Smaller PNGs
Last week I put together an animated infographic that required some flexibility. Alpha transparency was essential, but the number of images I needed to pull it off meant that my typical way of creating PNGs wasn't going to work. Read more...
mezzoblue, Today, 12:40am
SSD + Photoshop
I just got my first Mac with a solid state drive. If you've heard anything about SSD performance, you won't be surprised to hear that it's fast. How fast? Well, I filmed a video. Read more...
mezzoblue, Today, 12:40am
Embracing Uncertainty and the strange problem of habituation
Dave Cormier,
Dave’s Educational Blog, February 3, 2012.
Dave Cormier writes about Rhizomes and uncertainty. "The rhizome is uncertainty. That doesn’t mean it ‘isn’t’. It has no start and no ending. It is complex… and as such, it resists definition. As a model for learning, it resists ‘core principles’ or ‘final outcomes’. It is an ongoing process of growing, of surprise and of change." Martin Weller comments on this model in relation to the way experts are able to remember detailed aspects of their experience; "experts don't know they do this, but it's a by-product, or... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Yesterday, 2:00pm
Farewell to the Enterprise LMS, Greetings to the Learning Platform
Phil Hill,
e-Literate, February 3, 2012.
"We are going," writes Phil Hill, "from an enterprise LMS market to a learning platform market." The difference between an LMS and a learning platform is that the latter "does not contain all the features in itself and is based on cloud computing – multi-tenant, software as a service (SaaS)." Definitely have a look at the article for a number of links to examples. "Another trend that is becoming apparent is that many of the new offerings are not attempting to fully replace the legacy LMS, at least all at once."
[Link] [ Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Yesterday, 1:52pm
Flight 1549: Expertise and how it gets there
Dave Ferguson,
Dave's Whiteboard, February 3, 2012.
A topic that really interests me is expertise. How do we become 'expert' and what does it look like? Dave Ferguson takes a look at what was arguably expert performance, Chesley Sullenberger's "successful ditching" of a passenger aircraft in the Hudson River (which maps to another topic that really interests me, flight). What's... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Yesterday, 1:48pm
2017: RIP, OER?
David Wiley,
iterating toward openness, February 3, 2012.
Before we get a little overly exuberant about the ascendence of OERs, writes David Wiley, we need to look at what's happening in the education technology space. "Can you name a single OER project that does assessment at all (and I don’t mean PDFs of quizzes)? Can you name one that does diagnostic assessment or handles mastery in any meaningful way? ... Open education currently has no response to the coming wave of diagnostic, adaptive products coming from the publishers." The crux, says Wiley, is that if it took $100 million to get to where we are in OER, how much will it take to get to that next level?
Of course, the skill set... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Yesterday, 1:32pm
Let’s make OpenPhilosophy.org!
Jonathan Gray,
Weblog, February 3, 2012.
Jonathan Gray writes, "A little while ago I posted some ideas for a project called OpenPhilosophy.org, which would enable users to transcribe, translate, annotate and create collections of philosophical texts which have entered the public domain... the project has secured some funding from Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Yesterday, 1:10pm
Can Humanities Undergrads Learn to Code?
Rebecca Davis,
NITLE Logo National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education, February 3, 2012.
I would never have though this would be an issue, but apparently "a recurring motif along the lines that coding (markup and programming) is so difficult that undergraduates trained in the humanities cannot learn it quickly or successfully." I must be a polymath then, having spent time coding pretty much through the whole of my philosophy undergrad. Or maybe the motif is just wrong. "The skills most humanities majors have mastered as part of their academic training, such as formulating research questions and reading critically, carry over easily and naturally... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Yesterday, 1:04pm
Creative Thinking – Joanna Maxwell
Nicola,
One Change a Day, February 3, 2012.
Creative Thinking by Joanna Maxwell is a short but beautifully presented slide show outlining four major steps to cultivating your creativity. It is also sport-on -- these are tips I use on a daily basis and which have served me remarkably well:
- be curious
- make connections
- challenge yourself
- cultivate your ideas
[Link] [Comment] Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Yesterday, 5:13am
A CSS3 Tip
I'm probably way behind the curve on this one, but I recently realized the following: Read more...
mezzoblue, Yesterday, 12:40am
We Are More Than Algorithms
John T. Spencer,
Education Rethink, February 2, 2012.
