Normative Culture by J. Halverson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at normativeculture.blogspot.com.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Different drummer, same beat
It's a "I'm kinda' movin on" to the Web 2.0 class and "yo, what up" to my Adult Learners class, but the rhythm seems to have more similarites than differences. I am wondering how the two will compliment each other because I got so much out of the Web 2.0 lessons that I am still using and will try to integrate into the new class sessions. In any educational lesson, I don't think either the student or teacher can ask for anything more than the application, in real terms, of the subject matter. Did the class actually change the person? That can happen intellectually or in a practical sense, both have value.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Parody of ShamWow and Web 2.0
https://deimos.apple.com/WebObjects/Core.woa/BrowsePrivately/psu.edu.2923939450.02923939463.2946858513?i=1614854422
Many web 2.0 tools have a far reaching and deep educational value that can enhance the learning experience of many and give a richer and fuller quality to the ongoing intellectual process, this is not any of that.. it was just fun.
I used and explored, mostly through trial and error (a great learning experience) web 2.0 tools as a fun way to complete our assignment which was "how could you influence or plead with someone to check out your blog, wiki, niing or other web 2.0 site" and I choose a parody. Some of the challenges were technical, others dealt with time constraints and some were self imposed obsessions to do something that I liked and felt satisfied at the end.
So, first came the idea and that was germinated by Megan's direction of "what would it take to get someone to visit your site?" and for me it would have to be catchy and funny. I thought of a commercial and then out of the blue I thought of a parody of an infommercial (plus I am a fan of the genre, I first was going to do Ron Popeil the guy that brought us the oven where you just "Set It and Forget It!", Ron was the original TV pitchman going back to the '60's-my Dad owned a Ron Popeil Pocket Fisherman, one of the original TV pitched products.. enough of the back story) to explain a little about what the idea of web 2.0 is all about. I roughed out a script and started to flesh out some ideas.
I was able to find the original ShamWow script online and used it as a template for pacing and to capture some of the catch phrases used in the original. I needed some good background music, my first attempts in Audacity were failures.. bad tempo, wrong musical type. When I decided on what kind of music I wanted, I then had to find it. I went to a Torrent site and downloaded some music files but one of them was suspicious in how it acted etc., so I went elsewhere.
One of the songs I wanted to use I know I owned on a vinyl disc but a long torturous search revealed nothing except memeories attached to the old disks. I fianaly found a song I liked, but since I purchased it in iTunes, Audacity could not import it for some reason. Turning to the Audacity wiki I found a work around (record to a cd, play it in WMP and record it into Audacity) it worked.
But now the audio track I was laying down sounded terrible. The microphone from my web cam could not handle the sound. All of the track was clipped (too much digital information trying to get into a limited amount of bits on the track and you get static.. sounded bad). I tried almost every filter that Audacity offers but to no avail. I now know about almost every filter Audacity has and what it can do (another great learning experience).
Frustated with the end sounding result I went out and bought a microphone with the understanding of the salesman that if it did not record without clipping I was going to bring it back the next day, he agreed (gotta love seasonal help at Staples) and off I went.
The new microphone recorded beautifully. Full sound waves on the spectrogram scale in Audacity with plently of band width to manipulate with Audacity's tools. i was able to fade in, fade out, cut a piece from another take and splice it into another track, speed up a section to change my voice and in the end have fun with the whole process. When learning can be fun it's not learning at all, it is just joy.
Many web 2.0 tools have a far reaching and deep educational value that can enhance the learning experience of many and give a richer and fuller quality to the ongoing intellectual process, this is not any of that.. it was just fun.
I used and explored, mostly through trial and error (a great learning experience) web 2.0 tools as a fun way to complete our assignment which was "how could you influence or plead with someone to check out your blog, wiki, niing or other web 2.0 site" and I choose a parody. Some of the challenges were technical, others dealt with time constraints and some were self imposed obsessions to do something that I liked and felt satisfied at the end.
