In August 2008 after eight years of intensive use of AIM, she wrote the following:

The 21st Century Pedagogy Alternatives and Tricks/Tools of the Trade
For the condensed summary page go to http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateel.htm 

Bob Jensen at Trinity University

How can you best publish books, including multimedia and user interactive books, on the Web?
Note that interactive books may have quizzes and examinations where answers are sent back for grading.

History and Future of Course Authoring and Distribution Technologies
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm
(This includes modules on Blackboard, Moodle, and various competitors)

Organizing your papers and citations from the Web
Sharing and remotely accessing your bookmarks

Google, Yahoo, Wikipedia, and YouTube as Knowledge Bases  ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/searchh.htm#KnowledgeBases

Ideas for Teaching Online --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Ideas

Social Networking for Education:  The Beautiful and the Ugly
(including Google's Wave and Orcut for Social Networking and some education uses of Twitter)
Updates will be at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListservRoles.htm

New and Old Tools

Video Capture, Editing, Compression, Playback
(With Links to UserView for Viewing and Capturing Remotely Located Computer Screens and Audio)

Virtual World Research

Open Sharing and Adaptive Hypermedia

Using MindMaps To Teach, Learn, & Much More (video), Simoleon Sense, March 27, 2009 --- http://www.simoleonsense.com/

History of Spreadsheets in Education

Bye Bye Blackboard

Variable Speed Video and the BYU Noteworthy Success

The Future of Textbooks  

Devices and Systems for Mobile Learning

Distance Education Magazines and Journals  http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/crossborder.htm#Resources 

Resources for Faculty --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/newfaculty.htm 

The Latest Experiments in Student Recruitment by Colleges

PowerPoint and Other Teaching Helpers (Socratic Dialogue Gives Way to PowerPoint)

How to Add Audio to PowerPoint Presentations

Finding, Capturing, Storing and Sending Open Courseware
(Including MIT's search engine for searching for topics within a video lecture and alternatives for making and capturing streaming media)

Future Lab (in the U.K.):
Developing innovative learning resources and practices that support new approaches to education for the 21st century.

Just-In-Time Teaching

Instant Messaging

College Credit Over the Phone

Classroom, Building, and Campus Design (including LCD versus DLP) 

In a Nutshell:  Authoring Design and Software for the Web --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetoolsa.htm 

Innovative Cell Phone Technology

Response Pads and Clickers 

Tablet Computing 

Myths About Education Technologies

Ideas for Modifying Traditional Classroom Materials Into Online Learning Materials
(Including Updates on MIT's Open Knowledge Initiative called OKI)

Edutainment and Learning Games (including Dominos and Jeopardy and Monopoly)

Using the Monopoly Board Game for Education Edutainment

Second Life and Other Virtual Worlds

Virtual Reality 

Humor in Online Teaching

Example From a Texas A&M Professor Providing Distance Education in Mexico

Ideas for Teaching Online (including Distance Education via Centra Symposium and Webex)

Tools for Learning in the Boondocks

Technology Aids for the Handicapped, Disabled, and Learning Challenged

How To and How Not To Deliver Distance Education 
War stories from teachers in the first accredited online MBA program.

Cognitive Processes and Artificial Intelligence

Real Aud Audit Simulation

Interactive Network Simulation Learning Example

Advantages and Disadvantages of Education Technologies

Chris Dede's Vignettes

An Example of a Low Budget and Very Remarkable Online Course

Knowledge Portals and Vortals
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/portals.htm 

Web Page Design:  Ah, What Rotten Webs We Weave 

Resources --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/newfaculty.htm#Resources 

Classroom Use of Laptops and iPods 

Wikis Made Simple -- Very Simple

The Magic of DVR Recording 

RU THR? OMW ---The University of Florida Experiment With Text Messaging

Statistical Survey Sampling and Analysis

Education Tutorials

Free Images from the U.S. Government --- http://rastervector.com/resources/free/free.html

Free Federal Resources in Various Disciplines --- http://www.free.ed.gov/

Bob Jensen's threads on general education tutorials are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#EducationResearch

The Master List of Free Online College Courses --- http://universitiesandcolleges.org/

Free Online Textbooks, Videos, and Tutorials --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Textbooks
Free Tutorials in Various Disciplines --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#Tutorials
Edutainment and Learning Games --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Edutainment
Open Sharing Courses --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI
The Master List of Free Online College Courses --- http://universitiesandcolleges.org/

Bob Jensen's threads for online worldwide education and training alternatives ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Crossborder.htm

"U. of Manitoba Researchers Publish Open-Source Handbook on Educational Technology," by Steve Kolowich, Chronicle of Higher Education, March 19, 2009 --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3671&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Bob Jensen's threads for online worldwide education and training alternatives ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Crossborder.htm

"U. of Manitoba Researchers Publish Open-Source Handbook on Educational Technology," by Steve Kolowich, Chronicle of Higher Education, March 19, 2009 --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3671&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Technology is changing the way students learn. Is it changing the way colleges teach?

Not enough, says George Siemens, associate director of research and development at the University of Manitoba’s Learning Technologies Centre.

While colleges and universities have been “fairly aggressive” in adapting their curricula to the changing world, Mr. Siemens told The Chronicle, “What we haven’t done very well in the last few decades is altering our pedagogy.”

To help get colleges thinking about how they might adapt their teaching styles to the new ways students absorb and process information, Mr. Siemens and Peter Tittenberger, director of the center, have created a Web-based guide, called the Handbook of Emerging Technologies for Learning.

Taking their own advice, they have outfitted the handbook with a wiki function that will allow readers to contribute their own additions.

In the its introduction, the handbook declares the old pedagogical model—where the students draw their information primarily from textbooks, newspapers, and their professors—dead. “Our learning and information acquisition is a mash-up,” the authors write. “We take pieces, add pieces, dialogue, reframe, rethink, connect, and ultimately, we end up with some type of pattern that symbolizes what’s happening ‘out there’ and what it means to us.” Students are forced to develop new ways of making sense of this flood of information fragments.

But Mr. Siemens said that colleges had been slow to appreciate this fact. “I don’t see a lot of research coming out on what universities might look like in the future,” he said. “If how we interact with information and with each other fundamentally changes, it would suggest that the institution also needs to change.”

Handbook of Emerging Technologies for Learning ---
http://ltc.umanitoba.ca/wikis/etl/index.php/Handbook_of_Emerging_Technologies_for_Learning

Preface

This Handbook of Emerging Technologies for Learning (HETL) has been designed as a resource for educators planning to incorporate technologies in their teaching and learning activities.

Introduction

How is education to fulfill its societal role of clarifying confusion when tools of control over information creation and dissemination rest in the hands of learners[3], contributing to the growing complexity and confusion of information abundance?

Change Pressures and Trends

Global, political, social, technological, and educational change pressures are disrupting the traditional role (and possibly design) of universities. Higher education faces a "re-balancing" in response to growing points of tension along the following fault lines...

What we know about learning

Over the last century, educator’s understanding of the process and act of learning has advanced considerably.

Technology, Teaching, and Learning

Technology is concerned with "designing aids and tools to perfect the mind". As a means of extending the sometimes limited reach of humanity, technology has been prominent in communication and learning. Technology has also played a role in classrooms through the use of movies, recorded video lectures, and overhead projectors. Emerging technology use is growing in communication and in creating, sharing, and interacting around content.

Media and technology

A transition from epistemology (knowledge) to ontology (being) suggests media and technology need to be employed to serve in the development of learners capable of participating in complex environments.

Change cycles and future patterns

It is not uncommon for theorists and thinkers to declare some variation of the theme "change is the only constant". Surprisingly, in an era where change is prominent, change itself has not been developed as a field of study. Why do systems change? Why do entire societies move from one governing philosophy to another? How does change occur within universities?

New Learners? New Educators? New Skills?

New literacies (based on abundance of information and the significant changes brought about technology) are needed. Rather than conceiving literacy as a singular concept, a multi-literacy view is warranted.

Tools

Each tool possesses multiple affordances. Blogs, for example, can be used for personal reflection and interaction. Wikis are well suited for collaborative work and brainstorming. Social networks tools are effective for the formation of learning and social networks. Matching affordances of a particular tool with learning activities is an important design and teaching activity

Research

Evaluating the effectiveness of technology use in teaching and learning brings to mind Albert Einstein’s statement: "Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted". When we begin to consider the impact and effectiveness of technology in the teaching and learning process, obvious questions arise: "How do we measure effectiveness? Is it time spent in a classroom? Is it a function of test scores? Is it about learning? Or understanding?"

Conclusion

Through a process of active experimentation, the academy’s role in society will emerge as a prominent sensemaking and knowledge expansion institution, reflecting of the needs of learners and society while maintaining its role as a transformative agent in pursuit of humanity’s highest ideals.

 

Bob Jensen's threads on education technology --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm

Ideas for Teaching Online --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Ideas
Also see the helpers for teaching in general at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

Finance Test Questions --- http://financetestquestions.wikispaces.com/

In a previous edition of Tidbits, I provided a summary of resources for learning how and being inspired to teach online --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Ideas 

I forgot to (and have since added) helpers for assessment (e.g. testing) online --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/assess.htm#OnlineOffCampus
Also see the helpers for assessment in general at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/assess.htm

Also I forgot to add some special considerations for detection and prevention of online cheating ---
Also see helpers for detection and prevention of cheating in general at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/plagiarism.htm

The Bea Sanders/AICPA Innovation in Teaching Award  --- Click Here  http://ceae.aicpa.org/Resources/Scholarships+and+Awards/The+Bea+Sanders+AICPA+Innovation+in+Teaching+Award.htm

Computer Grading of Essay Questions --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/assess.htm#Essays

Remote (online) Testing of Students --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/assess.htm#OnlineOffCampus

Accounting Education Software --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob1.htm#software

Software for administering online examinations and quizzes ---

Onsite Versus Online Education (including controls for online examinations and assignments) ---  http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/assess.htm#OnsiteVersusOnline

Some universities, especially those with distance education programs, have online examination software. This varies greatly in cost and quality. You can read more about such software at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/assess.htm#Examinations

How students can find internships
Helpers for managing student interns
Intern Toolkit --- http://www.interntoolkit.com/

Drama Simulations --- http://www.cob.tamucc.edu/ATABestPrac2K/drama-simulations.htm
(Including the use of Lego constructions in cost accounting classes.)

Bob Jensen's threads on classrooms and electronic classrooms are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm#Classrooms 

Bob Jensen's Education Technology Threads are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm 

A tools PowerPoint file is included at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/EdTech/PowerPoint/

The American Accounting Association has a page on tools and cases --- http://aaahq.org/facdev/teaching/teaching_tools.htm

Also see the AAA’s wider set of helpers on teaching at http://aaahq.org/facdev/teach.cfm

Introductory Quotation

The movie Dead Poets Society showed examples of why students recalled so much of their learning. There were changes in location, circumstances, use of emotions, movement, and novel classroom positions. We know that learners remember much more when the learning is connected to a field trip, music, a disaster, a guest speaker, or a novel learning location. Follow up with a discussion, journal writing, a project, or peer teaching.

E. Jensen (1998, p. 110)
Teaching with the brain in mind

From U.K.'s Institute for Learning and Research Technology at the University of Bristol
Social Science Information Gateway http://sosig.esrc.bris.ac.uk/

Browse by Subject	Map of the SOSIG sections
Anthropology Business and Management Economics Education Environmental Science European Studies Geography Government Policy   Law Philosophy Politics Psychology Research Tools and Methods Social Welfare Sociology Statistics Women's Studies

Question
How can you best publish books, including multimedia and user interactive books, on the Web?
Note that interactive books may have quizzes and examinations where answers are sent back for grading.

Answer
There is no optimal software for all authors, because different alternatives have different features that will appeal to authors in varying degrees. Below are a few of the leading alternatives.

You can read more about the terminology and history of both course authoring software and course (learning) management software at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

You can read more about authoring and teaching tools and tricks of the trade at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

Author it in MS Word and save as an HTML file

Advantages

• The main advantage is that most authors are familiar with how to write in MS Word.
• This is the easiest Web alternative for authors who've already written their books in MS Word. All an author has to do is simply click on "File save as" and choose the HTM option in place of the usual DOC option. Updates of older HTM files created in MS Word are done in Word and the revised document can then be easily saved as an updated HTML file.
• Saving a DOC file to an HTML file enables the book to be viewed in all Web browsers such as Internet Explorer, Foxfox, Opera, and Safari.
• Saving to an HTML file eliminates some MS Word features such as macros, but authors rarely write books with macros for readers.
• MS Word is probably the best alternative for importing other MS Office content such as Excel and PowerPoint content.
• HTML files work well in conjunction with extensive coding like XML and XBRL --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/XMLRDF.htm
  For example company filings with the SEC can now be viewed in interactive XBRL linked from HTML documents. It becomes rather simple send HTML book readers off to SEC interactive filings on HTML book pages.

Disadvantages

• Saving as an HTML file loses some of the author's desired security alternatives that are optional for DOC files
• Some of the features of imported content from Excel and PowerPoint may be lost when pasted into the DOC/HTML file in MS Word.
• MS Word is not the best authoring alternative for multimedia and interactive content.
• MS Word does not have a lot of the authoring wizards that are pre-programmed into other alternatives. For example, Toolbook has various wizards that make writing of examinations and answers to examinations much easier than writing them in MS Word.
• MS Word does not have built-in features for writing learning simulations and scenarios.
  
   

Author it in MS Word and save as a PDF (Adobe Acrobat) file

Advantages

• This has all the ease of authoring in MS Word.
• PDF reader files are free and it's easy to update these readers from Adobe.
• Adobe Acrobat has the best security alternatives for protection of copyrighted material of all the Web publishing alternatives which is the main reason the major publishing firms choose PDF files when they want to make books available on the Web. For example, it's possible to make it impossible to easily select text for cut and paste from a clipboard.

You can see how this format is used in the many free electronic textbooks now available in most academic disciplines --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Textbooks

Disadvantages

• Some of the features of imported content from Excel and PowerPoint may be lost when pasted into the PDF file in Adobe Acrobat.
• MS Word is not the best authoring alternative for multimedia and interactive content. This content cannot be added in Acrobat since Acrobat itself is not authoring software.
• MS Word does not have a lot of the authoring wizards that are pre-programmed into other alternatives. For example, Toolbook has various wizards that make writing of examinations and answers to examinations much easier than writing them in MS Word.
• MS Word does not have built-in features for writing learning simulations and scenarios.

Author it directly into HTML files using such authoring software as FrontPage or Dreamweaver

Advantages

• HTML authoring software has some features that are not be available when saving DOC files as HTML files.
• FrontPage is more than authoring software. It can be used as a complete Website system.
• Some authors, not me, find Dreamweaver easier to use as an authoring tool without some of what I call FrontPage bugs and complexities.

Disadvantages

• Authoring directly in HTML loses some of the author's desired security alternatives that are optional for DOC and PDF files
• Some of the features of imported content from Excel and PowerPoint may be lost when pasted into the HTML file..
• MS Word is not the best authoring alternative for multimedia and interactive content.
• HTML authoring software does not have a lot of the authoring wizards that are pre-programmed into other alternatives. For example, Toolbook has various wizards that make writing of examinations and answers to examinations much easier than writing them in MS Word.
• HTML authoring is not an efficient alternative for pasting in multimedia.
• MS Word does not have built-in features for writing learning simulations and scenarios.

Author it in Toolbook that automatically saves files in HTML/DHTML files

Advantages

• Although I've not yet tried the latest version of Toolbook Instructor, authors who use this software contend it is much easier to use than HTML software such as FrontPage and Dreamweaver. One of the main advantages is that shells for writing book chapters are already pre-programmed. Watch the video at http://www.toolbook.com/demos/toolBook_demo/index.html
• It is much much easier to author multimedia and interaction (such as examinations) in Toolbook than in HTML software such as FrontPage and Dreamweaver. Watch the video at http://www.toolbook.com/demos/toolBook_demo/index.html
  You can author interactive books in either Toolbook Instructor or ToolBook Assistant.
• Toolbook makes it quite easy to author animations using built-in wizards.
• Whereas early versions of Toolbook required Toolbook Reader software, Toolbook now saves the files in HTML or DHTML files that can be read in major Web browsers such as Internet Explorer.
• ToolBook also has a foreign language translation system that automatically translates books into other languages --- http://www.toolbook.com/learn_translation_system.php

Disadvantages

• Toolbook authoring software is not commonly provided free by colleges as part of the installed software that computer centers pre-install in all college-owned computers using campus wide license agreements. The single-user license is currently $2,795 for Toolbook Instructor Version 9.01 as of March 2008. There are group-license discounts.
• Although I've not yet gone back to ToolBook, I was an early Toolbook enthusiast in the 1990s. One of my constant complaints in those days was the tendency of the company to send out software before its time and let customers find the many bugs in the system. The company's technical support often had not yet discovered the problems or their solutions. Toolbook today has only a miniscule part of the Web authoring market. Being small means that it will take longer to discover and correct bugs vis-a-vis big market share alternatives like MS Word and Adobe Acrobat. In fairness, however, it is now easier for Toolbook to pre-test its software than it was back in the days of its bug-saturated OpenScript scripting code. I'm just about convinced to give Toolbook another chance for my Web authoring. I've delayed this long because of memories of the days and weeks I sometimes wasted using bugged-up OpenScript software.
• If the book contains animation and interactive features requiring DHTML above and beyond simple HTML, this may restrict readers to read books in a smaller subset of Web browsers that are DHTML compliant. Fortunately Internet Explorer is DHTML compliant. But if DHTML declines in popularity among authors worldwide, newer browsers may eliminate these rather expensive code blocks from browsers. Fortunately there's no immediate threat of this happening.
• DHTML itself is a very inefficient coding/markup scripting alternative. More than a hundred lines of code may have to be written for a very simple task. This highly restricts authoring creativity of animations and interactions. Authors in Toolbook are for all practical purposes limited to the pre-scripted templates provided in Toolbook.
• Most colleges and business firms have firewalls that prevent two-way communication via DHTML such as when a student fills out the answers to an examination and then clicks on a "Send" button to transmit the an answer or set of answers to graders on campus. Some universities allow their Blackboard servers to receive answer files.

A cheap alternative for penetrating a firewall is to attach an answer file to an email message that penetrates campus firewalls. This can even be done via instant messaging with live graders responding to each answer in real time. But there are huge security risks to opening email attachments. Students can innocently or knowingly attach bad things to attached messages that will destroy your computer. Graders can reduce the risk by telling students that they will only open attached TXT files such as those generated in Wordpad.

Another alternative is to run your own server that will allow student returned answer files to penetrate the firewall (firewalls can be adjusted for degrees of security). If done right this is enormously expensive. First you must hire technicians to maintain the system. Second you much install back up systems such as RAID.

Another alternative is to hire a commercial online testing service our course management service, including Blackboard, that allows student returned answer files to penetrate its firewalls. Such services off campus, including Blackboard, will even serve up your entire book, although it is possible to have them only serve up the examinations and receive returned student answer files. Some testing services have course management systems and will serve up and manage entire courses and tutorials.
Examples such as eCollege are reviewed at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm 

Other examples of testing services are provided at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standardized_test

At this point you may want to read about SCORM standards --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCORM

March 23, 2008 message from Richard Campbell [campbell@rio.edu]

Bob:
In respect to sending exam scores and exam answers as email attachments - it really isn't effective in just about any content authoring tool that offers it - Camtasia, Toolbook or Captivate because of security issues. Before the email goes out it goes to the email client and the student can edit the exam score if they wished. Because of security issues the "owner" of the system should be the only one to control outgoing messages.
 

Author it as an interactive video (probably a flash video) file.

Advantages

• Youth of today prefer video and animated games to reading an many, many instances. Even us venerable readers often prefer short video tutorials of complicated tasks rather than having to read the manual. For example, I much prefer to watch a video on how to install and operate hardware/software than having to read the confusing manual. Demonstrating is often a better pedagogy than reading.
• The video alternative is better for certain types of handicapped users such as attention deficit readers, partly blind readers, and users who like an easy choice of subtitles for use in alternative languages such as English subtitles to Japanese learning videos.
• Adobe Flash interactive videos can be created from the relatively inexpensive Camtasia Producer software suite that offers various video compression choices including Adobe Flash. Another alternative is Adobe's Captivate3.  Interactive Flash videos allow users to navigate nonlinearly through video modules. For example, it is easy to repeat short segments on the fly or drill down into details when a user chooses to drill down further or skip details when desired. I find interactive video authoring to be somewhat complicated for authors but neat for readers.
• It is possible to author books that are viewed by users as streaming video rather than files that have to be downloaded into a user's computer. This has the advantage of not requiring large amounts of storage capacity on a users computer. This also makes it much more difficult for users to save and modify the video files. It is possible to capture and save streaming video, but its somewhat technical and there probably will be a downgrading of quality for inexpensive capturing alternatives --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

Disadvantages

• Even interactive video cannot be navigated as efficiently as text and large tables. A reader of text may speed read and scan paragraphs and tables at will rather than have to live with the navigation alternatives that authors pre-programmed into the video.
• Video files, even highly compressed video files, are enormously costly in terms of massive file size. They can be put on DVD disks or auxiliary storage such as thumb drives. But downloading on the Web may be very slow for big files. It is best to author in multiple smaller files than huge files, although this can limited interactive navigation through a video book.
• Streaming video overcomes the file storage problems, but there are drawbacks since users of streaming video must generally be on high bandwidth Internet connections. Also streaming videos must be served up from streaming video broadcasters. Most colleges do not broadcast streaming video, but there are commercial broadcasters available to authors. For example see the broadcast service available from Camtasia ScreenCast --- http://www.techsmith.com/screencast.asp 
• Video files are not optimal for simulation and game authoring, although they may be quite useful as modules within simulations and games.

May 1, 2008 message from Richard Campbell [campbell@RIO.EDU]

This is a demo on how to use Respondus to create interactive exams using Excel. This movie was created with Jing – a FREE utility of Techsmitth.

http://www.screencast.com/t/ijBIqVtjSl4 

Richard J. Campbell
School of Business
218 N. College Ave.
University of Rio Grande
Rio Grande, OH 45674
Voice:740-245-7288
http://faculty.rio.edu/campbell

Author it in simulation/game authoring software, including Second Choice virtual learning

Advantages

• Simulation, interactive game, and virtual learning software can do things that just are not possible in other authoring software. You can read about some of the authoring alternatives at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulation_software
• Virtual learning books used to be expensive to author and sometimes required computers more powerful than cheap PCs. Second Life is an increasing possible authoring alternative that is cheap and relatively easy for authoring --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life
  Also see http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#SecondLife
• Video and computer games have huge attractions to 21st Century learners who grew up enthralled with playing such games in arcades and at home. These games are a way of reaching certain learners who are turned off by more traditional pedagogy. You can read more about learning games and edutainment at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Edutainment
  The above site also links to some relatively inexpensive software for authoring learning games.

Disadvantages

• Simulation, learning games, and virtual learning systems sometime sound better on paper than they deliver in real life. These can be quite time consuming for students relative to other alternatives for a defined set of learning content. You can read about some of the problems at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#SecondLife
• Artificial worlds are just that --- artificial. It is only possible to program in a miniscule number of factors from the myriad of contingency factors and combinations of factors in the real world.

Author it in some of the other surviving course (learning) management software described at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

Advantages

• Its one thing to author a book or a tutorial. It's quite another to manage an entire course with software systems. Course (learning) management software (CMS/LMS) software often includes software for authoring books and lesson tutorials. CMS software, for example, often integrates learning modules with e-Mail chat rooms and other student networks.
• CMS software can offers different levels of security. For example, alternatives like Blackboard and Moodle allow authors to control access to students enrolled in a course rather than making the materials available to the world on a Web server.

Disadvantages

• Authoring software embedded in CMS/LMS systems often is not a full featured as software designed for book, simulation, game, and virtual world learning.
• Blackboard increasingly has a monopoly on CMS/LMS systems and is beginning to abuse its monopoly privileges and pricing --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Blackboard.htm

Organizing your papers and citations from the Web
Sharing and remotely accessing your bookmarks

February 16, 2006 message from Vidya Ananthanarayanan to the faculty at Trinity University

Dear Faculty,

Ever wished your bookmarks in Internet Explorer or other browsers were accessible anytime anyplace? Ever wanted to share your Internet resources with your class, research colleagues, or peers? How would you like to know what information sources other people in your field are using? Perhaps, you simply want to organize all your bookmarks in a manner that is more meaningful and personal to you? How often have you been frustrated by an outdated or broken URL and wished you could have saved the article or paper itself?

Want to find out more about how you can do any or all of the above? Then mark your calendars for the Social Bookmarking: Tag & Share! TEACHnology Seminar in Library Room 103 from 10:00 - 11:15 am tomorrow. We will explore online services like del.icio.us and CiteULike, and discuss ways to leverage them in the classroom and in your research. Refreshments will be served.

Vidya Ananthanarayanan
Instructional Support Manager
Center for Learning and Technology
210.999.7346
vidya@trinity.edu 
http://www.trinity.edu/ims

Jensen Comment
The CiteULike cite is at http://www.citeulike.org/

CiteULike is a free service to help academics to share, store, and organise the academic papers they are reading. When you see a paper on the web that interests you, you can click one button and have it added to your personal library. CiteULike automatically extracts the citation details, so there's no need to type them in yourself. It all works from within your web browser. There's no need to install any special software.

Because your library is stored on the server, you can access it from any computer. You can share your library with others, and find out who is reading the same papers as you. In turn, this can help you discover literature which is relevant to your field but you may not have known about.

You're currently looking at a list of the last few papers submitted by all the CiteULike users. Why not register for a free account today and start organising your collection and see just the articles you're interested in? All we need is your email address, a username, and a password. It should take less than fifteen seconds.

The del.icio.us cite is at http://del.icio.us/

» keep your favorite websites, music, books, and more in a place where you can always find them.

