Tēnā koutou katoaGreetings to you all Secondary Futures, New Zealand is writing a paper on how will we decide, in future, what technology is good or bad for kids. YOUR opinion is important.Check out the video. Then go to the Secondary Futures Post to leave your opinion there in a comment.Comments are turned off on this announcement post.Click the Secondary Futures link to leave a comment.Ka kite anōCatch ya later

Tēnā koutou katoaGreetings to you allThe Large Hadron Collider is a gigantic particle accelerator beneath the ground, near Geneva. Very soon it may provide information that could throw light on the fundamental structure of matter.The project aims to provide colliding particles with huge amounts of energy never before observed on earth. Information gathered may explain some of the unanswered questions surrounding the so-called Big Bang Theory of the origin and evolution of the Universe.Fermi's paradoxEnrico Fermi was a famous Italian physicist who lived in the first half of the 20th century. He built the first nuclear reactor. Known for his contribution to Quantum Theory, Nuclear and Particle Physics and Statistical Mechanics, he was awarded a Noble Prize in 1938.At a luncheon in 1950 Fermi asked the question "Where is everybody?" when considering the compelling evidence, available at that time, that intelligent life was likely to exist throughout the Universe.Fermi had already deduced that millions of civilisations could be far in advance of those on Earth. Some of them could have found solutions to many problems we have not yet solved, such as intergalactic communication and intergalactic travel.Despite the SETI projects, conceived in 1971, and pursued even to this day, the ubiquitous absence of evidence for civilisation, other than those on our planet, remains a mystery. It posed a conundrum known as the Fermi Paradox, that is still being debated.Ka kite anōCatch ya later

Tēnā koutou katoaGreetings to you all My experience with computers goes back to the early 80s. An Ohio Scientific machine, with its huge floppy disk drive, CPU and printer, occupied a whole table in my Physics lab because it happened to be the most secure room in the school.I had no interest in computers in those days. But I was determined that if a computer was going to occupy valuable space in my teaching lab, It’d be better if I learnt how to use it. The Challenger 4P looked like a mechanical calculator. It ran a fast basic program language, but had only 64k of ram. It had no software. So I learnt how to program in basic.Getting a little white arrow to run up and down and round and about a dark grey screen, controlled only by the arrow-keys, was no moderate achievement. Once I’d mastered a few other basic programming routines, I quickly found out how to do similar movements with other shapes. Inventing computer games quickly became a useful way to learn how to program the computer.ZX81My son, Nick, who was 11 years old, had his own computer - a Sinclair ZX81, with a 16k ram pack. There was no software with the ZX81 either. We both learnt a lot from working with that simple device. Nick too found that making up computer games was a good way to learn how to program.He and I made up a compendium of about 20 games that all ran from the same program that we saved on a cassette tape. But Nick was ahead of me, for he quickly learnt how to use machine code - an art that I never quite mastered.PentiumIt wasn’t until about 20 years later that Nick’s younger brother, Jack, gave the family a Pentium computer for Christmas. It was a machine that Jack had used, but it was our family’s first ‘real’ computer, and we were proud of it.Some of the games software that he’d ran was left on the hard drive. One of the games was an early version of Sid Meier’s Civilization III, a sophisticated strategy game where players could build their own civilisations from a single tiny settlement.My wife, Linda, insisted that we played a game together. So, turn by turn, we engaged in our very first commercial computer game and not only learnt how to play, but also won a cultural victory for Queen Elizabeth, the leader of our own civilization.PioneeringFor almost a year we enjoyed pioneering with our civilizations in CIV. We learnt a bit about how technology developed through the ages - not so much of the technology itself, but more about the sequence of technological evolution.Before my days of playing CIV, I was a total military ignoramus. I could no more explain what a stealth bomber was, than an Aegis cruiser can fly in the air. Yes, Sid Meier’s game taught me quite a bit, and I was soon to find out that what I'd learnt wasn’t far from reality either.What I learnt I went off the idea of playing CIV. That was shortly after Afghanistan was invaded by UK and USA. Then there was the similar invasion of Iraq. Quite frankly, what the game had taught me was too much to bear at that time. I’d learnt that there would be repercussions from those two 21st-century invasions, that there would be rebellious uprising and revolt within those invaded countries, that there would be continuous disorder from the resistance.That’s exactly what Linda and I had discovered happened when we invaded enemy civilisations in CIV and attempted to take over their cities. Even our own people rose to anarchy under circumstances of war, especially if they felt that we had gone to war unjustly. It was a year or so before I could play the game without being constantly reminded of the repercussions of war.What else I learntThere was something else that CIV brought home to me. Civilisations haven’t got to where they are today without a cost. That cost took human lives, either through disease, economic hardship or through the vagaries of war.I don’t play CIV any more. I still have a lot of respect for the game and its creator, Sid Meier. Having seen his (now not so) new CIV IV in action, I think it is a wonderfully animated teaching tool. It has the potential to educate those who recognise and understand the profound and fundamental lesson it brings forward to its players. Ka kite anōCatch ya later