When I read a statement like "we are more than algorithms" two things come to my mind:
- it depends on what you mean by "we", and
- it depends on what you mean by "algorithms"
Because, after all, an algorithm is, broadly construed a process or mechanism for doing something. Now if by that you mean 'a set of rules', then I agree, we are more than that. But if you mean by 'we' that there is some aspect of our comprehension that is by definition not representable through some process or mechanism, then I disagree. Simply Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 2, 1:54pm
the man who lived on his bike
THE MAN WHO LIVED ON HIS BIKE from Guillaume Blanchet on Vimeo. so good. I need to ride hands-free more. Haven’t really done that since I was a kid… via a tweet from Momentum Magazine: The Man Who Lived on His #Bike shar.es/fher2— Momentum Magazine (@MomentumMag) February 2, 2012 Read more...
D'Arcy Norman dot net, Feb 2, 11:43am
Noam Chomsky on the purpose of #education
Inge de Waard,
Ignatia Webs, February 2, 2012.
Mostly my thinking is in alignment with Noam Chomsky's so it is not surprising to find his reflections on the subject of education reasonable and well-considered. Here are (sme of) Chomsky's ideas on education in short (as paraphrased by Ignatia at times):
- There is a constant struggle between two realities: the principles of the enlightment and indoctrination.
- Technology is a neutral instrument, education is a framework (note: I don't agree that technology is neutral; technology, too, is a framework - SD)
Ignatia's reflections are also interetsing: "the thing I wonder about is, how can you build a critical thinking framework and ... even if... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 2, 11:26am
Open Textbook Authoring Tools Part 1 – Mediawiki
Scott Leslie,
EdTechPost, February 2, 2012.
Scott Leslie explores MediaWiki as an authoring tool for open textbooks. Along the way he discovers:
- D2L exports aren't very good
- there's no simple way of getting from an IMS Content Package to a wiki (cynically, I would say they were designed that way)
- approaches that let you output to multiple... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 2, 11:14am
Tuition cuts won't increase university access
Stephen Gordon,
Globe and Mail, February 2, 2012.
Following widespread tutition-rate protests in Canada yesterday the Globe and Mail is trotting out the well-worn counterargument: tuition cuts won't increase university access. It's disingenuous. The author, if he chose to be accurate, would write "tuition cuts by themselves won't increase university access." They are a necessary but not sufficient condition. We need to address other costs as well (such as, say, books) and we need to acddress social equity in society in general. But that said, ti should be clear, that tuition hikes... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 2, 5:29am
Crowdsourcing while learning
Wolfgang Greller,
Reflections on the Knowledge Society, February 2, 2012.
Wolfgang Greller takes a quick look at an intriguing project that has people learn a language by translating content on the web from that language into their own language. "Duolingo adjusts to your competence level and provides help on the fly, such as translation suggestions.
[Link] [Comment] Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 2, 4:26am
An Open Educational Resource Supports a Diversity of Inquiry-Based Learning
Catherine Anne Schmidt-Jones,
International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, February 1, 2012.
Today I bring to you links to four of the articles in the latest edition of the International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning. This first paper examines how people are using open educational resources (OERs). "Most reported accessing individual modules on their own initiative, as part of a specific, immediate inquiry, rather than responding to institutional directives or following entire online courses." Part nway through the paper we read an... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 1, 2:27pm
Heutagogy and Lifelong Learning: A Review of Heutagogical Practice and Self-Determined Learning
Lisa Marie Blaschke ,
International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, February 1, 2012.
One thing I've learned over the years in education and social science generally: for anything you can think of, someone has created a 'theory' of that thing. Thus we have heutagogy, which is "a form of self-determined learning with practices and principles rooted in... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 1, 2:18pm
Online Social Networks as Formal Learning Environments: Learner Experiences and Activities
George Veletsianos and Cesar C. Navarrete,
International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, February 1, 2012.
This article presents "a case study of learners’ perspectives and experiences in an online course taught using the Elgg online social network." We haven't heard a lot about Elgg recently but it remains an important model for online learning. One weakness of the... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 1, 2:02pm
Connectivism and Dimensions of Individual Experience
Carmen Tschofen and Jenny Mackness,
International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, February 1, 2012.
The authors explore "the dimensions of individual experience in connective environments and to further explore the meaning of autonomy, connectedness, diversity, and openness." According to the authors, the "definitions of all four principles can be expanded to recognize individual and psychological diversity within connective environments." I can understand the authors' concern: "It is easy to see that attention to the perspective of the individual may perhaps be viewed as ultimately moot within the cumulative mass of... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 1, 1:37pm
Three Passions of Bertrand Russell (and a Collection of Free Texts)
Mike Springer,
Open Cultutre, February 1, 2012.