» shareyour favorites with family, friends, and colleagues.

» discover new and interesting things by browsing popular & related items.

Free Public Affairs Case Teaching Materials and Sometimes Entire Course Materials from the University of Washington
The Electronic Hallway --- https://hallway.org/

The Electronic Hallway is pleased to announce a unique and progressive new product— Integrated Management: A Complete Core Curriculum — a previously untested venture in presenting an entire course package using online technology. This package represents a 30 week integrated core management curriculum.

Bob Jensen's threads on distance education and training alternatives are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/crossborder.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on free online textbooks and learning materials are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Textbooks

From the University of Virginia
Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities --- http://www.iath.virginia.edu/

IATH is a research unit of the University of Virginia. Our goal is to explore and develop information technology as a tool for scholarly humanities research. To that end, we provide our Fellows with consulting, technical support, applications development, and networked publishing facilities. We also cultivate partnerships and participate in humanities computing initiatives with libraries, publishers, information technology companies, scholarly organizations, and other groups residing at the intersection of computers and cultural heritage.

The research projects, essays, and documentation presented here are the products of a unique collaboration between humanities and computer science research faculty, computer professionals, student assistants and project managers, and library faculty and staff. In many cases, this work is supported by private or federal funding agencies. In all cases, it is supported by the Fellows’ home departments; the College or School to which those departments belong; the University of Virginia Library; the Vice President for Research and Public Service; the Vice President and Chief Information Officer; the Provost; and the President of the University of Virginia.

News Update from Campus Technology on January 11, 2005

Creating the Classroom of Tomorrow

What does it take to successfully integrate all systems across a campus? Planning, communication, flexibility, and more. In a new micro site sponsored by HP, you'll read how several campuses approached their IIS projects and what made them successful. Join a peer forum to discuss implementation and budget issues; read white papers, case studies and articles on the challenges of integration.

http://info.101com.com/default.asp?id=11787 

December 12, 2006 message from Richard Campbell [campbell@RIO.EDU]

Perhaps the most significant new "feature" in the new release is the hook that Adobe is providing to other revenue-enhancing products like Acrobat Connect, which provides web-conferencing capabilities within Reader for a competitive price to www.gotomeeting.com (which I use). Incidentally, I personally believe that such a web conferencing product is an indispensable feature of any Internet-delivered accounting course.

One intriguing new development in the new Acrobat PROFESSIONAL version ( the pdf creation tool), is the ability to create forms that can be filled out and saved by users who have the free Reader. This is a departure from prior practice for Adobe, because they were trying to sell more expensive server software to facilitate that task.

Richard

Google, Yahoo, Wikipedia, and YouTube as Knowledge Bases

This section was moved to http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/searchh.htm#KnowledgeBases

New and Old Tools

See Edutainment --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Edutainment

See the online tutorial links at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm

Educause Live --- http://www.educause.edu/content.asp?SECTION_ID=34&bhcp=1

From PBS:  Touch Table Computing Video --- http://www.pbs.org/kcet/wiredscience/video/231-touchtable.html

Social Networking for Education:  The Beautiful and the Ugly
(including Google's Wave and Orcut for Social Networking and some education uses of Twitter)
Updates will be at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListservRoles.htm

Datawatch's Monarch data mining software --- http://www.datawatch.com/_products/monarch_pro.php
"Kean and Emory Introduce Students to Data Mining," by Dian Schaffhauser, Campus Technology, April 6, 2009 ---
http://campustechnology.com/articles/2009/04/06/kean-and-emory-introduce-students-to-data-mining.aspx
Link forwarded by Ed Scribner

Two universities--Kean University in Union, NJ and Emory University in Atlanta, GA--have gone public with their use of Datawatch's Monarch data mining software to teach students how to perform business intelligence work.

Kean professor Beth Brilliant introduced Monarch to graduate students of her accounting information systems (AIS) and auditing information system classes.

"I have been using Monarch for years as a [certified public accountant] and swear by it," said Brilliant. "For example, I use Monarch to quickly find any bank discrepancies. As I work for a law firm with client trust accounts, this is extremely important, as all accounts must balance to the penny. I am able to reconcile all the accounts in minutes thanks to Monarch, picking up differences in checks from pennies to hundreds of thousands of dollars."

Brilliant added, "My department has also become more efficient with the use of Monarch, saving hours by importing data into the accounting system electronically vs. manually. Reports that I receive from vendors are saved as PDF files, which are mined using Monarch. The data is then extracted and imported into our accounting system. This not only saves time but it removes the risk of manual data input errors."

"I rely on Monarch to ensure data quality and to ensure I know exactly where company data is coming from, with no need to rely on the company's accounting and IT departments," she explained. "Monarch is an excellent resource for auditors and accountants, and well worth including Monarch within my AIS coursework."

Robert Gross teaches a graduate course on managing healthcare databases at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory. The course is part of the curriculum for the university's master of public health degree.

"Most of my students are physicians and other working healthcare providers, middle managers and public health agency leaders," said Gross. "The students are non-technical, yet must understand how to independently gather, sift, sort, and work effectively with public and private healthcare information sources. We address issues including effective data access strategies, how to ensure data quality, comply fully with HIPAA, and actively work with healthcare data using Excel, Access, and several statistical analysis products."

Continued in article

Bentley College Students Will Make Microloans to Small Businesses
Perhaps this is also an opportunity for accounting students to advise loan recipients on accounting, software, and taxes. There is precedent here for students in colleges that used to administer Small Business Administration grants. Years ago at the University of Maine I supervised some students who in turn were assisting grant recipients with accounting. In one humorous instance, the students could not find the recipients. The SBA had given a grant to a startup company to make patio furniture in much the same manner as birch-bark canoes are made using ash wood and birch bark. Once the recipients got the money for their chain saws and trucks, they were nowhere to be found. Turns out all they wanted the money for was to help them steal wood to sell to the paper companies. Such will also be the risk of microlending by college students.

"Bentley University Class Creates Local Microfinance Fund," Market Watch, October 28, 2008 --- Click Here

New Student-Run Initiative Brings Microlending to the Greater Boston Area An honors finance class at Bentley University has paved the way for an innovative financing initiative: a domestic microcredit organization that will fuel economic and community development by providing loans of $1,500 to $6,000 to local entrepreneurs at or below the poverty level.

The Bentley Microcredit Initiative (BMI) is the result of a course, Seminar in Micro Lending, which debuted in spring 2008. The mission of the BMI is to integrate microfinance into the Bentley community and to promote community development through education and innovation in microlending activities. The class and the BMI are the brainchild of Finance Professor and BMI Director Roy Wiggins. "The fund is something I really thought could be viable here at Bentley," says Wiggins. "Since it's student-run, it will provide hands-on banking experience while also furthering the Bentley mission to send future business leaders into the world who are socially responsible."

Microcredit or microlending refers to modest-sized loans for poverty-level recipients who may not qualify for funds at traditional financial institutions. The practice gained public attention in 2006, when Grameen Bank and its founder, Muhammad Yunus, received the Nobel Peace Prize for their work in microfinance.

Students enrolled in Seminar in Micro Lending developed a working model for the BMI after researching microfinance successes and failures both abroad and domestically to create a framework that could operate in Greater Boston. The fund is being financed by donations from alumni and parents and has an initial equity line of $100,000 on its way to a total loan portfolio of $300,000. The Bentley Microcredit Initiative will identify potential loan applicants by tapping into existing Bentley relationships with community organizations. "One of the attractive things about this venture is that it will be utilizing Bentley's academic resources," says Bentley President Gloria Larson. "We are essentially marrying Bentley's foundation in service and business to help address a societal issue. We hope the Microcredit Initiative will become a part of Bentley's legacy." BENTLEY UNIVERSITY is a leader in business education. Centered on teaching and research in business and related professions, Bentley blends the breadth and technological strength of a university with the core values and student focus of a close-knit campus.

SOURCE Bentley University

Epsilen Environment from Purdue University appears to have brought together the latest technology in a course authoring, course management, and e-learning package  --- http://www.epsilen.com/Epsilen/Public/Home.aspx

The Epsilen Environment is the result of six years of research and development within the Purdue School of Engineering and Technology at IUPUI. Epsilen Products and Services are commercially available through BehNeem LLC, the holding company created in Indiana to commercialize, market and further develop the Epsilen Environment. The New York Times is an equity and strategic partner in the company.

I maintain a site on the history of course authoring and course management technology at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

A 2008 addition to the above history site came to my attention in a loose-card advertisement for Epsilen Enviroment that came in the November 3, 2008 edition of the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Free ePortfolios 
 
Basic ePortfolio accounts are free for all registered students and faculty of U.S. colleges and universities.  An Epsilen ePortfolio can be created in minutes and be used throughout one’s academic career, during professional life, and even into retirement.  The free Epsilen ePortfolio account offers tools and resources enabling members to:

• Create and maintain a professional ePortfolio
• Engage in professional  and social networking
• Showcase scholarly work and other documents in a wide range of formats
• Develop and share resumes
• Store and share files/objects
• Use Epsilen e-mail, blog, wiki, and other communication and collaboration tools
• Create and participate in professional collaboration groups
• Access to online courses and trainings using the Epsilen Global Learning System (GLS) courseware.
• Produce a personal ePortfolio Web site with profile, photos and video
• Receive an automated weekly Epsilen status report that lets you know about those that have visited your “corner”, share similar research, teaching, internship or consulting interests.  

If your campus is, or becomes, a licensed Epsilen institution (see below), your free ePortfolio will integrate dynamically with more sophisticated tools and services listed below that accompany the paid license. Visit www.epsilen.com to create your personal ePortfolio and begin exploring the Environment. 

  
Exploratory Institutional Memberships
 
The Exploratory Membership is an easy and cost-effective option for colleges and universities, schools, districts and state systems to explore and experience the features of Epsilen, the next generation of learning and networking software.  Upon payment of an annual membership fee, the following features are available to Exploratory Members: 

• Administrative account to brand, monitor, and maintain internal ePortfolio accounts of your students ,faculty and alumnae
• Institutional ePortfolio site for your college or university
• Global announcement and message broadcasting to ePortfolio accounts associated with your institution
• Delivery of 12 online courses or training using Epsilen’s Global Learning System (GLS), with the option to incorporate New York Times content described below
• Direct access to the Epsilen helpdesk 
• A hosted Web-based  solution that requires no, or little, institutional IT support 
• Ability to upgrade to other licensed services (see below) 
• Ability to integrate Epsilen with campus SIS (see below) 
• Ability to cross list courses across institutions, departments, and schools  

Annual Exploratory Memberships begin at $5,000 for campuses with up to 2,000 students.  Click here for more pricing information and order application. 
 
 

New York Times Knowledge Network

New York Times Knowledge (NYTKnowledge Network) offers New York Times content to complement faculty-designed courses served dynamically in customizable templates through Epsilen’s Global Learning System.  New York Times content is aggregated by subject and easily selected and incorporated into lessons by faculty and the interactive learning environment. NYTKnowledge Network provides access to a repository of Times archives back to 1851 Times articles, special issues sections, multimedia features, and synchronous and asynchronous contact with correspondents, resulting in an extraordinary integrated learning environment that supports hybrid or online offerings.
 

The New York Times Knowledge Network also offers the opportunity to participate in Webcasts with the Times correspondents and other subject matter experts. These can be included in traditional courses, or offered by your institution as stand-alone life-long learning experiences with comprehensive continuing education programs designed by the New York Times. 

NYT Knowledge Network Provides:

• A rich repository of archived content back to 1851
• Access to other major content providers
• Multimedia news content
• Interactive maps and graphs
• Webcasts, chats with correspondents
• A comprehensive range of content aggregated by subject and easily integrated to support your teaching objectives.
• NYTimes Knowledge Network marketing of your continuing education courses.  

Visit http://www.nytimes.com/knowledge for further information and pricing (will be released in mid August 2007).
 

Student Learning Matrix 
 
Programs, departments, and schools within a campus may create unlimited student learning matrices to be used by students through an automated learning outcome assessment tool for both summative and formative learning assessment.  Features include:

• Creation of unlimited student learning matrices for program- or campus-level learning outcome assessment (Each axis includes attributes defined by the program/campus.)
• Ability for students to upload their learning outcomes according to predefined rubrics
• Access by faculty and academic advisors to each student learning matrix for assessment, advisement, and certification
• Program- and campus-level assessment reports for internal and external accreditation reviews
• A hosted Web-based solution that requires no institutional IT support

The annual Student Learning Matrix membership fee is based on the number of students in the program or institution.  Click here for more information and online membership application.
 
 

Global Learning System (GLS)
 
 

Epsilen offers the Global Learning System (GLS), a new Web-based learning framework developed as the next generation of eLearning and networking. In contrast to current legacy learning management systems, the GLS offers true global learning collaboration by connecting students and instructors on campuses in the U.S. and around the world in an interactive and intuitive Web 2.0 learning environment.  The GLS complements existing licensed or open source CMS products.  The GLS features include:

• Global learning management system that enables students and instructors to easily register or be invited to courses and learning collaboration
• Cross listing of class rosters of two or more courses within various campuses, or across institutions
• Innovative tools using professional and social networking to enhance learning, encourage collaboration, and utilize peer review technology
• The ability to easily archive courses and working groups for continued engagement
• A hosted Web-based solution that requires little, or no institutional IT support

The annual GLS membership fee is based on the number of students and courses within the institution. Click here for more information and online membership application.
 
 

Charter Membership
 
Experience the full suite of the Epsilen “Environment” and resources with unparalleled access to NYTKnowledge Network content. Charter members receive special pricing for unlimited use of ePortfolios, the Student Learning Matrix, courses through the Global Learning System, and interactive Webcasts with correspondents.  With charter membership, two university administrators will be invited to participate in the Epsilen - New York Times charter council, with meetings and events scheduled at The New York Times.  Benefits include:

• Single sign-on environment featuring a toolbox of services for ePortfolio, social networking, Learning Matrix, GLS, object repository, and NYTKnowledge Network
• Totally hosted turnkey solution with no need for local servers or local technical staff
• Cost effectiveness for both small and large campuses
• Collaboration on designing the next generation of eLearning through networking with other members of the Epsilen - New York Times charter council

The Epsilen Charter membership fee is based on the total number of students within the institution.  Click here for more information and online membership application. 
 
 

Technical Support and System Integration
 
Epsilen offers consulting and technical support through both internal and third-party sources for the integration of Epsilen with local campus databases and existing licensed technology.  This provides a seamless, single sign-on, portal approach to all resources and services supporting the learning and teaching initiatives of a campus.  Click Here for more information and online membership application.

I maintain a site on the history of course authoring and course management technology at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence: Tools for Teaching and Learning --- http://www.schreyerinstitute.psu.edu/Tools/

Tools for Teaching and Learning

Look to our specialists to help you use best practices in your teaching. Whether you are new to our services, or an old friend, please don't hesitate to contact us at site@psu.edu with your questions.

Course Design and Planning

• Adult learners
• Developing learning objectives
• Online and blended learning
• Syllabus development
• Test planning
• Using tests creatively in course design
• Writing effective cases
• Cutting Edge Course Design Tutorial

Teaching and Assessment Strategies

• Computer-based testing
• In-class assessment techniques
• Inquiry-based learning
• Large class strategies
• Pedagogy in Action, SERC portal for Educators
• Problem-based learning
• Resources for Teaching Writing
• Rubrics
• Teaching diverse students
• Using discussion in the classroom
• Ways to avoid students sharing test information
• Writing good test questions
• Working with groups

Tools for Course Evaluation

• Classroom observations
• Midsemester feedback
• Student Rating of Teaching Effectiveness (SRTEs)
• Using item analysis to improve tests and learning

Tools for University Assessment

• General Education Assessment
• Program and Department Assessment

Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

• Public scholarship
• Service learning
• Teaching and course portfolios
• Writing a teaching philosophy

Bob Jensen's threads on education technology --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm

Search Engine, ChunkIt, Marketed to College Students

Questions
How can you turn your email messages into free video messages?
How can you video conference calls?

Accounting Quiz Archives

August 21, 2008 message from Rob Nance [rnance@accountingweb.com]

Submitting 10-question accounting quizzes is great exposure for your accounting program. Check out the archives:

http://www.accountingweb.com/quiz/ 

If you would like to submit a quiz, reply to this message and I will send you the Excel template.

*****

Coming later this year: information on a scholarship program for your accounting students. AccountingWEB will be bestowing a load of money on three U.S. accounting students.

Rob

The AccountingWeb student zone (including humor) is at http://www.accountingweb.com/news/student_zone.html

"15 Tools to Make Your PC a Multimedia Powerhouse:  Enjoy your video and audio collections to the fullest with the help of these free and low-cost downloads," by Preston Gralla, PC World via The Washington Post, October 30, 2008 --- Click Here

Your PC has become the greatest entertainment device ever created, but you wouldn't know that judging by the software that ships with the machine. Bundled media players, and related software for playing and managing audio and video, tend to be underwhelming at best.

We've assembled 15 of our favorite video and audio applications, all of which can handle just about any job you can throw at them. The vast majority of these downloads are completely free, and the others offer no-cost trials.

They'll help you download YouTube videos to your PC, or convert videos to formats that you can view on handheld devices. They'll play any audio and video formats you can find. They'll make you into a DJ and allow you to create your own customized mixes, too. So if you want to get the most out of the entertainment device on your desk, read on--and start downloading. (And if you want to access all of these tools in one convenient place, hop to our audio and video downloads collection.)

Video

Want to download YouTube videos to your computer, convert video files to formats that you can view on portable players, find the best videos online, or watch TV from around the world? We have software that does all that, and a lot more.

TubeMe

How many times have you watched a YouTube video and wished that you could save it to your hard drive for future viewing? With this free software, you can save YouTube videos as .flv files; afterward, you can watch the videos in any multimedia software that supports the .flv format (such as FLV Player or VLC Media Player, both discussed below). Before downloading the videos, you get a full description of them, as well.

Be aware that using this program can be a bit confusing. Make sure to click the Download path button, at the bottom of the screen, to tell the program where to download your videos. And to download the video, you'll have to copy and paste the YouTube URL into the program. After that, click the icon with a small plus sign; it looks grayed-out, as if it were nonfunctional, but it does work. Once you've added the link, you can download the video. You can also put multiple videos in a list, and download them all at once.

Download TubeMe| Price: Free

FLV Player
If you've downloaded YouTube videos using TubeMe or another downloader, or if you've collected other files in the .flv format, you may run into a problem: Many media players, including Windows Media Player, can't handle them. FLV Player is a straightforward media player designed to play .flv files exclusively. To access a video, press , browse to the file, and open it, or else double-click the .flv file from inside Windows Explorer. You can also drag and drop files into the player. The software even handles multiple .flv files: Simply drag several files to the program, and the app plays each video in its own window.

You can control video playback through the usual controls, or with a variety of keyboard shortcuts. You can also toggle between full-screen mode and normal mode. Note that you may run into problems installing the software on Windows Vista. If that happens to you, right-click the installation file and choose Run as Administrator. That should solve the problem.

Download FLV Player| Price: Free

Any Video Converter Free Version

Playing video these days is no longer confined to your PC--countless other devices can play video as well, including handheld devices and music players, mobile phones, and the PlayStation Portable (PSP). The problem, though, is that if you've downloaded videos to your PC, they might not be in the formats your devices require.

Continued in article

Do It Yourself Interactive Whiteboard (about $60 instead of over $1,000)

October 27, 2008 message from Scott Bonacker [lister@BONACKERS.COM]

Mr. Lee encourages innovators to ask themselves, "Would providing 80 percent of the capability at 1 percent of the cost be valuable to someone?" If the answer is yes, he says, pay attention. Trading relatively little performance for substantial cost savings can generate what Mr. Lee calls "surprising and often powerful results both scientifically and socially."

As evidence, he might point to a do-it-yourself interactive whiteboard, another of his Wiimote innovations. Interactive whiteboards, which in commercial form generally sell for more than $1,000, make it possible to control a computer by tapping, writing or drawing on an image of the desktop that has been projected onto a screen. Mr. Lee's version can be built with roughly $60 in parts and free open-source software downloadable from his Web site.

Some 700,000 people, many of them teachers, have downloaded the software, Mr. Lee says. Much more expensive whiteboards may offer more features and better image resolution, but Mr. Lee's version is adequate for most classroom applications.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/26/business/26proto.html?_r=1&em&oref=slogin 

This seemed like it might be of interest, if not useful

Scott Bonacker CPA
Springfield, MO

Maple's Document Management System

October 30, 2008 message from Scott Bonacker [lister@BONACKERS.COM]

This came as part of a subscription to a technology newsletter, I haven't tried this product myself.  Scott Bonacker CPA, Springfield, MO]

As an IT professional, chances are good that you have lots of detailed information that you have to keep track of in order to do your job effectively and efficiently. You probably have a multitude of documents stored in a multitude of folders on your hard disk. Using a series of documents and folders to store all your information is a pretty logical way of doing things, especially when used in combination with Vista’s Search tool and Saved searches feature, keeping track of all that information is pretty easy. However, it could be better — especially if all that information could be made available in one place.

Well, I recently discovered a very nice document manager called Maple from Crystal Office Systems that runs perfectly on Windows Vista and produces what is essentially a document database. In this edition of the Windows Vista Report, I’ll introduce you to Maple and show you how to use it manage your document collection.

This blog post is also available in the PDF format in a TechRepublic Download.

Getting Maple

You can download Maple from the Crystal Office Systems Web site. Once you download it, installation is a snap and you’ll be ready begin creating you custom document database in no time. You can download and try Maple for 30 days at no cost. A single-user license is $21.95.

When you access the Crystal Office Systems Web site, you’ll also notice that there is another version of this document manager called Maple Professional, which provides a set of advanced features. You’ll also find free reader called Maple Reader that will allow other users to view any document database created with either Maple or Maple Professional.

 

Read the rest at http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/window-on-windows/?p=802&tag=rbxccnbt

Bob Jensen's threads on accounting software are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob1.htm#AccountingSoftware

Bob Jensen's threads on tools and tricks of the trade are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

August 19, 2008 message from MERLOT Webmaster [barb@merlot.org]

Question
What does a student's blinkless stare signify?

a. Daydreaming
b. Confusion
c. Anger
d. Stoned

"Facial-Recognition Software Could Give Valuable Feedback to Online Professors." Jeffrey R. Young, Chronicle of Higher Education, June 27, 2008 --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3126&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Many professors who teach online complain that they have no way of seeing whether their far-away students are following the lectures — or whether the students have fallen asleep at their desks. But researchers at the University of California at San Diego say they have a solution. They recently tested a system that can detect facial expressions of online students and determine when they find the material difficult, so that cues could be sent to the professors telling them to slow down.

Jacob Whitehill, a doctoral student at the university working on the research, presented results from the experiment this week at the Intelligent Tutoring Systems 2008 conference in Montreal.

In the experiment, eight subjects were shown short video clips of lectures while a Web cam tracked their facial expressions — looking for smiles, blinks, raised eyebrows, and the like. The subjects were then asked to report how difficult they found each section, and to take a quiz on the material. Mr. Whitehill says that the system correctly detected when students were having trouble (the most reliable indicator: students blinked less when they were struggling to understand).

The system could be used to give valuable feedback to professors teaching online, says Mr. Whitehill. “It’s not going to be perfect by any means,” he says, but it’s better than no student feedback at all. “Professors say that they can’t see the students. This could do it for them automatically.”

Visualization of Multivariate Data (including faces) --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/352wpvisual/000datavisualization.htm

May 4, 2008 message from Richard Campbell [campbell@RIO.EDU]

I have placed a (Camtasia) video online on omnisio.com, which allows comments to be placed OVER the video.

http://www.omnisio.com/v/49zPDUbdjhG/the-basic-accounting-equation 

This is a video that I have on youtube and just linked it to Omnisio.

Jensen Comment
There are some other cool things to do with video at http://www.omnisio.com/

"Microsoft Ramps Up Its Free College E-Mail Program," by Josh Fischman, Chronicle of Higher Education, May 27, 2008 --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3032&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Microsoft has decided to enlarge a service of keen interest to colleges, even as the company last week dumped another offering used by higher education, its Live Search Books program. Now Live@edu, the free Web-based e-mail and online collaboration program for students and alumni, is getting much larger inboxes, the ability to handle bigger attached files, true shared calendars, and the chance for colleges to block student e-mail containing words they deem offensive, the company announced today.

Tired of the 5 gigabyte inbox? Live@edu now offers accounts with 10 gigabytes, and the capacity to handle attachments up to 20 megabytes in size, says Bruce Gabrielle, senior product manager for the service. The boost is because the company has decided that, in addition to handing campuses Microsoft Hotmail accounts (with university-based e-mail addresses), it will offer accounts on the more powerful Microsoft Exchange Web access system. That gives users access to Windows programs like Outlook, with e-mail, full calendars, and a contact list.

It’s a solution used by many businesses, and Microsoft has been quietly offering it, in a form called Exchange Labs, to a few educational institutions since last fall. Drexel University, Hinds Community College, and the Colorado Community College system are some that have tried it.

With Exchange Labs, users at the same university can see one another’s calendars to set up meetings. E-mail tracking is enabled, so students can see whether a term paper was delivered to a professor’s inbox. They can also push e-mail to cell phones. (And they can use Exchange to wipe data from those phones if they happen to lose them.) Exchange Labs also gives university officials the ability to set up filters, like spam filters, for offensive terms in e-mail, though Mr. Gabrielle says he wasn’t sure what words, if any, that universities have tried placing on a “do not type” list.

At this point the service is not being offered to faculty members or administrators. “I think it’s a business model decision,” Mr. Gabrielle said, noting that the company may need to figure out whether it wants to allow ads on Web pages seen by those users; the student and alumni service is ad-free.