So, first came the idea and that was germinated by Megan's direction of "what would it take to get someone to visit your site?" and for me it would have to be catchy and funny. I thought of a commercial and then out of the blue I thought of a parody of an infommercial (plus I am a fan of the genre, I first was going to do Ron Popeil the guy that brought us the oven where you just "Set It and Forget It!", Ron was the original TV pitchman going back to the '60's-my Dad owned a Ron Popeil Pocket Fisherman, one of the original TV pitched products.. enough of the back story) to explain a little about what the idea of web 2.0 is all about. I roughed out a script and started to flesh out some ideas.
I was able to find the original ShamWow script online and used it as a template for pacing and to capture some of the catch phrases used in the original. I needed some good background music, my first attempts in Audacity were failures.. bad tempo, wrong musical type. When I decided on what kind of music I wanted, I then had to find it. I went to a Torrent site and downloaded some music files but one of them was suspicious in how it acted etc., so I went elsewhere.
One of the songs I wanted to use I know I owned on a vinyl disc but a long torturous search revealed nothing except memeories attached to the old disks. I fianaly found a song I liked, but since I purchased it in iTunes, Audacity could not import it for some reason. Turning to the Audacity wiki I found a work around (record to a cd, play it in WMP and record it into Audacity) it worked.
But now the audio track I was laying down sounded terrible. The microphone from my web cam could not handle the sound. All of the track was clipped (too much digital information trying to get into a limited amount of bits on the track and you get static.. sounded bad). I tried almost every filter that Audacity offers but to no avail. I now know about almost every filter Audacity has and what it can do (another great learning experience).
Frustated with the end sounding result I went out and bought a microphone with the understanding of the salesman that if it did not record without clipping I was going to bring it back the next day, he agreed (gotta love seasonal help at Staples) and off I went.
The new microphone recorded beautifully. Full sound waves on the spectrogram scale in Audacity with plently of band width to manipulate with Audacity's tools. i was able to fade in, fade out, cut a piece from another take and splice it into another track, speed up a section to change my voice and in the end have fun with the whole process. When learning can be fun it's not learning at all, it is just joy.
Learning Experience
J.C. Halverson
Special Topics INSYS 497B
Megan Fritz PhD
Fall 2009
Penn State Great Valley
Overview of Project
The project that I implemented web 2.0 tools into involves training individuals to become trainers for their respective organizations. The groups of “Train the Trainer” participants are from different areas of the Dallas Region of the Department of Labor’s Job Corps program. The participants are spread over eleven states at twenty two different residential training centers. For the purposes of this project the participants will be divided into two groups, those in the northern tier of states and those in the southern tier of states which will be the targeted group for this beta stage of the project. The overall objective is to have all of these staff become competent trainers in the “Normative Culture” training techniques which my training company provides as an independent training sub contractor. The web 2.0 tool which will be the focal point of this project will be wiggio, a free site designed to help working with groups easier.
Besides the logistics of having a group that is spread out over a wide geographic area, one of the challenges is that most of the staff involved are adult learners and they present specific challenges as adult learners and complicating the variables is that the project has the objective of the addition of implementing a new technology into that learning process. The Educause Quarterly identifies that adult students often have little experience working online and need help navigating content and performing learning tasks. There are groups striving to bridge the divide, the national Council of Adult Experiential Learners sponsors tools and seminars to assist in addressing the needs and realities of the adult learner. The wiggio tool was chosen as part of this project because of the simplicity of its design, the features included and it is free.
Implementation
As with any change project it is imperative to have authorization and support from the top management or administration and this project initiated a preliminary request on November 10, 2009 with the Program Supervisor of the Dallas Regional Office of Job Corps. I presented the overall concept of the online tool, my connection to the project as a student and as a businessman and answered questions about cost, copyright and hosting responsibilities. It was agreed that a follow up meeting would be held in Albuquerque during an upcoming training session with the targeted group of adult learners. A meeting was held with the Department of Labor Regional Director of Job Corps and the concept of the project and web 2.0 tool was presented. It was determined that permission from the National Office would not be necessary if my company would be hosting the site and therefore it would not have to fall under the Department of Labor’s Internet Acceptable Use policy which would have put undue restrictions and the possibility of a lengthy review process on the use of the web 2.0 tool.
