Concordia University (my employer) is organizing a conference on eLearning from April 3th to the 5th 2013:

President Alan Shepard will kick off the three-day conference with some remarks speculating on the impact of e-learning on the future of universities. The program will also showcase the wide spectrum of online, hybrid, and technology-supported teaching formats already adopted by faculty at Concordia and will feature visits from leading figures in the field, who will present keynote speeches.
[…]
Organizers of the e-Scape conference are hoping a series of plenary sessions will facilitate lively discussion about the pedagogical merits of technology tools in a relatively casual setting. The program will also provide faculty with the latest research findings on how to integrate new technologies to enhance the classroom experience.

Among the topics to be tackled: incorporating wireless student reponse systems, also known as “clickers”; successfully engaging students in massive open online courses or “MOOCs”; and integrating multimedia elements and social media to best effect in teaching.
[…]

I’ll probably present my business information literacy vidoes then…

Also worth a peek, this slide deck from Concordia’s interim provost on e-learning:

Full presentation: http://www.concordia.ca/now/docs/e-learning_Feb2013.pdf

Tip of the had to Kipmusic2345 for her great GarageBand toturials on youtube:
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MfRHiVHXsU?list=PL919D238C5B8CC8CB&w=560&h=315]
These were really useful for me – I’ve been meaning to start editing sound files for including them in my own digital tutorials.

On the left-hand side (from top to bottom):
– My Blue Yeti ™ microphone with wire
– Sustainable coffee mug
– Manfrotto self-standing monopod
– Black lab notebook
– Kodak Playsport camera with its carry-case (on the lab book)

Middle (from top to bottom):
– MacBook Pro laptop with power cord
– A MacIntosh apple on the laptop for the teacher (Mac-Heads will get the joke)
– A dry-erase board eraser, with a blue marker
– Remote control for data projector

Right:
– A few books used in the demo.

I’m pretty proud to say that I was able to equip myself for less than 2000$ with some decent gear !

[ted id=1592]
This is a Great TED talk by prof. Marshall on getting engineers to communicate their passion for science. I love the example of an engaging powerpoint slide (“bullets kill”!) and this equation:

Through the TED Talks iTunes feed, I watched last evening this talk by Mitch Resnick on teaching kids to code:

Here is the link to Scratch, the kid (and neophyte) friendly video game builder.

I’ve been thinking of using video games or gamification for library & information literacy instruction and the Scratch tool seems like a fun and easy way to test some prototypes.

A different thread lead me to the strange case of David S. Gallant, who was recently let go from the Canadian Revenue Agency. He apparently developed a simple game about his day job which seems to put him in hot water. Here is his video presentation you Youtube:
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOJ0oUaDL0U&w=640&h=360]

I like the simple game dynamic, it reminds me when I first learned how to code on Hypercard on an Apple II way back in the early 1990s. Essentially, you are placed in a situation and the system prompts you for a few options. I also really like the idea of putting the player in the shoes of a call center operator.

So, here is a simple concept of my game: You are the libarrian ™ in which you play a (maybe) stereotypical librarian that is faced with questions from users. That way, the player would need to learn what we know in a role-playing, cognitive dissonance inducing on-the-spot way. It is like taking a multiple-choice test, but with (possibly) jokes and a dynamic kitch-spartan interface. What more could you need ?

Actually, the goal would be to also start the game at the lever of the user. Too many library-related instruction starts by presenting the library (books on this floor, here is the library catalogue, etc.) – I find this turns most people off. We should start to discuss the learner – what are their learning/reading/seeking habits. Then, talk about their need – what it means to do research (at any level) in a university. Confronting the two is a great way to generate interest in library resources while having an open conversation about the tools that constituted their info seeking habits (i.e. watch my videos on Google & Wikipedia):
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLaqfn26UOsX-k3NLTFgGTJGUY6BLjj4D_&w=640&h=360]

I just stumbled on MonDiapason.ca (in French), a site I had seen a demo for 2 years ago at a conference. I’ve heard it may go “live” soon, although there is a lot of content on it already…

Last May, CRÉPUQ published the results of a study on the attitudes of university students and professors towards technology. The association of Quebec university presidents sponsored the study, which sought to obtain statistically valid information on a broad sample.