"SketchCast: a New Blogging and Teaching Tool," Chronicle of Higher Education, May 14, 2008 --- Click Here

Want to preserve that lesson you did at the blackboard today in class and share it with students online? Try SketchCast, a free blogging tool that allows users to record a digital drawing (and contemporaneous audio), and then embed the animated video onto a Web site. It’s essentially an easy form of animation.

Watch the video demo --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=2998&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Comment from Charles

What a nice tool to capture and share ideas informally! I have been trying to capture tools and concepts for opening up collaborative learning on my blog www.collaborativenetworkedlearning.blogspot.com 

— Charles May 14, 08:50 PM #

"TextMeTV Is Either Future of Television or Beginning of Its End," by Jeffrey R. Young, Chronicle of Higher Education, August 13, 2008 --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3240&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en 

Late at night on a television station in Lansing, Michigan, a new kind of program tries to make the audience the main attraction. It's called TextMeTV, and it goes like this: One or two young hosts, some of them college students, sit on a couch and read text messages being sent in live from viewers, and those messages are also posted on a box in the corner of the screen. Sometimes the hosts encourage those texters to debate topics of the day, other times they offer free iPods or other prizes to viewers who can answer trivia questions. The show looks more like a YouTube page than a television show. Though moderators do edit the text messages that come in before they post them to the screen, the show is live with no tape delay, says Helena Kirby, a producer for the show and one of its 7 rotating hosts. "There's no swearing and no sexual talk -- we keep it pretty clean," she adds. Viewers pay a small fee per text message to participate. Ms. Kirby says the show's best moments have been when viewers sparred about race issues or politics. "People get fired up," she says. But this January the show -- which has been on since last year -- began focusing more on games and contests, like trivia challenges, than on debates. One entertainment blogger recently called the show "the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard," noting that the show seems empty of substance. But Ms. Kirby argues that it represents a revolutionary new format. "I think some people are just afraid of it -- that this new concept is going to do something big, and they don't want it to," she says. "I say, Out with the old, in the with the new." Amariee Woods, another host of the show who is a senior at Michigan State University, says that younger audiences want to participate, not just passively consume media. "People want to put their comments on everything, and the faster they can do that, the better." A similar show in Texas called Subtext, which features students from the University of Texas at Austin, uses a similar format but focuses on dating. The shows are essentially trying to turn television into something more like the Internet. In fact, the shows would probably work better as interactive Web pages where people could put aside their cell phones and interact with their computer keyboards. But then the show's producers would not be able to make a cut of the text-messaging fees, as they do now. Do younger viewers now see one-way broadcast television as dull? Or are these interactive shows a sign that media companies are trying to mix many kinds of media formats? Use your computer keyboard to let us know what you think.

 

TextMeTV (watch the video) --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3240&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

"Making a Big Point (in class) With Your PC," by Josh Fischman, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 23, 2008 ---
http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=2932&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Pen Kenrick J. Mock says he loves recording lectures for his classes using his tablet PC. And the associate professor of computer science at the University of Alaska at Anchorage also loves projecting computational problems using PowerPoint or the writing program OneNote.

What Mr. Mock does not love is the inability to point to a specific part of the problem for his class. “It’s always bothered me that the pen cursor is a tiny little dot,” he writes in his blog on technology and teaching. “The problem is that I like to use the pen to “point” at things as I give the lecture, but it doesn’t help if the class can’t see it.”

He looked, in vain, for a program that would enlarge the cursor. And finally he gave in, remembered he was a computer scientist, and wrote a program himself.

The result is PenAttention, and it turns that minuscule dot into a minuscule dot with a big colored spotlight around it. It’s a little more distracting to write with this kind of cursor, but his class can finally see what he is doing.

The program is free, works on tablet PCs running XP and Vista, and can be downloaded from a link in Mr. Mock’s blog post describing it.

See http://www.math.uaa.alaska.edu/~afkjm/techteach/?q=node/52

"Microsoft Opens Free Online Workspace for Student Collaborations," by Josh Fischman, Chronicle of Higher Education, March 5, 2008 --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=2795&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Microsoft wants to help students get their lives together (their learning lives, at least), and Tuesday it rolled out a product to help. As part of Live@edu, the company’s free Web-based email and calendar suite, Microsoft unveiled Office Live Workspace, which lets students access their work online and share it with others. Live@edu is in use at more than 600 colleges.

“The most visible new feature is the activity panel,” said Guy Gilbert, a Microsoft group product manager, in an interview with The Chronicle Monday. “Suppose you are in a work group with other students. You can look at the panel and see everything that anyone has done since you last logged on. And links in the panel take you right to that object,” whether it is a document, a spreadsheet, contact list, or database.

Users can also set up e-mail alerts that notify them any time an item is changed.

The service has been running in beta for several months, and of its estimated 100,000 users, 20 to 30 percent are in higher education, Mr. Gilbert says. Microsoft has worked with 13 colleges to fine-tune the service, including Florida Community College at Jacksonville, Vanderbilt University, and the University of Wisconsin at Parkside.

And if the new service doesn’t seem familiar to users of Google Docs, don’t worry. Microsoft’s arch rival also promises real-time collaboration, and the two companies seem to be running neck and neck in the education marketplace.

AtGentive:   New software platforms that incorporate artificial intelligence and social networking into their approach toward e-learning.

February 20, 2008 message from Glen L Gray [glen.gray@CSUN.EDU]

Attention Please! Next-Generation E-Learning Is Here ICT Results (02/14/08)

European researchers working for the AtGentive project have developed two new software platforms that incorporate artificial intelligence and social networking into their approach toward e-learning. AtGentive coordinator Thierry Nabeth says the first generation of e-learning platforms focused on replicating the classroom experience, but student's often had difficulty staying motivated and the learning program failed to keep their attention. To overcome this problem, one of the AtGentive platforms uses techniques similar to those found on Web sites such as Facebook that make them so popular as a means of staying in touch with others. The platforms also use artificial intelligence to keep students interested. "Artificial agents are autonomous entities that observe users' activities and assess their state of attention in order to intervene so as to make the user experience more effective," Nabeth says. "The interventions can take many forms, from providing new information to the students, guiding them in their work, or alerting them when other users connect to the platform." The artificial intelligence agents provide a smart form of proactive coaching for students by assessing, guiding, and stimulating them. The agents can alert students when others have read their articles, or when they receive feedback on their contributions to a collaborative project. The agents are also able to detect when students are not interacting with the system and try to get them to rejoin the lesson.

Click Here to View Full Article

http://cordis.europa.eu/ictresults/index.cfm/section/news/tpl/article/BrowsingType/Features/ID/89524

Glen L. Gray, PhD, CPA
Accounting & Information Systems, COBAE
California State University, Northridge
Northridge, CA 91330-8372
818.677.3948
818.677.2461 (messages)
http://www.csun.edu/~vcact00f

Notes on the Smart Pen
The smart pen that Wired Campus flagged back in May was unveiled last week at a technology conference in Palm Springs, Calif. The company behind it, LiveScribe, has been aggressively marketing the device to college students with the slogan "Never miss a word." It's basically a combination recording machine and camera. Users take notes while a minirecorder, embedded in the pen, records whatever is being said. Later, to clarify the written notes, the user can touch the pen to a specific passage and listen to a recording of the instructor speaking those words. A tiny camera links what is being written to what is being recorded. In a takeoff on television commercials for pharmaceuticals, the smart-pen advertisement below features a student who suffers from "restless mind syndrome." The pen is offered as a panacea. Livescribe has set up a Facebook page to push the pen, and offers to pay college students to promote the device on their campuses. It's also advertised on the Web site ThePalestra, where Andy Van Schaack, a senior lecturer at Vanderbilt University, who is an adviser to LiveScribe, is seen praising the pen. Will the pen, which sells for about $200, take off with college students? Will it be used as a crutch for students who are too tired or distracted to listen to their professors?
Andrea L. Foster, "Notes on the Smart Pen," Chronicle of Higher Education, February 5, 2008 ---
http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=2719&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Bob Jensen's threads on gadgets are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm#Technology

Questions
Will we soon be able to lecture without opening our mouths?
Can you send a "relational" database file to a friend by simply shaking hands?
Is this the beginning of a whole new definition of human "relationships?"
Can the message of a hug be digital and unambiguous?
New magic in a kiss or two?
Does your database have halitosis or dirty fingernails or a flu virus?
I'd better stop asking questions about this before I get in trouble!
 

Japanese firm harnesses the power of human touch
They say you can tell a lot from a handshake. But while it's usually guesswork, the power of human touch will soon be used in Japan to transmit data. Telecom giant Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT) is planning a commercial launch of a system to enter rooms that frees users from the trouble of rummaging in their pockets or handbags for ID cards or keys. It uses technology to turn the surface of the human body itself into a means of data transmission. As data travels through the user's clothing, handbag or shoes, anyone carrying a special card can unlock the door simply by touching the knob or standing on a particular spot without taking the card out. "In everyday life, you're always touching things. Even if you are standing, you are stepping on something," research engineer Mitsuru Shinagawa told AFP. "These simple touches can result in communication," said Shinagawa, senior research engineer at the company's NTT Microsystem Integration Laboratories. He said future applications could include a walk-through ticket gate, a cabinet that opens only to authorised people and a television control that automatically chooses favourite programmes.
PhysOrg, February 21, 2008 --- http://physorg.com/news122793751.html

Bob Jensen's threads on ubiquitous computing are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ubiquit.htm

The Five Senses of the Future:  Threads on the Networking of the Five Senses (Sight, Sound, Smell, Touch, and Taste) --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/senses.htm  

Barbra Streisand - He Touched Me (1967) --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO-wPOgVtqg

Question
What are real time virtual office hours?
Hint:
They operate a bit like a course chat room with some added features like microphones, and an instructor or teaching fellow is in the room at all times.

A tools PowerPoint file is included at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/EdTech/PowerPoint/

Question
What are the supposed Top 10 and the Top 100 e-Learning tools, at least in England?

Answer
Top 100 --- http://www.c4lpt.co.uk/recommended/top100.html
Various experts list their Top 10 --- http://www.c4lpt.co.uk/recommended/index.html

Jensen Comment
I totally disagree with the rankings of the Top 100 and the Top 10.

Where is Blackboard and WebCT? --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackboard

Where are the many important tools for handicapped learners? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Handicapped

Where is Camtasia? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HelpersVideos.htm

Where are the edutainment and learning game alternatives? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Edutainment

Where is Matlab (used in virtually every U.S. university) --- --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MATLAB

Like it or not, Wikipedia is one of the most sought out sights in the world by e-Learners --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
There are risks, but the odds are high that users will get helpful learning information and links.

Where are HTML and related XML/RTF and XBRL markups?  --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/XBRLandOLAP.htm  

Where are the many huge and free online libraries? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm

Where are the important blogs and listservs? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListServRoles.htm

I could go on and on here!

Bob Jensen

August 3, 2007 reply from Richard Campbell [campbell@RIO.EDU]

Bob:
I agree with you that the list is flawed - Toolbook should be #1

Richard J. Campbell
mailto:campbell@rio.edu

Bob Jensen's threads on the history of course authoring, management, and presentation technologies are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

August 3, 2007 reply from Bob Jensen

Hi Richard

ToolBook should’ve been number 1 but it fumbled the ball. What proportion of e-Learners are now learning, today, from ToolBooks? My guess is that much less than one percent. A negligible proportion of instructors are developing learning materials using ToolBook dhtml files relative to FrontPage and Dreamweaver htm files.

The biggest innovation for e-Learners and authors was Adobe Acrobat’s tremendous development of online pdf files that could be read and electronically searched for free but not be tampered with by readers. Now major commercial publishing houses are putting new books on line as pdf files.

One of the biggest innovations I forgot to mention was the unknown (at least to me) date in which MS Office files (particularly ppt, doc, and xls files) could be downloaded and read from Web servers that at one time only could handle htm markups. In terms of e-learning htm, pdf, doc, xls, and ppt files are overwhelmingly the main files for e-Learning, although they are now joined by such files as xml files.

Another huge e-Learning innovation that I forgot to mention is the unknown (at least to me) date in which the above learning and research files could be attached to email messages. This made it easier to have private distributions (say to students in a class) without having to put files on Web, Blackboard, or WebCT servers. Anybody with email can not send files back and forth.

There is still a great risk of macro viruses when downloading MS Office files from the Web or email messages. However, most e-Learners are doing so from trusted Web sites and/or email senders such as files from their course instructors.

ToolBook could fade away and the world would hardly know about it or miss it.

Bob Jensen

Zotero software for  storing, retrieving, organizing, and annotating digital documents --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zotero

Zotero is a free, open source extension for the Firefox browser, that enables users to collect, manage, and cite research from all types of sources from the browser. It is partly a piece of reference management software, used to manage bibliographies and references when writing essays and articles. On many major research websites such as digital libraries, Google Scholar, or even Amazon.com, Zotero detects when a book, article, or other resource is being viewed and with a mouse click finds and saves the full reference information to a local file. If the source is an online article or web page, Zotero can optionally store a local copy of the source. Users can then add notes, tags, and their own metadata through the in-browser interface. Selections of the local reference library data can later be exported as formatted bibliographies.

The program is produced by the Center for History and New Media of George Mason University and is currently available in public beta. It is open and extensible, allowing other users to contribute citation styles and site translators, and more generally for others who are building digital tools for researchers to expand the platform. The name is from Albanian language "to master".

It is aimed at replacing the more cumbersome traditional reference management software, originally designed to meet the demands of offline research

"Mark of Zotero,"  by Scott McLemee, Inside Higher Ed, September 26, 2007 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2007/09/26/mclemee 

Zotero is a tool for storing, retrieving, organizing, and annotating digital documents. It has been available for not quite a year. I started using it about six weeks ago, and am still learning some of the fine points, but feel sufficient enthusiasm about Zotero to recommend it to anyone doing research online. If very much of your work involves material from JSTOR, for example – or if you find it necessary to collect bibliographical references, or to locate Web-based publications that you expect to cite in your own work — then Zotero is worth knowing how to use. (You can install it on your computer for free; more on that in due course.)

Now, my highest qualification for testing a digital tool is, perhaps, that I have no qualifications for testing a digital tool. That is not as paradoxical as it sounds. The limits of my technological competence are very quickly reached. My command of the laptop computer consists primarily of the ability to (1) turn it on and (2) type stuff. This condition entails certain disadvantages (the mockery of nieces and nephews, for example) but it makes for a pretty good guinea pig.

And in that respect, I can report that the folks at George Mason University’s Center for History and New Media have done an exemplary job in designing Zotero. A relatively clueless person can learn to use it without exhaustive effort.

Still, it seems as if institutions that do not currently do so might want to offer tutorials on Zotero for faculty and students who may lack whatever gene makes for an intuitive grasp of software. Academic librarians are probably the best people to offer instruction. Aside from being digitally savvy, they may be the people at a university in the best position to appreciate the range of uses to which Zotero can be put.

For the absolute newbie, however, let me explain what Zotero is — or rather, what it allows you to do. I’ll also mention a couple of problems or limitations. Zotero is still under development and will doubtless become more powerful (that is, more useful) in later releases. But the version now available has numerous valuable features that far outweigh any glitches.

Suppose you go online to gather material on some aspect of a book you are writing. In the course of a few hours, you might find several promising titles in the library catalog, a few more with Amazon, a dozen useful papers via JSTOR, and three blog entries by scholars who are thinking aloud about some matter tangential to your project.

Continued in article

Bob Jensen's threads on how scholars search are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm#Scholars

How to Avoid Expensive Adobe Software for Converting MS Office Documents to PDF Files

"Creating Documents for All to Read Inexpensive Ways To Convert a Variety Of Content to PDFs," by Katherine Boehret, The Wall Street Journal, August 8, 2007; Page D9 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118652753636390978.html

For years, people have accessed a variety of digital content in one of the most universally accepted formats: Adobe's Portable Document Format, better known as the PDF. A PDF holds images and text without altering a document's original fonts and layout. It can be searched, protected with a password, disabled from printing and enriched with bookmarks and hyperlinks that make it more navigable.

But while Adobe provides a free reader for viewing PDFs, creating PDFs yourself can be costly and confusing, even though the format is great for saving and sharing documents of almost any kind including images, Web pages, Word documents and emails. For users who want higher-end PDF creation and collaboration software, Adobe Systems Inc. offers its $450 Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional software program. But that's pricey for most casual users. So this week I tested some inexpensive or free methods for making PDFs.

There are plenty of Windows programs available for download online that will help you create basic PDFs. On Windows computers, I tried three programs, starting with the $20 standard version of deskPDF from Plano, Texas-based Docudesk Corp. (www.Docudesk.com). I tested a stripped-down and less-expensive version of Adobe's program called Create Adobe PDF Online, which works by uploading your document at www.CreatePDF.com and costs $10 monthly or $100 annually. And I also used a free program called CutePDF from Acro Software Inc. (www.CutePDF.com). If you own a Mac, things are even simpler. Macs come out of the box with the ability to turn documents into PDFs, and I tested that function as well. DeskPDF and CutePDF worked roughly the same way, though deskPDF costs $20 and CutePDF is free. Adobe's less-expensive program offered a few more features than deskPDF and CutePDF, such as the ability to add password encryption to a document or to make it unprintable by others. Making PDFs on the Mac was a cinch, including options to compress or encrypt a PDF. None of these methods allowed me to add extra features to PDFs like bookmarks and hyperlinks; for that, you'll need a more serious program. When Microsoft's Office 2007 program shipped early this year, many people expected that it would have the built-in ability to save documents in PDF format; it didn't. Users can find a patch that fixes this on Microsoft's Web site. Apple's operating system has long been known for the ease with which it can create PDFs using built-in tools. Put simply, any document that can be printed from a Mac can also be turned into a PDF. Users follow the normal steps necessary to print a document or Web site (usually File, Print), but can choose a button on the Print screen labeled "PDF" that converts the document. In seconds, I turned all types of documents on my iMac into PDFs, including images in JPEG and TIF formats, emails, Word documents and Web sites. This last conversion was helpful for saving not just a view of the current screen, but the entire site from the top of the page to the bottom. Options labeled "Compress PDF" and "Encrypt PDF" can be chosen in this Print screen. I chose Encrypt PDF and protected a PDF using a password in one quick step. The option to compress a PDF will decrease the size of an image in a document, but won't decrease the size of a text-only document. Two of the three Windows programs use a method similar to Apple's, letting me send documents or Web sites into print mode and converting them into PDFs. Downloading and installing deskPDF or CutePDF adds a virtual printer driver to the computer. Rather than choosing a separate button labeled "PDF," the conversion program is selected from a list of printers, and hitting the Print button saves the document as a PDF file. The first time I did this, I thought my document was printed rather than saved because a printer icon appeared in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen, as if the document was printing. But a screen appeared asking where I wanted to save the new PDF, and I specified a location. Docudesk offers free 24-hour technical support with all of its deskPDF programs, even trial versions. The company also touts its $40 deskUNPDF program, which restores PDFs to Word documents for editing purposes, one of the features also found in Adobe's $450 product. CutePDF writer and deskPDF must be used with separately installed converter programs, but these are small and free, and their installation is prompted after each of the core programs is downloaded. Both programs are also offered in upgraded versions that cost $50 for CutePDF Pro and $30 for deskPDF Pro, enabling advanced features like hyperlinks, encryption, password protection and printing restrictions. Adobe's Create Adobe PDF Online program offers a few more features than the others, but feels a bit disconnected because it uploads documents to the Web for PDF conversion rather than converting documents in an installed program. An option called Create Adobe PDF Online Printer installs a printer driver on your PC, like deskPDF and CutePDF. But this saves your PDF online forcing you to retrieve it via Adobe's Web site, an emailed link or an emailed attachment. After registering to use Adobe's online conversion product, users must select the file or Web page intended for PDF conversion. Security features are optional with each document, such as requiring a password to view it or not allowing others to print it. I tried both successfully. Once converted, a document can be delivered to you via email in a link or attachment. It can also be retrieved from a Conversion History section on the site or converted directly on the site. Most of these conversion programs are available in some free capacity. DeskPDF can be used five times free of charge in the standard and professional versions before it starts adding a watermark to each PDF, which is intrusive. Adobe's program can be used five times for each email that you register before you must subscribe to its conversion service. If you need to save a document in a format that has the greatest likelihood of being viewable by all of your recipients, PDFs are the way to go, and they aren't difficult to make.

Is Facebook the New MySpace?
MySpace has an impressive lead today, but things can change quickly in the fluid world of mass-market social networking sites. Just ask Friendster. First Friendster was everybody's favorite social networking site. Then Friendster fell out of vogue--precipitously--and people stopped going there. In its place, MySpace became the darling of the Web. MySpace provided not only a free place to host your own online identity, but a full set of tools for meeting and interacting with others. Now everybody is talking about Facebook, which fits the same description, but in a very different way. Will Facebook become the next MySpace? I think so, and here's why.
Mark Sullivan, PC World via The Washington Post, July 20, 2007 --- Click Here

From the University of Chicago
BiblioVault: An Alternative for Long-term Storage of Digital Book Files

BiblioVault helps scholarly publishers preserve and extend the value of their books. We provide long-term storage of digital book files for our member presses, as well as a wide range of scanning, printing, transfer, and conversion services. Launched in late 2001 by the University of Chicago Press, BiblioVault operates under the umbrella of Chicago Distribution Services, which also oversees a digital printing center, the Chicago Digital Distribution Center (CDDC). The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation supported the development of BiblioVault and the CDDC with three grants totaling $3.2 million.
http://www.bibliovault.org/BV.index.epl

Digital Production Strategies for Scholarly Publishers, by Denise Nitterhouse, BiblioVault from the University of Chicago, 2005 --- http://www.bibliovault.org/docs/digital_prod_strategies.pdf

SCHOLARLY BOOK PUBLISHING

Production

Offset versus Digital Printing

Specifications, Processes, and Quality

Cost and Quantity Trade-offs

Schedule

Additional Considerations

Production Decisions

Scholarly Book Sales Patterns

Scholarly Press Overprinting and Storage Costs

Production Decision Making and

Management Processes

DIGITAL PRODUCTION STRATEGY EXAMPLES

Paperback Reprints

Hardcover Digital Reprints

Hardcover Digital Frontlist Printing

CHANGING PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION MODELS

Integrating and Automating Production and Fulfillment

Short-Run Digital Printing (SRDP)

An Oldie but Goodie

An Oversize Classic

Saved by SRDP

Impact of CDDC SRDP

Harvard University Press: Ultra-Short Inventory-Replenishment Program (USIRP)

MIT Press Classics Series: Bringing Books Back into Print

Print-on-Demand (POD)

Electronic Distribution (E-books)

CHOOSING PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION ALTERNATIVES

Effects of Digital printing

Outstanding Issues

From Carnegie-Mellon University: How to Turn Your Photographs into 3-D Photographs

"A New Dimension for Your Photos Web service Fotowoosh wants to be the Flickr of 3-D," by Wade Roush, MIT's Technology Review, April 27, 2007 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/18596/ 

Bob Jensen's threads on tricks and tools of education technology are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

Camtasia 4.0 is Great --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/whatsnew.asp

Creative Commons Add-in for Microsoft Office

From the University of Illinois Issues in Scholarly Communication Blog on December 13, 2006 --- http://www.library.uiuc.edu/blog/scholcomm/

Microsoft has created a free add-in that enables you to embed a Creative Commons copyright license into a document that you create using the Microsoft application Word, PowerPoint, or Excel. With a Creative Commons license, authors can express their intentions regarding how their works may be used by others.

To learn more about Creative Commons, please visit its web site, www.creativecommons.org. To learn more about the choices among the Creative Commons licenses, see http://creativecommons.org/about/licenses/meet-the-licenses.

Download the Creative Commons Microsoft Office add-in from the Microsoft website. For a short URL to this resource, use this tinyURL:
http://tinyurl.com/y9y634

Installation of the Creative Commons Microsoft Office add-in will add an option to your File menu whereby you can easily add the CC logo and usage statement to your document.

Video Capturing, Editing, Compression, and Playback
(With Links to UserView for Viewing and Capturing Remotely Located Computer Screens and Audio)

Bob Jensen's video helpers are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HelpersVideos.htm

Internet users can view video either as video file downloads (that may or may not be stored on a hard drive) or as streaming video (that does not entail downloading a media file but can be captured with streaming media software).

Update from the AAA Accounting Commons --- http://commons.aaahq.org/pages/home
I thank Rick for sharing his expertise in the new VoiceThread multimedia education and communication technology.
Accounting Professor Rick Lillie Uses VoiceThread to Create Streaming Video --- http://iaed.wordpress.com/
 

If you have not yet discovered VoiceThread, I strongly recommend that you click on the link below and explore the VoiceThread website. You are in for a real technology treat!

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE VOICETHREAD WEBSITE

I use VoiceThread to create streaming video lectures, to create tutorials explaining how to solve problems, to explain answers to quiz and examination questions, and more. VoiceThread is easy to use, is similar to PowerPoint (but much more robust), and is web-hosted which makes it easy for you to share VoiceThread presentations with your students and colleagues.

During a presentation that I gave at the recent 2008 American Accounting Association (AAA) Annual Meeting in Anaheim, California, I talked about VoiceThread. To help participants to see how easy it is to create and share dynamic presentations with VoiceThread, I put together a short presentation that explains how to use VoiceThread. Click on the link below to view the short tutorial program.

Click here to view a short tutorial program explaining how to use VoiceThread

 

I encourage you to sign up for a free account.  Learn to use VoiceThread.  If you like what you create, then you can upgrade to the “Pro” version, which is very inexpensive. To get the full benefit of using VoiceThread, you need a headset/microphone and webcam.  To begin, use the tools included in VoiceThread. If you have questions about VoiceThread, use the “Contact Me” option on the right side of the screen.  Send me a message.  Include your email and/or telephone number.  I will be happy to work with you.

