Webbed Feat

Hanging out and watching videos

2012-01-25T12:15:00.000-08:00

If I don't say this all the time I should because I sure think it a lot! I'm so grateful for my membership in CPsquare, and especially the partnership between SCoPE and CP2 to organize quarterly field trips together. Well, after I typed that I immediately wanted to add also especially the monthly "my practice" series where I learn so much from other community of practice leaders.

Normally for the quarterly field trips John Smith and I invite community stewards to talk about their CoPs and sometimes walk us through their online spaces. This time we did something a little different; we watched videos about communities. John describes it well and has captured the experience on the CP2 blog:

The idea is that our field trips have tended to focus on communities that are formed intentionally, often looking at them through the eyes of someone who's leading or trying to cultivate them. The videos we select would be of communities that are "found" and observed from the outside but are interesting to us for one reason or another.

This turned out to be a very interesting experiment, and valuable exercise in thinking about what we can learn about CoPs from the outside, and useful and meaningful ways to look at CoPs together. It was also an opportunity to explore new technologies and processes for organizing online activities.

The planning phase
The videos (and presentations in other formats) were prepared by Pepperdine University students for a course facilitated by Margaret Riel. John initiated a discussion in the CP2 community asking members to watch a handful of videos to narrow down our choices. We ended up with a shortlist of 3 videos, one that was from an earlier collection of interviews done by John because it provided a nice contrast of listening to one person's perspective rather than looking in and making sense of a CoP from the outside.

The shortlist:
Ice Skating Sensations
Joseph Sikeku talks about the technologies he uses at FADECO radio to reach Tanzanian farmers.
The Gym

The next step was to find a way to view and discuss these videos as a group. I've had some experience doing this in Elluminate, but it wasn't without challenges! We decided to try Google Hangout, and were quite impressed with our trial run -- especially the 'reindeer' button! Check out John's nose! :-)

Next we worked out the logistics of how to gather people together.

Before Event

Create a Google account
Add Sylvia to your network (http://google.com/profiles/sylviacurrie) and send her a note to say you want to join the Field Trip (sylviacurrie@gmail.com)
Sylvia will add you to her circle "Field Trip"
Install Google voice and video plugin http://www.google.com/tools/dlpage/res/talkvideo/hangouts/
Test your audio and video: http://plus.google.com/hangouts/

Time of Event

Sylvia will create a hangout and invite everyone in the Field Trip circle.
Go to G+ to see a post in your stream letting you know there's a hangout going on. (If you're signed into Google chat you'll receive an IM with a link to the hangout.)
Note only 10 people can be in the hangout at one time, so be quick!

During Event

Click on the YouTube button, but do not press the play or pause buttons (John Smith is the pilot!)

Because the room is limited to 10 people, we didn't go beyond sending out a notice to the CP2 and SCoPE community members. We had 8 people RSVP that they would be joining in, so the numbers worked out well!

The Actual Event

After creating the hangout, and sending out the invitation to members of my "Field Trip" circle, folks started to roll in. This, by the way, is a pretty dangerous way to operate! If for some reason I wasn't able to connect then it would not be an easy task for somebody else to round people up into the room. I'm sure there's an easier way, and the enhanced version of hangout may address this but for now it doesn't support YouTube integration.

Once we were all in the Hangout we were able to just get started -- none of the usual audio checks or fumbling with webcams. Everything just worked!

I recorded much of the session using Jing Pro, not realizing that it would only run for 5 minutes at a time. I had to save and restart the recording MANY times, but I don't think I missed too much. One odd thing about Hangout is that you never see yourself in the top section when you are speaking, but others do. So my recording isn't exactly what other participants experienced.

I pieced together the questions and some sections in an effort to keep the video under 10 minutes, but hopefully also captured the essence of our field trip. At the end we have a debrief on the experience (again, an edited version).

Student Panel: How I/We Like to Learn

2012-01-18T12:02:00.000-08:00

The Teaching and Learning Institute at Selkirk College has put together another event that will be live streamed and you're all invited!

What: Student Panel
Topic: How I/We Like to Learn
Where: Live streamed here: http://tiny.cc/3z9xa
When: January 19, 2012 (Pacific time zone)

AGENDA
(see your time zone)
11:30 a.m. Panel Begins - Harry Pringle Moderating
12:00-12:15 p.m. Discussion - instructors may ask for clarification (not rebuttal : . )
12:30 p.m. Adjourn

QUESTIONS
Modified from Stephen Brookfield's Critical Incident Questionnaire:

At what moments in classes do you feel the most engaged?
At what moments are you the most distant from class?
What actions that instructors or classmates take in class do you find the most affirming or helpful?
What is not working or could be improved"5) What about your classes surprised you the most?