Bertrand Russel was, I think, among other things a fundamentally good man. "Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life," wrote Bertrand Russell in the prologue to his autobiography: "the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind."
[ Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 1, 1:35pm
Big Data's Arrival
Paul Fain ,
Inside Higher Ed, February 1, 2012.
According to this report, "Researchers have created a database that measures 33 variables for the online coursework of 640,000 students – a whopping 3 million course-level records." Actually, 3 million records isn't a lot - wait until we start dealing with 3 billion records, or 3 trillion records. These are already the case in other fields (such as medicine) and are just around the corner in e-learning. But more - this case describes records created by students in a single system, which is really inadequate for the purpose of research or analytics. What you want is to be able to collect records from everywhere, and amalgamate them. Ah - but who will be... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Feb 1, 5:24am
The place of ‘the teacher’ in relation to open content
Jenny Mackness,
Jenny Connected, January 31, 2012.
We've had a cancellation and as a result are collectively catching our breath in #Change11, which is probably a good thing (it allows me to pause and catch my breath in CCK12, which also got off to a vigorous start). And Jenny Mackness gets at the central question we are trying to answer with MOOCs: "Sir John Daniel as long ago as 1996 warned that traditional universities cannot create enough supply. So the question that was raised is, how do we scale up teaching without simply throwing content at people." After more than three years working with MOOCs, I still think it's a good question. And I'm thinking about how we can improve the existing model to... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 31, 1:58pm
Apple, iBooks Author, and Open Textbooks: RIP K-12 Publishers as We Know Them
David Wiley,
iterating toward openness, January 31, 2012.
David Wiley weighs in on the Apple iBooks announcement from the perspective of someone who has already dipped a toe (and both feet, and most of his body) into the world of online and open publishing. He describes the collapse of an entire industry in just a few paragraphs (which are so delicious they are worth reprinting in full):
"It’s fairly clear from the Jobs biography and the publishers’ behavior that the original plan was: (1) Apple would hire some rockstar PhDs who would write textbooks (2) Apple would own the textbooks, and (3) Apple would give away the books for free in order to sell more iPads.
"This... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 31, 1:55pm
Serendipity
How does a photo of a fruit fly breeding chamber lead to the discovery of one's own lineage back to 14th century France? That's not a question I'd ever have thought to ask, but this evening I found an answer after following the most fascinating click trail in, well, ever. Read more...
mezzoblue, Jan 31, 12:40pm
Open Textbook Challenge Wave I Winners Announced!!
Unattributed,
Saylor Journals, January 31, 2012.
Summarizing this press release the Saylor Foundation is announcing the release of three open access textbooks: Computer Networking: Principles, Protocols and Practice, by Olivier Bonaventure,... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 31, 12:15pm
Testing is dead - RIP
Maggie Hos-McGrane ,
Tech Transformation, January 30, 2012.
We're in a bit of a conundrum in online learning, I think. I certainly get the arguments for the assertion that "testing is dead," as asserted in this post. "Traditional testing can no longer assess the new skills we want our students to develop." And yet the means by which Norvig and Thrun were able to work with so many students at once was - yes - online testing. So testing is not dead. Of course from such dilemmas come the next great innovations (which is why so many people are looking so hard at learning analytics).
[Link] [ Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 1:49pm
Crowdsource My Basement Design
Karl Fisch,
The Fischbowl, January 30, 2012.
The idea of crowdsourcing your basement design is so delicious I can't pass it by. Karl Fisch posts a number of photos of his existing space and links to a homestyler plan and encourages readers to collectively redesign it. When looking at the photos I wanted to focus on the ceiling and wall paint (or panels) but there doesn't seem to be an option for that. You really need to brighten a space like a basement because there are so few windows.
[Link] [ Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 1:44pm
Making universities obsolete
Matt Welsh,
Volatile and Decentralized, January 30, 2012.
There's a lengthy comment thread following this post from Matt Welsh describing three ways today's universities are failing:
- Exclusivity - "I estimate that I taught fewer than 500 students in total during my eight years on the faculty at Harvard. That's a pretty poor track record by any stretch."
- Grades - "the idea is that if you can't get through a course in the 12-to-13 week semester then you deserve to fail, regardless of whatever is going on in your life."
- Lectures - "it was to boost my ego and get some gratification for working so hard on the lectures."
The upshot is that online learning is challenging... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 1:36pm
How Apple Can Solve Its China Problem
Mike Elgan,
Cult of Mac, January 30, 2012.