University Affairs, a trade publication, interviewed Concordia University’s own Vivek Venkatesh last November and this January about the study, in which he was involved as a researcher. For example, he mentions that:

Our study was not designed to demonstrate the effectiveness of any one (or set of) instructional technique(s) over others. We set out to – and have succeeded in creating – robust, generalizable and predictive models of factors that impact attitudes towards university course effectiveness. Prior research (for example, Wright and Jenkins-Guarnieri, 2012) has analyzed the findings of 11 meta-analyses (193 studies) on student evaluations of teaching, or SETs, with a specific focus on their construct validity, susceptibility to bias, practical use and effective implementation. Their research provides support for the use of SET measures in evaluating instructor skill and teaching effectiveness.

We strongly believe that with a large enough representative sample and a probabilistic sampling strategy, which we have used in our study, gathering students’ perceptions on course effectiveness is a valid measure because it can reflect the reality of what is happening in the classroom – or, dare we say, what should be happening in the classroom. There have been various comments, both as a response to the UA article, as well as in the larger web sphere regarding the generalizability of our results due to a purportedly biased sample and the fact that our research was designed to reach specific conclusions. These assertions are simply untrue and bear very little logic.

You can also listen to a full interview of Vivek Venkatesh on CBC’s Spark.

A further paper will be submitted to the Journal Computers & Education.

Petra Dierkes-Thrun launches a “A Bill of Rights and Principles for Learning in the Digital Age” on her blog this morning (hat tip to the Chronicle and University Affairs for the link).

I love these statements from the preamble:

The Internet has made it possible for anyone on the planet to be a student, a teacher, and a creative collaborator at virtually no cost. Novel technologies that can catalyze learning are bubbling up in less time than it takes to read this sentence. Some have emerged from universities, some from the private sector, some from individuals and digital communities. In the past year, Massive Online Open Courseware, or MOOCs, have become the darling of the moment–lauded by the media, embraced by millions–so new, so promising in possibility, and yet so ripe for exploitation.

We believe that online learning represents a powerful and potentially awe-inspiring opportunity to make new forms of learning available to all students worldwide, whether young or old, learning for credit, self-improvement, employment, or just pleasure. We believe that online courses can create “meaningful” as well as “massive” learning opportunities.

We are aware of how much we don’t know: that we have yet to explore the full pedagogical potential of learning online, of how it can change the ways we teach, the ways we learn, and the ways we connect.

[…]
Our broad goal is to inspire an open, learner-centered dialogue around the rights, responsibilities, and possibilities for education in the globally-connected world of the present and beyond.

The document itself presents a set of rights and another of principles. With regards to the former, they include the right to: access; privacy; create public knowledge; own one’s personal data and intellectual property; financial transparency; pedagogical transparency; quality and care; have great teachers; and to be teachers. While for the latter, principles include: Global contribution; Value; Flexibility; Hybrid learning; Persistence; Innovation; Formative assessment; Experimentation; Civility; and Play.

I find that these statements are important reminders of the issues that underpin our daily activities. Congratulations to the drafters and this will certainly help me orient my online endeavours.

Here are some books that a colleague from our Center for Teaching and Learning has recommended:

Call Number LB2361 P6813 2009eb
Author Power, Michaël
Title A designer’s log [electronic resource] : case studies in instructional design / by Michael Power
Publisher Edmonton [Alta.] : AU Press, c2009

Call Number LB 1027.23 C24 2011
Author Caulfield, Jay, 1949-
Title How to design and teach a hybrid course : achieving student-centered learning through blended classroom, online, and experiential activities / Jay Caulfield ; foreword by Alan Aycock
Edition 1st ed
Publisher Sterling, Va. : Stylus Pub., 2011

Also found this one through the xEDBook blog:
Teaching and learning at a distance : foundations of distance education by Michael Simonson … [et al] atPearson/Allyn & Bacon (the 5th edition seems to be the most current one).

A new report from the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO) attempts to measure the effectiveness of various information literacy (IL) initiatives.

The study involved 500 undergraduate students at Georgian College and tested four different models for IL, including providing specific information literacy courses, embedding information literacy into existing curriculum, online tutorials and non-mandatory tutorials. As they state on the announcement,

The study calls for institutions to adopt information literacy strategies that focus on teaching styles, delivery models, human resource requirements, outcome measurements and defining the benefits to student, institution and employer. Many faculty suggested more time be allotted to skill development as well as additional resources including online tutorials.

As may be expected, students’ comfort, accuracy and ability to utilize information literacy skills increased over their two years of study. While the overall results showed no single method of delivery to be particularly advantageous, the students who had information literacy training embedded in their course curriculum did show significantly higher ability to accurately cite source material.

The full report is available in PDF format (about 70 pages), as are the appendices.