I spoke with the training participants and told them of my plans to put together a web site that would help them organize the training material, provide supplemental training aides and provide a forum to share with others the trials and tribulations they were going through in performing training sessions. Speck has identified that “adults will commit to learning when the goals and objectives are considered realistic and important to them. Application in the 'real world' is important and relevant to the adult learner’s personal and professional needs”.
On December 9, 2009 an email was sent to the Train the Trainer group announcing the launch of the wiggio web 2.0 web site and inviting them to log in and begin to interact with the features of the site. Follow up invitation emails were sent as well emails announcing the addition of new material as a way to pique interest in those that have not logged on yet.
Evaluation
In order to evaluate the success of this project will require a long term perspective and tangible evaluative criteria. The evaluation will be divided into four main categories; involvement, active usage, training and participant self assessment. A rudimentary rubric was developed to have an ongoing base line of evaluation. It is the intention to complete the rubric at the end of each month for the first four months of the project as a means to give the Regional Office of Job Corps and the participant’s feedback about where the group stands in the use of the web 2.0 wiggio tool. The first measurement area is to look at participant involvement as measured by how many of the group log into the site. This is a simple numerical standard used but could identify if some participants might have issues logging on because of a lack of computer skills or access to a computer.
The second area evaluated will be the amount of active usage participants do. This will measure the degree to which the group uses the materials in a collaborative way to edit, comment and produce training material. Leib has written how adults have accumulated a foundation of life experiences and knowledge that may include work-related activities, family responsibilities, and previous education. They need to connect learning to this knowledge/experience base. (Leib) The scale will be determined by the degree to which participants are able to “personalize” the training material with references from their own lives.
The third area to be evaluated will be trainings the participants actually perform at their respective centers. This is an important component in that it represents an overall objective irrespective of the use of the web 2.0 tool but still is indicative of the tools ability to influence the behavior of the group members. The function of the wiggio site allows individuals to post their scheduled and completed training sessions.
The final evaluation area to be examined is a poll distributed to participants asking about their assessment of their development as a trainer. A Leikert scale will be used to gauge the progress of individuals over the four month evaluation period. Questions will be developed to ascertain knowledge of the training content, confidence in presenting the material, support of management and feedback from the participants in their training sessions.
Works Cited
Cordes, S. (2009). How IT Can Help Support Adult Learners. Retrieved 12 12, 2009, from Educause Quaterly: http://www.educause.edu/EDUCAUSE+Quarterly/EDUCAUSEQuarterlyMagazineVolum/AdultLearnersHowITCanSupportNe/163869
Council of Adult Experiential Learning. (n.d.). Retrieved 12 10, 2009, from http://www.cael.org/
Leib. (n.d.). Principles of Adult Education. Retrieved 12 14, 2009, from Adults as Learners: http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachtip/adults-2.htm
Appendix
#1 Email sent to Train the Trainer participants/ December 9, 2009
I hope everyone is doing well. As I had mentioned during our last session in
Albuquerque I have put together a web site for all of the Train the Trainer
participants. Feel free to explore and try out some of the features. I have put
the files from the trainer’s manual under the "folder" tab, have put some video
clips under the "links" tab and we can message under the "message" tab. When you
open a file under the "folder" tab, you can edit it and save it and the original
version will remain and a new version will be created. What we can do is have
people make changes and create a group version of some of the material.
For now just play around, send me a message (that will help me out know that you
were able to log on) add material; add a link of your center.... just have some
fun exploring the site and we will see if this is worthwhile for us.
Take care and I hope everyone had a great holiday and survives the upcoming
holidays!
ps- on the calendar tab you can put in the dates you have worked out to do
training at your center (hopefully!!!), so put your center's name and what
portion of training you are doing... good luck and as always I am open to
feedback... oh the "view" feature does not seem to work with the documents, use
the "edit" and the document will open.
----------------------------------------
Reply in the Messages section of Normative Culture:
http://www.wiggio.com/seek.html?type=message&gid=188929&id=935463&email=ngtgroup@aol.com
Thank you for using Wiggio!