Selkirk College: Student Panel

View more documents from BCcampus.

MicroSCoPE News

2012-01-12T20:13:00.000-08:00

Cross-posted from SCoPE:

MicroSCoPE: A closer look at what's happening in SCoPE

January Activities

Use of Video in Education
January 11-24, 2012
Facilitator: Amy Severson
"As video gets easier to record and publish, it's valuable to step back and ask ourselves a few questions." What are your questions? How have you used video in your teaching? We've already started so come on in!

Open Content Licensing for Educators
January 23-27, 2012
A special invitation is extended by the OER Foundation to this free, open, online workshop designed for educators and students who want to learn more about open education resources, copyright, and creative commons licenses.

Demystifying the Student Perspective Part 2
January 25-28, 2012
Facilitators: Hilda Anggraeni and Diana Chan
This series is organized by students, for faculty. During Part 2 we will focus on the online environment. A 2-day asynchronous discussion will be followed by an interactive web conference, and a 1-day wrap-up discussion.

Quarterly Field Trips
January 23, 20:00 UTC
Our next field trip is an exploration of Communities of Practice that were "found" and observed from the outside and documented by Pepperdine graduate students -- organized in collaboration with CPSquare, the community of practice on communities of practice.

February Activities
Writing an e-book about e-books for fun and no profit
February 1-14, 2012
Facilitators: Richard Schwier and Scott Leslie

Cases in Online Interview Research
February 20 - March 3, 2012
Facilitator: Janet Salmons

New Groups
Shared Services: Adobe Connect is a group of British Columbia educational practitioners using Adobe Connect in teaching and learning who are interested in sharing and improving practices.

About SCoPE
SCoPE brings together individuals who share an interest in educational research and practice, and offers opportunities for dialogue across disciplines, geographical borders, professions, levels of expertise, and education sectors. Our activities are facilitated by volunteers in the community, and membership is free and open to everyone.

SCoPE members receive email updates automatically. If you prefer to read MicroSCoPE on the web or via RSS, login and manage your subscription here. Professional learning events, resources, and member highlights are captured via Scoop.it.

We welcome requests to host or promote professional development activities and projects related to teaching and learning. SCoPE is supported by BCcampus. Contact: Sylvia Currie (scurrie@bccampus.ca)
Please spread the word about SCoPE!

Communicating Online: Email Signatures

2012-01-12T20:05:00.000-08:00

It was such a refreshing change to see this email signature from Phil O'Hara, Dalhousie University:

The information in this e-mail is NOT privileged or confidential. This information is intended for your use and any other distribution, copying or disclosure is strongly encouraged. Thank you.

after seeing these:

This communication is privileged and contains confidential information intended only for the person(s) to whom it is addressed. Any unauthorized disclosure, copying, other distribution of this communication or taking any action on its contents is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please notify us immediately and delete this message without reading, copying or forwarding it to anyone.

This communication is intended for the use of the recipient to whom it is addressed, and may contain confidential, personal, and or privileged information. Please contact us immediately if you are not the intended recipient of this communication, and do not copy, distribute, or take action relying on it. Any communications received in error, or subsequent reply, should be deleted or destroyed.

Please consider the environment before printing this email. This e-mail may contain confidential or privileged information. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify the sender immediately. Any review, dissemination, copying, printing or other use of this email by persons or entities other than the addressee is prohibited, unless permission is granted by the sender. If you have received this email in error, please contact the sender immediately and delete the material from any computer.

This email and any attachments are intended only for use by the addressees named in this email and may contain legally privileged and/or confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient of this email, you are hereby notified that any use, dissemination, distribution or copying of this e-mail or any attachments is strictly prohibited. If you have received this email in error, please immediately notify me by return email and by phone at xxxxx, permanently delete the original and any copy of this email and any attachments from your systems and destroy any printouts of them.

I actually have a bigger collection of signatures that I've saved over the past year or so. But you get the idea!

I've noticed signatures from different people/organizations that have identical wording. Are they plagiarized? ;-)

I get a kick out of reading these. I'm curious about WHY people use email signatures that reveal such paranoia about how others might use those words in the message.

Do you add an email signature to your correspondence. Why? Is it a requirement of the organization you work for? Are you really concerned that someone will forward your email to others?

Have you noticed that nobody pays attention to these disclaimers? I've received hundreds of cc'd and forwarded messages containing information clearly stating that I should never have received them!