Enjoy!
Rick Lillie

Jensen Comment
VoiceThread has an advantage in allowing a community of users to comment (in multimedia) comments on an instructional video.
It's drawback is that it uses a lot of storage and bandwidth for talking heads.

Some VoiceThread pricing information is given at http://voicethread.com/pricing/pro/
It is possible to get small amounts of video file storage free, but it can get really expensive when the community goes on and on with long commentaries.
In the pro version, file sizes are limited to 100 Mb. This is about one tenth the size of a 10 minute YouTube video. YouTube generally limits file sizes to 1 Gb or 10 minutes of compressed video such as mpg compression --- http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hlrm=en&answer=57924
Colleges can stream much larger videos on YouTube such as the courses that UC Berkeley makes available on YouTube with over one hour of video for each lecture in a course.

VoiceThread makes it possible to have somewhat longer videos in a 100 Mb file by using small video screens. Note how Rick does this at http://voicethread.com/#q.b173180.i923368

YouTube also allows any users to comment in text format such that commentaries can accompany videos on YouTube. The huge advantage of YouTube is that videos can be uploaded, viewed, and even downloaded for free. VoiceThread, for an annual fee, has more features.

Although I've not tried VoiceThread, it would seem that cost and file size limits make this less attractive than YouTube.

Other video streaming alternatives are summarized at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

Camtasia users should note that TechSmith will serve up streaming videos in a utility called ScreenCast --- http://www.techsmith.com/screencast.asp

You can read the following at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

However, in most instances open sharing videos are streaming (using the term loosely here) videos for which there is no file to download. In that case the video must be captured in total or in part by software designed for such purposes. The software I like for video capturing is called Camtasia Recorder --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/record.asp
Also see http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/education.asp
This is cheaper alternative than many more specialized products for streaming video capture. You can download my PowerPoint file about Camtasia at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/EdTech/PowerPoint/
Links to examples are given in this slide show.

 

Other streaming media alternatives are summarized at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

August 31, 2008 reply from Rick Lillie at the AAA Accounting Commons --- http://commons.aaahq.org/pages/home

Hi Bob,

Thank you for your comments about VoiceThread.  I would like to expand on several points that you raised.

Regarding the way VoiceThread works

VoiceThread is a hosted service that can be used in a variety of ways.  For example, VoiceThread may be used to create

• a digital discussion board where comments may be made in text, audio, or video formats.
• streaming audio commentaries (e.g., streaming lectures, tutorials and personalized feedback to students).
• streaming video commentaries (e.g., steaming lectures, tutorials, and personalized feedback to students).

Currently, VoiceThread is offered in both free and low-fee options.  The pricing screen needs a little more explanation.

• When using the "free" version, you are limited to three active VoiceThread programs (files) at any given time.  If you need to go beyond three active VoiceThread files, simply delete one or replace it with the new program.
• The file size and time limitations apply to EACH VoiceThread program created.  This is not an overall limitations (e.g., for all three VoiceThread programs if you use the "free" version).
• The "Pro" version is extremely generous in that you can create an unlimited number of VoiceThread programs during a subscription year, with each file including up to 500 slides and being up to 100 MB in size.
• You create your slides on your own computer and then upload them into VoiceThread.  Once uploaded, this is where the production process takes place.  Commenting on individual slides is done online through the VoiceThread interface screen.  You control
  • how your VoiceThread will be made available to viewers (i.e., public or private).
  • whether viewers can post reply comments to individual slides within the program.
  • whether individual slides may be downloaded.

• The VoiceThread file is condensed which reduces overall file size for a VoiceThread program.

Pros vs Cons of VoiceThread

• VoiceThread recognizes the need to maintain privacy of materials created for use within a learning environment (i.e., face-to-face, blended, or online classroom setting).  You control who may view a VoiceThread.  While a VoiceThread may be viewed through VoiceThread's social network (i.e., visable to everyone), you may limit viewing.  This is important with respect to satisfying "fair use" of copyrighted materials.
• VoiceThread is extremely easy to use as compared to other software programs (e.g., Camtasia).
• To create a streaming video VoiceThread, all you need is your computer, an internet connection, a headset/microphone, and a webcam.  If you do not have a headset/microphone, you can use a telephone to record the audio track.
• VoiceThread does not currently meet all ADA (Sect. 508) requirements.  However, the developers have said that VoiceThread is expected to be fully ADA compliant by early to mid-2009.
• VoiceThread does not currently include a closed-captioning option.  YouTube announced yesterday (8/30/08) that it has added a closed-captioning feature for use with videos uploaded to YouTube.
• VoiceThread includes a feature that the other software programs do not include.  VoiceThread makes it possible to annotate a slide while the program is being recorded.  All other programs record static slides and attach an audio and/or video track to the slide.  The capturing of the live annotation adds a "warmth" to the delivery of the content that brings the student's learning experience closer to what would be experienced in a live, face-to-face classroom.  I have found that this "single feature" improves the learning experience for students, especially when used in blended and online learning settings.

IN CLOSING

There are lots of ways to create rich-media instructional materials.  I use them extensively in my accounting courses.

Personally, I do not like Camtasia, Adobe Presenter, Camtasia Recorder and similar software programs.  For me, these programs are too complex to use.  I like processes to be as simple as possible.  This is why I prefer VoiceThread.

VoiceThread allows me to focus on creating the slides, pictures (jpeg files), Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) files, etc., that I want to include in a streaming presentation.  VoiceThread makes it easy to go from slides to streaming video with embedded commentary.  VoiceThread saves the file and gives me a URL to the program or the html code for embedding a player into course materials.

The overall process is simple and easy to use.

Many accounting faculty that I have talked with seem hesitant to include technology in their courses and to use technology tools when creating course materials.  When I find something that will make life easier, I share the information.

Thank you for your comments.  I enjoy this type of discussion.

Best wishes,

Rick Lillie

August 31,  2008 reply from Bob Jensen at the AAA Accounting Commons --- http://commons.aaahq.org/pages/home

Hi Rick,

I  really appreciate your detailed elaboration on video creation alternatives. Thank you so much! Please keep them coming at the AAA Commons. You obviously have unique technology skills.

The one area where I disagree with you is on Camtasia. I personally learned how to use Camtasia in less than an hour and then recorded many technical videos for my students to use outside the classroom. It cut down on the traffic through my office door by about 95% from students who just did follow the technical details in class. More importantly these videos (especially the ones about MS Access technicalities) helped me explain things that I forgot how to do over time. Examples of my Camtasia videos can be found at the following links:

ACCT 5342 (AIS videos) --- http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/video/acct5342/

ACCT 5341 (Accounting Theory videos) at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/video/acct5341/ 

I even prepared a tutorial on how to record (capture) computer image videos and produce (compress) them into smaller files for storage and delivery --- http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/video/Tutorials/
(I suggest clicking on the CamtasiaTutorial.wmv file)

I hope accounting professors and students will not be scared away from Camtasia before even trying it out. A limited and free version may be attempted first. It is called Jing --- http://www.jingproject.com/ 

But an even better suggestion is to download Camtasia Studio itself on a free trial basis --- http://www.jingproject.com/ 

Another interesting product from TechSmith is called UserView. Suppose a student is located somewhere else in the world. UserView allows a professor to both see and record what is happening on a student's computer screen such that the professor can analyze the moves and suggest to the student how to do something better. Similarly, the student can see what is happening on a professor's computer while he/she narrates.  Good stuff --- http://www.techsmith.com/uservue.asp 

But for me, the best thing since grapefruit is Camtasia Studio for producing videos for my own servers, YouTube, and possibly even VoiceThread. For YouTube I suggest choosing mpg compressions after recording a wmv video.

Bob Jensen's video helpers are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HelpersVideos.htm

Thanks Rick,

Bob Jensen

The Financial Accounting Standards Board recently approached Bloomfield about studying how to create financial accounting standards that will assist investors as much as possible, he quickly turned to the virtual world for answers.

"Theory Meets Practice Online: Researchers and academics are looking to online worlds such as Second Life to shed new light on old economic questions," by Francesca Di Meglio, Business Week, July 24, 2007 --- Click Here 

In fact, many economics researchers, including Bloomfield, professor of accounting at Cornell's Johnson Graduate School of Management, are using the virtual environment to test ideas involving staples of economics such as game theory, the effects of regulation, and issues involving money. Since 1989, Bloomfield has been running experiments in the lab in which he creates small game economies to study narrow issues. But when the Financial Accounting Standards Board recently approached Bloomfield about studying how to create financial accounting standards that will assist investors as much as possible, he quickly turned to the virtual world for answers.

"It would be very difficult to look at the complex issues that FASB is trying to address with eight people in a laboratory playing a very simple economic game," he says. "I started looking for how I could create a more realistic economy with more players dealing with a high degree of complexity. It didn't take me long to realize that people in virtual worlds are already doing just that."

. . .

At Indiana University, researcher Edward Castronova has posed the idea of creating multiple virtual economies to study the effects of different regulatory policies. At Indiana, Castronova is director of the Synthethic Worlds Initiative, a research center to study virtual worlds. "The opportunity is to conduct controlled research experiments at the level of all society, something social scientists have never been able to do before," the center's Web site notes (see BusinessWeek.com, 5/1/06, "Virtual World, Virtual Economies").

A virtual stock market is certainly not the only online entity that opens itself up to research. Marketers are already using the virtual world to test campaigns, packaging, and consumer satisfaction. Pepsi (PEP) famously tracks use of its products in There.com. Architects seek reaction to design. Starwood Hotels (HOT) test-marketed its new loft designs in Second Life (see BusinessWeek.com, 8/23/06, "Starwood Hotels Explore Second Life First").

Continued in article

Bob Jensen's threads on tools and tricks of the trade are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on Accounting Research versus the Accounting Profession are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen//theory/00overview/theory01.htm#AcademicsVersusProfession

November 30, 2007 message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

RECOMMENDED READING

"Recommended Reading" lists items that have been recommended to me or that Infobits readers have found particularly interesting and/or useful, including books, articles, and websites published by Infobits subscribers. Send your recommendations to carolyn_kotlas@unc.edu for possible inclusion in this column.

Infobits subscriber Karen Ellis, founder of the Educational CyberPlayGround (http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/), recommends the

following:

STUDIO THINKING: THE REAL BENEFITS OF VISUAL ARTS EDUCATION By Lois Hetland, Ellen Winner, Shirley Veneema, and Kimberly M. Sheridan New York: Teachers College Press, 2007

$24.95

ISBN 978-0-8077-4818-3

"The authors set out to tell us why arts education is important and to give art teachers a research based language they can use to describe what they teach, and what is learned. They reached their conclusions after studying a number of well-taught studio classes in two schools.

Over the course of a year, they observed what they call a 'hidden curriculum' that defines what art education is and what it does. Studio Thinking presents their findings in a cohesive model along with lesson examples and commentary. The authors say they want to 'change the conversation about the arts in this country' and that could happen if they can resurrect, or reinvigorate, some of their earlier work. Studio Thinking presents what the authors say is the right 'reason' for arts education as opposed to some other rationales, which they say, are just plain wrong."

-- Review by John Broomall, Executive director of the Pennsylvania

Alliance for Arts Education

http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/Arts/StudioThinkingArtsAdvocacy.html

Summarizing Academic Accounting Research for Practitioners

April 14, 2007 message from Ron Huefner [rhuefner@acsu.buffalo.edu]

The Journal of Accountancy (AICPA) has begun a new series of articles to review accounting research papers and explain them to practitioners. The April issue has an article on "Mining Auditing Research."

It summarizes about a dozen research articles, mostly from The Accounting Review, but also including articles from JAR, CAR, AOS, and the European Accounting Review.

The link for this article is: <http://aicpa.org/pubs/jofa/apr2007/boltlee.htm> 

This may be useful in bringing research findings into classes

Ron

Question
When should professors add practitioners to their courses?

"Mixing Theory and Practice on Defense Policy," by Andy Guess, Inside Higher Ed, August 8, 2007 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/08/08/defense

In a class about United Nations regulations on the laws of war, the discussion turned inevitably to Star Trek.

When the U.N. authorizes sanctions against a particular nation, said Ilan Berman, the professor, the institution acts much like the Borg — in the show’s universe, a mechanized force of cyborg mercenaries bent on assimilating all of mankind. The analogy was lost on most of the class, but Berman drove the point home for those who didn’t regularly tune in to syndicated science fiction programs in the early 1990s: Each member nation must act as part of the collective.

The lecture, peppered as it was with the occasional pop culture reference, covered a lot of ground, from the U.S. national security strategy to the justifications for nations’ use of force. The students in the class — five were present on a Monday night in July for the elective — come from a range of backgrounds, several of them working full-time, but all in the program with an eye toward defense policy, whether in the government, consulting or think tanks.

In Washington, those are hardly unorthodox goals. Programs in defense or security studies churn out students every year in the nation’s capital, from well-known and respected institutions such as Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies and Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, and also outside the Beltway at places like Harvard (Kennedy) and Princeton (Wilson). The students in Berman’s class, tucked in a conference room on the seventh floor of a corporate office building in Fairfax, Va., are part of a relatively new experiment: What if a state school in Springfield, Mo., operated a satellite campus alongside the established players in defense studies?

So far, enrollments have been growing each year since the unit opened shop in 2005 within commuting distance from the city, sandwiched between a rapidly developing apartment complex and an office park. The Department of Defense and Strategic Studies, a part of Missouri State University, caters to students who want to break into Beltway defense circles with a public university price tag and the advantages of a more practical approach. In doing so, it offers a two-year M.S. degree that requires both coursework and internships.

Having access to actual practitioners in the classroom means, in this case, connections to defense and foreign policy officials in the government. As with others like it, the program has had a long revolving-doors tradition, starting from its original incarnation in the early 1970s at the University of Southern California, where it was founded by a former defense official who served on the SALT I delegation, William R. Van Cleave, and partially funded by the free-market Earhart Foundation. But unlike at similar departments elsewhere, Missouri State’s full-time faculty of three and its nine affiliated lecturers tend to come mainly from positions in Republican administrations and conservative-leaning institutions.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
Some years back Professor Sharon Lightner (UC at San Diego) put together a really interesting online course for students, practitioners, and accounting standard setters in six different countries where the classes met synchronously.
"An Innovative Online International Accounting Course on Six Campuses Around the World" --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/255light.htm

Open Sharing and Adaptive Hypermedia

There are now nearly 7,000 accounting education videos on YouTube, most of which are in very basic accounting.
But there are nearly 150 videos in advanced accounting.
Sometimes the videos are advertisements such as an advertisement for downloading
INTERMEDIATE ACCOUNTING 12th ED Solutions Manual by KIESO, WEYGANT, WARFIELD
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ca08uh1cq1Y

There are nearly 70 videos on XBRL.

More than 100 colleges have set up channels on YouTube --- http://www.youtube.com/edu
Many universities offer over 100 videos, whereas Stanford offers a whopping 583

"YouTube Creates New Section to Highlight College Content," by Jeffrey R. Young, Chronicle of Higher Education, March 27, 2009 --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3684&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

More than 100 colleges have set up channels on YouTube, and this week the popular video service unveiled a new section that brings together all of that campus content in one area.

It had been difficult to find college lectures on YouTube, since they are generally far less popular than the site’s humorous and outrageous clips, and so they do not show up in lists of the most viewed videos on the site. Although YouTube has long had an education category, it relies on users who post videos to decide whether to categorize their videos as educational, and as a result the definition of education is very broad. The new YouTube EDU page includes only material submitted by colleges and universities.

Spencer Crooks, a spokesman for YouTube, said in a statement that the site now features complete lectures for some 200 full college courses. “Subjects range from computer science to literature, biology to philosophy, history, political science, psychology, law, and much more,” he said. “You can search within YouTube EDU to find videos on topics of interest.”

The new section makes it possible to find out which college-produced video is most popular. The winner so far is an interview with a University of Minnesota professor discussing the science behind the new movie Watchmen. That video has been viewed about 1.5 million times. The most popular lecture video on YouTube is from the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, on the subject of “Advanced Finite Elements Analysis” (which has been viewed about 19,000 times).

Bob Jensen's threads on open sharing are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

Bob Jensen's threads on general education tutorials are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#EducationResearch

MIT's Video Lecture Search Engine: Watch the video at --- http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/
Researchers at MIT have released a video and audio search tool that solves one of the most challenging problems in the field: how to break up a lengthy academic lecture into manageable chunks, pinpoint the location of keywords, and direct the user to them. Announced last month, the MIT Lecture Browser website gives the general public detailed access to more than 200 lectures publicly available though the university's OpenCourseWare initiative. The search engine leverages decades' worth of speech-recognition research at MIT and other institutions to convert audio into text and make it searchable.
Kate Greene, MIT's Technology Review, November 26, 2007 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/19747/?nlid=686&a=f
Once again, the Lecture Browser link (with video) is at http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/
Bob Jensen's search helpers are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm

Find free video lectures from free universities at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

"UC Berkeley university puts course videos (but not for credit) on YouTube," PhysOrg, October 3, 2007 --- http://physorg.com/news110638174.html

University offerings at the dedicated YouTube channel include peace and conflict studies, bioengineering courses, and a science class titled "Physics for Future Presidents."

"UC Berkeley on YouTube will provide a public window into university life: academics, events and athletics," said vice provost for undergraduate education Christina Maslach.

The University plans to continually add videos to the channel, which officially launched Wednesday with about nine full courses consisting of approximately 40 lectures each.

Berkeley lays claim to being the first university to offer full courses on popular video-sharing website YouTube, which is based in Northern California.

The university began online broadcasts, called "webcasts," of its own in 2001 and last year began making audio "podcasts" available for download at Apple's iTunes online store.

"We are excited to make UC Berkeley videos available to the world on YouTube," said Ben Hubbard, who co-manages the university's webcast program.

"I think the whole open content movement is in keeping with what we are as a public institution, we really believe at our core that making this available to the public is truly important."
 

UC Berkeley is the first university to make videos of full courses available through YouTube. Visitors to the site at youtube.com/ucberkeley can view more than 300 hours of videotaped courses and events. Topics range from bioengineering, to peace and conflict studies, to "Physics for Future Presidents," the title of a popular campus course. Building on its initial offerings, UC Berkeley will continue to expand the catalog of videos available on YouTube.
View the Playlist Here --- http://www.youtube.com/ucberkeley 
There is a link to the most viewed videos (with star ratings) at the above page.

Examples include Integrative Biology, Physics, Chemistry, Electrical Engineering, etc.
Links to 201 videos --- http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=ucberkeley&p=r
You can search by topic in the search box at the above page.

On October 4, 2007 I could not find any accounting, finance, or economics videos at the UC Berkeley site. There were six courses that popped up for "Business."

Here's a student, who created a RealPlayer playlist, explaining how to these videos --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUfKoXtwEu0

Also see Webcast.Berkeley [iTunes, Real Player] http://webcast.berkeley.edu/ 

UC Berkeley also has XLab --- http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2004/07/13_xlab.shtml

Nearly all prestigious universities now offer some form of open sharing of course materials, the most noteworthy of which is MIT. Yale, however, has some of the finest lectures on video --- http://www.yale.edu/opa/download/VLP_QuestionsAnswers.pdf

From Princeton
University Channel (video and audio) ---  http://uc.princeton.edu/main/

From the University of Texas
Take Five from the University of Texas http://www.utexas.edu/inside_ut/take5/

From Harvard
Introduction --- http://athome.harvard.edu/about/about.htm
Program List --- http://athome.harvard.edu/archive/archive.asp

Teaching Materials (especially video) from PBS

Teacher Source:  Arts and Literature --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/arts_lit.htm

Teacher Source:  Health & Fitness --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/health.htm

Teacher Source: Math --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/math.htm

Teacher Source:  Science --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/sci_tech.htm

Teacher Source:  PreK2 --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/prek2.htm

Teacher Source:  Library Media ---  http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/library.htm

Video Lecture Search
Type in "Video Lectures" with quotation marks at http://megite.com/discover.php?q=learning
Example:  David Deutsch Quantum Computation Lectures --- http://www.quiprocone.org/quipmain.htm  

You can read about these and other examples of open sharing at major universities at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

Winners of KPMG's Integrity/Ethics Videos Contest --- http://www.kpmgcampus.com/whoweare/ethics.shtml

Copyright Restrictions on Open Sharing/Source Learning Materials

These are only my opinions, and they should not be taken as legal advice.
Just because something can be accessed online does not mean it is an open sharing item. Generally online items are like library books that can be accessed by the public but have copyright restrictions copying and uses other than personal reading. If online learning materials are billed as "open sharing," or "open source" (as in the case of OCW materials at MIT) chances are that they can be used in total or in part for educational purposes in other open sharing materials if proper credits are given. In commercial materials such as books and course videos, there is vulnerability for lawsuit by the copyright owners. In my personal opinion, I think a lot depends upon how central the copyrighted material is to the purchased material. If use is incidental and credits are fully proper, then the risks of lawsuit are less than when the copyrighted material becomes more featured in the material. In any case, it is good advice to seek permission from copyright owners if the use is for some for-profit purpose. This probably includes online or onsite courses for which fees are charged to take the course. The dreaded DMCA is somewhat vague on open sharing materials, but open sharing does not mean that copyright owners have abandoned all rights. You can read more about the dreaded DMCA at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/theworry.htm

This is Very Important --- http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/help/faq3/index.htm
MIT is the most open sharing major university in terms of course materials --- http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/home/home/index.htm
It's statement on intellectual property sets, in my opinion, precedent for most other open sharing colleges --- http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/help/faq3/index.htm

YouTube has a statement about use of YouTube videos at http://www.youtube.com/t/howto_copyright
Also see http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/topic.py?topic=10550&hl=en_US

Since the term "open source" is rooted in computer software, the term is a bit cloudy when it comes to text and multimedia learning materials. You can read more about open sharing and copyrights at the following sites:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_license
• http://www.e-strategy.ubc.ca/news/update0409/040929-copyright.html
• http://questioncopyright.org/copyright_and_open_source
• http://digg.com/linux_unix/Open_source_developers_file_first_GPL_copyright_infringement_suit_in_the_US
• http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Legal/2002/copyright-software-20021231

How to Excerpt Open Courseware Video, Compress It, and Serve it Up to Students

Suppose that a very long video lecture is available as open courseware for proper use in other learning materials. An instructor may only want to use parts of this lecture in another course or supplemental tutorials for a course. Searching a long video is tedious and time consuming. A better approach is to make audio or video excerpts of portions of the long lecture.

Homemade video tutorial (very basic) on how to record streaming audio on your PC --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPHSDOyj5f8
Note the passing reference to a free sound recorder called Audacity --- http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
Note that if you are watching a lecture video that's pretty much a talking head, it saves a lot, I mean a LOT, of file space to only capture the audio.
This might, for example, work very well when capturing parts of  the many UC Berkeley, YouTube, Yale, or Harvard video lectures --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI
Just in case source streams disappear from the Internet, I suggest capturing what's important to you and saving to external media such as a CD or DVD disk.
Capturing also allows you to only capture what is relevant to you or your students without having to spend a lot of time waiting for the good parts.

If the video open sharing video is a file, you might be able to download the video file and then edit the file using something like the Producer Module in Camtasia Studio --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/enhance.asp

However, in most instances open sharing videos are streaming (using the term loosely here) videos for which there is no file to download. In that case the video must be captured in total or in part by software designed for such purposes. The software I like for video capturing is called Camtasia Recorder --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/record.asp
Also see http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/education.asp
This is cheaper alternative than many more specialized products for streaming video capture. You can download my PowerPoint file about Camtasia at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/EdTech/PowerPoint/
Links to examples are given in this slide show.

You can read about other alternatives for streaming video capture at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

When you capture streaming media as an avi file it has the advantage in that you can edit the movie and delete parts you do not want using software like Camtasia Producer  --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/enhance.asp
You can also add interaction "skip to" buttons, quiz questions/answers, survey questions, etc.

But captured avi files are generally enormous and cannot be stored efficiently anywhere. After you've excerpted and edited the captured video as an avi file it is almost always necessary to compress it into a wmv, mov, rm, scf, flv, or some related option such as the compression options available in Camtasia Producer. There is not generally a noticeable quality degradation in the compressed versions. However, it is not possible, at least in Camtasia, to alter the compressed version without recapturing it as an avi file.

After you have your compressed file such as a wmv you will need to get it to your students. Chances are that your Blackboard, WebCT, or Web server does not give you enough capacity to serve up a lot of video, including space-saving compressed video. The next best thing is to either distribute your video to students on CD or DVD disks or to send it to them over the Internet.

It is not generally possible to attach large video files to email messages. However there are very good free alternatives for sending files to students over the Internet --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm#SendingLargeFiles

Bob Jensen's threads on free online textbooks and other electronic literature --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm

Camtasia Studio + iPods = Videos to Go --- http://visuallounge.techsmith.com/2006/02/camtasia_studio__ipod__videos_to_go.html

Twiki wiki Tutorial by Michael Lougee at the University of Minnesota ---  https://wiki.umn.edu/view/Main/MichaelLougee

May 3, 2006 message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

RESOURCES FOR RESHAPING SCHOLARLY COMMUNICATION

". . . the crisis in the scholarly communication system not only threatens the well being of libraries, but also it threatens our academic faculty's ability to do world-class research. With current technologies, we now have, for the first time in history, the tools necessary to effect change ourselves. We must do everything in our power to change the current scholarly communication system and promote open access to scholarly articles."