#2 Evaluation Rubric
**(sorry, but the formatting for the following did not carrying over when I pasted thsi from my paper and I don't know how to correct it, thanks)
Participant
Involvement Evaluation # Date: Comments:
0-6 participants log on to wiggio site within 30 days of invitation
Score 1
7-12 participants log on to wiggio site within 30 days of invitation
Score 2
8-18 participants log on to wiggio site within 30 days of invitation
Score 3
18-25 participants log on to wiggio site within 30 days of invitation
Score 4
Total
Active Usage
Participants do not view or edit any documents
Score 1
Participants view documents but do no editing or downloading
Score 2
Participants do editing of documents and download
Score 3
Participants collaborate with others in creating documents, add new material
Score 4
Total
Training
Participants do not perform any training session
Score 1
Participants schedule training sessions but they are not completed
Score 2
Participants schedule and perform one to two days of training
Score 3
Participants schedule and perform three to five days of training
Score 4
Total
Self Assessment
Participants do not return poll distributed
Score 1
Participants return poll with no comments
Score 2
Participants return poll with comments
Score 3
Participants return poll with comments and suggestions
Score 4
Total
Grand Total
Special Topics INSYS 497B
Megan Fritz PhD
Fall 2009
Penn State Great Valley
Overview of Project
The project that I implemented web 2.0 tools into involves training individuals to become trainers for their respective organizations. The groups of “Train the Trainer” participants are from different areas of the Dallas Region of the Department of Labor’s Job Corps program. The participants are spread over eleven states at twenty two different residential training centers. For the purposes of this project the participants will be divided into two groups, those in the northern tier of states and those in the southern tier of states which will be the targeted group for this beta stage of the project. The overall objective is to have all of these staff become competent trainers in the “Normative Culture” training techniques which my training company provides as an independent training sub contractor. The web 2.0 tool which will be the focal point of this project will be wiggio, a free site designed to help working with groups easier.
Besides the logistics of having a group that is spread out over a wide geographic area, one of the challenges is that most of the staff involved are adult learners and they present specific challenges as adult learners and complicating the variables is that the project has the objective of the addition of implementing a new technology into that learning process. The Educause Quarterly identifies that adult students often have little experience working online and need help navigating content and performing learning tasks. There are groups striving to bridge the divide, the national Council of Adult Experiential Learners sponsors tools and seminars to assist in addressing the needs and realities of the adult learner. The wiggio tool was chosen as part of this project because of the simplicity of its design, the features included and it is free.
Implementation
As with any change project it is imperative to have authorization and support from the top management or administration and this project initiated a preliminary request on November 10, 2009 with the Program Supervisor of the Dallas Regional Office of Job Corps. I presented the overall concept of the online tool, my connection to the project as a student and as a businessman and answered questions about cost, copyright and hosting responsibilities. It was agreed that a follow up meeting would be held in Albuquerque during an upcoming training session with the targeted group of adult learners. A meeting was held with the Department of Labor Regional Director of Job Corps and the concept of the project and web 2.0 tool was presented. It was determined that permission from the National Office would not be necessary if my company would be hosting the site and therefore it would not have to fall under the Department of Labor’s Internet Acceptable Use policy which would have put undue restrictions and the possibility of a lengthy review process on the use of the web 2.0 tool.
I spoke with the training participants and told them of my plans to put together a web site that would help them organize the training material, provide supplemental training aides and provide a forum to share with others the trials and tribulations they were going through in performing training sessions. Speck has identified that “adults will commit to learning when the goals and objectives are considered realistic and important to them. Application in the 'real world' is important and relevant to the adult learner’s personal and professional needs”.
On December 9, 2009 an email was sent to the Train the Trainer group announcing the launch of the wiggio web 2.0 web site and inviting them to log in and begin to interact with the features of the site. Follow up invitation emails were sent as well emails announcing the addition of new material as a way to pique interest in those that have not logged on yet.
Evaluation
In order to evaluate the success of this project will require a long term perspective and tangible evaluative criteria. The evaluation will be divided into four main categories; involvement, active usage, training and participant self assessment. A rudimentary rubric was developed to have an ongoing base line of evaluation. It is the intention to complete the rubric at the end of each month for the first four months of the project as a means to give the Regional Office of Job Corps and the participant’s feedback about where the group stands in the use of the web 2.0 wiggio tool. The first measurement area is to look at participant involvement as measured by how many of the group log into the site. This is a simple numerical standard used but could identify if some participants might have issues logging on because of a lack of computer skills or access to a computer.
