Category: General

Harvesting Web Information?

I have been reading David Warlick’s “Raw Materials for the Mind.” I like his work and would recommend this resource. We share many beliefs concerning the educational potential of Internet resources and have a similar model that involves finding, evaluating, harvesting, processing, and applying online information.

I must admit some of the specific suggestions for “harvesting” online information give me some trouble. To me harvesting can mean a range of things describing both note taking and wholesale copying. In the writing I do, I stay away from describing resources and techniques for “whacking” web pages and sites. Warlick is careful to acknowledge that he is not a lawyer or expert on Internet copyright issues and he does suggest that you should contact web authors for permission (Landmark-Project permission form). He lists some of the situations that might encourage “harvesting” – e.g., classroom computer does not have Internet access, conference presentation may not involve Internet access. Still, most of the suggestions seem about convenience. Authors seem reluctant to say – DO NOT COPY MATERIAL UNLESS YOU HAVE PERMISSION. It always seems like authors are hedging. To me, the message for teachers is unclear.

Any thoughts on this situation?

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WebQuest Portal

Bernie Dodge presented about WebQuests at NECC. For the next few months you can view this session online.

This session was interesting to me for two reasons. First, it is always interesting to understand how someone associated with a process or product understands his/her own vision. When you are acquainted with ideas indirectly, you may acquire a personal perspective that is different than originally intended. I use the word “different” to indicate that each of us brings our personal experiences to the interpretation of abstract ideas and the result may be more or less useful than the original. The opportunity to interact allows moving toward a shared vision (a social constructivist kind of thing). However, after listening to Bernie on multi-occassions, I am also convinced his own ideas drift (grow/change) as I am sure is true of all of us. Anyway, if you are interested in WebQuests, you will benefit from this presentation.< The second reason I liked this presentation was the focus on a “community.” This is an idea many of us have played with and considered how to develop. Dr. Dodge has made the assumption that those individuals interested in WebQuests represent a potential community and the collective wisdom and time of this community exceeds his own. The goal is to find a way to tap into this collective wisdom and time for the benefit of all. His present effort to do this is represented in a web site – WebQuest.org.

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New Toy

iSight Image

I have a new toy – an iSight. The iSight is a video camera/microphone from Apple. I made the purchase because of another product – iChat AV. iChat allows audio/video/text interaction. At this point, I can’t say I have interacted with anyone using the video capabilities of this system, but Cindy and I communicate using audio (she is in Japan this summer) and the quality of the audio is great. We may have to wait a bit to try the video. There is supposedly a new Apple store in Tokyo, but she could not find it.

iChat is presently available as a free beta to those operating on OSX machines. I read the ads to indicate the product will eventually cost $30 to those with existing OSX software and will come with the next version of the operating system. Try the beta to see what you think.

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Front Page

A listserv I follow has recently been discussing Microsoft FrontPage. In my opinion, this web authoring program has had a bad reputation. The messages to the list continue to support this view, but some disagree. One link that surfaced – Front Page Updates – seems to show that improvements have been made.

I would certainly welcome comment if you have had experience with this product.

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Last Day

Blogging NECC has caught on. I see that an organized group of contributors is creating NECC blogs so a link from here is warranted.

I have noticed there is not a lot of support here for “No Child Left Behind.” Perhaps this is a function of the sessions I select. I listed to Ferdi Serim this morning. He and a colleague talked about the difference between growth (NWEA) and performance orientations to evaluation. The idea is that a hurdle system (performance) does a poor job of informing teachers how to work with individual students and is insensitive to entering differences in capabilities/background.

I attended a David Thornburg presentation to end the day. Again, a big picture person with challenging ideas. The theme of the presentation was helping students navigate from data to understanding. Thornburg offered some interesting data on data – just how much of it we experience. He also recommended tools for working with data – how to locate meaningful data (Grokker), how to organize (Inspiration) and how to personalize and add context (eZedia). I assume other tools could be substituted. Grokker was new to me. This application is a different type of search engine/organization tool and it is certainly worth a look.

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Alan Kay Keynote

I like presenters who offer both big ideas and specific examples. If you have the time, connect to the archived video of Alan Kay’s keynote. You will have to wait a bit to view the archived version, but in a week or so try Minds TV. If you once were excited by the ideas of Papert and LOGO, this presentation is for you.

Since this video will likely go away soon, you might also explore a web site that attempt to promote some of the same ideas – Squeakland.Org.

Recommended site – Adobe Digital Kids Club. Learning and apply the skills of digital photography.

50 Ideas for using a digital camera in an elementary school.

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