Paul G. Haschak's webliography provides resources to help effect this change. "Reshaping the World of Scholarly Communication -- Open Access and the Free Online Scholarship Movement: Open Access Statements, Proposals, Declarations, Principles, Strategies, Organizations, Projects, Campaigns, Initiatives, and Related Items -- A Webliography" (E-JASL, vol. 7, no. 1, spring 2006) is available online at http://southernlibrarianship.icaap.org/content/v07n01/haschak_p01.htm

E-JASL: The Electronic Journal of Academic and Special Librarianship [ISSN 1704-8532] is an independent, professional, refereed electronic journal dedicated to advancing knowledge and research in the areas of academic and special librarianship. E-JASL is published by the Consortium for the Advancement of Academic Publication (ICAAP), Athabasca, Canada. For more information, contact: Paul Haschak, Executive Editor, Board President, and Founder, Linus A. Sims Memorial Library, Southeastern Louisiana University, Hammond, LA USA;
email: phaschak@selu.edu 
Web: http://southernlibrarianship.icaap.org/

November 2, 2006 message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

OPEN SOURCE IN HIGHER EDUCATION

The October/November 2006 issue (vol. 3, issue 1) of INNOVATE is devoted to open source and the "potential of open source software and related trends to transform educational practice." Papers include:

"Getting Open Source Software into Schools: Strategies and Challenges" by Gary Hepburn and Jan Buley

"Looking Toward the Future: A Case Study of Open Source Software in the Humanities" by Harvey Quamen

"Harnessing Open Technologies to Promote Open Educational Knowledge Sharing" by Toru Iiyoshi, Cheryl Richardson, and Owen McGrath

The complete issue is available at http://www.innovateonline.info/ .

Innovate [ISSN 1552-3233] is a bimonthly, peer-reviewed online periodical published by the Fischler School of Education and Human Services at Nova Southeastern University. The journal focuses on the creative use of information technology (IT) to enhance educational processes in academic, commercial, and government settings. Readers can comment on articles, share material with colleagues and friends, and participate in open forums. For more information, contact: James L. Morrison, Editor-in-Chief, Innovate; email: innovate@nova.edu ; Web: http://www.innovateonline.info/ .

Bob Jensen's threads on open sourcing are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

......................................................................

ADAPTIVE HYPERMEDIA

The JOURNAL OF DIGITAL INFORMATION (JoDI) has recently published a special issue focusing on adaptive hypermedia. "Adaptive hypermedia systems are those that build a profile of the user and then deliver content that is appropriate for these needs, rather than the more traditional 'one-size-fits-all' approach of the web." These systems have the potential for tailoring online learning experiences to the individual student.

The complete issue (vol. 7, no. 1, 2006) is available at http://journals.tdl.org/jodi/issue/view/29 .

The Journal of Digital Information (JoDI) [ISSN: 1368-7506] is a peer-reviewed Web journal, supported by Texas A&M University Libraries. Current and past issues are available at http://journals.tdl.org/jodi .

See also:

"Adaptive Hypermedia: A New Paradigm for Educational Software" By H. Spallek ADVANCES IN DENTAL RESEARCH, vol. 17, December 2003, pp. 38-42 http://adr.iadrjournals.org/cgi/reprint/17/1/38  [Note: online access available via a subscription by your institution.]

Although this paper discusses how adaptive hypermedia was used in dental education courses, it's findings can be applied to other disciplines.

Bob Jensen's threads on asynchronous learning are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/255wp.htm

History of Spreadsheets in Education

"Spreadsheets in Education–The First 25 Years," by  John E Baker Director, Natural Maths john@naturalmaths.com.au  and Stephen J Sugden School of Information Technology, Bond University ssugden@bond.edu.au , July 24, 2003 --- http://www.sie.bond.edu.au/articles/1.1/bakersugden.pdf

Spreadsheets made their first appearance for personal computers in 1979 in the form of VisiCalc [45], an application designed to help with accounting tasks. Since that time, the diversity of applications of the spreadsheet program is evidenced by its continual reappearance in scholarly journals. Nowhere is its application becoming more marked than in the field of education. From primary to tertiary levels, the spreadsheet is gradually increasing in its importance as a tool for teaching and learning. By way of an introduction to the new electronic journal Spreadsheets in Education, the editors have compiled this overview of the use of spreadsheets in education. The aim is to provide a comprehensive bibliography and springboard from which others may develop their own applications and reports on educational applications of spreadsheets. For despite its rising popularity, the spreadsheet has still a long way to go before becoming a universal tool for teaching and learning, and many opportunities for its application have yet to be explored. The basic paradigm of an array of rows-and-columns with automatic update and display of results has been extended with libraries of mathematical and statistical functions, versatile graphing and charting facilities, powerful add-ins such as Microsoft Excel’s Solver, attractive and highlyfunctional graphical user interfaces, and the ability to write custom code in languages such as Microsoft’s Visual Basic for Applications. It is difficult to believe that Bricklin, the original creator of VisiCalc could have imagined the modern form of the now ubiquitous spreadsheet program. But the basic idea of the electronic spreadsheet has stood the test of time; indeed it is nowadays an indispensable item of software, not only in business and in the home, but also in academe. This paper briefly examines the history of the spreadsheet, then goes on to give a survey of major books, papers and conference presentations over the past 25 years, all in the area of educational applications of spreadsheets.

Bob Jensen's video tutorials on spreadsheets are at
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/video/acct5342/

Bob Jensen's threads on the history of education technologies are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

Bye Bye Blackboard

The Blackboard:  A tribute to a long-standing but fading teaching and learning tool
From the Museum of History and Science at Oxford University: 
Bye Bye Blackboard: From Einstein and others --- http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/blackboard/

Bob Jensen's threads on technology in education are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm

Devices and Systems for Mobile Learning

Question
What are real time virtual office hours?
Hint:
They operate a bit like a course chat room with some added features like microphones, and an instructor or teaching fellow is in the room at all times.

A tools PowerPoint file is included at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/EdTech/PowerPoint/

June 29, 2007 message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

PAPERS ON MOBILE LEARNING

Mobile learning is the theme of the current issue of the INTERNATIONAL REVIEW OF RESEARCH IN OPEN AND DISTANCE LEARNING. Papers include:

"Mobile Distance Learning with PDAs: Development and Testing of Pedagogical and System Solutions Supporting Mobile Distance Learners" by Torstein Rekkedal and Aleksander Dye, Norwegian School of Information Technology

"The Growth of m-Learning and the Growth of Mobile Computing: Parallel Developments" by Jason G. Caudill, Grand Canyon University

"Mobile Learning and Student Retention" by Bharat Inder Fozdar and Lalita S. Kumar, India Gandhi National Open University

"Instant Messaging for Creating Interactive and Collaborative m-Learning Environments" by James Kadirire, Anglia Ruskin University

"m-Learning: Positioning Educators for a Mobile, Connected Future" by Kristine Peters, Flinders University

The issue is available at http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/issue/view/29 . Papers are available not only in HTML and PDF formats, but you can also download and listen to them in MP3 audio versions.

International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning (IRRODL) [ISSN 1492-3831] is a free, refereed ejournal published by Athabasca University - Canada's Open University. For more information, contact Paula Smith, IRRODL Managing Editor; tel: 780-675-6810; fax: 780-675-672;
email: irrodl@athabascau.ca ;
Web: http://www.irrodl.org/ .

See also:

"Are You Ready for Mobile Learning?" By Joseph Rene Corbeil and Maria Elena Valdes-Corbeil, University of Texas at Brownsville EDUCAUSE QUARTERLY, vol. 30, no. 2, 2007 http://www.educause.edu/apps/eq/eqm07/eqm0726.asp 

"Frequent use of mobile devices does not mean that students or instructors are ready for mobile learning and teaching."

The Future of Textbooks

June 29, 2007 message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

......................................................................

PROPOSED SOLUTION TO "BROKEN" COLLEGE TEXTBOOK MARKET

"Most debates over high textbook prices devolve into a blame game . . . Publishers go after excessive profits, bookstores stock too few used books, professors ignore prices and switch books on a whim, colleges fail to guide their faculty members, and students are not smart shoppers. Such claims are unproductive, the [Education Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance] says, though it sides more with students than with publishers." [The Chronicle of Higher Education, June 1, 2007]

After a yearlong study, the Committee, an independent panel that advises the U.S. Congress on student aid policy, has released "Turn the Page: Making College Textbooks More Affordable," a report that addresses the problem of rising prices of college textbooks. Long-term solutions would entail an "infrastructure of technology and support services with which institutions, students, faculty, bookstores, publishers, and other content providers can interact efficiently. This infrastructure would consist of a transaction and rights clearinghouse, numerous marketplace Web applications, and hosted infrastructure resources. . . . The hosted infrastructure would ensure that all systems interface, support a registry of millions of learning items, provide marketplace services to thousands of campuses and millions of users, and process hundreds of millions of transactions for both fee-based and no-cost content."

The report and related materials are available at
http://www.ed.gov/about/bdscomm/list/acsfa/edlite-txtbkstudy.html .

......................................................................

PAPERS ON MOBILE LEARNING

Mobile learning is the theme of the current issue of the INTERNATIONAL REVIEW OF RESEARCH IN OPEN AND DISTANCE LEARNING. Papers include:

"Mobile Distance Learning with PDAs: Development and Testing of Pedagogical and System Solutions Supporting Mobile Distance Learners" by Torstein Rekkedal and Aleksander Dye, Norwegian School of Information Technology

"The Growth of m-Learning and the Growth of Mobile Computing: Parallel Developments" by Jason G. Caudill, Grand Canyon University

"Mobile Learning and Student Retention" by Bharat Inder Fozdar and Lalita S. Kumar, India Gandhi National Open University

"Instant Messaging for Creating Interactive and Collaborative m-Learning Environments" by James Kadirire, Anglia Ruskin University

"m-Learning: Positioning Educators for a Mobile, Connected Future" by Kristine Peters, Flinders University

The issue is available at http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/issue/view/29 . Papers are available not only in HTML and PDF formats, but you can also download and listen to them in MP3 audio versions.

International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning (IRRODL) [ISSN 1492-3831] is a free, refereed ejournal published by Athabasca University - Canada's Open University. For more information, contact Paula Smith, IRRODL Managing Editor; tel: 780-675-6810; fax: 780-675-672;
email: irrodl@athabascau.ca ;
Web: http://www.irrodl.org/ .

See also:

"Are You Ready for Mobile Learning?" By Joseph Rene Corbeil and Maria Elena Valdes-Corbeil, University of Texas at Brownsville EDUCAUSE QUARTERLY, vol. 30, no. 2, 2007 http://www.educause.edu/apps/eq/eqm07/eqm0726.asp 

"Frequent use of mobile devices does not mean that students or instructors are ready for mobile learning and teaching."

Answer
Top 100 --- http://www.c4lpt.co.uk/recommended/top100.html
Various experts list their Top 10 --- http://www.c4lpt.co.uk/recommended/index.html

Jensen Comment
I totally disagree with the rankings of the Top 100 and the Top 10.

Where is Blackboard and WebCT? --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackboard

Where are the many important tools for handicapped learners? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Handicapped

Where is Camtasia? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HelpersVideos.htm

Where are the edutainment and learning game alternatives? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Edutainment

Where is Matlab (used in virtually every U.S. university) --- --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MATLAB

Like it or not, Wikipedia is one of the most sought out sights in the world by e-Learners --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
There are risks, but the odds are high that users will get helpful learning information and links.

Where are HTML and related XML/RTF and XBRL markups?  --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/XBRLandOLAP.htm  

Where are the many huge and free online libraries? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm

Where are the important blogs and listservs? --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListServRoles.htm

I could go on and on here!

Bob Jensen

Bob Jensen's threads on the history of course authoring, management, and presentation technologies are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on tools and tricks of the trade are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm 

August 3, 2007 reply from Richard Campbell [campbell@RIO.EDU]

Bob:
I agree with you that the list is flawed - Toolbook should be #1

Richard J. Campbell
mailto:campbell@rio.edu

August 3, 2007 reply from Bob Jensen

Hi Richard

ToolBook should’ve been number 1 but it fumbled the ball. What proportion of e-Learners are now learning, today, from ToolBooks? My guess is that much less than one percent. A negligible proportion of instructors are developing learning materials using ToolBook dhtml files relative to FrontPage and Dreamweaver htm files.

The biggest innovation for e-Learners and authors was Adobe Acrobat’s tremendous development of online pdf files that could be read and electronically searched for free but not be tampered with by readers. Now major commercial publishing houses are putting new books on line as pdf files.

One of the biggest innovations I forgot to mention was the unknown (at least to me) date in which MS Office files (particularly ppt, doc, and xls files) could be downloaded and read from a Web servers that at one time only could handle htm markups. In terms of e-learning htm, pdf, doc, xls, and ppt files are overwhelmingly the main files for e-Learning, although they are now joined by such files as xml files.

Another huge e-Learning innovation that I forgot to mention is the unknown (at least to me) date in which the above learning and research files could be attached to email messages. This made it easier to have private distributions (say to students in a class) without having to put files on Web, Blackboard, or WebCT servers. Anybody with email can not send files back and forth.

There is still a great risk of macro viruses when downloading MS Office files from the Web or email messages. However, most e-Learners are doing so from trusted Web sites and/or email senders such as files from their course instructors.

ToolBook could fade away and the world would hardly know about it or miss it.

Bob Jensen

The future of text books?
From Jim Mahar's blog on June 16, 2005 --- http://financeprofessorblog.blogspot.com/

The future of text books?
Megginson and Smart Introdcution to Corporate Finance--Companion Site

Wow.
I think we may have a glimpse into the future of text books with this one. It is the new Introduction to Corporate Finance by William Megginson and Scott Smart.

From videos for most topics, to interviews, to powerpoint, to a student study guide, to excel help...just a total integration of a text and a web site! Well done!

At St. Bonaventure we have adopted the text for the fall semester and the book actually has made me excited to be teaching an introductory course! It is that good!!

BTW Before I get accused of selling out, let me say I get zero for this plug. I have met each author at conferences but do not really know either of them. And like any first edition book there may be some errors, but that said, this is the future of college text books!

Check out some of the online material here. More material is available with book purchase.

Bob Jensen's threads on education technology are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm

The Latest Experiments in Student Recruitment by Colleges

Question
Take a look at your college's current Web site.  How does it stack up against the competition?

Answer
The Latest Experiments by Colleges Recruiting New Students

"College Recruiters Lure Students With New Online Tools," by Bob Tedeschi, The New York Times, December 30, 2004 
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/30/technology/circuits/30coll.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1104501548-NF+yTytFntuHGH4s471j9A 

Colleges taking their battle for high school seniors to the Web and beyond.

Frustrated by the failure of e-mail solicitations to generate much response - largely because of the colleges' own unrestrained e-mail policies - admission directors are looking for new ways to incorporate the Internet into their marketing plans. For some, that means setting up more online chats. For others, it means streaming more video from their Web sites.

For Saint Mary's College, a Catholic college for women in Notre Dame, Ind., the answer is a high-tech version of campus view books, glossy tomes featuring ethnically diverse samplings of students wandering through verdant campuses, happy to be within sprinting distance of a Chaucer text.

After two years of testing, this fall Saint Mary's rolled out a video magazine, or Vmag, aimed at prospective applicants. Students can download the publication from the Saint Mary's home page (www.saintmarys.edu), along with software that automatically retrieves updates. When an updated version is ready for viewing, a desktop icon prompts the user to reopen it.

Each Vmag contains four one- to two-minute video clips featuring various aspects of campus life. While some of the clips show monologues by the college president or financial aid director, most are narrated by a pair of Saint Mary's students, who take viewers on a tour.

"We were searching for something a little more innovative and exciting to catch the attention of prospective students, and we found it," said Mary Pat Nolan, who was until recently the Saint Mary's director of admission. "This really sets us apart."

Ms. Nolan, who left Saint Mary's this month, said the college had tested the Vmag for two years, sending it to applicants who had been accepted by the school but had not yet decided to enroll. She said it was impossible to determine how it had affected enrollment, but added that she suspected it had helped.

Delivering a video magazine, Ms. Nolan said, "is a way to tell students we're not living in the dark ages, and that we're technologically advanced."

"We're not a convent school that's isolated, where you'll never see a man or have a social life," she said. "You'll have it all."

That message resonated with Maggie Oldham, who was among the first prospective students to view the video magazine two years ago. Ms. Oldham, now a sophomore, had been accepted by four colleges; initially, Saint Mary's was at the bottom of her list.

"When you see pictures, you think, 'That looks nice,' " Ms. Oldham said. "But with video, I could see myself in that class or at that basketball game. It was pretty persuasive, the whole interactive part of it."

Frequent updates to the video were helpful. "Once you go to all those schools, they all kind of run together," she said. "You can go back and look at all the brochures, but this is better at reinforcing what you've seen."

Kathleen Hessert, co-founder of NewGame Communications, a Charlotte, N.C., company that produces Vmags for schools and other organizations, said the technology is starting to attract interest from more colleges. "I think we were a little bit ahead of the market initially," Ms. Hessert said.

Continued in article

 

PowerPoint Helpers

Question
How can you add audio to PowerPoint presentations?

March 2, 2007 message from David Fordham, James Madison University [fordhadr@JMU.EDU]

March 2, 2007 reply from Richard J. Campbell [campbell@VIRTUALPUBLISHING.NET]

Question
How can you incorporate streaming media such as archived Webcast into a live presentation?

Answer:

You should try www.playstream.com  - They have very inexpensive streaming services using a variety of file types - wmv, mp3, realmedia and quicktime. After you upload your clips to your site, you will get an "easylink", and all you need to do is paste that link into your Powerpoint presentation. Playstream has been purchased by Vitalstream, but the new owner has only enhanced their services.

Richard J. Campbell
mailto:campbell@rio.edu

Presentation Pop Out Tools

September 11, message from David Beckman CPA [ddb@IOWALAW.COM]

I am making a presentation later this month to professionals that are returning to the University for continuing education. I want to focus participant's attention on particular line items on my PowerPoint slides. I will be using an add-in for PowerPoint called PopOut Presenter that does 60-minute type call-outs or tear-outs. Experts at PowerPoint can do some of what it does within PowerPoint, but this is easy, quick and only cost $15. It is available at:

http://www.popoutpresenter.com

September 11, 2002 reply from Bob Jensen

Hi David,

Thank you for linking to a useful product that I never heard about before.

There is a helpful PowerPoint FAQ page that discusses add-ins of various types at http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/
It is interesting to search at the above site using the phrase "pop out"

Bob Jensen

Links to two Bob Jensen helpers for tools are as follows:

http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/newfaculty.htm#Resources

Finding, Capturing, Storing and Sending Open Courseware

From MIT:  New Video Lecture Search Engine --- http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/ 
Watch the video demo at --- http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/

"Searching Video Lectures A tool from MIT finds keywords so that students can efficiently review lectures," by Kate Greene, MIT's Technology Review, November 26, 2007 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/19747/?nlid=686&a=f

Researchers at MIT have released a video and audio search tool that solves one of the most challenging problems in the field: how to break up a lengthy academic lecture into manageable chunks, pinpoint the location of keywords, and direct the user to them. Announced last month, the MIT Lecture Browser website gives the general public detailed access to more than 200 lectures publicly available though the university's OpenCourseWare initiative. The search engine leverages decades' worth of speech-recognition research at MIT and other institutions to convert audio into text and make it searchable.

The Lecture Browser arrives at a time when more and more universities, including Carnegie Mellon University and the University of California, Berkeley, are posting videos and podcasts of lectures online. While this content is useful, locating specific information within lectures can be difficult, frustrating students who are accustomed to finding what they need in less than a second with Google.

"This is a growing issue for universities around the country as it becomes easier to record classroom lectures," says Jim Glass, research scientist at MIT. "It's a real challenge to know how to disseminate them and make it easier for students to get access to parts of the lecture they might be interested in. It's like finding a needle in a haystack."

The fundamental elements of the Lecture Browser have been kicking around research labs at MIT and places such as BBN Technologies in Boston, Carnegie Mellon, SRI International in Palo Alto, CA, and the University of Southern California for more than 30 years. Their efforts have produced software that's finally good enough to find its way to the average person, says Premkumar Natarajan, scientist at BBN. "There's about three decades of work where many fundamental problems were addressed," he says. "The technology is mature enough now that there's a growing sense in the community that it's time [to test applications in the real world]. We've done all we can in the lab."

A handful of companies, such as online audio and video search engines Blinkx and EveryZing (which has licensed technology from BBN) are making use of software that converts audio speech into searchable text. (See "Surfing TV on the Internet" and "More-Accurate Video Search".) But the MIT researchers faced particular challenges with academic lectures. For one, many lecturers are not native English speakers, which makes automatic transcription tricky for systems trained on American English accents. Second, the words favored in science lectures can be rather obscure. Finally, says Regina Barzilay, professor of computer Science at MIT, lectures have very little discernable structure, making them difficult to break up and organize for easy searching. "Topical transitions are very subtle," she says. "Lectures aren't organized like normal text."

To tackle these problems, the researchers first configured the software that converts the audio to text. They trained the software to understand particular accents using accurate transcriptions of short snippets of recorded speech. To help the software identify uncommon words--anything from "drosophila" to "closed-loop integrals"--the researchers provided it with additional data, such as text from books and lecture notes, which assists the software in accurately transcribing as many as four out of five words. If the system is used with a nonnative English speaker whose accent and vocabulary it hasn't been trained to recognize, the accuracy can drop to 50 percent. (Such a low accuracy would not be useful for direct transcription but can still be useful for keyword searches.)
 

Once again, the Lecture Browser link (with a video demo) is at http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/

Find free video lectures from leading universities at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

Bob Jensen's search helpers are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm

"UC Berkeley university puts course videos (but not for credit) on YouTube," PhysOrg, October 3, 2007 --- http://physorg.com/news110638174.html

University offerings at the dedicated YouTube channel include peace and conflict studies, bioengineering courses, and a science class titled "Physics for Future Presidents."

"UC Berkeley on YouTube will provide a public window into university life: academics, events and athletics," said vice provost for undergraduate education Christina Maslach.

The University plans to continually add videos to the channel, which officially launched Wednesday with about nine full courses consisting of approximately 40 lectures each.

Berkeley lays claim to being the first university to offer full courses on popular video-sharing website YouTube, which is based in Northern California.

The university began online broadcasts, called "webcasts," of its own in 2001 and last year began making audio "podcasts" available for download at Apple's iTunes online store.

"We are excited to make UC Berkeley videos available to the world on YouTube," said Ben Hubbard, who co-manages the university's webcast program.

"I think the whole open content movement is in keeping with what we are as a public institution, we really believe at our core that making this available to the public is truly important."
 

UC Berkeley is the first university to make videos of full courses available through YouTube. Visitors to the site at youtube.com/ucberkeley can view more than 300 hours of videotaped courses and events. Topics range from bioengineering, to peace and conflict studies, to "Physics for Future Presidents," the title of a popular campus course. Building on its initial offerings, UC Berkeley will continue to expand the catalog of videos available on YouTube.
View the Playlist Here --- http://www.youtube.com/ucberkeley 
There is a link to the most viewed videos (with star ratings) at the above page.

Examples include Integrative Biology, Physics, Chemistry, Electrical Engineering, etc.
Links to 201 videos --- http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=ucberkeley&p=r
You can search by topic in the search box at the above page.

On October 4, 2007 I could not find any accounting, finance, or economics videos at the UC Berkeley site. There were six courses that popped up for "Business."

Here's a student, who created a RealPlayer playlist, explaining how to record the audio of these videos --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUfKoXtwEu0

Also see Webcast.Berkeley [iTunes, Real Player] http://webcast.berkeley.edu/ 

UC Berkeley also has XLab --- http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2004/07/13_xlab.shtml

Nearly all prestigious universities now offer some form of open sharing of course materials, the most noteworthy of which is MIT. Yale, however, has some of the finest lectures on video --- http://www.yale.edu/opa/download/VLP_QuestionsAnswers.pdf

From Princeton
University Channel (video and audio) ---  http://uc.princeton.edu/main/

From the University of Texas
Take Five from the University of Texas http://www.utexas.edu/inside_ut/take5/

From Harvard
Introduction --- http://athome.harvard.edu/about/about.htm
Program List --- http://athome.harvard.edu/archive/archive.asp

Teaching Materials (especially video) from PBS

Teacher Source:  Arts and Literature --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/arts_lit.htm

Teacher Source:  Health & Fitness --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/health.htm

Teacher Source: Math --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/math.htm

Teacher Source:  Science --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/sci_tech.htm

Teacher Source:  PreK2 --- http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/prek2.htm

Teacher Source:  Library Media ---  http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/library.htm

Science Videos --- http://www.scivee.tv/

Video Lecture Search
Type in "Video Lectures" with quotation marks at http://megite.com/discover.php?q=learning
Example:  David Deutsch Quantum Computation Lectures --- http://www.quiprocone.org/quipmain.htm  

Educause Live --- http://www.educause.edu/content.asp?SECTION_ID=34&bhcp=1

You can read about these and other examples of open sharing at major universities at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

Copyright Restrictions on Open Sharing/Source/Courseware Learning Materials

These are only my opinions, and they should not be taken as legal advice.
Just because something can be accessed online does not mean it is an open sharing item. Generally online items are like library books that can be accessed by the public but have copyright restrictions about copying and uses other than personal reading. If online learning materials are billed as "open sharing," or "open source" (as in the case of OCW materials at MIT) chances are that they can be used in total or in part for educational purposes in other open sharing materials if proper credits are given. In commercial materials such as books and course videos, there is vulnerability for lawsuit by the copyright owners. In my personal opinion, I think a lot depends upon how central the copyrighted material is to the purchased material. If use is incidental and credits are fully proper, then the risks of lawsuit are less than when the copyrighted material becomes more featured in the material. In any case, it is good advice to seek permission from copyright owners if the use is for some for-profit purpose. This probably includes online or onsite courses for which fees are charged to take the course. The dreaded DMCA is somewhat vague on open sharing materials, but open sharing does not mean that copyright owners have abandoned all rights. You can read more about the dreaded DMCA at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/theworry.htm

This is Very Important --- http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/help/faq3/index.htm
MIT is the most open sharing major university in terms of course materials --- http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/home/home/index.htm
It's statement on intellectual property sets, in my opinion, precedent for most other open sharing colleges --- http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/help/faq3/index.htm

YouTube has a statement about use of YouTube videos at http://www.youtube.com/t/howto_copyright
Also see http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/topic.py?topic=10550&hl=en_US

Since the term "open source" is rooted in computer software, the term is a bit cloudy when it comes to text and multimedia learning materials. You can read more about open sharing and copyrights at the following sites:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_license
• http://www.e-strategy.ubc.ca/news/update0409/040929-copyright.html
• http://questioncopyright.org/copyright_and_open_source
• http://digg.com/linux_unix/Open_source_developers_file_first_GPL_copyright_infringement_suit_in_the_US
• http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Legal/2002/copyright-software-20021231

How to Excerpt Open Courseware Video, Compress It, and Serve it Up to Students

Suppose that a very long video lecture is available as open courseware for proper use in other learning materials. An instructor may only want to use parts of this lecture in another course or supplemental tutorials for a course. Searching a long video is tedious and time consuming. A better approach is to make audio or video excerpts of portions of the long lecture.

