Here is a description of another Google tool – Google Notebook. I took notes on the tool using the tool so I will offer these notes as a link.
One of my research interests for several years has focused on collaborative class note taking and note using. Google Notebook would be perfectly suited to such applications.
The University of North Dakota has an annual technology conference (for 6 years now). I think local conferences are great and I continue to be impressed by those who participate.
Our graduate program in instructional design takes the opportunity to do a little self promotion. In helping to set up the booth, I missed the opening session, but I found a vacant room streaming the session and watched what was going on at a distance.
Late last night, as things tend to go for me, I encountered a great reference on how to blog a conference. Perhaps if things go a little slow during one of today’s sessions, I may open the pdf the authors provide and see what I should be doing.
Cindy is also attending the conference. I guess this is a perk of us both working in the same field. When I remarked to her about the participation from distant places, she speculated that some folks must be coming up on their tenure decision. And she says that I am a cynic. Whatever the explanation, many of the topics look interesting and perhaps I will find something specific to write about in a later post (after I learn about blogging a conference).
Twice a week I walk across campus to teach Intro Psych in the Ed College’s large lecture classroom. Each trip I walk down the hallway toward the classroom and I walk past a distribution site for the NY Times. I always notice how many copies are available. Now, understand that I make this trip in the afternoon and the copies of the paper are free for the taking. I don’t know how many copies are available at the beginning of the day, but it always seems to me that a very large number of copies are left.
For some reason I have becone preoccupied with why it takes so long to get rid of free copies of the paper. Perhaps I am interested because I recently wrote a post announcing the availability of free online access to the paper. I guess I do not understand what the NY Times hoped to accomplish by giving away copies of the paper. Perhaps there was an assumption that there was an untapped market in North Dakota and students who got hooked on the paper would purchase it when they leave school. My daily unofficial observation would seem to indicate that a different approach may be required. Perhaps the Times should include a page of local news – something like the USA Today does when it offers a paragraph of news for each state. Of course, I don’t know if students who bother to pick up a free copy of a local paper either. Maybe the digital natives don’t read content in hard copy. I guess that might explain the performance of students on my last exam.
I did learn from my reading of the paper that there is a growing dispute over the unsanctioned use of images posted to Flickr. You don’t have to buy or even pick up a free copy of the paper to read this article – it is available online.
Here is a new take on the the role of social networking and the politicial process. Myspace/MTV are sponsoring a series of presidential candidate dialogues. On different scheduled dates, individual candidates respond to questions in real time – there is no debate (see YouTube debate).
An interesting feature is the opportunity to participate by agreeing/disagreeing with stated positions. In the Read/WriteWeb blog analysis, it sounds like a good idea, but those who respond tend to agree with nearly all statements. Perhaps we are only willing to watch our favorite candidates. A debate at least exposes viewers to multiple candidates.
I have long been a Ken Burns fan. I own his “jazz” series and is the type of material that I will watch every six months or so.
His new documentary, The War, examines the WWII from the perspective of 4 communities (one in Minnesota) and has been playing on PBS this week. Burns and PBS offer some great resources related to the program – one component of this site offers resources for educators.
My father was stationed in the south pacific during the war as a radar operator. When I was a kid, I found an old radio in the attic that could search the ham radio frequencies. Dad knew Morse code from his military days and he would sit in the bedroom with me and write down the morse code conversations I would find. I remember he always printed in capital letters when he did this and this was not the way he normally wrote.
The images in the Burns videos made me remember my dad. A big personal regret I have had in the last few years was that I had basically ruined a large collection of negatives my dad had brought back from the war. I became aware of the lost potential of these negatives when Cindy was working on her history project and the Burns material reminded me again. My dad was an amateur photographer and also a bit of an entrepeneur. He had a 620 camera and took black and white pictures. A 620 negative is large enough to contact print (it is about the size of a snapshot and you don’t need an enlarger). He took pictures and sold small collections to his buddies so they could send pictures home. There was a shoe box full of these pictures in the attic (I did spend a good deal of time exploring the stuff in the attic.). My dad helped me take and develop pictures and I also printed some of his pictures from the war. I was not particularly careful and he did not put a lot of personal value on the negatives. Over time the collection was kind of depleted and somehow disappeared. What a resource the collection would be now!
We worry about leaving our kids money. That was the way my dad was. You can always make more money. Once the pictures are gone, they are gone forever.
NAEP results are in and you are likely to encounter a discussion from most news outlets (see NY Times article – I knew open access to the NY Times would be useful). Really short version – math scores are up a little, reading results are mixed, various political groups interpret differently (NCLB may be good or it may be misdirected).
If you are interested in NCLB, I would offer Volume 44, No.3, American Educational Research Journal as suggested reading. This is a special issue on NCLB and there are several analyses to review. I would suggest the following (my bias is obvious in previous posts) – Hursh, D. (2007). Assessing no child left behind and the rise of neoliberal education policies. AERJ, 44, 493-518.
One short quote from the conclusion (p. 514):
…, I strongly suggest that the exams used to assess schools have increased the number of high school dropouts. They have no made curricula more rigorous, and neither have they closed the achievement gap …
The NY Times has given up trying to make money (with the exception of ad revenue) from its web site (article from the Times on decision). Perhaps of interest to history buffs, most of the archives will also be available. The NY Times site claims to be the most visited web site associated with a newspaper. The explanation for the change is unclear in the Times article, but the decision is similar to that of CNN in abandoning subscription access. I suppose the “information wants to be free” advocates will argue this move was inevitable.
I can’t claim to be a regular NY Times reading in hard copy or online. I tend to read what some of the editorial writers have to say in the books that eventually incorporate their work. Perhaps I will now make an effort to follow the education section.