SYLLABUS -- Before unleashing multimedia degree students on to work stations where they are likely to be confused by the interfaces, we need to teach them how to work within that environment. So we teach how to maneuver pull-down menus and how to use online help. We also ask them to write a useful tutorial in their Media Writing course.
DOWNES -- Stephen Downes writes an excellent essay about blogging in education for EDUCAUSE this month. His footnotes point to a host of useful sites that deserve to be bookmarked into news reader.
IOSN -- The IOSN primer covers the use of Free/Open Source Software (FOSS) from schools to universities. It provides a brief overview of how it can help in setting up the IT infrastructure and administration of educational institutions and considers software (mainly proprietary) which is now used as the basis for IT curricula and alternative FOSS which is available.
MOODLE -- While poking around Moodle.ie, home of the Irish Moodle Moot, I saw Peter Doolittle listed as a visiting professor at the Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design, and Technology. PDoo is one of the most inspirational speakers I have ever heard speak in an instructional technology setting. If he offered more than passing support for Moodle, the adoption rate of the technology would soar.
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IRRODL – As I rewire four separate online education modules, I have set aside some time to read about interaction and immediacy in open and distance learning. Because they are related, we need to take into account some specific implications for best practise.
Robert Woods and Jason Baker -- “Interaction and Immediacy in Online Learning” (ISSN 14923831)
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CLONMEL -- Multimedia degreee student Alan McGuire explains why wireless Internet access is a smart move for colleges. It's a matter of speed--no queues for seats at workstations when you can open up your laptop and post away.
EDUFORGE -- George Siemens uses a wiki to list useful guides concerning open source technology. The wiki explains items through tutorials and reviews best practise for technology in education.
RAPID INTELLECT -- Very handy "frequently-read-articles calculation" based on hits/visitors received by articles archived on Rapid Intellect. Rankings, updated monthly, reflect accumulated hits from time of posting until the current month. For rankings to be listed, minimum 500 hits is required. Updates recorded in 50 hits increments. Listings for Top Ten Articles are made in bold. Too bad there's no RSS feed for the page.
Stephen Downes -- "Academic Exchange Quarterly"
Cory Doctorow -- "turn any website into an RSS feed for $2"
Carlo Zottmann -- "accepting feed requests"
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INQUISITION -- Blocking porn incites passion in the hearts of some IT specialists. When supported by management, this passion can quickly evolve into a rabid form of sexual absolutism. Its structures can criminalise both artistic representation and objective intellectual examination and speculation. When this happens, we subordinate freeflowing thought to absolute value strictures imposed from above.
BBC -- There's a story about SUBzone's plans to offer high speed wireless access to 1.2m students at at more than 55 student unions in Britain. The same kind of support needs to be rolled out across Irish campuses.