Homemade video tutorial (very basic) on how to record streaming audio on your PC --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPHSDOyj5f8
Note the passing reference to a free sound recorder called Audacity --- http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
Note that if you are watching a lecture video that's pretty much a talking head, it saves a lot, I mean a LOT, of file space to only capture the audio.
This might, for example, work very well when capturing parts of  the many UC Berkeley, YouTube, Yale, or Harvard video lectures --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI
Just in case source streams disappear from the Internet, I suggest capturing what's important to you and saving to external media such as a CD or DVD disk.
Capturing also allows you to only capture what is relevant to you or your students without having to spend a lot of time waiting for the good parts.

If the video open sharing video is a file, you might be able to download the video file and then edit the file using something like the Producer Module in Camtasia Studio --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/enhance.asp

However, in most instances open sharing videos are streaming (using the term loosely here) videos for which there is no file to download. In that case the video must be captured in total or in part by software designed for such purposes. The software I like for video capturing is called Camtasia Recorder --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/record.asp
Also see http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/education.asp
This is cheaper alternative than many more specialized products for streaming video capture. You can download my PowerPoint file about Camtasia at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/EdTech/PowerPoint/
Links to examples are given in this slide show.

You can read about other alternatives for streaming video capture at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

When you capture streaming media as an avi file it has the advantage in that you can edit the movie and delete parts you do not want using software like Camtasia Producer  --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/enhance.asp
You can also add interaction "skip to" buttons, quiz questions/answers, survey questions, etc.

But captured avi files are generally enormous and cannot be stored efficiently anywhere. After you've excerpted and edited the captured video as an avi file it is almost always necessary to compress it into a wmv, mov, rm, scf, flv, or some related option such as the compression options available in Camtasia Producer. There is not generally a noticeable quality degradation in the compressed versions. However, it is not possible, at least in Camtasia, to alter the compressed version without recapturing it as an avi file.

After you have your compressed file such as a wmv you will need to get it to your students. Chances are that your Blackboard, WebCT, or Web server does not give you enough capacity to serve up a lot of video, including space-saving compressed video. The next best thing is to either distribute your video to students on CD or DVD disks or to send it to them over the Internet.

It is not generally possible to attach large video files to email messages. However there are very good free alternatives for sending files to students over the Internet --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm#SendingLargeFiles

Bob Jensen's threads on free online textbooks and other electronic literature --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm 

Question
How can you capture and send streaming media?

August 9, 2007 question from XXXXX

How do I get a copy of the power point show of this great presentation? Am not computer literate but would like this on disc or dvd for a friend who does not have a pc.

Thank you

August 9, 2007 reply from Bob Jensen

I assume you mean from the link http://www.greatdanepro.com/Chiquitita/index.htm 

This is a streaming presentation which means you cannot download it as a file like you would download it as a PowerPoint file.

There are several alternatives for capturing streaming media.

Ratings and reviews of media streaming software --- http://www.homeofficereports.com/streaming%20video.htm

One alternative is to capture the streaming media in a Camtasia Studio video. This will work fine for the images, but the music that is also captured may be somewhat disappointing --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia.asp 

For capturing and sending out streaming media you may also check out Playstream at http://www.playstream.com/ 

Also check out Studio Now for capturing and sending streaming media --- http://www.studionow.com/conversion/?gclid=CKidoveJ6I0CFSasGgodZFTr0w 

One approach to get a PowerPoint version is to click on Pause with each image and capture the image in streaming video. You can then paste the image into your own PowerPoint slide. It’s a bit tedious but you can then have a PowerPoint slide for each captured image. There are various software options for image capturing such as the Import command in Paints. Separately you can capture the music and then add it to your PowerPoint file --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#PowerPointAudio 

Various alternatives for capturing screen images are available for a fee. For years I used the Import feature of Paint Shop Pro from JASC. Now, however, I prefer SnagIt from Tech Smith --- http://www.techsmith.com/screen-capture.asp 
Tech Smith also has a free capture program called Jing. PC World (via The Washington Post) gives a highly favorable review of Jing that is quoted at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/2007/tidbits070801.htm

Hope this helps a little.

Bob Jensen

Bob Jensen's threads on tools and tricks of education technology are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

Bob Jensen's technology bookmarks are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm

Internet users can view video either as video file downloads (that may or may not be stored on a hard drive) or as streaming video (that does not entail downloading a media file but can be captured with streaming media software).

Update from the AAA Accounting Commons --- http://commons.aaahq.org/pages/home
I thank Rick for sharing his expertise in the new VoiceThread multimedia education and communication technology.
Accounting Professor Rick Lillie Uses VoiceThread to Create Streaming Video --- http://iaed.wordpress.com/
 

If you have not yet discovered VoiceThread, I strongly recommend that you click on the link below and explore the VoiceThread website. You are in for a real technology treat!

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE VOICETHREAD WEBSITE

I use VoiceThread to create streaming video lectures, to create tutorials explaining how to solve problems, to explain answers to quiz and examination questions, and more. VoiceThread is easy to use, is similar to PowerPoint (but much more robust), and is web-hosted which makes it easy for you to share VoiceThread presentations with your students and colleagues.

During a presentation that I gave at the recent 2008 American Accounting Association (AAA) Annual Meeting in Anaheim, California, I talked about VoiceThread. To help participants to see how easy it is to create and share dynamic presentations with VoiceThread, I put together a short presentation that explains how to use VoiceThread. Click on the link below to view the short tutorial program.

Click here to view a short tutorial program explaining how to use VoiceThread

 

I encourage you to sign up for a free account.  Learn to use VoiceThread.  If you like what you create, then you can upgrade to the “Pro” version, which is very inexpensive. To get the full benefit of using VoiceThread, you need a headset/microphone and webcam.  To begin, use the tools included in VoiceThread. If you have questions about VoiceThread, use the “Contact Me” option on the right side of the screen.  Send me a message.  Include your email and/or telephone number.  I will be happy to work with you.

Enjoy!
Rick Lillie

Jensen Comment
VoiceThread has an advantage in allowing a community of users to comment (in multimedia) comments on an instructional video.
It's drawback is that it uses a lot of storage and bandwidth for talking heads.

Some VoiceThread pricing information is given at http://voicethread.com/pricing/pro/
It is possible to get small amounts of video file storage free, but it can get really expensive when the community goes on and on with long commentaries.
In the pro version, file sizes are limited to 100 Mb. This is about one tenth the size of a 10 minute YouTube video. YouTube generally limits file sizes to 1 Gb or 10 minutes of compressed video such as mpg compression --- http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hlrm=en&answer=57924
Colleges can stream much larger videos on YouTube such as the courses that UC Berkeley makes available on YouTube with over one hour of video for each lecture in a course.

VoiceThread makes it possible to have somewhat longer videos in a 100 Mb file by using small video screens. Note how Rick does this at http://voicethread.com/#q.b173180.i923368

YouTube also allows any users to comment in text format such that commentaries can accompany videos on YouTube. The huge advantage of YouTube is that videos can be uploaded, viewed, and even downloaded for free. VoiceThread, for an annual fee, has more features.

Although I've not tried VoiceThread, it would seem that cost and file size limits make this less attractive than YouTube.

Other video streaming alternatives are summarized at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

Camtasia users should note that TechSmith will serve up streaming videos in a utility called ScreenCast --- http://www.techsmith.com/screencast.asp

You can read the following at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

However, in most instances open sharing videos are streaming (using the term loosely here) videos for which there is no file to download. In that case the video must be captured in total or in part by software designed for such purposes. The software I like for video capturing is called Camtasia Recorder --- http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/record.asp
Also see http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/education.asp
This is cheaper alternative than many more specialized products for streaming video capture. You can download my PowerPoint file about Camtasia at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/EdTech/PowerPoint/
Links to examples are given in this slide show.

 

Future Lab (in the U.K.):
Developing innovative learning resources and practices that support new approaches to education for the 21st century.
By bringing together the creative, technical and educational communities, Futurelab is pioneering ways of using new technologies to transform the learning experience.
FutureLab Innovation in Education --- http://www.futurelab.org.uk/index.htm

Literature reviews:		a series of reviews into areas such as thinking skills, games, e-assessment, mobile technologies and 14-19 education
Futurelab handbooks:		themed findings from related projects, including creativity and collaboration, designing with users, and games
Opening Education:		a series of publications designed to open up areas for debate and stimulate new visions for education
Personalisation report:		a report presenting the key issues of the personalisation agenda (includes the Learner's Charter)
Innovations reports:		outcomes from a series of workshops looking at the impact of different technologies in the future
ESRC seminars report:		a report on improving the design of interactive media for children (includes Directory of Educational Researchers)
Discussion papers:		articles that aim to raise questions and prompt debate
Other publications:		externally-published books and articles by Futurelab staff

Bob Jensen's threads on education technologies are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on tools of education technologies are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

Just-In-Time Teaching --- http://134.68.135.1/jitt/

What is Just-in-Time Teaching?

G. Novak, gnovak@iupui.edu

Just-in-Time Teaching (JiTT for short) is a teaching and learning strategy based on the interaction between web-based study assignments and an active learner classroom. Students respond electronically to carefully constructed web-based assignments which are due shortly before class, and the instructor reads the student submissions "just-in-time" to adjust the classroom lesson to suit the students' needs. Thus, the heart of JiTT is the "feedback loop" formed by the students' outside-of-class preparation that fundamentally affects what happens during the subsequent in-class time together.

What is Just-in-Time Teaching designed to accomplish?

JiTT is aimed at many of the challenges facing students and instructors in today's classrooms. Student populations are diversifying. In addition to the traditional nineteen-year-old recent high school graduates, we now have a kaleidoscope of "non-traditional" students: older students, working part time students, commuting students, and, at the service academies, military cadets. They come to our courses with a broad spectrum of educational backgrounds, interests, perspectives, and capabilities that compel individualized, tailored instruction. They need motivation and encouragement to persevere. Consistent, friendly support can make the difference between a successful experience and a fruitless effort. It can even mean the difference between graduating and dropping out. Education research has made us more aware of learning style differences and of the importance of passing some control of the learning process over to the students. Active learner environments yield better results but they are harder to manage than lecture oriented approaches. Three of the "Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education" encourage student-faculty contact, increased time for student study, and cooperative learning between students.
To confront these challenges, the Just-in-Time Teaching strategy pursues three major goals:

• 1. To maximize the efficacy of the classroom session, where human instructors are present.
• 2. To structure the out-of-class time for maximum learning benefit.
• 3. To create and sustain team spirit. Students and instructors work as a team toward the same objective, to help all students pass the course with the maximum amount of retainable knowledge.

What JiTT is Not

Although Just-in-Time Teaching makes heavy use of the web, it is not to be confused with either distance learning (DL) or with computer-aided instruction (CAI). Virtually all JiTT instruction occurs in a classroom with human instructors. The web materials, added as a pedagogical resource, act primarily as a communication tool and secondarily as content provider and organizer. JiTT is also not an attempt to 'process' large numbers of students by employing computers to do massive grading jobs.

The JiTT Feedback Loop

The Web Component

JiTT web pages fall into three major categories:

• 1. Student assignments in preparation for the classroom activity: WarmUps and Puzzles.
• 2. Enrichment pages. Short essays on practical, everyday applications of the course subject matter, peppered with URLs to interesting material on the web. These essays have proven themselves to be an important motivating factor in introductory service courses, where students often doubt the current relevance the subject.
• 3. Stand alone instructional material, such as simulation programs and spreadsheet exercises.

  For detailed examples of the JiTT web resources, please see the JiTT resources page.

  WarmUps and Puzzles are the heart of the JiTT web component. These are short, web-based assignments, prompting the student to think about the upcoming lesson and  answer a few simple questions prior to class. These questions, when fully discussed, often have complex answers. The students are expected to develop the answer as far as they can on their own. We finish the job in the classroom. These assignments are due just a few hours before class time. The responses are delivered to the instructor electronically to form the framework for the classroom activities that follow. Typically, the instructors duplicates sample responses on transparencies and takes them to class. The interactive classroom session, built around these responses, replaces the traditional lecture/recitation format.
  Students complete the WarmUp assignments before they receive any formal instruction on a particular topic. They earn credit for answering a question, substantiated by prior knowledge and whatever they managed to glean from the textbook. The answers do not have to be complete, or even correct. In fact, partially correct responses are particularly useful as classroom discussion fodder. In contrast to WarmUps, Puzzle exercises are assigned to students after they have received formal instruction on a particular topic. The Puzzles serve as the framework for a wrap-up session on a particular topic.
  The WarmUps, and to some extent the Puzzles, are undergirded by education research and target a variety of specific issues. The list of targeted issues might contain: developing concepts and vocabulary, modeling -- connecting concepts and equations, estimation- getting a feel for magnitudes, relating technical scientific statements to "common sense", understanding the scope of applicability of equations, etc. The targeted issues are highly content specific. They may involve the characteristics of a particular class (e.g. the background skills of a particular student body).
  In preparing WarmUp assignments for an upcoming class meeting, we first create a conceptual outline of the lesson content. This task is similar to the preparation of a traditional passive lecture. As we work on the outline, we pay attention to the pedagogical issues that we need to focus on when in the classroom. Are we introducing new concepts and/or new notation? Are we building on a previous lesson, and if so, what bears repeating? What are the important points we wish the students to remember from the session? What are the common difficulties typical students will face when exposed to this material? (Previous classroom experience and teaching and learning literature can be immensely helpful here). Once this outline has been created, we create broadly based questions that will force students to grapple with as many of the issues as possible. We are hoping to receive, in the student responses, the framework on which we build the in-class experience.

The Active Learner Classroom

The JiTT classroom session is intimately linked to the electronic preparatory assignments the students complete outside of class. Exactly how the classroom time is spent depends on a variety of issues such as class size, classroom facilities, and student and instructor personalities. Mini-lectures (10 min max) are often interspersed with demos, classroom discussion, worksheet exercises, and even hands-on mini-labs. Regardless, the common key is that the classroom component, whether interactive lecture or student activities, is informed by an analysis of various student responses.
In a JiTT classroom students construct the same content as in a passive lecture with two important added benefits. First, having completed the web assignment very recently, they enter the classroom ready to actively engage in the activities. Secondly, they have a feeling of ownership since the interactive lesson is based on their own wording and understanding of the relevant issues.
The give and take in the classroom suggests future WarmUp questions that will reflect the mood and the level of expertise in the class at hand. In this way the feedback loop is closed with the students having played a major part in the endeavor.
From the instructor's point of view, the lesson content remains pretty much the same from semester to semester with only minor shifts in emphasis. From the students' perspective, however, the lessons are always fresh and interesting, with a lot of input from the class.
We designed JiTT to improve student learning in our own classrooms and have been encouraged by the results, both attitudinal and cognitive. We attribute this success to three factors that enhance student learning, identified by Alexander Astin^* in his thirty year study of college student success:
 

• increased amounts and quality of student-student interaction
• student-faculty interaction
• student study outside of class.

By fostering these, JiTT promotes student learning and satisfaction.

^*Astin, Alexander: What matters in college? Four critical years revisited (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1993).

First read about Instant Messaging at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_Messaging

Amy Dunbar's Early Applications of Instant Messaging While Teaching Online from Her Home

"Cogito Interruptus," by Scott McLemee, Inside Higher Ed, August 20, 2008 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2008/08/20/mclemee

Long before any of us started going online, Jean Baudrillard wrote about the “ecstacy of communication.” This was not as pleasant as it probably sounds. It referred to a state in which “the most intimate processes of life become the virtual feeding ground of the media” and “the entire universe comes to unfold arbitrarily on your domestic screen.” It is a new cultural scene that abolishes “the minimal separation of public and private,” in which certain aspects of life were “played out in a restricted space.” Baudrillard, writing in the 1980s, was thinking of TV, which is hardly the “screen” that comes to mind now. Clearly things have gotten ever more ecstatic since then.

In any case, not being disposed either to text messaging or IM certainly did not mean living off the grid. I went through the usual struggles to maintain some degree of control over how much of my attention was consumed by “new media” (an expression that is starting to seem a little silly after all this time). Spending more than about 30 minutes online at a stretch tends to produce a condition in which my head feels like a Mexican jumping bean – my brain thrashing around inside its shell without much possibility of deliberate, purposeful motion. It is possible to minimize this distracted state through the practice of iron self-discipline. So one tells oneself while Googling “how to develop iron self-discipline.”

None of this is unusual, of course. Friends, relations, and colleagues report similar experiences. Nor is it necessarily a sign that the media are creating irreversibly stupifying effects. In my experience, it is still possible to have long spells of tightly focused concentration — times when the flow of my attention to the work at hand precluded any distraction by email, or news updates, or what have you.

Or so it once seemed. Over the past few months, I’ve started to wonder.

For a while, it seemed like a generational thing.... The first text message came to my cell phone from a young political activist (someone born around the time this 45 year-old was first arrested at a protest) sending out a reminder about the location of a meeting. “Please respond if you can attend,” the note said.

Someone with the necessary skills explained how to type a response on my cellphone. I felt old. But it was a special nuance of that feeling – one that comes with learning to do something you understand to be commonplace, now.

Such reservations were moot. A few days later, another meeting, another message – followed by another, and another – all of it leading, in due course, to that moment of first seriously considering whether it might make sense to abbreviate the word “for” with the numeral 4 in the interest of saving keystrokes, which is not a sacrifice of standards I am quite prepared to make.

Around the time all this texting was beginning to grow routine and familiar, something else happened. The editor of a literary magazine sent me an instant message asking if I would be interested in writing about a new book. Once, this sort of inquiry would have arrived by e-mail, and I might have responded to it by picking up the telephone. Instead, the IM popped up on my computer screen as a little box – making a loud electronic “bing” sound as it did – and seemed to demand an instant reply.

What would normally have taken the form of a phone conversation instead took place at the keyboard. Over the next few days, the “bing” resounded several more times as other friends and colleagues started to IM me. (I had been contacted by one other person by IM about a year ago, but only noticed the message well after it appeared, and never took up IM as routine.) After nearly 15 years of coming to some kind of modus vivendi with e-mail and the Web, I found Baudrillard’s “ecstacy of communication” suddenly growing even more pervasive.

At one level, texting and IM are just slight variations on the now-familiar medium of e-mail. They tend to be even more casual — without so much formality as a subject line, even — yet they finally seem more similar to e-mail than anything else.

But now that e-mail itself is both so commonplace and so prone to abuse (“naked Angelina Jolie pics here!”), these supplementary forms have a slightly different valence. They seem more urgent. In the case of IM in particular, there is a suggestion of presence – the sense of an individual on the other end, waiting for a reply. (Indeed, the IM format indicates whether someone you know is online at a given time. The window indicates when a person is typing something to send to you.)

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
One of the first accounting/tax professors to use Instant Messaging with online students was my online hero Amy Dunbar when she taught those early UCONN online courses from her home. You can read her paper and  listen to Amy describe her early successes with IM in online teaching at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/002cpe/02start.htm#2002
Her mp3 file is also at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/002cpe/
Scroll down to the audio link to her mp3 file (this large file loads slowly)
I recorded this using my video camera's microphone, so don't expect much in the way of audio quality.

In August 2008 after eight years of intensive use of AIM, she wrote the following:

Bob,

By now AECM is probably tired of hearing about how I teach online, but thank you for the plug. I never tire of talking about online teaching because I am such a huge believer in its efficiency and effectiveness, particularly for working graduate students. Of the 11 online faculty, only 3 of us use AIM in our classes, so most prefer not to synchronous interaction. After 8 years of teaching online, I am still a big fan on instant messaging with my students. Unlike the earlier years, however, I now have scheduled office hours online, although I occasionally log on at other times, especially if an assignment is due. My TA logs on every Tuesday night. I log on every Wednesday and Thursday nights, from 7 to 9, which usually goes on until 10 or later because I have a policy that as long as I am getting questions I will stay online. Sometimes when I am getting a lot of IMs, I just post brb (be right back), and the student types the question while I am answering another question. The trend has been that students IM me much less and IM their group members much more. They have to evaluate each other each week, so they have an incentive to work together to ensure high participation scores.

When I log on, I can see which groups are meeting because I change their screen names (usually undecipherable names) to G(roup)#LastName, using an AIM tool. Works like a charm. Students post their AIM chats on their group boards so anyone who misses a meeting can see what happened. As I have noted before on AECM, I take excerpts from their chats and post a weekly highlights at the end of each week. This reminds the groups that they are part of a larger class .

Some instructors fear that they will have no personal impact in an online setting. That has not been the case for me. The following is from a student email today: Your energy level is not only exhausting, but inspiring ...

Thus, students still get a feel for who I am as a person, although the energy is certainly going down as the years pile on!

Amy Dunbar
UConn

 

Questions
How can you turn your email messages into free video messages?
How can you video conference calls?

Question
How can you get Instant Messaging (IM) for free without having to install any software?

"Don't Tell Your Boss, But There Is a Way To IM Despite Blocks," bu Sarmad Ali, The Wall Street Journal, October 11, 2007; Page B1 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119205933351855322.html

Just use an Internet-based service so that you can chat from a Web page without having to install any software, which might be blocked by a firewall. I tested two such services: Meebo at www.meebo.com  and KoolIM at www.koolim.com . Both are free.

These services let you simultaneously log in to multiple IM accounts -- and communicate with people with various services. If you have a friend who uses Yahoo Messenger, for example, and another who likes MSN Messenger, you can chat with either.

Another plus: Meebo and KoolIM are far less vulnerable to viruses than downloadable applications. They're also more efficient, saving users the hassle of installing multiple programs on a computer. This is especially handy for people with old computers that slow down when running several applications.

Meebo has a well-designed, sleek interface that makes it appealing to even the least tech savvy. From its home page, you simply sign in for different IM services—MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, GTalk (or Jabber) and AIM (or ICQ). Your buddy list will be combined automatically. You don't have to register, but if you do, you get perks such as a single sign-on for all of your accounts, and the ability to share files, save chat logs and store conversations.

I tried Meebo on my work Windows PC and my iBook at home, and it worked well on both. To start chatting, you just log in to any of the IM services by entering the screen name and password you already have with a service, or by picking a new name, password and services. Your buddy list will appear in a window on the right side of the page, with each name marked by an icon denoting the service the person uses. Once in your buddy list, you can add or delete a contact, message or join a group chat.

Continued in article

October 14, 2007 reply from Steven Hornik [shornik@BUS.UCF.EDU]

I just wanted to let the list know that I've been using Meebo this semester for my undergrad financial accounting class and my grad AIS course. You can see the meebo widget on both of my webpages (wikis) that I use for the course at either: http://financialaccounting.wikispaces.com  or http://acg5405.wikispaces.com  and if I'm online feel free to say hello to see how it works.

I have always included my Yahoo ID in my syllabus so students could IM me with questions. In recent years I observed two things: 1) I tended to forget to start my IM more and more - I just wasn't using it that much, and 2) students weren't using it, as it required them to get a Yahoo account, download the IM software, etc.

Since using Meebo, and in particular placing the meebo widget on my web pages, student communication with me has increased at least 10 fold (anectodal not empirical). I'm convinced of the reasons: 1) Ease of Use - students just have to access the course web page, and the widget lets them know if I'm online, and if so they can just type away. 2) I don't forget to start it - since it's web-based I simply have the meebo webpage as one of my tabs in firefox and whenever I start my browser (first thing I do whenever I'm at my computer) meebo is there.

Meebo also has chat rooms (I haven't used these yet), that allow you to import almost any kind of media (audio/video) and you can invite your students to it to create a synchronous environment for viewing course material and discussing it as a group.

Dr. Steven Hornik
University of Central Florida
College of Business Administration (407) 823-5739

Google Introduces Instant Messaging
Google Inc. is joining yet another Internet turf battle, the one over instant communication. Google introduced today an instant-messaging service that lets users exchange text messages and make voice calls over personal computers. Google's move pits it against Internet giants such as Time Warner Inc.'s America Online unit, Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp. that dominate the market.
Mylene Mangalindan and Christopher Rhoads, "Google Introduces Instant Messaging," The Wall Street Journal, August 24, 2005; Page B3 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB112482337312020777,00.html?mod=todays_us_marketplace
See this IM service at http://www.google.com/talk/

Set up free conference calls at http://www.freeconference.com/  

College Credit on the Phone? This makes me suspicious!

"Community-College System Offers Distance Education by Cellphone," by Sara Lipka, Chronicle of Higher Education, November 12, 2008 --- http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3458&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Universities in Japan and Canada unveiled courses by cellphone last year, and now, in the midst of National Distance Learning Week, the United States has too.

The Louisiana Community and Technical College System yesterday announced the creation of LCTCSOnline, a new program built in collaboration with AT&T and Pearson Custom Solutions, a branch of the publishing and education company.

Beginning in January, students can register on a single Web site for online courses offered — at $63 per credit hour — by any community college in Louisiana. And they’ll be able to complete their coursework on desktops, laptops, or mobile phones.