Apple is on the verge of a public relations nightmare, and from all accounts, possibly deservedly so. This article looks at what Apple can to do improve its image (and by happy coincidence, conditions for workers in its Chinese factories). But I would like to make a more general point: If goods and capital can move freely from country to country, and people cannot, then people are and always will be slaves to goods and capital. We as a global society will not solve our Apple problem until people are free to live and work where they choose.
[Link] [ Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 1:28pm
What Happens When You Leave Students Alone?
Susan Engel,
Edudemic, January 30, 2012.
I have made the case on numerous occasions that independent learning fails only because we have given our students no freedom to learn independently. Today a couple of posts come along reinforcing that argument, this one from Edudemic (summarizing a Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 1:16pm
Getting Started with Drupal…01.27.12
RachelVacekandNinaMcHale,
The Proverbial Lone Wolf Librarian's Weblog, January 30, 2012.
In one of my personal projects I using Drupal to set up a community web site. The learning curve is steep as it always has been but Drupal has a lot of advantages for community projects intended to support multiple users. This link is to a longish slide show introducing Drupal to web designers. Even if you're not building websites it's useful to take a look just to familiarize yourself with the concepts and vocabulary.
[Link] [ Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 1:07pm
A Day in the life of an “OER Librarian”
Scott Leslie,
EdTechPost, January 30, 2012.
Scott Leslie describes his experience as an 'OER librarian' searching for open-access textbooks that can be used to replace the more proprietary versions currently in use. Among his discoveries: the generic Google search is nearly useless for a task like this, there's no one-stop OER reference point but a few collections are... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 12:53pm
PaintbrushJS
It occurs to me that I should finally mention here a project I've been working on over the past month or so. Much to my surprise, what started out as a simple foray into the canvas element's pixel manipulation APIs quickly evolved into a full-fledged Javascript library called PaintbrushJS. Read more...
mezzoblue, Jan 30, 12:40pm
Publishing News: Ereader ownership doubles, again
Jenn Webb,
O'Reilly Radar, January 30, 2012.
E-reader ownership doubled in a month. Yes, a month - from 10 percent of adults in December to almost twice that in January.
[Link] [Comment] Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 12:32pm
The Squeezed Middle: Exploring the Future of Library Systems
Ben Showers,
JISC, January 30, 2012.
Really interesting summary of a recent two-day conference on libraries in the information age. The conference produced a list of library systems objectives, and in addition, writes Ben Showers, several themes emerged: dealing with data rather than systems; the impact of outsourcing on skills and roles; shared infrastructure; and personalization. "An example of one of the presentations can be found on Paul Walk’s blog. The other three were by Ken Chad;... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 11:25am
How Online Learning Companies Bought America's Schools
Lee Fang,
The Nation, January 30, 2012.
The problem wasn't that online enterprises bought "America's schools". The problem was that they were for sale to begin with.
[Link] [Comment] Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 30, 9:19am
a day in the life of @dlnorman
I tried an experiment, where I took a photo every hour on the hour (or as close to it as I could manage/remember) to see what documenting a full day might look like. It was surprisingly fun to do. Might make an interesting @ds106 daily create project… Read more...
D'Arcy Norman dot net, Jan 28, 12:52pm
Calculate and Learn about Percentages with Percentage Calculator
Wesley Fryer,
Moving at the Speed of Creativity, January 27, 2012.
Honestly, you shouldn't need a calculator to be able to figure out percentages. It's easy. I'll show you how, where a small number (say 13365) is a percentage of a big number (say 456312):
- Divide your big number by 100. Eg. if it's 456312 you now have 4563.
- How many times does that go into your small number? Eg., how many times does 4563 go into 13365?
- If that's too difficult, divide each number by 10 and round off until it becomes simple. How many times does 456 go into 1336? Still too hard? How many times does 46 go into 137? Still too hard? How many times does 5 go into 14? Just under 2.5.
-... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 27, 2:00pm
A WordPress Widget Perfect For Building Your PLN
Jeff Dunn,
Edudemic, January 27, 2012.
I'm not really a WordPress user but if I were I'd probably be looking at "a widget that displays a curated list of your favorite education blogs and websites." It's created by Dell Marketing. Hm. Maybe I wouldn't be so interested. "The widget has a special crawler that goes to a pre-set list of education blogs that are selected based on content quality.... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 27, 1:46pm
UStream Broadcasts from EduCon 2.4
Chad Sansing,
Cooperative Catalyst, January 27, 2012.