The second area evaluated will be the amount of active usage participants do. This will measure the degree to which the group uses the materials in a collaborative way to edit, comment and produce training material. Leib has written how adults have accumulated a foundation of life experiences and knowledge that may include work-related activities, family responsibilities, and previous education. They need to connect learning to this knowledge/experience base. (Leib) The scale will be determined by the degree to which participants are able to “personalize” the training material with references from their own lives.
The third area to be evaluated will be trainings the participants actually perform at their respective centers. This is an important component in that it represents an overall objective irrespective of the use of the web 2.0 tool but still is indicative of the tools ability to influence the behavior of the group members. The function of the wiggio site allows individuals to post their scheduled and completed training sessions.
The final evaluation area to be examined is a poll distributed to participants asking about their assessment of their development as a trainer. A Leikert scale will be used to gauge the progress of individuals over the four month evaluation period. Questions will be developed to ascertain knowledge of the training content, confidence in presenting the material, support of management and feedback from the participants in their training sessions.
Works Cited
Cordes, S. (2009). How IT Can Help Support Adult Learners. Retrieved 12 12, 2009, from Educause Quaterly: http://www.educause.edu/EDUCAUSE+Quarterly/EDUCAUSEQuarterlyMagazineVolum/AdultLearnersHowITCanSupportNe/163869
Council of Adult Experiential Learning. (n.d.). Retrieved 12 10, 2009, from http://www.cael.org/
Leib. (n.d.). Principles of Adult Education. Retrieved 12 14, 2009, from Adults as Learners: http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachtip/adults-2.htm
Appendix
#1 Email sent to Train the Trainer participants/ December 9, 2009
I hope everyone is doing well. As I had mentioned during our last session in
Albuquerque I have put together a web site for all of the Train the Trainer
participants. Feel free to explore and try out some of the features. I have put
the files from the trainer’s manual under the "folder" tab, have put some video
clips under the "links" tab and we can message under the "message" tab. When you
open a file under the "folder" tab, you can edit it and save it and the original
version will remain and a new version will be created. What we can do is have
people make changes and create a group version of some of the material.
For now just play around, send me a message (that will help me out know that you
were able to log on) add material; add a link of your center.... just have some
fun exploring the site and we will see if this is worthwhile for us.
Take care and I hope everyone had a great holiday and survives the upcoming
holidays!
ps- on the calendar tab you can put in the dates you have worked out to do
training at your center (hopefully!!!), so put your center's name and what
portion of training you are doing... good luck and as always I am open to
feedback... oh the "view" feature does not seem to work with the documents, use
the "edit" and the document will open.
----------------------------------------
Reply in the Messages section of Normative Culture:
http://www.wiggio.com/seek.html?type=message&gid=188929&id=935463&email=ngtgroup@aol.com
Thank you for using Wiggio!
#2 Evaluation Rubric
**(sorry, but the formatting for the following did not carrying over when I pasted thsi from my paper and I don't know how to correct it, thanks)
Participant
Involvement Evaluation # Date: Comments:
0-6 participants log on to wiggio site within 30 days of invitation
Score 1
7-12 participants log on to wiggio site within 30 days of invitation
Score 2
8-18 participants log on to wiggio site within 30 days of invitation
Score 3
18-25 participants log on to wiggio site within 30 days of invitation
Score 4
Total
Active Usage
Participants do not view or edit any documents
Score 1
Participants view documents but do no editing or downloading
Score 2
Participants do editing of documents and download
Score 3
Participants collaborate with others in creating documents, add new material
Score 4
Total
Training
Participants do not perform any training session
Score 1
Participants schedule training sessions but they are not completed
Score 2
Participants schedule and perform one to two days of training
Score 3
Participants schedule and perform three to five days of training
Score 4
Total
Self Assessment
Participants do not return poll distributed
Score 1
Participants return poll with no comments
Score 2
Participants return poll with comments
Score 3
Participants return poll with comments and suggestions
Score 4
Total
Grand Total
Monday, December 14, 2009
Blog #4 Planning and Implementation
Well I have to admit that for most of the semester I felt as though I was playing catch up and struggling to keep pace. No excuses, but I was working, running a business, traveling doing training, starting grad school, working on the car and bike, getting ready for the holdays and being part of a family. All satisfying and rewarding pursuits but it became a chocolate mess for a while trying to juggle and plan how I could manage all the important things in my life. Then came the learning curve of new technologies presented in class, I had moments of being overwhelmed and questioning of what was going to have to give. So, it had to come down to planning and dilligently multi-tasking or risk having to make some serious decisions.
