Creating a Word cloud #edcmooc

One of the sites I learnt about during the EDCMOOC was Wordle - that lets you create a word cloud.
Here is the "wordle" of this blog at the end of the course.

Technology in schools - does it work? #edcmooc

I have made a video with some comments about technology in schools - best discussed around the water cooler (or should that be over IM?)


Water Cooler 2.0
by: wclass

Technology in schools - do our kids have the right tools and the knowledge to use them?

Does e-learning work? #edcmooc

A question posed on the EDC MOOC site asks about the benefits of e-learning. One major issue raised, especially for moocs, is whether the "massive" aspect means that most of us get lost in the huge array of information. This one especially has forums, blogs, tweets, Flickr challenges, just to name a few.

How different is it really from finding your way around the old mailing lists and bulletin boards? You had to "lurk" for a while before you understood the language and worked out "who to follow". And is that different to face to face classes? Sometimes you want to sit back and listen for a moment to assess everyone's agenda.

One positive aspect of this course is the Google handouts presented by the staff - I think it helps the students enormously to get a picture of what is going on in several areas of the course.

For me, the great benefit of e-learning is the fact that you can access vast amounts of information in your own time.

Utopias and Dystopias - Looking to the Future #edcmooc

In the future, is the question really who will benefit and who will miss out?

Already I want to look back to the past and ask if this was the question when we got books, or radio, or television, and so on.

The video ads from Corning and Microsoft make technology look easy - everything is clean and white and nice - really? I think the purpose is to represent utopia with these new tools but is it real? People know ahead of time who you are and what you'll need. There is too much that is skipped here - what about privacy?

Sight, Charlie 13, and Plurality all deal with privacy. Technology can help you score, keep you safe, and keep your world safe but at what price?

I didn't get all the references, but I was totally amused at the classic comic "men carrying a pane of glass" routine.

The real questions are about control, the price of "safety" and freedom, but also, who audits the auditors?

Utopias and Dystopias - Looking to the Past #edcmooc

In this first week of EDCMOOC, that is, the massively open online course (MOOC) from Coursera called eLearning and Digital Cultures, I have made the following notes and observations.

One of the main themes is technological determinism and we looked at films and read articles about technology and culture and the utopias or dystopias they represent. Technology can be liberating - it can bring people together in ways that may have been impossible before (see Inbox), but people may also come to rely too heavily on this technology (see Thursday) and even begin to worship it (Bendito Machine). For some, technology represents an extremely grim future that sees man replaced (New Media). Maybe we should follow the example of the birds - technology does not control them. They use it - for perching, for nesting, whatever. It does not seem to worry them but neither do they make any gain from the possible benefits.

The films and readings seemed to show a very black and white view of the issue. I want to ask people what do they hope to benefit from the technology, and what are they prepared to give up. Many people seem to just not take any responsibility for what is around them.