Following on to the earlier posting on copyright. I also found a page at Heritage Canada that is quite interesting…
A Practical guide on Copyright Clearance for New media Producers
http://www.pch.gc.ca/progs/ac-ca/pubs/ic-ci/pubs/copymm_e.htm
This should prove useful..
Planning discussions has always been challenging… and adding the online element has really required a re-think of goals, strategies, approaches…
I, like many of my colleagues, really have to rethink how I encourage and use Discussions in the online environment. I ran across what I think is a really nice resource..
Preparing Faculty for Successful Synchronous and Asynchronous Discussions: Plan, Implement & Evaluate by Barbara A. Frey (Univ Pittsburgh) and Linda Wonjar (Duquesne University).
Poster Session for MARC04
The authors provide a set of suggestions and best practice related to using Discussions in synchronous, blended (both) and asynchronous environments, structured into the following:
Nice resource!
I’ve spent the last two days glued to various reports associated with the 9.0 quake in Sumatra… and the ensuing tsunami.
I first heard of it not through the mainstream media… but through my Bloglines EQuake RSS feed (that link is now now deactivated, see below for new links). I was dumbfounded when I read the USGS summary…
My geology side and learning tech side don’t always walk hand-in-hand… but that was one of those strange convergence things. I had started monitoring that RSS feed when I started teaching this fall, and now look at it daily.
I cannot believe the number of big (>6.0) aftershocks… as some have said, the Earth is ringing like a bell from that one…
Further convergence today came with the NY Times article “Blogs Provide Raw Details From Scene of the Disaster“.
The weblog accounts coming out of the disaster area are heart wrenching. The shift from the Christmas pictures to disaster photos at http://sumankumar.com/ struck me like nothing has in some time.
The power of people connecting through this medium is immense.
The NY Times article (which you may have to sign up for their free subscription to see, not sure) does a really good job of pointing out the strength of both weblogs and mainstream media.
Power of people and the power of the Earth… convergence of my two worlds…
Addendum
Looks like the USGS has just retired the original link I used. You can now subscribe to one of three RSS feeds, for earthquakes of three magnitude and date ranges). See this page for the links:
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/recenteqsww/rss.html
I created a link to the original list and had it render inside my WebCT course this past term.
I’m doing some background work related to clearning copyright for online courses, and wanted to store a few links here. I thought I would check into what other Canadian Institutions are doing.
I am really impressed with the University of Manitoba pilot project on digital copyright clearance. They are in the middle of their pilot implementation, due to run until March 2005. The work products from this are already impressive:
Cool… more later…
Further to the DE post on Dec 12, the other resources that I think are quite useful have been out for a while as well, but good to surface:
Regional Accrediting Agency Documents on Electronically Offered Degree and Certificate Programs – click on the “Best Practices for Electronically Delivered Programs” link. This is an excellent set of guidlelines, outlining…
These Best Practices are meant to assist institutions in planning distance education activities and to provide a self-assessment framework for those already involved.
Five components are outlined:
1. Institutional Context and Commitment
2. Curriculum and Instruction
3. Faculty Support
4. Student Support
5. Evaluation and Assessment
The second group of documents relate to the Student Services Side
WCET: Guide to Developing Online Student Services, http://www.wcet.info/resources/publications/guide/guide.htm
Also available as an Acrobat document
In addition the Project website from Beyond the Administrative Core: Creating Web-based Student Services for Online Learners comprises a rich set of resources and guidelines.
Recieved this via Campus Technology’s IT Trends newsletter: Instant Messaging -Collaborative Tool or Educator’s nightmare!
As they indicate:
“This well-researched white paper by Robert Farmer, posted on the University of New Brunswick Web site, examines the pros and cons.”
If you are putting together any info for your faculty about IM, this is a good source for you. The hyperlinks are really useful!
In addition, there is good information about the “enterprise view” – jhow would an institution look at this?
I must admit, being an IM user, I feel good about the statement in the article:
Instant Messaging (IM) is a technology that has been embraced by the information age younger generation — ….”
Starting to match my picture…. [*grin*]
Harkens back to the “Day in the Life” Days — I forget what group/organization did that particular project, the World Wide Panaroma Project, described in this CS Monitor article… , reminds me of this.
The cool thing is, of course, as one might suspect, these are VR images (Novak, you’ll like these!).
The article gives nice background, as does the website at Berkely: http://geoimages.berkeley.edu/wwp.html .
There have been three rounds of this, the Spring equinox, summer solstice (this is very interesting… world heritage sites, wow!) and and Fall equinox, with the latest having a focus on Bridges…
Very very cool…
I’ve been pretty absorbed over the last few months with teaching a Geology course (thus the Rock Blog) fully online for the first time ever… the Online Freakout Party Zone** has languished…
Teaching certainly is not over yet… I’m still grading, the students will be taking the final this week…
However, just a few thoughts: Teaching online was and is the rich, rewarding experience I suspected it would be, and the kind of reality check that is good for a “Director, Learning Technology” to have…
Although I have been working with people who were teaching, or supporting teaching and learning in the online environment pretty much everyday since I last taught (face to face) in Fall 1999, it is certainly not the same as actively teaching…
Not surprising when you are teaching, everyday was a learning experience – for me, with the fully online environment as the newest part of the equation, particularly interacting with a mix of students — some who were taking both online and face to face classes, as well as those that were only taking “distance” courses.
I had forgotten so much about the experience of teaching (nothing like reactivating prior knowledge and experience, eh?) …
– How revitalizing it is to interact with students on a daily basis
– The challenge of carefully shaping your responses to student questions to guide learning, as opposed to providing the ready answer… a challenge that is magnified by needing to do this in writing, instead of speaking…
– Wondering why I was feeling especially wary/alert this fall, and realizing that that feeling was, for me, a normal part of teaching — the ongoing stress/tension of knowing that there is a group of people that rely on you…
– Grading [*shudder*]
And some new things..
– Fully using many of the tools of WebCT, like student tracking, the assignment drop box and discussions, for the first time. Being able to recognizing their strengths (–> selective release is your friend, –> who knew the Clipboard could be so useful?), as well as getting frustrated with some of the “time intensive” quirks (–> moving Discussion Topics — ack!, Why can’t I sort mail by reverse date? Hmm… or can I?).
– Affirming my respect for those that support instructors in their roles – and a new appreciation for the expertise of instructional designers… (thank you, Karen Belfer!)
– Realizing just how much I have to learn about this profession, and being very excited about getting the chance to do this again.
Most of all, part old, but always new — a strengthening of my respect for the UBC student population, including our Access students. Bright, creative, motivated, respectful and supportive of one another…. and their instructor (thank you, class!)…
What an honour to be able to do this…
Speaking of grading, work, etc… must get back to it..
**For those of you who have never seen this weblog — the name was provided by Brian Lamb almost two years ago (I think) as a placeholder – but it somehow stuck…
Distance Education has occupied a lot of our collective time lately. I wanted to start collating some resources in my weblog, so I don’t lose track of them.
First, two resources related to the big picture learner support and guiding principles for teaching and learning/curriculum include from the American Distance Education:
More later…
Via EduResources Weblog, come a link to a new journal, Interdisciplinary Journal of Knowledge and Learning Objects .
The list of possible topics that they propose is quite interesting. Looks like this may be a good venue for publisshing the work of insttructional and media developers.
