Archive for January, 2011
Levels of Classroom Use of Second Life
Jan 26th
Speaking with a faculty member who recently (past 6 months) entered Second Life and has been exploring potential uses within his Chemistry classroom, I described four levels of classroom use of Second Life to help organize an approach to incrementally implementing the technology in the classroom: presentation tool, guided experience, self-directed experience, and student generated content. I’m relatively certain others have previously described and likely posted something similar; if you’re aware of those, I’d be interested in your thoughts and other similar posts. More >
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Facebook Meme as Online Class’ Personal Introduction Assignment?
Jan 23rd
Teaching an online class, I’m always looking for ways for students to introduce themselves in a method other than a discussion board post. They typically don’t write anything spectacular, and after all is said and done, it is text. I have seen folks use ToonDoo.com, Animoto.com and other online tools to have students create media that introduces themselves in some way to their classmates. Tonight, I encountered a Facebook Meme that AJ (@sorry_afk) posted. It was interesting enough that I decided to follow along; I don’t do that very often. As I was finishing it, I thought this might be an interesting activity for students to do as a first activity in an online class. For it to work though, some intentionality would have to be inserted. My result, at least the image, for the meme is to the left, and the modified list of instructions for a first assignment are below. The original that AJ posted to FB is at the bottom. More >
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VWER: Future of Education in Virtual Worlds?
Jan 8th
(cross posted from http://blogs.sanjac.edu/virtualworlds)
I attended the Virtual Worlds in Education Roundtable (VWER) Annual “First Meeting of the Year” for 2011 this past Thursday. I believe this is the third year the VWER’s new year has begun with a panel discussion. The stated focus of the discussion was on the Probable, Possible and Preferable Futures of education in virtual worlds. Of course, the majority of the discussion focused on the first two. The discussion was moderated by (using Second Life monikers) AJ Brooks and included Buddy Sprocket, Fleep Tuque, Anthony Fontana, Wainbrave Bernal, and Kenny Hubble. So what’d the panel have to say? (with my thoughts mixed in throughout.) More >
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...@Rockmelt Browser, a first impression
Jan 6th
Rockmelt, according to their site, is “re-imagining your online experience by creating a new web browser that makes it easy to stay in touch with friends, search online, and get updates from your favorite websites.” My explanation? It’s a Google Chrome-based browser that’s been modified to integrate social networks as a “native” part of the browsing experience. You can read and watch more about the browser from the folks at Rockmelt (video embedded below). I want to offer a few first impressions from an educational perspective after tinkering with it for a little while. If you decide you’re interested, let me know; I have a few invites available. More >
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I *wish* Google Chrome had . . .
Jan 5th
Integrated Web Search. The one feature I wish Google Chrome – or an extension for it – offered is Integrated Web Search. Or at least, that’s the term Firefox uses for the feature. At this point, I have not found an extension that provides the same feature; if you happen to know of one, please let me know. Why is it all that important or useful, you ask? More >
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