Open Content Licensing for Educators

2011-12-21T17:43:00.000-08:00

Plan to participate in Open Content Licensing for Educators! This free, online workshop is a perfect follow-on from several events hosted by BCcampus this past year:OER universityDesigning OERu CredentialsOpening Education ConferenceA Framework for Academic Volunteers InternationalIt is also a perfect way to launch our 2012 Opening Education Series at SCoPE, aimed to provide overview and 'how to' sessions to assist in the development of OER, and to share completed (or in progress) curriculum resources and experiences. More details will be posted at SCoPE in the new year.#OCL4ED

View more documents from BCcampus

Meet Janine Hirtz

2011-11-22T13:15:00.001-08:00

This quick interview is part of a new Educational Technology Users Group series to showcase members of the community. I am interviewing Janine Hirtz from University of British Columbia Okanagan.

About the process

The interview was done using Skype, along with an inexpensive application Call Recorder. I uploaded the .mov file that was generated from Call Recorder to Blip.tv but only the audio for Janine was working. So I imported the same file into iMovie, and while I was at it did one small edit where I got lost in the excitement and forgot how to speak! Somewhere along that process the audio got fixed because the exported version that I again uploaded to blip.tv works fine.

Technical overhead is always one of my biggest challenges. I admire people who can push buttons, talk, listen, adjust volume, move things around on their desktop, all while ignoring ringing phones and other distractions. If you want to see the pros in action participate in any online session with Paul Stacey, Nancy White, and Jonathan Finkelstein, to name a few. What I realized after hanging up is that there were some really big parts of Janine's story that we didn't get to. If I had been able to completely focus on what she was saying, I could have prompted more. Thankfully there are many other ways you can learn more about Janine!

My messy office in the background leaps out at me in this video. Why didn't I take the advice of Jesai Jayhmes, who taught us so much about backgrounds and lighting during the Humanizing the Online Experience series (part 1 and part 2) at SCoPE? I should have also revisited Janet Salmon's seminar at the time of the release of her book Online Interviews in Real Time, which is sitting right here on my bookshelf!

Here are my tips:

If something doesn't work, just fiddle!
Have those interview questions handy where you can see them.
Do whatever you can to be completely focused on the conversation. (I did put my dogs in another room. That counts!)
Quick and informal is fine, but there is still a lot you can do to improve the production.

Online Course Showcase

2011-11-21T13:50:00.001-08:00

Tannis Morgan and Karen Belfer got the ball rolling for this event in 2010, and it just keeps on rolling! Note that this year the event will be live streamed.

Do you teach online or are interested in online teaching? You might want to consider attending the free Online Course Showcase event happening at the Justice Institute of British Columbia (JIBC) on Nov 30, 2011.

The online course showcasing event is co-hosted by JIBC and Vancouver Community College and sponsored by the Metro Vancouver Educational Developers Network, with support from BCcampus. The purpose of the event is to bring together post-secondary institutions in the lower mainland to showcase their “best” online courses.This year’s showcase focuses on design decisions that are made because of the particular needs of students in the following categories:
1. Accessibility
2. Mobile learning
3. Online courses in post-secondary institutions, and beyond.

We will also have a student panel this year!

When:November 30, 20119am-4pm (see your time zone)
Where:JIBC Theatre. The event will also be web streamed.

How to Register:
This year you can register attend in person or via web streaming. You must register for either by November 24, 2011. Registration at: http://onlinecourseshowcase.wordpress.com/event-registration/

How to get more details
Stay in touch with sessions, schedule, and presenters as we get closer to the event at http://onlinecourseshowcase.wordpress.com and via Twitter #ocshowcase2011

Update
Join us for some collaborative notetaking

Behind the Scenes of an Open Event

2011-11-16T16:47:00.001-08:00

This week I participated in a debate organized by the Selkirk College Teaching and Learning Institute.: Is the internet making you smarter? An open invitation was extended to all by Theresa Southam, coordinator for the Institute. Being new to social media combined with her very part-time position at the college, Theresa requested a little help with event promotion and engagement. She is interested in opening up more events both in an effort to engage faculty and staff across the geographically distributed Selkirk campuses, but also to invite others beyond the walls of the college.

I'm so glad to see more of these open opportunities around the province! I thought I would share the experience and perhaps those institutions that would like to be more open in their professional learning activities will see some elements of what they will or will not do for their own events.

The Selkirk Tech team took care of the live streaming, which I understand was a first for them. They did a great job, and used Ustream which conveniently captures a recording. The number of online participants went up and down but I think the average was around 18. Some high school students were participating, including a debate team. How great is that!

The day before the event I received a couple really fun posters as PDF files via email which I posted on my own blog. In hindsight I should have also uploaded these posters to Slideshare as a way to help spread the word, and also Facebook. Ideally, these posters would have been embedded on the Selkirk website. Information about the event was also sent out via the BCcampus blog, @bccampus, and added to the MicroSCoPE Scoop.it page.

