I am an unapologetic technologist but I have been skeptical about the use of computer technology in education. Teachers have been telling me for decades how they were revolutionizing education with computers but never delivered on the promise. I left a career in computer engineering and entered a doctoral program in Adult and Higher Education Administration in 1999 and teaching had not evolved a bit since I graduated from Michigan State University in 1975. The teachers were still making empty promises about technologies ability to teach but now they added the challenge of geographic diversity.

I decided to focus my research on how professors used the World Wide Web to address the needs of distance learners. I found several shortcomings.

1. Distance courses relied on outdated modes of communication to present content.
2. Technology was a barrier between students and faculty.
3. Teaching was synchronous.

I remained skeptical.

Technology advanced in giant leaps since 1999 and I’ve grown from skeptic to enthusiast. Here’s why.

Course management has evolved to the point where any reasonably intelligent professor can make effective use of it. My school has been using Blackboard to good advantage for several years and it keeps getting better and easier. The best thing about online course management software is that it makes learning available anywhere and anytime. All a student needs is Internet access with is quickly becoming ubiquitous.

Podcasts are now enabling the free inclusion of multimedia content into online courses. Apple iTunes and YouTube have tons of great content. All one needs to do is surf to either of these sites and shop around. Apple is so engaged in education they started a new service this year called iTunes U where a host of colleges and universities are making rich multimedia content freely available. These “podcasts” can be supplemented by high quality online tutorials. Soon the textbook while be going the way of the dinosaur.

Students can be easily engaged into a dialog with professors and peers using Discussion Board Forums and a little academic controversy. The first step is to pick an interesting topic like the war in Iraq. I like to start things off by sharing some controversial multimedia like excerpts from a Michael Moore film. The last step is to create an area where students can post their comments, thoughts, reactions, or whatever else they may wish to contribute. See below.

Will this work? Yes. I had my doubts but I decided to test it in 2003. I taught several sections of a general education course that year. Students enrolled in these course were my test subjects. I had one controversial topic presented per week with an accompanying discussion forum. I motivated students to participate by awarding points for participation but I was skeptical so I only required participation in 3 of the 15 forums. I was shocked when I found the average number of forums participated in was over 13. These statistics have be consistent ever since.

Michael Moore has a gift for you to get your mental juices flowing.

Enjoy!

My friends know I love playing the guitar. I’m known for sitting outside my office at Mount Marty College and playing for hours. Sometimes students bring their kids in so I can play them a tune. It’s a great way to connect with people. I’m not very good but I do love to play.

The great thing about the guitar is every guitarist I know is still learning. We’ve been using the World Wide Web to help us for some time too.

You might be thinking vodcasts are just good for learning theory but not skills. You’d be WRONG! Check out this vod to see how its done.

Now there’s a model for life long learning!

Note how the teacher first demonstrates what she wants the student to do. Next she explains each step in detail and finally allows an opportunity for practice. The beauty of having her do this on a vod is that we can watch it over again if we need to. We can pause it to work out how to play a new chord or back it up to see a technique again. And we can do it anytime we want!

Where’s my guitar?

The core design concept of this podcast series is brevity. Its just right for me. My friend worked as a spanish interpreter and I often find myself outside of conversations feeling like an ugly American. My plan is to learn enough spanish to speak with her and her spanish-speaking friends and family at dinner someday.

The variety of two speakers with different roles works well in this podcast. There is more going on here than a conversation. We have a master and a learner to make the program more interesting.

I also enjoy how the teacher grounds new vocabulary words by drawing word pictures. This helps us remember the information presented. Listen for the happy cows!

You can find this series on iTunes or on Radio Lingua Network’s Coffee Break Spanish webpage. Just click here! 

This is a stunning travelog of America’s western wilderness in 28 parts. Each pod focuses on one aspect of the natural west. Water in Wyoming and the West discussed the fragile nature of water and its significant role as a life-giver. Mountain Lions presents the illusive predator from its own point of view. The true role of western women is revealed in A Woman’s Work Is Never Done: Geraldine Lucas. And Bison examines the natural history of the King of the Prairie.  I think this would be a wonder series for a geography or American history course.