Come to find out that some of those web 2.0 tools could actually organize some parts of my overflowing life pursuits, if I could just figure out how they work.
I focused on the interaction of school and the training business and how they could complement each other. I have always needed to have a practical application of something to keep my interest, never went for novels, had to be non-fiction to appreciate the reality of it all.
I was lucky to be at a point in my training business where a web 2.0 tool fit nicely into a new initiative we were doing. I presented the overall plan to the powers that be and to the particpants themselves and everything was very well received, so off we went! i spent some frustrating times preparing to launch the tool (wiggio.com) trying to get all of the parts to work and even with some shortcomings, loaded up the site with lots of my work (with a nod to the concept of creative commons)and sent out invitations to the participants. The response has been good, not great, but a very good start. Some people had issues (what do i click on?) which indicated the group is going to go through a similar experience I went through, how does this stuff work.. how do I fit this into my busy life.. they are no diferent than I was at the start of the semester.. sometimnes overwhelmed. Plus they may naot have the motivation I had I'm trying to get another grad degree and a good enough grade so I get reimbursed from my employer, so they may not share my enthusiasm or perspective.
So as I near the end of the semester I truely have to say that I have learned alot, what more can a teacher or student hope for than that declartation? I look forward to where I can take this, I am committed to following through because I have made it part of my training company, hopefully that was a wise decision. I think ti is the right direction, it is not the destination but the direction.. I could always find another web 2.0 application and intetgrate that without degrading the overall direction. best luck to everyone and I hope you have a peaceful holiday with your loved ones, because we all know that they are the most important social network there is.
Come to find out that some of those web 2.0 tools could actually organize some parts of my overflowing life pursuits, if I could just figure out how they work.
I focused on the interaction of school and the training business and how they could complement each other. I have always needed to have a practical application of something to keep my interest, never went for novels, had to be non-fiction to appreciate the reality of it all.
I was lucky to be at a point in my training business where a web 2.0 tool fit nicely into a new initiative we were doing. I presented the overall plan to the powers that be and to the particpants themselves and everything was very well received, so off we went! i spent some frustrating times preparing to launch the tool (wiggio.com) trying to get all of the parts to work and even with some shortcomings, loaded up the site with lots of my work (with a nod to the concept of creative commons)and sent out invitations to the participants. The response has been good, not great, but a very good start. Some people had issues (what do i click on?) which indicated the group is going to go through a similar experience I went through, how does this stuff work.. how do I fit this into my busy life.. they are no diferent than I was at the start of the semester.. sometimnes overwhelmed. Plus they may naot have the motivation I had I'm trying to get another grad degree and a good enough grade so I get reimbursed from my employer, so they may not share my enthusiasm or perspective.
So as I near the end of the semester I truely have to say that I have learned alot, what more can a teacher or student hope for than that declartation? I look forward to where I can take this, I am committed to following through because I have made it part of my training company, hopefully that was a wise decision. I think ti is the right direction, it is not the destination but the direction.. I could always find another web 2.0 application and intetgrate that without degrading the overall direction. best luck to everyone and I hope you have a peaceful holiday with your loved ones, because we all know that they are the most important social network there is.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Working With a Group
I recently started using a Web 2.0 tool called Wiggio,www.wiggio.com, which is designed to improve working with groups. Soem times working with a group or groups is like herding cats, it seems simple but there are so many going in different directions it hard to keep everyone together.
In my application of the tool I am working with three groups, spread over eleven states at twenty two different sites. The wiggio site is like a wiki, in that memebrs are invited to join and there are links for the group to use. Wiggio provides an areas for uploading files, videos, power point presentations and documents. This allows the memebrs of the site to edit, view or download the files to use. the editing feature allows group memeber to work colllectively on a document and retain previous versions to refer or revert ot.