“The top barriers for students in obtaining their degrees are geographic access, cost of higher education, and scheduling conflicts,” said Joe D. May, the college system’s president, in a written statement. “We’re excited to be able to bring a greater level of access to potential students.”

Louisiana ranks last among the 50 states in the percentage of adults with associate’s degrees, according to the college system, which hopes to solve workforce shortages by enrolling nearly three times as many students as it does now.

“This initiative embodies the type of thinking we need,” Sally Clausen, Louisiana’s commissioner of higher education, said in a written statement.

A $500,000 grant from the Louisiana Board of Regents financed the program, which the college system developed in nine months with AT&T and Pearson, The Town Talk, a local newspaper, reported

Bob Jensen's links to online training and education alternatives are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Crossborder.htm

Classroom, Building, and Campus Design

June 1, 2006 message form Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

DESIGNING THE FUTURE PHYSICAL UNIVERSITY

"In discussions about the future of the university, little has been said about how these changes will affect its spatial layout, even though a university's physical characteristics must complement and strengthen its mission." In "Designing the University of the Future" (PLANNING FOR HIGHER EDUCATION, vol. 34, no. 2, 2005-2006, pp. 5-19) Rifca Hashimshony and Jacov Haina discuss several factors, including teaching and learning technology, that may define what the physical facilities of the university of the future will look like.
The paper is online --- Click Here 

Planning for Higher Education is published by the Society for College and University Planning, 339 E. Liberty, Suite 300, Ann Arbor, MI 48104 USA; tell: 734-998-7832; fax: 734-998-6532;
email: info@scup.org 
Web: http://www.scup.org/ 

See also:

"The Impact of Facilities on Recruitment and Retention of Students" by David Cain and Gary L. Reynolds FACILITIES MANAGER, vol. 22, no. 2, March/April 2006 http://www.appa.org/FacilitiesManager/article.cfm?ItemNumber=2567&parentid=2542  or http://www.appa.org/files/FMArticles/fm030406_f7_impact.pdf 

According to a survey conducted by the Association of Higher Education Facilities Officers: "Nearly three out of 10 students spurned a college because it lacked a facility they thought was important."

"Facilities Can Play Key Role in Students' Enrollment Decisions, Study Finds" by Audrey Williams June THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION, May 30, 2006 http://chronicle.com/daily/2006/05/2006053002n.htm
(Online access requires a subscription to the Chronicle.)

Do It Yourself Interactive Whiteboard (about $60 instead of over $1,000)

October 27, 2008 message from Scott Bonacker [lister@BONACKERS.COM]

Mr. Lee encourages innovators to ask themselves, "Would providing 80 percent of the capability at 1 percent of the cost be valuable to someone?" If the answer is yes, he says, pay attention. Trading relatively little performance for substantial cost savings can generate what Mr. Lee calls "surprising and often powerful results both scientifically and socially."

As evidence, he might point to a do-it-yourself interactive whiteboard, another of his Wiimote innovations. Interactive whiteboards, which in commercial form generally sell for more than $1,000, make it possible to control a computer by tapping, writing or drawing on an image of the desktop that has been projected onto a screen. Mr. Lee's version can be built with roughly $60 in parts and free open-source software downloadable from his Web site.

Some 700,000 people, many of them teachers, have downloaded the software, Mr. Lee says. Much more expensive whiteboards may offer more features and better image resolution, but Mr. Lee's version is adequate for most classroom applications.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/26/business/26proto.html?_r=1&em&oref=slogin 

This seemed like it might be of interest, if not useful

Scott Bonacker CPA
Springfield, MO

LCD = Liquid Crystal Device computer/video panel and projector displays

DLP = Digital Light Processor projection device developed by Texas Instruments. DLP is based on a digital micromirror device (a chip with millions of microscopic, hinged mirrors). Red, green and blue light is filtered through a color wheel.

"LCD or DLP?" by Dave Nagel, T.H.E. Journal, May 2007 --- http://www.thejournal.com/articles/20627 

I've been reviewing projectors for quite some time, and I've seen them evolve from extraordinarily expensive, bulky, poor-quality devices into what they are now: reasonably priced, high-performance display systems that now enjoy widespread adoption. I've also seen the gap between the two major projector technologies--LCD and DLP--diminish over the years. Nevertheless, some minor perceptual differences remain (as well as one major one) that should be considered when making purchase decisions for setting up classroom and auditorium systems.

LCD Pros and Cons
In the olden days, the divide between LCD projectors and DLPs was defined by color fidelity and contrast ratio. That's still true to a lesser extent today. But it comes down more to individual products than the technologies as a whole. Given a halfway decent budget, you could easily find a projector using either technology (or LCoS, for that matter) that would suit your quality standards.

However, schools are faced with budgetary restrictions that generally lead them into purchasing lower-end projectors. And DLPs seem to offer better specs in the sub-$1,000 category than LCDs.

Seem to.

LCDs on the low end still have some advantages:

• Color performance is better in low-end LCDs than in low-end DLPs, at least in my experience. This helps produce an image that seems brighter owing to color saturation.
• The images produced by LCDs are sharper, which is good for data display.
• LCDs are still brighter than DLPs at any given brightness rating (ANSI lumens).

There are only two real disadvantages to low-end LCD projectors. First, they're more bulky than DLPs in general. This should not impact installations or even applications that require moderate portability. For those traveling constantly with a projector, size and weight can become a factor. The other disadvantage is the screen door effect produced by LCDs. This is less pronounced now than it used to be, but it's still there, and it can be a distraction for those sitting close to a screen or for those watching video programs.

DLP Pros and Cons
DLP projectors, on the other hand, offer more portability and can offer much higher contrast ratios than LCD projectors. However, the reported contrast ratios from some manufacturers are highly tainted with shady testing practices.

Contrast ratio is a means of stating the range between the brightest gray (white) the projector can produce and the darkest gray (black). Theoretically, the greater the contrast ratio, the greater the range between white and black, meaning that more details should be visible in dark scenes and shadows.

In reality, tests of some DLP chips are conducted in such a way as to create artificially large contrast ratios by testing only white and only black and measuring those results separately. This is called "On/Off," and it can produce a contrast ratio 125 percent the ratio that would be measured using the ANSI method, in which blacks and whites are displayed and measured simultaneously.

Continued in article

Physical Design of Schools in the Technology Age
A 2006 Report from the National Summit on School Design provides recommendations to help designers and educators make better decisions about some of the $30 billion spent annually on new or renovated school facilities--- http://www.archfoundation.org/aaf/documents/nssd.report.pdf

Stanford University Experiments With the Latest Classroom Technology and Building Design

"Wallenberg Hall:  Opening the Door to New Technologies," by Melinda Sacks, Syllabus, September 2004, pp. 13-16 --- http://www.syllabus.com/article.asp?id=9936 

Each Wallenberg Hall classroom offers a platform for a new level of teaching, at the same time serving as a laboratory for testing and analyzing the value and potential of new technology. Some of the tools will prove invaluable, SCIL researchers believe, while other tools may not be worth their expense. Such information could prove useful to everyone, from an academic department deciding whether to invest a small amount of money in several tablet PCs for the classroom, to a university redesigning or creating a new multimedia auditorium, to a college seeking funding to reinvent its learning spaces.

“The teaching and research happening here in Wallenberg Hall could be of enormous value to our colleagues at all levels of education regardless of their geography,” says Steinhardt. “Wallenberg Hall represents the university’s commitment to explore new ways of enhancing learning and education through targeted investments in technology.”

Research and Teaching at Wallenberg

Research

The broad range of multidisciplinary projects includes:

• High-Performance Learning Spaces: A multidisciplinary team of researchers is examining two years’ worth of audio and video records of Wallenberg classes, related interviews, activity surveys, and focus group data to assess the effects of technology on teaching and learning. Results will assist educators at all levels in how to best employ technology in the classroom.
• DIVER: Created by a team led by SCIL co-director Roy Pea, DIVER software enables users to focus attention on relevant portions of any video footage, then annotate and analyze the video to share it with colleagues and peers. This year, student teachers utilized DIVER to reflect on tapings of their own teaching to evaluate their performances through “guided noticing.” DIVER also has promising applications in the fields of law, medicine, film study, and architecture.
• Folio Thinking: Based on the hypothesis that documenting and tracking learning through the use of an electronic portfolio deepens learning, students in an engineering class in Wallenberg Hall are the focus of SCIL’s current research on ePortfolios. Findings will help researchers understand more about how students learn and what tools most complement their experience.
• Virtual Video Collaboratory: Supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation, a team of SCIL researchers is creating the world’s first Digital Video Collaboratory—a multimedia library that will be available on the Internet. The library will allow the viewing, annotating, and editing of a vast array of useful footage collected and catalogued from sources around the world.
• Teachable agents: The CAT2 Lab at SCIL, which has developed its own “learn by teaching” software, is studying the idea that a powerful way to learn is by teaching.
• Interactive toys and robots: This broad project involves the development and testing of interactive toys and robots that teach and entertain, utilizing concepts and ideas from psychology, sociology, linguistics, computer science, robotics, communication, and education.
• Social responses to communication technology: This new research is examining the extent to which human interactions with computers, television, and new communication technologies are conditioned by real social relationships and the navigation of real physical spaces.

Teaching

Since Wallenberg Hall first opened its doors to classes in 2002, it has grown from a magnet for early adopters to a widely sought-after learning center for faculty and students from more than 20 departments and schools at Stanford University. Courses offered in the high-performance learning spaces of the hall have included anthropology, history, biochemistry, classic Greek, engineering, and Hebrew, reflecting the fact that virtually any subject can benefit from a well-designed, technology-enriched environment.

Every day from early in the morning until late into the evening, teachers and students utilize the frequently updated classroom equipment such as interactive Webster boards, video conferencing tools, in-class laptops, tablet PCs, and reconfigurable furnishings to create a seamless multimedia experience. As faculty and students employ these technologies, researchers from the Stanford Center for Innovations in Learning (SCIL), who also reside in Wallenberg Hall, evaluate and analyze the impact in an ongoing study of technology in education.

Highlights from some of the innovative courses taught in Wallenberg Hall include:

• Using iRoom software, Prof. Russ Altman had his students download Web pages on particular diseases each was studying, then asked them to share the material with the class. PointRight, experimental software, allowed them to “beam” their material to the computerized Webster white board. During discussion, the Webster screens were jointly controlled by the students from their own computers so that anyone could point out highlights and issues without passing around a keyboard or leaving their seats.
• In her course, “Introduction to Hebrew,” instructor Vered Shemtov used the three large screens in the Peter Wallenberg Learning Theater to present diverse content, from written poems, to music, to video clips, maps, and artwork. One screen could display the course outline for the day, while another showed a piece of literature and a third ran a related video clip. Moving from one medium to another occurred without hesitation, all controlled by one remote computer mouse.
• The Program in Writing and Rhetoric (PWR), directed by Prof. Andrea Lunsford, is a requirement of all freshmen and sophomores at Stanford. Freshmen practice everything from working individually on their laptops, to working collaboratively in small groups with one computer and a large plasma display, to whole class discussions utilizing the Webster smart boards. The PWR program is an excellent example of how Wallenberg Hall allows teaching and learning to keep pace with technological advances.

Innovative Cell Phone Technology

This cell phone technology may have wide ranging education and training possibilities.

"Cell-phone lessons prompt students to prepare for SAT," by Tanya Schevitz, San Francisco Chronicle, October 19, 2004 --- http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/10/18/MNG3S9BHPN1.DTL&type=tech  

A new program started this month by the Princeton Review, a test preparation company, and wireless application developer VOCEL allows students to do practice drills in math, reading and grammar by having the questions sent to their phones. Students can download a bank of questions and minidrills or have the phone call them at set intervals with practice test questions.

The program can also be set up to call or e-mail parents with the results.

"When you are sitting waiting for the football game or whenever you have a few minutes, instead of carrying around a big book, it is all right in the palm of your hand," said San Diego high school senior Brian Plavnicky, 17, who tried the phone during a Princeton Review SAT preparation class. "Since you are able to use it whenever and wherever you are, it is convenient for you and you are able to study more often."

Continued in the article

Response Pads and Clickers

Classroom Clickers After 20 Years of Application

May 26, 2009 message from Bill Ellis [bill.ellis@furman.edu]

I thought I’d pass along this email on clickers and recommend a new book by Derck Bruff.

I’ve been using Clickers for almost two years now in Principles, Advanced and Governmental accounting courses at GTC and Furman. The comments by Derck Bruff, a Furman graduate, below are right on target.

Accountability and engagement are the primary two features clickers have brought into my classrooms. There is no place for shy students to hide. A response is demanded and every student’s score is recorded. Every student is engaged not only by having to answer questions throughout the lecture, but in discussions using “think-pair-share” techniques that reinforce learning in a very active way.

I don’t use clickers for grades but do let students know their “scores” and class averages. I’ve seen a high positive correlation between responses on the question “how many hours did you study this week?” to a student’s clicker score for the lecture. If students miss a question that gives me an early warning that I should go over that learning objective again.

I’m convinced that clickers when used creatively help confidence, teaching and learning to improve.

Bill Ellis, CPA, MPAcc
Furman University
Accounting UES

May 26, 2009 message from Rick Reis <reis@stanford.edu>

Date: Tue, 26 May 2009 08:30:20 -0700
From: Rick Reis <reis@stanford.edu>
Subject: TP Msg. #950 Clickers
To: tomorrows-professor@lists.stanford.edu 

"Instead of creating chaos, faculty find that when everyone gets a remote control (and you ask good questions), everyone ends up on the same channel."

Folks:

The posting below looks at the impact of an important new technology on faculty lecturing and student learning. It is by James Rhem, executive director of the National Teaching & Learning Forum and is #45 in a series of selected excerpts from the NT&LF newsletter reproduced here as part of our "Shared Mission Partnership." NT&LF has a wealth of information on all aspects of teaching and learning. If you are not already a subscriber, you can check it out at [http://www.ntlf.com/] The on-line edition of the Forum--like the printed version - offers subscribers insight from colleagues eager to share new ways of helping students reach the highest levels of learning. National Teaching and Learning Forum Newsletter, Volume 18, Number 3, March 2009.? Copyright 1996-2009. Published by James Rhem & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved worldwide. Reprinted with permission.

Regards,

Rick Reis reis@stanford.edu 

Tomorrow's Teaching and Learning

Clickers

Clickers have been quietly marching over the horizon of attention for several years. Only early adopters, however, and schools with enough money and vision to try them have come to understand that, far from being simply the latest new gadget, they offer students a pedagogically powerful blend of intimacy and anonymity that can move them from passive to active learning with the click of a button (and a battery of well-crafted questions).

Rapid improvements in the technology and especially the publication of Derek Bruff's Teaching with Classroom Response Systems: Creative Active Learning Environments (Jossey-Bass, 2009) seem poised to place clickers in faculty consciousness across the board. The attention the book has already received offers some index of the growing interest in clickers. Bruff has already been profiled by the on- line newsletter Inside Higher Education and the Chronicle of Higher Education.

How They Work

For those who don't know, clickers are hand-held devices similar to the remote controls for televisions and other media devices. They can send a specific electronic signal to a central receiving station connected to a computer equipped with software that tabulates the responses and can then display the distribution of answers on a bar graph.

In operation-especially in quantitative fields with concrete correct and incorrect answers-a professor presents a multiple choice or true/false question. Students respond by pushing buttons for answers (a), (b), (c), and so on. Then, normally, the professor shows the bar graph of how the class answered. Quickly, students can see where they stand in terms of how well they understand the material, and (just as importantly) where their classmates stand, and where they stand in relation to these peers. And students get all of this very specific feedback on their learning without risking a moment of embarrassment. The anonymity of the system allows students to confront little important truths about their progress (or lack of it) without risking a thing.

Faculty schooled a few generations back when shame and guilt were felt to have at least some pedagogical value-that is to say, in a time when students felt ashamed to make a poor grade or come to class unprepared-the ascendance of this new teaching environment may seem strange. However, as the emphasis in education has shifted over the centuries from building character to simply learning, it all makes sense. (And, of course, whether shame and guilt actually built character remains an open question.)

Anonymity's Advantages

The anonymity is "pretty important," says Derek Bruff, who teaches mathematics and serves as assistant director of the Vanderbilt Center for Teaching. "Students are often hesitant to speak up in front of their peers," he says. "A key element in that is the desire not to be wrong or foolish in front of their peers, especially in a class where there are right/ wrong answers. In other classes, they don't want to stand out or be the one with the strange opinion."

Peer pressure, says Bruff, "dampens conversation." The anonymity that clickers provide is one way of dealing with that. "It's not the only way," Bruff concedes. "There are professors that are able to create a safe environment where that's not a problem."

If escaping peer pressure and taking refuge in anonymity prove such positive elements in teaching and learning, a question that comes immediately to mind is, where do cooperative learning and other small group activities fit in? The answer? On the next click, so to speak.

Offering an answer via the clicker establishes a "buy-in," says Bruff, a commitment not simply to an answer but to the learning process. With this threshold crossed, passivity has begun to be left behind. The anonymity allows cumbersome emotional baggage to be left behind as well, lending both a purity and a more animated sense of mission to the next step, the familiar "think-pair-share."

The "Think Moment"

"We use the think-pair-share method a lot here," says Bruff, "think, talk with one, talk in the larger group. There's more risk at each stage, but giving students a warm-up experience is important because many need that moment. If a hand in the first row goes up to answer a question, their thinking is stopped. The class is then moving on. Maybe they needed 30 more seconds. Giving the 'think moment' is helpful. Then, in the pair, they get to practice saying what they think, and they get to hear other thinking which then sharpens theirs."

The silent, private "think moment" operates like moving from warm water to hotter and hotter baths in a hot spring, for example, and finally into strong currents where one may have to swim against the tide intellectually.

Just as this technologically enhanced learning environment intensifies the focus on learning and recognizing where everyone stands in the process moment to moment, it also intensifies the burden on faculty to become "agile teachers." For example, when clickers first began to be used, showing the bar chart of student responses immediately was expected. As their use has grown and influenced faculty understanding of group behavior and learning patterns, whether to show or not to show the graph has become an important "thinking-on-your-feet" decision. Even if most students agree on a correct answer, how deeply do they understand the reasoning behind it? Sometimes, to make sure their learning goes more deeply, faculty withhold the results and ask students to turn to their neighbor and talk out the reasons for their answer, especially if their neighbor gave a different answer.

"When I have that happen," says Bruff, "I tell my groups, 'Even if you agree, talk it out because you could both be wrong.' I want them to test themselves a little bit."

It's the "thinking-on-your-feet" challenge that burdens faculty. "That's a roadblock for some faculty," says Bruff. "They want 'ballistic teaching,'" he says with a laugh. "Launch lecture, and once it's off, it's off on its way." Clickers offer lots of chances for mid-course corrections, but their use also demands something of a chess player's mentality of knowing not only how the pieces move, but which move to make next for maximum advantage. Sometimes, the best move does turn out to be "creating times for telling," says Bruff (using a phrase coined by Schwartz and Bransford), time for a little lecture students need and which skillful use of clicker questions can lead them to want. For example, anticipating a common misconception, faculty may ask a question experience has shown them most students will answer incorrectly.

"The instructor then reveals the correct answer," says Bruff, "often through a demonstration. The students are surprised most of them got the answer wrong and it makes them want to hear why the right answer is right and the answer they gave is wrong."

Making Good Questions

Successful use of clickers turns on the skillful use of good questions. "Writing good questions I would have to say is the hardest part" of teaching with clickers, says Bruff. But it's also the most exciting part because it causes faculty to become intensely intentional about their teaching moment to moment, not just lecture to lecture. "That's why I like to talk about clickers with faculty," says Bruff, "because it generates this kind of conversation: 'What are my learning goals for my students?'"

There are content questions asking for recall of information, conceptual questions seeking evidence of understanding, application questions, critical thinking questions, and free-response questions. When and how to ask the right kind of question in response to where the students actually sitting before the faculty member are becomes the proof of good teaching in that moment.

One of the most interesting aspects to emerge from the use of clickers has to do with the flexibility of the multiple choice question to stimulate thinking and learning. "Many people think of the multiple choice question as being only about factual recall," says Bruff, but the one-best-answer variation probes much deeper. "A really good teacher can write really good wrong answers to a question," says Bruff, ones that key into common student difficulties with material. "When I really like 40-60% of my students to get it wrong. And I'd like them to be split between a right choice and several wrong choices, because then that means I have tapped into some misconceptions that are fairly common and need to be addressed and the question is hard enough to be worth talking about."

Metacognition and Confidence

Some of the problems that have emerged in using clickers have also turned out to reveal opportunities for increasing student learning or rather student learning about their own learning. Bruff, a mathematician, began to ponder how much confidence he could have in student learning reported via true/ false questions or even some multiple choice questions. In a true/ false situation, for example, students might guess and have a 50% chance of lodging a correct answer. Multiple choice questions might be constructed to include an "I don't know" option, but then the matter of discouraging student engagement becomes an issue. Students might retreat to the safety of an "I don't know" answer rather than commit to a response they felt uncertain about. Pondering this problem has led a number of pioneers in clicker use, like Dennis Jacobs at Notre Dame, to marry self-assessments of confidence levels with decisions about right or wrong answers. So, for example, in Jacobs' system (where clicker responses are graded) a correct answer in which a student indicated high confidence would receive five points. An incorrect answer that a student had expressed high confidence in would receive no points. On the other hand, an incorrect answer in which a student indicated low confidence would receive two points.

"If a student gives a right answer," says Bruff, "but realizes they aren't confident in it, they have a little metacognitive moment thrust upon them: they have to ask themselves 'Why wasn't I more confident in my answer? What are the standards of evidence in this field that would allow me to be confident in my answer?'" By the same token, a student aware enough of his own learning to express low confidence in an incorrect answer receives partial credit for sensing that he didn't know, thus encouraging him as a learner rather than thumping him for getting something wrong. With this system, he gets both the positive and negative points to be made through the question.

Creative Options Everywhere

One of the strengths of Bruff's book on clicker use lies in the wide range of faculty examples he includes. That range evinces impressive imagination and commitment among faculty to improving student learning, itself a pleasure in reading the book. And, while the dominant use of clickers falls in scientific fields, the book includes rich examples of skillful use of clickers in humanities courses as well. Moreover, while clickers offer the most efficient means of collecting student responses, the overall emphasis falls on collecting those responses and on the dimensions of psychology, motivation, and cognition involved in their use. Hence, Bruff includes discussion of some low-tech means of collecting student responses as well.

With clickers, as with so many other new technologies, the greatest benefit seems to lie in the way they uncover new means of improving one of the most ancient of transactions-teaching and learning. Socrates would be proud.

Contact Derek Bruff at: Derek.bruff@vanderbilt.edu

May 27, 2009 reply from Bob Jensen

Hi Bill and Rick,

One of the enthusiastic early adopters of response pads (clickers) in the hands of students during lectures was our AECM founder Barry Rice. Barry used the early technology called HyperGraphics for screen presentations and student responses on screen --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#ResponsePads 

HyperGraphics was DOS-based before the Windows operating system came on the scene. HyperGraphics had a unique niche in the DOS world but never competed well in the Windows/Mac worlds when ToolBook and Authorware came on the scene --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm  This illustrates how technology can make and destroy software. ToolBook and Authorware, in turn, never competed well in academe after course technology became more Web-based. Now we have HTML, XML, Wikis, chat rooms, instant messaging, etc.

But response pads (clickers) are still popular with many faculty in various academic disciplines. In a lecture, clickers offer limited response capabilities that online students get with full network capabilities from their PC stations.

I’m certain Barry Rice will be pleased with your 2009 testimonial about successful clicker use that he used successfully as far back as 1989. Barry would probably still use clickers in lectures had he not switched to full-time administration many years ago.

I had the luxury of teaching in an electronic classroom over the past two decades. Each student sat in front of a PC capable of easily interacting on screen and via ear phones with the instructor and each other. With a flick of a button I could flash any student’s screen in front of the class just as a clicker response can be flashed in front of the entire class.

What I did not develop software for was response aggregation. One advantage of clicker software is the power to instantly aggregate joint responses of all students in the class such as the number of responses for each of the choices in a multiple choice question. I think the Trinity University electronic classrooms now have such aggregation software that can slice and dice multiple student responses.

While many faculty users of clickers minimize clicker cheating by not providing student performance grades based on clicker usage, there are some that give credit in some form, including quiz points based upon clicker responses. This can create problems. One study on clicker cheating can be found at http://www.lychock.com/portfolio/Documents/final report.pdf

Another problem in very large lectures might arise when clickers are used for taking attendance. These are not very reliable for taking role unless accompanied by some verification controls.

Bob Jensen

Bob Jensen's threads on the history of classroom and networking course management systems --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

July 1, 2005 email message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

CLICKERS IN THE CLASSROOM

Resembling television remote control devices, clickers transmit and record responses to questions. Unlike earlier keypad student response systems, clickers can be registered to a student and used in any classroom equipped with a receiving station (which can also be portable). Using clickers, instructors can quickly poll students to ascertain their understanding and mastery of course materials. Clicker polls, unlike a show-of-hands poll, can be anonymous; the results can be quickly tabulated, recorded, and saved in a variety of formats; and students report enjoying the immediate feedback they get. For more information about using clickers in classroom settings, see "7 Things You Should Know About . . . Clickers" at http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7002.pdf .

EDUCAUSE publishes the "7 Things You Should Know About . . ." series on emerging learning practices and technologies. EDUCAUSE is a nonprofit association whose mission is to advance higher education by promoting the intelligent use of information technology. For more information, contact: EDUCAUSE, 4772 Walnut Street, Suite 206, Boulder, CO 80301-2538 USA; tel: 303-449-4430; fax: 303-440-0461; email: info@educause.edu; Web: http://www.educause.edu .