Tēnā koutou katoa Greetings to you all ( 8 ) << - other Web2.0Wednesday posts - >> ( 6 ) ( 5 ) ( 4 ) ( 3 ) ( 2 ) ( 1 ) Michele Martin’s Web 2.0 Wednesday assignment - to uncover one’s personal brand - makes several assumptions. One of them is that a personal brand is, Michele quotes, as Steve Woodruff defines it:(amended 14/09 see comment)When people see you, think of you, and relate to you, words and images and feelings come to mind. That is your personal brand.Another is that I wish to uncover my personal brand. I’m not sure that a single personal brand exists. My impression is that people are so diverse in their personality, likes and dislikes, points of view, etc, that how someone may view me would certainly be quite different from how another may see me, even if it was just from an online perspective.To average all these perceptions in some way, and come up with a categorisable description, strikes me as being similar to finding an average letter for the alphabet. Casting all ridiculousness aside, I approached this challenge from as wide a perspective as possible.I didn't conduct a survey on my commentsphere. Surveys are difficult to devise, and their results are notoriously poor reflections of what they are meant to convey.AcknowledgementMy choice is to acknowledge my commentsphere for who they are - a wonderful group of people who, over the past few months, have helped to shape the blogger I am becoming. The participants in my commentsphere around newmiddle-earth.blogspot.com have been patiently keeping me on track.Over the period from early May 2008 until today they have provided me with much pleasurable discourse and I have learnt a lot from them. You may appreciate the pattern their names make in the Wordle blimp at the top of this post. Here they are in alphabetical order of first name:Amazing commentsMy precious commenters have provided me with an amazing 13, 833 words in comments! I sifted the comments, gathered in a single text file, removing all small words such as and and to, the and but, etc. The key words left behind were made prominent by their frequency, and are displayed in a Wordle blimp shown here:Nga mihi nuiBest wishes

