Collaboration Revisited

Posted on November 14, 2007 by Alvin Trusty

Today we had another group activity in class.  The students in class have been exposed to many different collaboration techniques this semester.  I think they now have the tools to examine the situation and determine the best way to work together to complete the activity.

This time I gave them too much work for one person to complete.  The only way to complete the activity in the limited time provided was to divide the work so that each group member completed a small part.  In the end, each student had a separate file that was shared with the group.

They got it.  Each group spent a few minutes deciding how the work would be done.  A couple people needed some help with the process.  The stronger members of the team helped the weaker ones. 

In the end, the individual files had to be consolidated.  Most of the groups used USB flash drives to swap files.  I did see one group use email to send the files to each other.

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The Point

Posted on November 13, 2007 by Alvin Trusty

thepoint.pngThe Point is a unique social networking idea that can be used to rally the troops for any cause.

There are several criteria for any campaign.  You or your group define what must happen before you act on your campaign.  The Point keeps track of the number of people rallying behind your cause and notifies you when you have the numbers to make it happen.

The Point is interesting because no campaign is too small.  I saw one campaign looking to raise $20 while another was looking for eight people living on the same street to join in a campaign for a new street light.

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Legislating Napster

Posted on November 12, 2007 by Alvin Trusty

Here is a bill that I hope dies before becoming law. 

The U.S. House of Representatives bill (PDF), which was introduced late Friday by top Democratic politicians, could give the movie and music industries a new revenue stream by pressuring schools into signing up for monthly subscription services such as Ruckus and Napster. Ruckus is advertising-supported, and Napster charges a monthly fee per student.

If universities do not implement technologies that give students alternatives to illegal downloading, all federal financial aid for students (even students that don’t own computers) would be forfeited.

It seems to me that this legislation protects a business model instead of the rights of Americans.

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Why Blog

Posted on November 11, 2007 by Alvin Trusty

Blog is such a poor name for a powerful environment.  I wish something more powerful sounding had caught on instead of blah-ish blog.  I think we are stuck with it.

Here is a scenario I have explained hundreds of times, but I haven’t typed it here.  In the interest of archiving my thoughts forever… here goes.

A teacher asks a technology director for some help in publishing classroom material online.  Here are the things she wants:

  • Add new text and graphics to the site
  • Make changes to items that are already online
  • Make it possible for a visitor to search the whole site
  • Visitors must be able to leave comments on the site
  • Learn no HTML
  • FTP or other complicated processes are not involved

Ten years ago, the tech director would have laughed the teacher out of the room.  The only way to make web pages was to learn complicated HTML.  All the files were then transferred using FTP.  If a page needed modification, it had to be downloaded, edited and then uploaded back to the server.  Having a search engine for a site was far-fetched.  Search engines were expensive add-ons that corporate web site had.

With free blog software, like WordPress, a teacher can be given all of the above and more in only a few minutes.  In addition, templates are available that make it easy to customize the look and feel of the whole site with one click.

If you don’t have a server, there are free blogs servers available online.  I recommend that teachers use Edublogs.org because it is designed for that audience.

Blogs have brought Internet publishing to the masses.  The name may not be the greatest, but the technology behind it is empowering.

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We’re Going Nuclear

Posted on November 10, 2007 by Alvin Trusty

With the high price of gasoline and the anticipated record cost of fuel oil, today we were tossing around alternative ideas to heating the house this winter.  Nuclear power would be the “warmest” heat and there are all kinds of tax incentives if we switch to atomic power.

A Google search gave us quite a few resources from people that have already had this idea.  In the former Soviet Union, they have nuclear powered homes, cars and even toasters.

That’s it.  We are not going to buy any more gas.  It’s just too expensive.

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