Okay: I’m back in Oklahoma, after a great visit to Mercersburg Academy in Mercersburg Pennsylvania (I stayed at the lovely Steiger House, Belgian waffles for breakfast, I am SO spoiled now…). On Friday while I was there, we talked about blogs and RSS and syndication. The teachers were really excited about the possibilities, and wanted to know about the different tools available to them. Since getting home I’ve put up a kind of demonstration project using a very user-friendly tool - Live Journal - that allows individual teachers to easily create custom feeds of “daily” materials. In this case, a Latin story of the day! Continue reading ‘Using LiveJournal to Syndicate Daily Content’
Archive for June, 2003
HISTORICAL SIDEBAR
Richard Whately (1787 – 1863)
Richard Whately’s Elements of Rhetoric (1828) contains ideas and insights that are remarkably applicable to a person who desires to write a persuasive essay in which he/she “takes a position.” Whately, an ordained Anglican priest who was educated and taught at Oxford University, was the author of numerous books that explored the relationships of persuasive discourse, rhetoric, and religion. A few more details about Whately’s life can be found at sacklunch.com’s entry for him: http://www.sacklunch.net/biography/W/RichardWhately.html. Continue reading ‘Richard Whately and Internet-Enhanced Composition’
Let your emotions guide you.
A persuasive essay is difficult to write if you don’t care about your topic. Of course, this doesn’t mean that you have to become a passionate advocate, organize campaigns, lead rallies, or anything extreme. However, it does mean that you have to do enough thinking about the subject matter to start to feel an interest in not only the obvious points, but also the deeper issues. Continue reading ‘First-Year Composition and the Internet: Getting Started with Persuasive Essays’
On several occasions I’ve mentioned Perseus as one of the best online tools available for Latin and Greek students, and for fans of the ancient world in general. Perseus is the home of a digital text library as well as an enormous digital image library - and it uses some of the smartest dynamic webtools available in order to make this huge quantity of information available to you - to everyone! - for free. Continue reading ‘Guide to the Perseus Digital Library’
Analogies, when used properly, can reveal and clarify principles or their connections. In addition, they spice up a topic because they extend outside of it but without departing from it. They provide the opportunity for variation and comparison, both of which are important in learning and understanding.
Each situation may contain all the facts about it like a hologram, but the human mind learns what confronts it, that is, what is facing it directly. The direct way is the one provided by nature, other ways are the result of human conception. The direct way is what allowed people to know only their front view before human ingenuity created mirrors (or photographic cameras). People could see their faces on a reflective surface, like that of a calm lake, but of course, they could not place ..another lake (!) at a different angle to see their profiles or backs. However, human creativity made mirrors, the number and position of which can be controlled at will. Similarly, analogies serve as images of many mirrors. The more of these image ‘reflections’ we use properly, the deeper and sharper our capacity to ‘reflect’ seems to become.
Continue reading ‘MYTH OF SISYPHUS — Extending computer experience beyond computers’
Thanks for the news aggregator suggestions! Since I am a happy Syndirella user, I knew that what I was looking for is a three-paned viewer to run on my desktop (Windows). This pane-based presentation can organize a lot (A LOT) of content into differently functioning panes: a pane listing subscriptions, pane with headlines, pane for viewing individual items. And it is a very familiar interface because it is so commonly used for email programs. So, since I wanted a three-pane viewer, Amphetadesk was out, even though I really like their website (check out this nice overview of finding more content sources). Continue reading ‘Wildgrape - My new news aggregator of choice!’
Needs-Tailored, or, Needs-Modified Approach:
In order to be responsive to economic development requirements and to share resources and knowledge, universities favor following a “needs-tailored” approach by modifying currently-existing university-generated curricula and degree programs so that they meet rapidly shifting requirements. “Needs-tailored” curriculum can be anticipated by deciding to leave at least 20% of course content as customized content, such as case studies or principles that deal with specific needs of the cohort group or the track. Continue reading ‘Responsiveness Matters: Needs-Tailored Distance Education’
Lots of people are blogging - and lots of those blogs have syndication features. But what is that all about? I would guess that it is still only a small minority of my friends and colleagues who are taking advantage of syndication. So, in the same way that I needed somebody to tell me about being able to have my Google in Latin, I’m going to write up a quick explanation here of what it means to have your web content available to you in an “aggregator” via syndication. Apologies to everybody for whom this is old hat - but remember the first time you learned what a “browser” did? There’s a first time for everything… Continue reading ‘Syndicating with Syndirella, or: What’s an aggregator?’
Session 6
Saturday 10:15 - 11:30
Session — Closing Plenary: “When Ideas Mattered”
Presenter — Kristina Woolsey Hooper, Ph.D.
The closing plenary is being streamed and archived by the NMC. According to the description, “This talk will focus on a number of the ideas and demonstrations of the Apple Multimedia Lab which were part of these initial “new media developments”. It will chronicle a number of investigations which explored the possibilities of media-rich learning environments which still have general relevance today, not necessarily for the marketplace but for the continuing understanding of the opportunities available in this emerging medium of publication and participation.” You can find the presentation at http://mslive.sonicfoundry.com/NMCCCP/index.asp
Continue reading ‘NEW MEDIA CONSORTIUM CONFERENCE — Session 6′
Session 5
Saturday 8:30 - 9:45 am
Session — Collaboratories
Joan Freedman, John Hopkins University; Ted Kahn, DesignWorlds for Learning, Inc.; Bill Shrewbridge, University of Maryland Baltimore County Continue reading ‘NEW MEDIA CONSORTIUM CONFERENCE — Session 5′
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