August 2nd, 2010
from Jan Schwartz
I sat in on a series of 4 webinars, last week conducted by Allen Interactions. The presenter was Ethan Edwards and he talked about Allen Interaction’s process in developing computer based elearning and training. He described and demonstrated the concepts of context, challenge, activity and feedback.
I had a number of great take-aways from each of these webinars, but the one that sticks in my mind is not really about course design or content. It’s about expectations–expectations for student performance and not being afraid to set the performance value at 100%. This is easier to do online because each student can have multiple chances to learn the material at their own pace. If a course is properly designed for education, not just knowledge transfer, then the assessment is really not in the quiz, but in the performance of course activities that allow repeated tries with feedback.
In most schools I’ve attended the passing grade was 75%. Based on 100% being excellent, I think 75% is mediocre. How many mediocre people do we want in the world, or in our professions? How can we change expectations in our schools and in our communities of practice, whatever that may be?
Photo credit: Flikr, Steph Anderson
Tags: college students, education, elearning, expectations, online learning; benefits of online learning; overcoming fear of speaking
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July 28th, 2010
From Judith McDaniel
Months ago I wrote about Intellectual Property and how that is changing in the digital age. No one can “own” a syllabus any more. There is one just like yours on one of the many Open Courseware sites. Authors don’t have to cite information that is spread all over the internet, though they may want to do so for their own protection. Recently, my department just asked (politely but firmly) for me to open my online courses to graduate students who would be teaching them in the future. No need for them to reinvent everything.
Opening
The Library of Congress manages copyright issues. They have recently been putting out new rules about academic “fair use” of videos and print media. It’s not easy reading a copyright ruling, and I’m a law school grad.
But here’s the future, compliments of the New York Times:
“The Library of Congress, which has the power to define exceptions to an important copyright law, said…that it was legal to bypass a phone’s controls on what software it will run to get “lawfully obtained” programs to work. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit digital rights group, had asked for that exception to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to allow the so-called jailbreaking of iPhones and other devices.
‘This is a really important victory for iPhone owners,’ said Corynne McSherry, a senior staff lawyer with the foundation. ‘People who want to tinker with their phones and move outside of the Applesphere now have the ability to legally do that.’”
It is important, and not just for iPhone owners or software designers. It is important to all of us because it is one step closer to shared knowledge and shared use.
Tags: copyright, iPhone, Library of Congress, phone apps, shared use
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I sat in on a series of 4 webinars, last week conducted by Allen Interactions. The presenter was Ethan Edwards and he talked about Allen Interaction’s process in developing computer based elearning and training. He described and demonstrated the concepts of context, challenge, activity and feedback.
