richard shotton's presentation

richard shotton gave his presentation in uni this afternoon, and while covering some of the point's we'd discussed in our interviews, also brought up some other very interesting points. it was a great presentation, for the full review check the post on my e&pp blog :)

pro forma presentation

gave my pro forma presentation this morning. only took an hour to put together last night, and it was refreshing to give a powerpoint without having to constantly refer to notes; definately allows for a much more fluid delivery. you can click the icon below to download the file :)

tutorial with wendy

wendy was offering tutorials this afternoon, so i thought i'd run my ideas past her for some feedback. she liked where i was heading, and my notes are as follows:

define market and user group needs first
...project brief follows this

concentrate on a pilot project
look at if it's sustainable
"social application"

ensure strong methodology
involve user group in the evaluation
produce proof of concept document
rapid prototyping
focus on hci principals
social and economic benefits?

questionnaires and interviews to find application
online evaluation

resources

physical language workshop
MIT openitalia & treehouse; look at philosophies
UNA exchange
cardiff 'temple of peace'
research council guidelines

lyndsay grant

replying to my email to nesta futurelab, lyndsay has expressed an interest in sharing information for our research :)

Hi James,

Tim passed your email on to me, as I'm looking into a similar area at the moment. I've been looking at the use of social software in education, particularly wikis, though also social bookmarking and other sharing mechanisms. I haven't looked in detail at the wider range of web 2 applications at the moment.

I'm also currently working for an MSc in education, design and technology. I've completed a very small scale case study using wikis in a school which was really about raising some of the issues rather than providing firm answers, but I'm hoping to do a longer case study in this area for my dissertation.

The social software angle for me really links in with the whole area of trying to facilitate collaborative learning in schools (and outside) which although everyone seems to be in favour of is very hard to make work well, for all sorts of school cultural reasons.

I have co-authored a report on the potential uses of social software in education that will be published by Futurelab shortly - keep an eye on our website, it will be downloadable. This looks at a range of potentials uses of social software in education. However, it will take much more than technology to really facilitate the kind of collaborative learning that we want to see, and the teacher's role is critical in this. Outside formal education and the constant background awareness of assessment, it is much easier for social software to provide a place for people learning from one another. There is also a publication on Open Source approaches in education being published by futurelab shortly - this looks both at how Open Source software can be used in teaching and learning, and at using the whole approach of Open Source as way of thinking about learning resources.

It would be very interesting to hear about your project and if I can be of any help. Futurelab I know are already involved with John Cabot school on another project. I'm also talking to teachers at Gordano school who are using wikis as part of English and Media Studies courses, and I have contacts with other teachers using blogs and open source VLEs such as moodle, etc to support social learning environments.

Best wishes,
Lyndsay

tutorial with simon

i got into uni early this morning for a tutorial with simon, having missed friday's seminar. essentially, i had about a dozen ideas for possible projects, and wanted simon's input on which might be most fruitful

while making notes over the weekend on everything i've done so far, i came up with the idea of looking at sri lankan education models, researching what problems they face, and then seeing how web/web 2.0 technologies might offer solutions

simon liked the idea, and suggested an emphasis on translation and infrastructure aspects, and that this could prove to be a good introduction to professional information architecture. the next step is to contact sri lankan institutions in order to arrange research visits while i'm there at easter

richard shotton confirmed

richard shotton has just confirmed that he will give a presentation for e&pp on march 20th at 1pm

richard is a director at imagine education, a uk organisation who specialise in managing and supporting the process of innovation in schools, especially in the fields of curriculum development, the use of new technologies, and globalisation. these folks are former teachers who have taken advantage of their technology and IT skills to start up in business

rp literature review

i've just uploaded an updated version of my literature review following marking. click the image below to download it as a pdf

simple web 2.0

finally! i've found a simple definition of web 2.0, courtesy of cnn