This looks like a fun time for people over the weekend: "This weekend several Coöp folks and National Writing Project (NWP) friends will meet-up and facilitate conversations at EduCon 2.4 which is a conference that aims to host conversations about technology in service of learning, learning spaces, and learners (I think)." Christina Cantrill, Paul Oh, Kirsten Olson and Chad Sansing are hosting a conversation called Permission to Speak on... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 27, 1:38pm
iPads For All: One Sales Team's Story
Chris Murphy,
Information Week, January 27, 2012.
I have a sense this is moving a lot more rapidly than people realize. For example, "Level 3 Communications just gave iPads to its 1,300 North American salespeople and sales engineers.... Level 3's sense of urgency is a reminder of just how fast tablets are moving into mobile workers' lives. 2011 was the year of pilot tests. 2012 is the year companies will roll out iPads by the thousands to entire sales and service teams, packing them with purpose-built business applications, not just generic email, browsers, and off-the-shelf productivity apps." It's what we always expected of mobile computing - I remember talking up a project to do this sort of thing for... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 27, 1:33pm
It Looks Like College Students are the Majority of Google+ Users
Kyle James,
.eduGuru, January 27, 2012.
Something called PlusDemographics is asserting that Google_ users are mostly young, mostly male and mostly students. Kyle James observes, "The one piece of data that this report doesn’t share is user engagement with the service. Facebook claims more than 800 million “active” users with more than 50% of these active users logging in on any given day. Google+ has 90 million user... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 27, 1:27pm
Announcement: Anonymous Commenting Fixed
I have finally tracked down and fixed a very annoying bug that was preventing people from being able to comment on posts anonymously. So now you will no longer need to be logged on in order to post comments. Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 27, 12:20am
Connectivism and Connective Knowledge 2012
Stephen Downes and George Siemens,
CCK12, January 26, 2012.
For those of you who never had the opportunity, or those of you who want to relive the dream, George Siemens and I are offering yet another iteration - our fourth! - of Connectivism and Connective Knowledge. This has been the smoothest launch of the gRSShoper technology yet (and it has been equally smooth for our sister course, Learning Analytics). Our first live online session is tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern - more information here and if you want you can sign up here. So we're... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 26, 1:47pm
Video of an XO-1.75 Directly Running Off a 10W Solar Panel
Christoph Derndorfer,
OLPC News, January 26, 2012.
As the title suggests, this is a video showing an OLPC computer running directly off a solar panel. They suggest it might be the first computer able to run directly off a solar panel. The process is demonstrated with a 10 watt solar panel. In case you're wondering (I was) a 10 watt solar panel costs between $50 - $150. As Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 26, 1:39pm
‘Open space rewards consensus and punishes dissent’
jenny Mackness,
Jenny Connected, January 26, 2012.
Interesting commentary about open spaces and dissent, following from some of Dave Snowden's comments in #Change11. As an aside - I don't get where this view that I have some kind of authority comes from. I have no authority. My academic credentials are from another field, and are inadequate anyways. I supervise zero people. I don't issue grades, pass or fail people, or impact their career prospects in any way. In theory I could maybe block some people from using one of my websites, but in practice I don't, and a determined person could probably get around any sanctions I would apply. The only authority whatsoever that I have comes from the weight of my... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 26, 1:27pm
Use Appointment Slots on a Google Calendar
Wesley Fryer,
Moving at the Speed of Creativity, January 26, 2012.
There's a whole world in calendar technology that lies just outside my grasp. It's a world where when you set repeat events your .iCal reader knows to schedule them at the right time on the right day. Or it's a world where in Google Calendar you can set up appointment slots that other people using other calendars... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 26, 1:11pm
Charts: Education Publishing Much Bigger Than You Think
Alexander Russo,
This Week in Education, January 26, 2012.
Alexander Russo puts things into perspective: "Still trying to digest Apple's recently-announced foray into the textbook market? The education textbook business is big, notes Wired -- much bigger... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 26, 12:59pm
Photography for Elearning Developers - Why shooting in RAW makes sense
Sumeet Moghe,
The Learning Generalist, January 26, 2012.
OK, I admit it. When I shoot digital photographs, I shoot in JPG. Not RAW, I don't even know what RAW is, nor what to do with it. All I know is the files are really big, and I have to do stuff with them. But now, maybe, after reading this article, all that will change. "The problem is that the JPEG file is just a snapshot of a moment in time - nothing... Read more...
Stephen's Web ~ OLDaily, Jan 26, 12:57pm