Category: General

I just finished finals week. One of the useful by-products of this time for me is the opportunity to read student papers. It becomes a useful way to increase the breadth of the material I normally read. A couple of papers this time dealth with high stakes testing and both papers cited the work of Arizona State Univ. profs Amrein and Berliner. These researchers assumed that any general benefit of high stakes tests would be evident on other standardardized tests administered in the state (ACT, SAT, NAEP and AP). They concluded “evidence from this study of 18 states with high-stakes tests is that in all but one analysis, student learning is indeterminate, remains at the same level it was before the policy was implemented.” This finding raises some interesting questions about what the tests actually accomplish.

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A recent Education Week special report considered “Technology and Testing”. A variety of issues, applications, and concerns are addressed. I see the new PT3 “call” for proposals includes this area as a possible area of emphasis.

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New York Times has an interesting description and analysis of how women are portrayed in video games. The article considers both positive and negative perspectives on the agressive roles female characters (or any character) portrays in interactive entertainment.

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I see that KidLink has generated some online press. Kidlink has utilized the Internet to enroll students from 157 countries on every continent in a variety of programs. KidLink put “kids” in touch with each other through listservs, chats, forums, and lesson series.

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Marco Polo offers resources that all teachers should take the time to examine. Recently, there was some concern that financial difficulties of a company supporting this site would force the site to close. However, the site has survived and continues to offer great resources. Marco Polo is known for a careful review process and for linking lessons to standards at the state level.

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We spent Mother’s Day in Minneapolis involved in the Race/Walk for the Cure. I walked. It rained a lot, but was a great day.

Here is Cindy (left) with brother Scott and his wife Denise.

The Race for the Cure raises money for breast cancer research. She is now a nine-year survivor. Appreciate each day.

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Cindy and my books have used HyperStudio as an example of a multimedia authoring environment for many years. We don’t think of what we do as promoting specific products, but it might come across that way to others. We see our approach as using the example(s) we anticipate that future teachers are most likely to have available when they move into classrooms. It is in our best interest to use examples that course instructors see as “mainstream.” HyperStudio is the product that is still featured in the just released 4th edition of our book.

If I had the book to redo, I would focus on a different product. At this point, I prefer eZedia. Our local K-12 district is switching over to this software and I really like the upside on this product. It is fairly easy to learn to use, has great high end features, and the company is still in the process of developing the software so I expect new and better things to come. I guess this is my frustration with HyperStudio. When the company was sold — the product (in my opinion) stagnated.

How would I improve either product? My preference would be to move multimedia toward Internet delivery. I would guess this is where eZedia is moving based on their new product eZediaQTI.

I guess everyone has an opinion. At present, this is my opinion on multimedia authoring products.

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