Tēnā koutou katoa Greetings to you all ( 4 ) ( 3 ) ( 2 ) << - related postsA lot has been discussed recently in the blogosphere on so-called metaphors for learning. There’s been everything from the idea of neural connections - thinking in terms of models - to what I’d call analogies, where learning is described as building on established structures, the growth of a tree-like organism, or the flow of a stream or river over a terrain.These wonderfully graphic products of imagination indicate how vibrant our thinking is on something as abstract as learning.My classical education does not permit me to see easily the bridges that may lie between things I recognise as models and metaphors or analogies, that are often used to explain how learning appears to happen. When it comes to using the terms, however, I often get them muddled.Neural connectionsThe neural connection description for learning is what I’d call a model. At the microscopic level, it is a particle model that explains how connections are made between cells in brain tissue, and is not unlike microscopic circuit connections within a computer chip. Though it explains how the complexity is established within the intricacy of the brain, it does not explain the feature or characteristic of learning.As a teacher/educator/assessor of student learning, I’m more used to outcomes that are as a result of meeting learning objectives. These, of course, are what we call the assessable outcomes.On the other hand, I see the river and tree-like ‘metaphors’ more as analogies, where the analogous, known features in a river or tree are used to explain how learning can be thought of as developing or growing through time.When I read the writing of others on these topics, I am constantly aware that some are talking about models, while some are talking in metaphors, and others are drawing analogies. I get confused. I feel that there is a need to find a distinction between what’s a model, what’s a metaphor and what’s really just an analogy. They are not all the same.What are models?Models are the basis for assisting a raft of scientific thinking that has a history going back several hundreds of years. A model can be a physical thing and is often thought of as such. It can be held in the hand, such as a model for a molecule of matter, defined as the smallest particle of a substance, retaining all the known microscopic characteristics of the substance it represents.It can also be a written thing, such as a mathematical formula or expression that, according to known and understandable parameters, explains how things are seen to behave. A model for how the volume of a cube relates to the length of one of its sides can be described by the equation, v = d x d x d, or v = d3. In general, the model leaves little to the imagination.MetaphorsMetaphors are different from models. They don’t necessarily need to be tangible artifacts, nor written expressions or relationships, such as equations. The word comes from its literal use, where something becomes something else.A metaphor is thought of as having two parts, the target and source. The target is the subject to which attributes are ascribed. The source is the subject from which the attributes are borrowed. "He was a lion in the fight", is a metaphor for a warrior (target) who was not just like a lion, but became the envisioned replacement - the lion (source).Metaphors are slick. They permit the mind to think swiftly in terms of the source rather than more cumbersomely in terms of the target.Metaphors tend to be borrowed from other disciplines. The particle/wave model for light, for instance, has been adopted as a way of describing knowledge, thought of as a thing and a flow. In this way, the model has become a metaphor.An archaic metaphor for learning was filling jugs. Presumably the jugs were the minds of the students that were to be filled with liquid, which was knowledge. It is a two-in-one metaphor - jugs for minds, liquid for knowledge.AnalogiesAnalogies are quite different from the other two. Unlike the model, an analogy is not trying to depict, in any way, how the thing or concept exists. Nor is it like the metaphor, that tries to make the thing or concept be something else. An analogy is a direct mapping between one idea and another. There is no need for there to be any physical or ethereal resemblance between the thing or concept and its parallel.So we may well think in terms of a model when joining popper beads to represent neural connections while learning occurs in the brain. We may also think of the metaphor for knowledge as a thing and a flow when considering knowledge management. But the analogy is the most involved of the three.It calls for the most use of our imagination. It is a parallelism that’s left mainly up to the ingenuity of the thinker, who considers the behaviour of one thing when thinking of the parallel behaviour of another.Nga mihi nuiBest wishes

Tēnā koutou katoaGreetings to you all I was struck by the diversity of opinion to be found on The Learning Circuits Blog on To-Learn Lists. Clearly I'd been kidding myself all these years that everyone knew all about to-learn lists.Yesterday I read Gina Minks' post on What’s a "To Learn" List, and wrote a comment:Ah! The ‘to learn list’.Many years ago I went on a course on manual writing. I’d just become a computer trainer and my boss sent me on this course - she thought I needed the skills. She wasn’t far wrong - but I found some of the course fascinating.To cut another epic comment-post short, one of the key tips for starting writing a manual was:Write the contents page - neatly.No kidding. And y’know. It works. It’s the psychological effect it has on making that starting leap. Clearly, the manual almost wrote itself after that momentous task was done.A ‘to learn list’ works the same way. Different from a not-written-down skills-I-need-to-get-list :-)It’s the immediacy of the thing, like writing instructions on a work sheet for kids.It’s not"See if you can write a poem on . . ."but,"Write a poem on . . .".There’s a whole Britannica difference between one approach and the other.The "to learn list" will have a number of A1 tasks on it, for sure. Now an A1 task deserves to be written, if only to focus the mind.But it’s more than that. It puts it firmly in the mind. How often has one written the shopping list and got to the supermarket to find it’s still lying on the kitchen table? I’ve done that so often, but, y’know, I race home after the shopping’s done to check the list. Most times I get the lot. I wonder how successful I might have been if I’d just not bothered to write the list at all.So. Yep. The "to learn list" is one sure-fire way to make sure you’ll get it all done. And don’t just scribble it.Take a clean lined sheet of refill. Sit at the writing desk, and in your best copperplate writing, draw up your list - with a pen. Pin it to the noticeboard when you’ve finished, sit back and wait for the learning to happen.Ka kite anōCatch ya later

