Tag Archives: innovation

Future of Online Learning – Stephen Downes

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We were very lucky to have had a conversation with Stephen Downes last night as he took us through his vision of the next 10 years in online learning. The presentation was based on Stephen’s insightful post from last November.

For the presentation, we used Elluminate as the “front row”. As well, I hijacked the Elluminate video/audio out to Ustream.tv for those that preferred a pure back channel. Even with this provision, the majority of the conversation remained in Elluminate (the front row).

The Elluminate recording is available here, and the Ustream recording is here. Previous sessions from this course (with various other presenters) are available in the course archive.

Thanks to Stephen for an excellent presentation, and one that will keep us thinking for some time to come.

CBC Sask on Twitter

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Jordan (a former student of mine) and I were briefly interviewed for a short CBC piece about Twitter. It is interesting to see the increased interest in the service by mainstream media, especially in the past several months.

Additionally, here’s an older piece from the CBC (March 2002) that discussed the implementation of highspeed Internet in every Saskatchewan school (was quite a big deal at the time). While there is a shared focus in the two pieces around connectivity, there is certainly a shift in what this means. In 2002, the focus here was in retrieving content/information. Now, the focus is much more on establishing human connections and social interactivity.

Centre for Future Storytelling

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The MIT Media Lab has announced the creation of the Centre for Future Storytelling through a Partnership with Plymouth Rock Studios.

With the establishment of the center, whose research program begins immediately, the Media Lab and Plymouth Rock Studios will collaborate to revolutionize how we tell our stories, from major motion pictures to peer-to-peer multimedia sharing. By applying leading-edge technologies to make stories more interactive, improvisational and social, researchers will seek to transform audiences into active participants in the storytelling process, bridging the real and virtual worlds, and allowing everyone to make their own unique stories with user-generated content on the Web. Center research will also focus on ways to revolutionize imaging and display technologies, including developing next-generation cameras and programmable studios, making movie production more versatile and economic.

Future of Storytelling

This is an exciting project and I look forward to the innovation and possibilities that emerge in the coming years.

The Airwaves Have Been Freed

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From FreeTheAirwaves.com

On November 4, 2008, by a vote of 5-0, the Federal Communications Commission agreed to free the unused TV airwaves for unlicensed public use.

This is a tremendous victory for Internet users.

Thanks and congratulations to the more than 20,000 of you who signed the Free the Airwaves petition to the FCC. This historic vote would not have been possible without your effort.

To understand what this could mean for public wifi access, listen to Minnie Ingersoll of Google.

More at Google blog.

College IT Index – Class of 2012

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Peter Schilling (not this one), IT Director of Amherst College, has crunched the numbers and has come up with some interesting statistics regarding the 438 newly enrolled student population. Here are a few notable points:

    – Percentage of applicants that applied online = 89%.
    – Registered devices (computers, iphones, game consoles) on the University network – 370 students registered 443 devices.
    – 14 students brought desktop computers, while 93 brought iPhones/Touch devices.
    – Likelihood of a student in class having an iPhone/Touch – 1 in 2.
    – 432 of 438 students were involved in the Amherst College Facebook group, and had posted 3,225 posts by mid August.
    – Total number of students on campus this year that have landline phone service – 5.
    – Classes 2009 and 2010 are more likely to own Windows machines, while classes of 2011 and 2012 are most likely to own Macs.

Times are changing. This survey has really made me want to do something similar here on campus.

View the complete Amherst College IT index here. See also the Benoit College Mindset list.

New Lifelike Animation Technologies

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Watch Emily speak about Image Metrics, “a marker-less performance driven animation company.”

Emily – the woman in the above animation – was produced using a new modelling technology that enables the most minute details of a facial expression to be captured and recreated.

Very neat stuff. Read more at timesonline.com.

No, THIS Guy Is Edupunk

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My friend and colleague Marc (who really needs a blog) alerted me to this story regarding a recent legal ruling in the matter of the University of Ottawa and the Association of Professors of the University of Ottawa (UPUO). The case arose when the U of O charged that Professor Denis Rancourt “had misrepresented his course in a detailed web posting, in such a way as to have described a dramatically different course not compatible with the official course description.” The 65-page ruling the case supported Dr. Rancourt’s actions as within the purview of academic freedom.

But here is the stuff I really like! See these pieces of the ruling that help to describe how Dr. Rancourt led this controversial course.

The ruling establishes that pedagogical innovation and implementation are fully protected under the academic freedom enjoyed by a professor, including the choice of grading system – considered an integral part of the pedagogical method.

In the specific case, the protected pedagogical innovations included:

(a) A large fraction of the class time used to present societal and political material – in a physics course intended to deliver fundamental physics concepts as the only required physics course in an environmental studies program – as a way to motivate student learning and to position the science in the broad societal context. This was achieved using invited scientist and non-scientist speakers that included activists, politicians, community workers, etc. The ruling clarifies that no “exception [was] taken to the use of activism and social and political issues as catalysts to learning.”

(b) Parallel student workgroups with evolving themes and freely changing student memberships and town-hall-style whole-class discussions instead of traditional lectures delivered by the professor.

(c) An open invitation to all community members to freely and fully participate in the class, without necessarily officially registering and paying tuition, as a way to bring in the community to enrich class discussions and strengthen relevance and community connections. This brought in a variety of perspectives and expertises that would otherwise not have been available.

(d) Large latitude in individual student decision making regarding: order in which to learn things (e.g., workgroup membership and topic), depth of treatment, method of study, method of reporting progress, degree of cooperative work, etc. (Sharing was not considered cheating.)

(e) A satisfactory/non-satisfactory (S/NS) grading system rather than the traditional letter grade system (used in all other science courses given that term).

I have been very lucky that my Faculty and University has been supportive of my work in pursuing several similar approaches in my teaching. I am pleased to see the results of this case so positive for Dr. Rancourt as it has the potential to help other professors take risks toward passionate and creative forms of teaching and learning.

Learn more about this story here.

Status of OpenMoko

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I will likely pick up an iPhone 3G this week. While I have been wanting to pick up one for some time now, I would be happier if there were an open alternative. I have been watching the OpenMoko project for some time now, but it appears the device still has some major technical issues. See the video below:


OpenMoko Train Wreck from Dave Fayram on Vimeo.

Perhaps by the time my (ugggh) 3 year contract with Rogers runs out, there will be a mature, open alternative. I really hope OpenMoko gets there.

Is Google Making Us Stupid?

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Can you relate?

Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable sense that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory. My mind isn’t going—so far as I can tell—but it’s changing. I’m not thinking the way I used to think. I can feel it most strongly when I’m reading. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.

I certainly can. Read this article, that is, if your attention span allows it.

Read at Work – Brilliant!

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You really have to try this to appreciate it. (via yesbutnobutyes)

The folks at the New Zealand Book Council have created a truly ingenious way to read more at work. Read At Work turns your desktop into a full screen, realistic PC looking desktop with folders, start button, recycle bin, the works. The kicker is the all the folders contain writings of famous authors and New Zealand locals. And, keeping in mind that you’re reading at work, these stories are displayed in a convenient PowerPoint format. Hence your superiors won’t know what you’re really doing. This particular screen shot here is from Edgar Allan Poe’s poem “A dream.”

Edgar Allan Poe's

This is very cool, and a great implementation, although I cannot fathom working in a place where I would have to resort to reading the classics via PowerPoint format.