I enjoyed listening to these pods and learned a lot despite living in the west for the past decade. These programs from Teton Science are brief and to that point. The banjo music in the background moves the mind west of the Mississipi. You can find these pods on iTunes.

I think everyone ought to listen to this program. Its compelling and offers great examples of high quality pods (programs on demand).

The program begins with a pod discussion with Dean James Gustave Speth of the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies entitled The Heart of the Matter. It runs just over 14 minutes. Dean Speth gives an enticing introduction to the issue of environmental protection including climate change. The sound quality is excellent and the use of a moderator helps make the talk more interesting.

This is followed at an hour long pod entitled Seen “An Inconvenient Truth” – Now What? which is a lecture given by Professor Eban Goodstein of Lewis and Clark College. His lecture begins with the words “We stand at the unique moment in human history …” and goes on to point out how society has failed to protect itself from global warming. He continues by explaining the science, economics, and politics involved and calling for involvement in a grassroots movement to save the planet for future generations. He unfortunately refers to visuals that are no available to the pod audience. The pod closes with a 16 minute question and answer period. This lecture may be better offered in segments closer to the length of the average undergraduate student’s attention span. On the other hand, it may be better to respect the lecture by leaving it intact. In the end its a judgement call. The classroom instructor ought to be able to find one or more good TED Talk vods (video on demand) to replace this pod.

It’s not easy being a frog is a wonderful pod. Yale’s Professor David Skelly discusses the affects of the ecology in birth defects among frogs and why we ought to be concerned about it. This 9 minute pod makes use of a female moderator providing an interesting contrast of voices. The program begins and ends with a pleasant bit of piano music in the background. It is well edited and the sound quality is fantastic.

Tropical music sets the mood for Biophillic Design: Opening the door to nature an 8 minute talk by Professor Stephen Keilert of the Tweedy Ordway School of Social Ecology. His message is that nature nurtures man and he is concerned about the affect environmental damage has on human well-being.  He prescribes biophillic architecture to alleviate many of the symptoms.  This is another well assembled pod.

Green to Gold discusses how “going green” can provide a competitive advantage to businesses by reducing costs, reducing risks, expanding markets, and building an environmentally friendly image. Professor Dan Esty shares current success stories and illuminates a hopeful future. This pod makes its point in just under 17 minutes. 

Global Warming and Species Distribution is a 10 minute exploration of the carbon blanket’s affect upon wildlife. 

Poor Countries Pay the Price for Global Warming is a 9 minute presentation of global warming’s affect on the poorest of humanity and a strategy for managing climate change.

Industrial Ecology: Why Waste Waste? is a 9 minute presentation on how China and India are striving for sustainable development through industrial ecology.

Burn Trees, Save Energy suggests using domestic wood as fuel to reduce dependence on foreign oil. This compelling argument is made in less than 6 minutes.

Predator Prey Plant Connection is a 6 minute video exploration of the role predators play in the ecology. The video is vivid and often breathtaking.

Calculating the Cost of Climate Change discusses how reducing carbon emissions can positively impact the U. S. economy in this 4 minute vod.

Dr. James Gustave Speth makes his appeal to take a more realistic approach to assissing economic growth in The Environment and Economy in Conflict. This 5 minute vod asks us to evaluate our long-term priorities when considering economic expansion.

This is an outstanding series and stands as a shining example of what academics ought to strive for in their pods. It expresses it point eloquently and compels the audience to reflective action.

DePaul University released 6 vods (videos on demand) on using the Blackboard course management system to iTunes U. These vods are released in the spirit of the open learning which means they are freely available to all.

The first vod entitled SNL Blackboard Training was recorded on March 14, 2007. SNL stands for School for New Learning and its a DePaul initiative to offer degree programs online. This first vod in the series is a videotape of a live faculty in-service. The production quality is low. The lighting is poor and the sound fades at times. The room was dark while taping and the screens shots are merely projector screen images. Shooting was from an angle rather than straight on. The course was based on the book Blackboard to Dummies and I’m sure you’ll get more out of the book than watching this vod for two hours and thirty-five minutes. I could only watch it for about seven minutes. However, I did spot check it throughout and the lack of quality was consistent.