See also:

"No Wrong Answer: Click It" WIRED NEWS, May 14, 2005 http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,67530,00.html

Jensen Comment
Back is the early 1990s, Barry Rice and I were both inspired heavily by a company called HyperGraphics that authored a complete course management and delivery system in DOS (before the days of Windows and Macs).  My classes were small at Trinity University, but Barry had some large basic accounting lecture classes at Loyola College of Maryland.  He made active use of hardware from HyperGraphics that allowed each student in a large lecture to respond to questions in class.  At first all these response pads were hard wired to student desks.  Later they became wireless.  HyperGraphics changed names over the decades but is still in the business of selling wireless response pads.  Now the classroom "Clickers" are replacing the older style wireless response pads.  You can read more about the history of this type of thing at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

Read how clickers are used at the University of Wisconsin --- http://www.news.wisc.edu/11142.html
A pilot test at Iowa State University (where students buy them for $16 at the bookstore) is reported at http://www.iastate.edu/Inside/2005/0610/clickers.shtml
Canada's usage is reported at http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050510.gtclickermay10/BNStory/Technology/

Also see http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,68086,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_3

One source for clickers is http://www.smartroom.com/ 

Richard Campbell suggests www.einstruction.com

July 5, 2005 reply from Carla Carnaghan [cacarnag@UWATERLOO.CA]

Alan Webb and I have done a study of the effects of clickers on student satisfaction, engagement and learning in an accounting context. We looked at incremental effect of the clickers beyond what is acheived through the use of an interactive pedagogy alone. Our results suggest that while students enjoyed the use of the technology, there were only modest positive effects on learning (as measured by exam scores) relative to students not using the clickers. There were some interesting effects on oral participation that suggest that using the response pads to ask questions that are too easy actually reduces students asking questions. (We suspect that when the results are displayed showing that most students got a particular question right, those that didn't are even more reluctant to ask questions to improve their understanding, since they are clearly in the minority).

Similar to what Amy said, both Alan and I found it a useful means of determining what the students did and did not understand so we could tailor our material coverage accordingly.

Our paper is available at http://www.learning.uwaterloo.ca/LIF/responsepad_june20051.pdf  if anyone is interested in the research design or our findings. I will be presenting it at the AAA annual meeting in August as well.

July 5, 2005 reply from Thomas C. Omer [omer@UIC.EDU]

So Carla, in your conclusion you suggest that students are more uncomfortable after the GRS System has been removed. Given my teaching experience in an atmosphere where verbal interaction is required and participation is graded the reluctance of students to talk in front of peers and instructors is quite obvious even though students get better over the semester they are still prone to silence. It seems to me that while the GRS is beneficial to the instructor (which I do not deny) is propagates the incentives to remain silent, to not express an opinion, and never allow the possibility of being seen given a wrong (or right answer for that matter) answer in class. In a sense it heightens the continuing problem of a mute society of students that must suddenly find their voice when the first pay check arrives.

Interesting paper, good luck on your presentation.

May 5, 2005 reply from Bob Jensen

A clicker and a response pad are both devices that can be used as technology aids for "cold calls" in the class.  Many of us use a cold call pedagogy to keep students more alert and tuned into the class lecture/discussion.  There is a great deal of anecdotal evidence that cold calls improve attentiveness in class.

Kathleen O'Toole, "Cold-Calling Van Horne," Stanford Alumni Newsletter, May 2005 --- http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/bmag/sbsm0505/feature_vanhorne.shtml

Salespeople trade tales about cold-calling customers, but at the Business School, students and alums reminisce about the moments when their hearts stopped because of “cold calls” from Professor James Van Horne.

The A. P. Giannini Professor of Banking and Finance is legendary for his classroom-quizzing techniques, which somehow strike both fear and respect into the students who volunteer for his elective courses. Now in his 40th year at the Business School, Van Horne crafts tough questions about interest rates and finance for corporations, nonprofits, and governments. He also demands tough answers of himself. During a lecture to alumni last fall, for example, he challenged the conventional wisdom that says it’s good for the Federal Reserve Board to signal its intentions on interest rates. Van Horne argues that the policy gives us a false sense of certainty.

Recently, the School’s most fabled inquisitor consented to have the tables turned. At the suggestion of an alumnus, this magazine invited four alums to cold-call Van Horne on anything they desired. Here is an edited transcript of that laughter-filled discussion last October, which Van Horne, in his usual disciplined style, promptly ended at the appointed time.

Continued in article

Tablet Computing

June 29, 2006 message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

TABLET PCS AND FACULTY USERS

Many recent studies on tablet PCs in higher education have focused on student users. The purpose of the Seton Hall University project described in "The Tablet PC For Faculty: A Pilot Project" (by Rob R. Weitz, Bert Wachsmuth, and Danielle Mirliss in JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY & SOCIETY, vol. 9, issue. 2, 2006, pp. 68-83) "was to test and evaluate faculty applications of tablet PCs apropos their contribution to teaching and learning. Put another way, how would real faculty teaching actual classes use tablets, and how would they evaluate the utility of doing so?"

Some of the study's findings:

-- "only a fraction of faculty are motivated to use tablet technology: roughly a third of faculty expressed an interest in replacing their notebook computer with a tablet computer"

-- "generally, participating faculty did indeed use tablet functionality in their classes and were convinced that this use resulted in a meaningful impact on teaching and learning."

The paper is available online at http://www.ifets.info/journals/9_2/6.pdf

The Journal of Educational Technology & Society [ISSN 1436-4522 (online), ISSN 1176-3647 (print)] is a peer-reviewed quarterly online journal published by the International Forum of Educational Technology & Society (IFETS). Current and past issues are available in HTML and PDF formats at no cost at http://www.ifets.info/

From Syllabus News on Octiber 26, 2004

UVa. Testing Tablet PC-Hosted Digital Courseware Program

The University of Virginia is hosting the test of a state-of-the-art educational delivery platform this fall in a collaboration with three companies holding a big stake in the higher education community. The project involves Thomson Learning, which is supplying Web-based courseware developed with UVa. faculty based on the firm's iLrn platform. Course packages will include Web sites with online tests, diagnostic tools for personalized learning and planning, and links to reference materials via Thompson Gale's InfoTrac service.

Students will be equipped with Tablet PCs from HP running Microsoft Windows XP Tablet PC software and Microsoft OneNote digital note-taking application. In one application, OneNote templates are being used to record biochemistry lectures. The university expects a professor's ability to gauge students' comprehension of the course material immediately via their online performance will improve student retention.

"The academic environment has changed dramatically in the last decade as a result of numerous social, cultural and economic factors," said Edward L. Ayers, dean of Arts and Sciences at UVa. "The rise of technology has affected how students learn, how instructors teach and how course materials are developed and presented. Greater numbers of students, as well as significant changes in the demographics of those students, necessitate new approaches and instructional models." The program will continue through the spring 2005 semester.

Myths About Education Technologies

• Myth 01
  Online students must do all their learning from content stored on a computer.  This is true only in the relatively rare case of online courses that have no online synchronous classes in virtual classrooms, no electronic communications with a live instructor, no electronic communications with classmates, and no mentors or experts to contact for help and information.  Experiments show that communications tend to increase when students take courses online.
  
  A major advantage of technology today is the ease and efficiency of linking students to experts and mentors.
  
  

• Myth 02
  Students on average will perform worse on examinations if they only have online courses as opposed to onsite traditional courses.  There are so many variables and contextual factors that it is risky to make any claims on this one way or another.  With online courses,  much depends upon the quality of the technology hardware, the quality of the specially-designed online learning materials, and the maturity and motivation of the students.  If the suitable materials are available and motivated students know what must be learned, there generally is no difference in examination performance.  There is some evidence that online learning is more efficient in the sense that students learn faster and there is less time wasted in travel, setting up meetings with instructors or other students, and in searching hard copy documents that are not available on a computer.  
  
  The multi-million dollar, multi-year comparisons of online asynchronous pedagogy versus onsite traditional pedagogy tended to show that the online students than students in traditional classes and sometimes had higher grade distributions.  See http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/255wp.htm and http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/assess.htm.
  
  

• Myth 03
  Students have deeper and more important communication in face-to-face encounters.  There are advantages and disadvantages of face-to-face communications vis-à-vis electronic communications.  Clearly there are advantages of face-to-face communications in learning social skills and in reading body language.  There are obvious advantages when the learning is physical (e.g., learning to play team sports, learning how to diagnosis patients, etc.).  Being able to read body language improves communications when students are weak in the language being spoken.  
  
  But there are many disadvantages in face-to-face encounters.  Some people are more shy, more easily intimidated, more bothered by physical defects.   Electronic communications make follow-up messaging easier.  So many times, students do not think of everything they would like to say at a given point in time.  An hour later, they may think of something to add or something to retract.  Electronic messaging may be strung out over days and are not limited to a particular meeting time.  Electronic messages are more easily translated into other languages.  Even when not translated, it is easier to deal with another language in text form than in audio form.  For example, students who can read French often have no idea what is being said on the streets of Paris.
  
  The major advantage of electronic communications is the ease of sending off a message at any time to most anywhere in the world.  Face-to-face encounters take more time to set up even if teleconferencing is of thehighest quality.
  
  

• Myth 04
  Virtual classrooms are vastly inferior to live classrooms.  Technologies for live audio and video virtual classrooms have vastly improved.  The advantages of bringing students face-to-face from all over the world to conduct live (synchronous) classes are obvious.  The worry is that the technology is unpredictable or that the learning is inferior to a traditional class meeting in a room.  Schools such as Duke University, the University of Virginia, Notre Dame, Northwestern University, Columbia University, Stanford University, the London School of Economics, and hundreds of other top-rated universities are praising the technologies of virtual classrooms.  For Example, the Global Executive MBA program at Duke University now has years of successful operations of virtual classrooms.  

• Myth 06
  Online Testing is Both Less Effective and More Prone to Cheating
   

     
  Accounting Professors in Support of Online Testing That, Among Other Things, Reduces Cheating
  These same professors became widely known for their advocacy of self-learning in place of lecturing

  "In Support of the E-Test," by Elia Powers, Inside Higher Ed, August 29, 2007 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/08/29/e_test Critics of testing through the computer often argue that it’s difficult to tell if students are doing their own work. It’s also unclear to some professors whether using the technology is worth their while. A new study makes the argument that giving electronic tests can actually reduce cheating and save faculty time. Anthony Catanach Jr. and Noah Barsky, both associate professors of accounting at the Villanova School of Business, came to that conclusion after speaking with faculty members and analyzing the responses of more than 100 students at Villanova and Philadelphia University. Both Catanach and Barsky teach a course called Principles of Managerial Accounting that utilizes the WebCT Vista e-learning platform. The professors also surveyed undergraduates at Philadelphia who took tests electronically. The Villanova course follows a pattern of Monday lecture, Wednesday case assignment, Friday assessment. The first two days require in-person attendance, while students can check in Friday from wherever they are. “It never used to make sense to me why at business schools you have Friday classes,” Catanach said. “As an instructor it’s frustrating because 30 percent of the class won’t show up, so you have to redo material. We said, how can we make that day not lose its effectiveness?” The answer, he and Barsky determined, was to make all electronically submitted group work due on Fridays and have that be electronic quiz day. That’s where academic integrity came into play. Since the professors weren’t requiring students to be present to take the exams, they wanted to deter cheating. Catanach said programs like the one he uses mitigate the effectiveness of looking up answers or consulting friends. In electronic form, questions are given to students in random order so that copying is difficult. Professors can change variables within a problem to make sure that each test is unique while also ensuring a uniform level of difficulty. The programs also measure how much time a student spends on each question, which could signal to an instructor that a student might have slowed to use outside resources. Backtracking on questions generally is not permitted. Catanach said he doesn’t pay much attention to time spent on individual questions. And since he gives his students a narrow time limit to finish their electronic quizzes, consulting outside sources would only lead students to be rushed by the end of the exam, he added. Forty-five percent of students who took part in the study reported that the electronic testing system reduced the likelihood of their cheating during the course. Stephen Satris, director of the Center for Academic Integrity at Clemson University, said he applauds the use of technology to deter academic dishonesty. Students who take these courses might think twice about copying or plagiarizing on other exams, he said. “It’s good to see this program working,” Satris said. “It does an end run around cheating.” The report also makes the case that both faculty and students save time with e-testing. Catanach is up front about the initial time investment: For instructors to make best use of the testing programs, they need to create a “bank” of exam questions and code them by topic, learning objectives and level of difficulty. That way, the program knows how to distribute questions. (He said instructors should budget roughly 10 extra hours per week during the course for this task.) The payoff, he said, comes later in the term. In the study, professors reported recouping an average of 80 hours by using the e-exams. Faculty don’t have to hand-grade tests (that often being a deterrent for the Friday test, Catanach notes), and graduate students or administrative staff can help prepare the test banks, the report points out. Since tests are taken from afar, class time can be used for other purposes. Students are less likely to ask about test results during sessions, the study says, because the computer program gives them immediate results and points to pages where they can find out why their answers were incorrect. Satris said this type of system likely dissuades students from grade groveling, because the explanations are all there on the computer. He said it also make sense in other ways. “I like that professors can truly say, ‘I don’t know what’s going to be on the test. There’s a question bank; it’s out of my control,’ ” he said. And then there’s the common argument about administrative efficiency: An institution can keep a permanent electronic record of its students. Survey results showed that Villanova students, who Catanach said were more likely to have their own laptop computers and be familiar with e-technology, responded better to the electronic testing system than did students at Philadelphia, who weren’t as tech savvy. Both Catanach and Satris said the e-testing programs are not likely to excite English and philosophy professors, whose disciplines call for essay questions rather than computer-graded content. From a testing perspective, Catanach said the programs can be most helpful for faculty with large classes who need to save time on grading. That’s why the programs have proven popular at community colleges in some of the larger states, he said. “It works for almost anyone who wants to have periodic assessment,” he said. “How much does the midterm and final motivate students to keep up with material? It doesn’t. It motivates cramming. This is a tool to help students keep up with the material.”   Bob Jensen attempts to make a case that self learning is more effective for metacognitive reasons --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/265wp.htm This document features the research of Tony Catanach, David Croll, Bob Grinaker, and  Noah Barsky. Bob Jensen's threads on "Online Education Effectiveness and Testing" are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Assess.htm#OnlineOffCampus

  
   

• Myth 05
  Only wealthy schools can set up virtual classrooms and conduct reliable distance education programs.  Technologies for virtual classrooms and high quality asynchronous course delivery are exceedingly expensive, especially in terms of the cost of backup systems for the primary systems.  These are sometimes too costly and too complicated even for the wealthy schools.  Fortunately, there are relatively inexpensive alternatives available from external providers such as eCollege, Blackboard, and HorizonLive.  For more details see http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm
  
  

• Myth 06
  The most important goals of technology in education should always be to make learning unambiguous, easier, faster, cheaper, and more fun.  These are important goals and, in the 21st Century, technology advances (e.g., wireless communications, improved bandwidth, audio access, knowledge portals, ubiquitous computing, etc.) will take education and training to unbelievable heights.  The problem is that we are also discovering more about human metacognition and the fact that deep learning and deep memory  rely more upon discovering answers "on your own" with frustration, pain, anger, ambiguity, mistaken paths, making and correcting of mistakes, and serendipity. The fact of the matter is that students may be better off if instructors program in deliberate mistakes and fail to provide easy access to some learning content.

• Myth 07
  Knowledge portals of the future will be so fantastic that there will be little need for courses, instructors, or student interactions.  Knowledge portals such as Fathom at Columbia University will become bigger and better to a point where they will be described as panaceas to ignorance at all levels of knowledge.  But they will not likely be true panaceas to deep learning and deep memory.  Ironically, educators of the future may be needed to create ambiguity, difficulty, pain, and frustration to overcome the simplicity of knowledge portals.  Also there will be so much knowledge in the world's knowledge bases that educators will be desperately needed to put together curricula "cruises" that can be managed by students in a sea of knowledge.  See my threads on knowledge portals at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/portals.htm.
  
  

• Myth 08
  A major advantage of education technologies is that they make life easier for instructors.  Nothing can be further from the truth than the myth that instructional technologies make it easier to teach a course.  In fact, the major drawback is that use of technologies causes instructor burn out even among instructors who are proficient in the use of these technologies.  One of the burn out factors is the increased burden of dealing with heavy electronic communications from students and the monitoring of student communications in electronic chat rooms.  Another drawback is that learning materials should be designed specifically for an online pedagogy.  Old lecture materials cannot simply be pasted into a web server with the expectation that students will get as much from reading them as they did from listening to the lectures.  Lecture materials must be redesigned into hypertext and hypermedia format with gaps filled in where the lecturer tends to ad lib or interact live with students in class.  Messages from "daring professors" on their frustrations with educational technologies can be found at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ideasmes.htm.
  
  

• Myth 09
  For a variety of reasons (notably convenience of course access and/or timing), there will be less student attrition in online courses than onsite courses. 
  It is very common for a higher proportion on online students to not complete distance education courses.  Many reasons are confounded in this phenomenon.  One of the major reasons is that online students are often part-time students who are not able to take an onsite course because of job and/or family commitments (e.g., a parent who must be home caring for children or a person with an unpredictable work schedule that may entail frequent travel.).  Such students sign up for the online course with great optimism  for how much time can be devoted to the online course and later discover that they were overly optimistic.  Another reason is the "try out" phenomenon.  Since online courses are sometimes easier to "try out" with fewer logistical problems of getting to an onsite class, there is a tendency for students to enroll for a trial period and then drop if their grades are lower than expected before the deadline for dropping a course.
  

• Some Other Myths

Why (Some) Kids Love School --- http://familypc.com/smarter_why_kids.asp 

Dropout rates are down and test scores are up. Students are engaged in learning and their self-esteem is soaring. So what's really going on within the classroom walls of the country's top wired schools? By Leslie Bennetts

Once upon a time, back in the olden days, kids used to exult about getting out of school, celebrating their release from drudgery by singing "No more pencils, no more books!" or so the schoolyard ditty would have it. These days, with the explosion of technology that's revolutionizing education around the country, many students are now eager to stay after school, competing for access to all the high-tech equipment that's opening up so many new opportunities to them.

For younger kids, technology is transforming the schoolwork their older siblings sometimes regarded as tedious into challenging games and activities. For high-school students, technology may banish once and for all the tired questions about relevance. Even the most rebellious adolescents are aware of the real-world value of the skills and experience they're getting in wired schools.

Teachers who have mastered the art of integrating technology into the curriculum also deserve credit. For a closer look at some of the ways educators are transforming American schools, here are six outstanding examples from this year's Top 100 Wired Schools—two elementary, two middle, and two high schools that have applied creativity as well as resources to the educational challenges of the 21st century.

My sampling of innovations includes the following:

1. CAMELOT ELEMENTARY SCHOOL Lewiston, Idaho
   This year, 6th-graders and their Idaho pen pals are discussing a state proposal to remove dams on the Snake River; the environmentally friendly plan to encourage salmon breeding could have an adverse impact on the livelihood of some state residents, including their parents. "The kids are learning that people in other parts of the state are impacted in different ways by the same issue," says Kuntz.
   
   
2. CAMELOT ELEMENTARY SCHOOL Lewiston, Idaho
   (After drawing monsters, 3rd-graders must describe them in English (creative writing) to e-mail pals at other schools.)
   The culmination of the project is a picnic at a local park. The kids from the different schools, who have not met before, line up holding their monster pictures and try to find their monster twin. After the picnic, students create Web pages about the project, including their monster descriptions, their own drawing, and the drawing that their pal made. The pals continue their e-mail relationships for the rest of the school year.
   
   
3. DELANO OPTIONAL SCHOOL Memphis, Tennessee
   Students in the 4th, 5th, and 6th grades produce a daily news show, the "Noon News," which is broadcast to every classroom via closed-circuit TV. Each week, a team of students fills 15 positions, from director and producer to sound technicians, visual designers, and weather announcers, with each successive crew training the next one. They use digital audio/video mixers to switch between the cameras and the computers for different video shots. Broadcasts run from 10 to 25 minutes and include world news.
   
   At the end of the year, the school celebrates students' achievements with a Technology Fair, where students create traditional cardboard displays and multimedia presentations that show their use of technology. Parents and friends are invited to attend the fair.
   
   
4. FAYETTE MIDDLE SCHOOL Fayette, Alabama
   Last spring local leaders asked the school to create a CD-ROM highlighting all the good things the town of Fayette has to offer, with the idea of using it to advertise the community and attract new businesses.
   (Students in the 8th-grade actually worked with civic leaders to produce the CD.)
   
   
5. AUDUBON MIDDLE SCHOOL Milwaukee, Wisconsin
   An urban school with a predominantly minority student body, 98 percent of whom are bussed to school from the inner city, Audubon has made enormous strides in getting wired over the last few years.
   
   Last September, several 6th-grade social studies classes from Audubon, under the instruction of Karen Jagmin, cooperated with a group of 10th-graders from another Milwaukee public school in a project involving the Olympics in Sydney. The students picked Olympic sports they were interested in, researched the sport and its athletes, and kept track of the United States' performance in the competitions using the Internet, newspapers, online magazines, CD-ROMs, and TV. Every day they e-mailed a group of high-school students in Sydney, who would respond to their questions.
   
   Among the topics the students discussed via e-mail were whether other countries make icons out of sports figures the way the United States does, and how cultural differences affect the ways in which athletes are selected and trained. The Audubon students made spreadsheets and graphs showing everything from the medal counts to the shot-put distances, and they wrote summaries explaining their data. They then worked in cooperative groups to create PowerPoint presentations about their experiences to share with other students in their grade and with their 10th-grade partners via Audubon's distance-learning network.
   
   
6. GRANBY HIGH SCHOOL Norfolk, Virginia 
   Last fall, Fred Hartnett, an advanced placement government teacher at Granby, taught an entire unit using Web-based assignments. His students participated in the Youth Leadership Initiative sponsored by the University of Virginia. The kids registered online for a statewide mock election to vote for presidential, congressional, and senatorial candidates. One class member attended a training session at the university to serve as a student facilitator. Each student used the Internet to research a state's past presidential voting history and current polling projections. The unit culminated in an election-night sleepover at the school in which students tracked the results of the election, including the cliffhanger presidential race. "A number of kids were saying, 'I'll never miss another election,' because of the drama of just being involved," says Michael J. Caprio, the principal. "It was very valuable; they saw what the system was all about. They saw democracy work. They lived history."
   
   
7. GULF COAST HIGH SCHOOL Naples, Florida
   In Gulf Coast's interdisciplinary approach to learning, teachers from more than one academic area work together to design a teaching unit. One recent project was called Legends, an unusual collaboration between the English and physical education departments in which students studied the tale of King Arthur. "Students in the English classes took different themes: King Arthur in stained glass, King Arthur in literature, King Arthur in Broadway plays, and so on," Gates says. "They researched their topics using the Internet and created presentations that included 3D animation, sound, and video. The physical education classes researched medieval and Renaissance dance and sporting events like jousting. They learned medieval dances, which they taught to the students in the English class. The results were filmed and are being made into a CD-ROM."

   In fact, the phys ed department infuses technology into all of its fitness activities. "Every single one of our PE courses uses video and digital photography in many ways, including analyzing movement in sports and presenting information on fitness and health," says Gates. "Students research a topic such as jet skiing, kayaking, or surfing, and make a PowerPoint presentation about that fitness activity. They also take digital pictures of the correct way to use each weight and exercise machine in the school's fitness room and they post the images on the school's Web site."

Ideas for Modifying Traditional Classroom Materials 
Into Online Learning Materials 
(Including Updates on MIT's Open Knowledge Initiative called OKI)

One of the most frequently asked questions asked in my education technology workshops is as follows:  
"In what ways should course content materials be modified for online learning?"

My quick and dirty response is that faculty who develop content should learn how to use FrontPage or some other good HTML editor and then learn how to screen capture and video capture themselves rather than relying upon technicians.  You can learn Microsoft FrontPage, screen capturing, and Camtasia video capturing in just a few days with a little help from your friends.  With a little added effort, you can make your online course materials more interactive by saving Excel worksheets as interactive Webpages and by learning how to use JavaScript.  You can learn all of these things in less than a week if you have the correct software and hardware.

1. Use more screen captures, audio captures, and video captures of things that you normally demo in lecture presentations.   Look under "Resources" at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/newfaculty.htm 
   Also see my tutorials at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HelpersVideos.htm 
   
   
2. MP3 Audio
   Audio capturing is especially important since you can let students hear what you like to say in lectures or case discussions.  For example, in an Excel spreadsheet you can add buttons that students can click on to hear your explanation of what is going on in various cells of the spreadsheet.  Look under "Resources" at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/newfaculty.htm 
   
   
3. Camtasia AVI Versus RM Recordings --- See http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HelpersVideosSummary.htm 
   Flesh in PowerPoint, Excel, or other presentations with video and audio.  Camtasia works great for both capturing dynamic computer screen presentations in video accompanied by your audio explanations.  Your video files may take up more space than you are allowed on your Web server.  However, you can save them to CD-R or CD-RW disks that can be sold to students for around $1.00 per disk. You can learn more about Camtasia from http://www.techsmith.com/ .  You can make CDs by simply dragging files to a blank CD using Windows Explorer if you first install Easy CD (http://www.roxio.com/en/products/ecdc/ ).  
   
   For video illustrations and tutorials, see http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HelpersVideosSummary.htm 
   
   
4. Excel Saved as Webpages Can Add Interactivity In Imaginative Ways
   Suppose that you want to have students make journal entries in a HTML Webpage.  Or suppose you want to see the impact of interest rate swap valuations with changes in forward yield curve estimates. 
   
   Or suppose you want an interactive Excel chart imported into a HTML Webpage where the chart will change when the reader changes the loan principal, interest rate, or maturity date. 
   
   For illustrations on publishing Excel workbooks, spreadsheets, or charts as interactive Webpages, see http://www.trinity.edu/rjense