Tēnā koutou katoaGreetings to you allWe’ve had an avalanche of enthusiasm and opinion about podcasts and videocasts, audio comments and video comments on blogs. I don’t knock any of those. I’m all for innovation, and I like the idea of identifying with the person who is communicating with me.Back in the bad old days, people got all enthusiastic about embedding a picture of themselves in a word file, and printing out the letter on a colour printer.PDFs also became popular about the same time, though not as accessible. Embedding an audio file in those was a development. That showed promise - a bit of a veer to the side, since the PDF was originally intended to provide a portable printable format, but that's cool.At that same time, we had webs with embedded audio files and streamed videos. Web 2.0 hit us and all of that burst in cascades of foam as things went wild with Twitter, Tumbler, Seesmic and lots of other goodies besides.A put-down on textThere’s been a bit of put-down where blogs with text comments are concerned. And I wonder if any real thought has been put into why blogs should still be so popular, or indeed, of the real merits of text.Here’s my take on reading a post or comments against it, compared to listening to podcasts or watching video comments - and I emphasise here that it’s not my intention to knock any of those technologies, for I truly believe they all have their place.But . . .When it comes to scanning for detail that may be useful, I find it difficult to do this with audio or video. Even if all of the comments are video comments in response to the original video casted post, there is no way I have a hope of scanning the page to see if there’s anything that interests me there. I have to doggedly play the files - one by one.Frankly, there is no way I can get the feel of what the discussion is all about just by scanning the post. The same applies to audio files. In short, they actually slow me down and can make skimming for information exceedingly tedious, if not impossible.When it comes to citing, or quoting from a video-post or video comment I have the same problem. I've yet to hear anything to the contrary. It seems that they’re not transmutable, for the ‘in’ way to respond or comment on a video-cast seems to be only acceptable in kind.Yesterday, I listened to a 10 minute conversation-cast. I had some ideas that I’d like to comment on, and though the speakers were all introduced one by one, I’m damned if I could remember all their names.Not an easy scanD’you think I could easily scan across the vid to pick them out? Not a chance. I gave up in the end and submitted a bland comment with no appropriate reference to the speakers because I could not easily recall who they were.As I said at the beginning of this soliloquy, I’m not knocking the audios or the vids. They have their place. Just don’t expect me to drum up enthusiasm to respond in kind when I know damn well it’s simpler to write a brief comment.Ka kite anōCatch ya later

Tēnā koutou katoaGreetings to you allA plea for helpI’ve just set up a private blog on Blogger with about 20 author invitees. Some of my invitees are having real problems getting in. I’ve checked all their email addresses - twice now. All valid and squeaky clean.There are 12 people who can get in (one’s a dummy email/password I created for myself) and at least 4 people who cannot get their valid Google account IDs to permit them access - doh! It's really frustrating!A couple more found that their already-created Google accounts worked but the new ones with their work email address did not.Lack of FeedAnother thing I notice is that I can’t subscribe to the new blog.At first I thought that this was because of the settings, but then when I checked, none of them mentioned anything about RSS Feed except for the one on Blog Feeds.I have Allow Blog Feeds set to FULL, and the Permissions set to Only Blog Authors (all my invitees are invited as blog authors).I've checked out the Help on Blogger and haven't been successful at finding anything relevant to my troubled invitees who have been very patient with me.I’m setting this blog up for the start of next term (in just over 2 weeks time here in NZ) and I hoped to get all invitees started by the end of this term. I'd really like it to happen.So if you have any suggestions, I’d be really grateful to hear from you.Ka kite anōCatch ya later