Use this vod if you ever want to demonstrate the need for professional technicians on campus to your superiors.

Moving on. The next two vods consist of the same video-taping session offered in two halves rather than a whole. This is slightly better because the vods are shorter but that is the only improvement. Still too long given the lack of production quality.

There is hope though. The next two vods entitled Explorer Print Tutorial and Firefox Print Tutorial demonstrate how to print Blackboard web pages. They are brief and to the point at just over a minute in length. It appears they are using screenshots with an out of focus camera but no but I believe they are actually videotaping from an overhead projector which causes focus issues. Why does DePaul want to kill trees anyway? Let’s become the promised paperless society and let the forests grow.

The final vod Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) and Vista Blackboard Tutorial is produced in the same manner but the focus seems a little better. Unfortunately all this vod does is show a work-around to solve problems with Microsoft’s new products. It seems Microsoft’s new operating system and browser don’t like user input. I have a better idea! Use a Mac.

Nice try but no cigar! This series illustrates the difficulties involved in video production. All in all I have to assess this work as a failure. There is information here but its too much effort to glean it. DePaul’s effort is appreciated and I’m sure their hearts of are in the right place but they need to redo. It is a great topic and need to be done well. Next time I hope they have a professional camera man and a director. They also need to break the material down into manageable segments. These are smart people. They’ll get it right.

Kudos for trying!

The rest of us need to remember taping a vod is the same thing as taping a television show or movie. 

I’m deleting this series from my hard drive ASAP. Sorry DePaul, better luck next time.

The Mac is my preferred computer. I’ve been using them ever since I resigned from Gateway 2000. So, I would be remiss not to blog about tech news vods focusing on Macs.

MacBreak is probably the best one you’ll encounter these days. Each program focuses on one topic. This issue is on flipit, an online protein folding game for all ages. The video is crisp and clean and the audio superb. This is one to watch as I’m sure other teachers will find material here to include in their online courses.

Click here to surf out to MacBreak’s home page. Unfortunately you will have to download the vod if you go to their website. An alternative is to go to the iTunes store and search for it in the Technology podcasts. 

Its important to keep current in my field but finding the time to read all of the professional journals is tough. I’m also responsible to pass along tools that will help my students keep informed after they graduate. Fortunately there are a number of pods and vods out there dedicated to bringing us the highlights of technology news so you can catch up while surfing the net!  

dl.tv is one of the news services I tune into occasionally. Its a vod (video podcast) so I find it more captivating and its full of geek humor. There is a new release every week. Yes, some of us actually do get geek humor. The programs vary from 30 to 40 minutes depending on the topics covered. Its fun to listen to the excitement in the hosts voices as the carry on. And dl.tv has credibility being published by Ziff-Davis; the publisher of PC Magazine.

I just viewed the July 10th, 2008 release. It includes the quirky news highlights, a product review of a solar-powered backpack, a demonstration of several “really sweet” interactive websites including Autopsy, Kaleidoscope, Crime Reports, and more . There is also a discussion on troubleshooting video delay problems.

Click here to visit dl.tv’s website to see their latest program.

How do they do it? The are sponsored by GoDaddy.com.

I like this vod so much I added I link to it on my blog.

Raul Midon’s All the answers is a passionate song about all the possibilities of learning on the web. His musicality is superb and his lyrics inspiring. 

Hopefully listening will inspire others to test the waters of drawing the World Wide Web and internet technologies into their teaching. There is so much out there. Its a universe of collaboration and information waiting to be tapped into. Why wait?

How do groups get anything done? Through collaboration!

Microsoft, Chrysler, Fannie Mae, and many other icons of business are experiencing failure while loosely knit groups such as WikiPedia are thriving. Why? Clay Shirky gives a compelling explanation in Institutions vs Collaboration at the TED conference.

I recommend this podcast for anyone interested in leadership or organizational theory.