Month: January 2006

Is the read/write web moving toward extinction? Lawrence Lessig argues the negative position from his unique legal perspective. His focus typically involves commercial moves to block creative repurposing of content. The example in this article is kids being asked to desist from creating music videos by adding their own art to commercial music. To tell the truth, I can see the position of the music companies – if I can access a music video and I can strip the music why should I not anticipate that the people who invested to produce the music would not object. I assume this is the concern. Should the companies be concerned? I can’t say – the work to create these products would seem to limit how many are actually available, but perhaps the concern is that such student activities will spawn related ventures and where will the line be drawn?

I think the real threat, if threat can be considered the correct word, is that of commercial resources – e.g., blogs, podcasts from CNN, New York Times, etc. Those individuals hoping to “have a voice” and “participate in the dialog” will likely receive less attention. I am not sure this would bother me. I am still of the opinion that we produce content because we value the experience and, if we feel the need, we find ways to generate our own audience – perhaps by interacting with others who value the social experience as much as accessing the content provided by commercial “experts”.

While I write here about educational applications of technology, I typically do not have the opportunity to teach a course specifically focused on this topic. This situation is different this semester and I am likely to spin off a few blog posts as a consequence of my preparatory reading.

I like to spend a little time at the beginning of my course to address the question of “what is it like out there.” The core idea is that we should not be willing to settle for our own perceptions but should be willing to explore a little in hopes of gaining a broader perspective. What is typical? What are the extremes? I try to come up with some quantitative representations (i.e., statistics) and the perspectives of some “advocates” to help students and I create personal understanding.

I assume my students will be a little confused. While I am past the stage of assuming the research will provide me a clear picture of anything, I must admit I am also finding it difficult to “pull things together.” Here is an example. Students in my class and others they take within our program read some papers by those who describe a “Net Gen” (for example a recent edutopia piece by Marc Prensky) basically suggesting that the experiences of “today’s students” have been quite different than our own and as a consequence these students will be frustrated by our reliance on traditional educational experiences. Extreme change is necessary.

I also assigned the recent Educause 2005 study of Students and Information Technology. This massive study of 18,000 college freshmen and seniors from 63 institutions collected survey data on student reaction to their experiences with technology on campus.

One might expect a survey of present college students to demonstrate the frustration that concerns those who are warning the rest of us about the Net generation. I invite you to read these perspectives for yourself. I read the college student data to indicate that “these students pick up many technology skills from their course experiences – students are more technologically sophisticated when they leave college than when they enter”, and students prefer “a moderate amount of technology in their courses.” Students value the communication options a course CMS makes available and like to look up their grades. I must say – I find their collective “expectations” disappointing.

I am interested in many of the same things that fascinate other technologists. Games and experiential environments are cool. Learning by doing makes sense. Flexible, anytime learning experiences seem worth exploring.

There is no doubt they use cell phones and IM as a “natural” form of communication and enjoy video games. However, what are the consequences of such preferences for desired learning experiences? I am not convinced today’s students are way ahead of the rest of us AND are demanding change. Maybe they should be, but what data make this point in a convincing fashion?

Anyone remember the Guido Sarducci five minute university skit? Father Sarducci offers a five-minute version of what people learn in college and proposes that we might as well learn this version because it is what we remember anyway.

For some reason, the Crash Course in Learning Theory post offered at Creating Passionate Users brought that Sarducci skit to mind. Read this post – it offers a summary of “principles” for educators. Would I offer this in place of my course? No, but I would hope my students remember some of these ideas.

One of the listservs I follow contained a post by Lavona Grow concerning federal funding for technology. Lavonna is now associated with the FIPSE grant program (a focus on higher education). My personal reference for her is in association with the now defunct PT3 grant program (a Program to train future teachers to use technology we were able to tap for work at the University of North Dakota).

Lavona’s post mostly excerpted sections of an article in eSchool News explaining the funding cuts relevant to technology use in K-12 settings (Lavona’s own comments focused on cuts in FIPSE funding).