Tēnā koutou katoaGreetings to you allEver thought how useful it would be to be always right? Over time, one has the opportunity to make many mistakes and regrettably, a lesser number of successes. My track record is as chequered as a new weave of tartan.When I look back at the things that I got right, I feel very humble. Rare though they may be, these are the things that most helped me get to where I am today. I know! Don’t remind me!Self-esteemIt’s true for us all, though. Sometimes we do get things right - thank goodness. And serendipitous though these occurrences may appear to be, they are very important to our self-esteem.There have been many occasions when I have looked back smugly on happenings that turned out just the way I’d expected. I may even have spoken to friends and acquaintances or work-mates about how I thought things may turn out and got some opposition to my opinion at the time.But have you ever noticed how unpopular you can be when, through the passage of time, you are proved right and you crow, "I told you so"?People’s reactions can be such a put down to a know-it-all who’s right. Even if it’s just the once. The fact is, people rarely want to hear that time honoured assertion.No win situationIt’s been my experience with this that’s taught me to button up when these superior occasions arise. I find it difficult. Often, my attitude gives the game away, even if I don’t say a word. I get quite petulant. I feel it’s simply not fair - I just can’t win.Dale Carnegie eloquently explains the social consequences of being proved right and saying so. It’s not excatly how to win friends and influence people - hence the title of his book, I guess.So how does one cover for this? Is the answer to be always wrong? That could be just as problematic. In any case, the chances of being always wrong are probably similar to the chances of being always right. It’s never as consistent as you might like it to be.But on the occasions when I just know I’m going to be proved right and I say as much, the words are often out before I have a chance to consider the long-term consequences of my utterances. Short of getting a tonguectomy, what is there that a bear of little brain can do?Ka kite anōCatch ya later

Tēnā koutou katoaGreetings to you allArt by Hannah Christine Allan DearEarlier this year, I wrote an elearning discussion paper on reusable learning resources for Futurelab. It was snapped up and published. Stephen Downes gave it a brief thumbs up and correctly interpreted the paper as an introduction and a history of learning resources.But a rattled blogger put a comment against Stephen’s post that was far from complimentary to Stephen, Futurelab or me. Presumably the writer thought that the comment would get wider exposure on Stephen’s blog than on the Futurelab site. The claim was that my paper was written on the strength of "a few google searches".Research or copyingI suppose some papers are written on a few Google searches. Many may not necessarily cite any of the results. In my attempt, I cited a dozen or so (I'd 26 citations) of the hundreds I had on my list, including some mention of my own findings in the field.The commenter's criticism reminded me that research of this type could come across as bogus to someone who may never have done proper research before, or had not considered the usefulness of passing on accumulated knowledge to others. Bogus or not, clearly I was being painted as a copier, and an out of date one at that. Perhaps I am.Authors, thoughts and plagiarismIn Dave Snowden's recent post on a keynote speech he attended about innovation in companies, he asks the question: how does imitating other cases constitute innovation? Dave was obviously uneasy about the assumption that copying may be an integral part of innovation.Sandipan Roy discussed plagiarism in the context of innovation in design, from an ethical point of view, and is still looking for a definition of it. He cites Wikipedia: "Plagiarism is the unauthorized use or close imitation of the language and thoughts of another author and the representation of them as one’s own original work". Presumably the operative word here is ‘author’, though I wonder about 'thoughts'.A learning skillFor as much as note taking is a fundamental skill of an independent learner, it would appear that taking notes at university lectures could incur copyright issues. So far, such copying is seen as a protected infringement unless it is published, which is another form of copying.Given the recent interest in so-called wiring of the brain and the associated metaphors, in the context of learning, how long will it take before copyright is applied to the passing on of skills and knowledge by a teacher?Ka kite anōCatch ya later