A calendar feature allows all memebrs to the group to schedule or view events. A meeting tab gives the group the abiliity to have a virtual meeting, an ongoing discussion or a place to post comments. If you were interested in finding out how the group thinks about a specific issue or topic, a polling feature is avbailable that can be designed to send out questionaires to group memebers and tabulate the results.
I have found that using this tool has given my business a new and forward thinking look to those individuals and organizations I am working with. This also is a great "value added" benefit that only costs me my time, what a deal. If interested, check out wiggio, makes working with a group easier, although I don't think it will help with those cats.
In my application of the tool I am working with three groups, spread over eleven states at twenty two different sites. The wiggio site is like a wiki, in that memebrs are invited to join and there are links for the group to use. Wiggio provides an areas for uploading files, videos, power point presentations and documents. This allows the memebrs of the site to edit, view or download the files to use. the editing feature allows group memeber to work colllectively on a document and retain previous versions to refer or revert ot.
A calendar feature allows all memebrs to the group to schedule or view events. A meeting tab gives the group the abiliity to have a virtual meeting, an ongoing discussion or a place to post comments. If you were interested in finding out how the group thinks about a specific issue or topic, a polling feature is avbailable that can be designed to send out questionaires to group memebers and tabulate the results.
I have found that using this tool has given my business a new and forward thinking look to those individuals and organizations I am working with. This also is a great "value added" benefit that only costs me my time, what a deal. If interested, check out wiggio, makes working with a group easier, although I don't think it will help with those cats.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Blog #3 Safety and Security
The issue of safety and security is many times taken from the perspective of protecting students from online predators and adult web sites and this is how it should be but there is another perspective in terms of security from the position of the organization or school administration from itself and staff.
A recent NY Times article http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/15/education/15plans.html brings up the issue of teachers selling their lesson plans online for their own gain and in some cases to purchase classroom material. The issue is a moral question but also a security issue that schools and organizations have to come to a decision on. "Can a teacher sell the material used in the school for their own financial gain"? It also has to be decided if using the web access and technology to create and ultimately sell the lesson plans is a security violation of the Internet use policy.
It seems this is where collaboration and the concept of "open" symbiotic development hits the entrepreneur spirit and the free market concept. The web blog site Edutopia is discussing this http://www.edutopia.org/poll-selling-lesson-plans-online?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EdutopiaNewContent+%28Edutopia%29&utm_content=Google+Reader issue and some of the points brought up is the idea that teachers should own their work and should then be allowed to do what they want to do with it. The problem with this argument is that it has been a legal tenant that work created during work time is owned by the organization (does this apply to a school?). So following this, if teachers did projects on their own time they can sell them through their home computers at will. the moral issue their is for those buying them, is that an accepted method, why not, isn't it like buying a book as a reference.
So the line between collaboration and sharing ways to educate can become blurred when profit comes into the picture, but should it?
A recent NY Times article http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/15/education/15plans.html brings up the issue of teachers selling their lesson plans online for their own gain and in some cases to purchase classroom material. The issue is a moral question but also a security issue that schools and organizations have to come to a decision on. "Can a teacher sell the material used in the school for their own financial gain"? It also has to be decided if using the web access and technology to create and ultimately sell the lesson plans is a security violation of the Internet use policy.
It seems this is where collaboration and the concept of "open" symbiotic development hits the entrepreneur spirit and the free market concept. The web blog site Edutopia is discussing this http://www.edutopia.org/poll-selling-lesson-plans-online?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EdutopiaNewContent+%28Edutopia%29&utm_content=Google+Reader issue and some of the points brought up is the idea that teachers should own their work and should then be allowed to do what they want to do with it. The problem with this argument is that it has been a legal tenant that work created during work time is owned by the organization (does this apply to a school?). So following this, if teachers did projects on their own time they can sell them through their home computers at will. the moral issue their is for those buying them, is that an accepted method, why not, isn't it like buying a book as a reference.
So the line between collaboration and sharing ways to educate can become blurred when profit comes into the picture, but should it?
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