The eSchool article says:

The massive, $602 billion spending package–which includes funding for labor, health, and education initiatives–slashes funding for several ed-tech related programs, including $221 million less for the Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) state block-grant program, the primary source of federal funding for educational technology.

The cut to EETT amounts to 45% of the present rate. Also cut (actually completely eliminated) was the 21st Century Community Learning Center Program.

What troubles me about this situation is that it places a greater portion of the burden for the cost of technology on the state and district. The districts most likely to pick up the slack will be those districts able to go to the local tax payers and successfully argue for more funds. In some locations this will happen and in many locations it will not. Now, attempt to wrap your mind around this situation while simultaneously contemplating the expectations of NCLB. Is it possible to create a logical explanation for this combination of expectations and resource availability? Why is it reasonable to blame schools struggling under the most challenging in and out of school circumstances for their performance and at the same time take actions that differentially remove the basic resources these schools rely on to function?

[Note – this is one of the topics I wrote about a month or so ago and am not rewriting due to a database problem on my server (my fault) and the significance of the topic.]

Mac addicts probably already know this, but the MacWorld 2006 keynote is available online. It used to be possible to watch the keynotes live, but this has not been possible lately. At least the delayed version remains and it is good entertainment (mostly marketing hype).

I do enjoy the opportunity to check out new products. As things in my world go, we purchased a new iMac desktop for a kind of Christmas present and Apple announced a new iMac during the keynote presentation. Supposedly nearly twice as fast. Oh well, the “old” one is still too fast for me.

I thought the new iLife 06 products have educational potential. The iWeb softare appears to be an easy way to author web content and a new feature of iPhoto allows sharing of image collections. The new opportunity to create videopodcasts within iMovie may also provide the foundation for projects.

Check out the streaming version of the keynote – you can skip the first fifth or so and see the products I mention here.

I turned off my original server today. It was a Mac PowerPC 6150 operating at 66 megahertz. It ran on the 7.6.1 operating system and used Webstar 3.0 server software.

As is the case with other “characters” of legend, I really don’t know how old my server was. The oldest file I could find dated from 1996, but I am not certain the original page served from the machine still exists.

The expression “they don’t make ’em like they used to” really applies to this machine. Early on, I remember the fan went out and the machine shut down automatically because of the heat. With the exception of that one equipment problem and the time power to the campus was shut down during the flood of 1997, the machine ran for probably ten years without a problem. Imagine turning your desktop machine on, starting some program that continually accesses the harddrive, and then coming back 10 years later to see if everything is OK.

The machine was still willing to try, but new web content is simply too complex, built of too many components. Each component, no matter how small, takes a channel and the server software would only handle 10 channels. It takes time to open and close these channels and at 66 megahertz to send data through the channels there were simply too many delays for viewers. Not everyone respects “experience.”

I do not think I will be able to recycle this machine. Perhaps I will find a nice place in the corner of my lab and just let it rest. I once thought we might retire together. I would box up my stuff, turn off my server, and walk out the door. I guess not.

I am fascinated by the new AJAX applications (e.g., gOffice). I don’t understand exactly how software of this type is written and I am fascinated by those who spend what must be a tremendous abount of their time on projects with no obvious compensation (I do recognize the value of satisfying the creative urge, but I personally can satisify this drive with only a couple of hours of time).

My newest interest in Writely.

For the uninitiated, this type of application resides on the “net” and operates on your machine within a standard browser. It is similar to what I used to understand the term “thin client” to imply (a machine with no harddrive requiring that all apps be downloaded into memory as needed).

So, Writely allows you to access a browser whenever and from where ever you might want to work. Writely has two features I did not understand to exist in gOffice. First, you can store files in RTF format and you can get them to your personal machine when you want. Second, Writely has been developed to encourage collaborate efforts – i.e., you can work on a document remotely with colleagues and not have to send the document back and forth (the copy you see is the existing version of the document). I would think an app of this nature would of interest to K-12 teachers wanting to engage their students in collaborative writing activities.