessed.
I have also watched Sean grow over the past few years that I have known him. He has become an integral asset to the MAET program. He openly and eagerly shares his expertise with me, pushing me to improve my own photography, video and design skills. He is a constant source of strength and encouragement in my work.
Brandon and Sean were my travel buddies during the MAET overseas program – we shared many a pint, glass, bottle and meal during our adventures. Their willingness to indulge in my foodie adventures was much appreciated and it was comforting to be in my element with all three of us having camera in hand taking pictures of the food, beer, etc.
This is not a sad goodbye – in actuality I may see Brandon more since he’s moving closer to me and I’ll be in much closer contact with Sean since he’ll be working directly with the MAET program. They’re both growing as professionals and the new opportunities they’re headed towards are perfect fits for their expertise and passions. Though, selfishly, I am sad that a much cherished part of my workflow will be disrupted. I loved every breakfast, coffee and beer we three have shared together over the years. I know we’ll all get together again, but an impromptu breakfast to geek out, vent, or collaborate will no longer be a text message away.
Cheers guys.
Love,
Leigh
Michelle, Punya, Kristen and I have a huge favor to ask – can you vote for us? Our proposed SXSWEDU panel “Developing TPACK: Design Case Scenarios on Display” is up and open for voting!
Here’s the description:
Technology integration and developing information literacy skills in students must begin by developing teachers’ technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) (Mishra & Koehler, 2006). This development however is an intricate and complex process, made even more so by the fact that most technologies are not designed explicitly for education purposes (Koehler & Mishra, 2008). This panel addresses these issues and presents three in-depth practitioner focused case studies from our Master of Arts in Educational Technology program specifically aimed at developing teachers TPACK and creative technology integration. We describe the design and implementation of each case as an example of our attempts to improve K-12 teachers facility to incorporate technology into their classroom practice. Each case study is presented in detail along with data detailing technology specific creative growth and the development of domain-general TPACK.
You can vote for our proposal by visiting: http://panelpicker.sxswedu.com/ideas/view/14302
Voting and commenting closes this Friday, October 28th!
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