I pointed people to the Teaching and Learning Institute site, but noticed it was missing information about time zones. When I promote events through the SCoPE community I'm reaching out to educators around the world so I created an event on Time and Date. Also, our British Columbia post-secondary institutions span two time zones so I always like to answer that question before I'm asked.

The Selkirk Teaching and Learning twitter account, @FrankenSmarter, was to be used for the debate. I suggested using a hashtag #FrankenSmarter as a way to collect tweets into one place. Listening to the debate recording I realize that the Selkirk folks thought I would be tweeting from the @FrankenSmarter account. Oh well! Lesson learned is that I should do a better job of explaining what I'm up to!

I set up a #FrankenSmarter archive using a local Twapper Keeper install on our BCcampus Sandbox but I don't think it worked. That sandbox is a fun place to play but the tools there are not meant for production. In any case, anybody out there planning an event, make sure you create an archive for the hashtag because those tweets don't stick around for long. Twapper Keeper seems to be the most popular way to do this, and it also feeds into other nifty tools to display tweets, such as Summarizr.

Aside from a handful of retweets when promoting the event...

and a response from @mctoonish articulating her view on multi-tasking...

I mostly filled up the twitter stream all by myself. :-)

I was careful not to bombard my twitter followers with too much during the hour, and obviously it would have been a better experience with more interaction, but such is the nature of twitter -- just get it out there! The Ustream chat wasn't functioning for me but I see from the recording that "Selkirk Registrar"was there...alone. Actually, during Ustreamed events the chat backchannel can be a very valuable tool; it has little technical overhead, and not being limited to 140 characters can be liberating! For anyone planning to use Ustream for more than one-off occasions, the premium account is the way to go to avoid ads during the broadcast.

All in all this approach to opening up events does not involve a huge investment in time and dollars. The facilitator/ MC might acknowledge the virtual participants, but is not expected to engage them beyond that. The debate format is ideal for a live streamed event because the focus is on the people on the stage and holding the microphones. This means the camera can stay put and there is no requirement to repeat questions and comments from the audience, or to run around the room with portable microphones.

A challenge for me was that I didn't catch the names of the debaters during the live session, and I couldn't find that information online. But apart from feeling a little removed from the details of, and people involved in, the event, it was very entertaining! It was a fun way to spend an hour. We even got a nice thank-you from the Selkirk Prez.

Is the Internet Making Us Smarter?

2011-11-09T07:55:00.000-08:00

Heck YES or Heck NO? Join the debate at Selkirk College!

When

November 15, 2011 at 11:30 (Pacific). See your time zone

How

Live Stream http://www.ustream.tv/channel/selkirk-danm

Twitter http://twitter.com/FrankenSmarter

#frankensmarter

Brought to you by the Selkirk College Teaching and Learning Centre.

(click on posters to enlarge)

UCIPD

2011-10-31T14:15:00.000-07:00

Each fall and spring a group of individuals involved in working with faculty to support public post secondary teaching and learning in British Columbia gather together to share their work experiences and expertise. UCIPD stands for University, College, and Institute, Professional Development. Not a very fancy name, and members admit to spending too much time trying to explain the acronym to their institutional administrators. One day it might change to something more catchy, but meanwhile this grassroots group continues to collaborate, share, and gather together for what always amounts to the some of the most interesting days of my professional life. I feel privileged to be a part of this Community of Practice. Yet, at the same time, I've always been a little perplexed about how it functions.

I remember my first gathering about four years ago. I was there wearing two hats: one to fill in for my dean at Nicola Valley Institute of Technology, and the other to report on SCoPE, which at that time was supported by Simon Fraser University. We started out with quick round-table reports highlighting activities and challenges at each institution. My jaw dropped. I was astounded at all of the fantastic work, as well as professional development opportunities... that very few people know about! Well I assume that's right, since I was wedged right in a faculty support role and I didn't know about all of these great things. In fact, I had worked in post secondary system for over 20 years and I had never heard of UCIPD. Why?

Having been part of this CoP for awhile now, I think I can offer a few reasons.

There is no web, and no social media, presence.
The main form of communication is a listserv. I'm sure that anyone in the teaching and learning field in the British Columbia post secondary system who requests to join would be welcomed. But first you need to know that it exists. Then you need to find out how to join. It's sort of a you-need-to-know-somebody-who-knows approach.
The group has a really good thing going. All members feel supported, and grateful for the access to such a fantastic resource. There is a long, interesting history spotted with challenges, and through it all the group has held together. There seems to be a desire, especially from the long-time members, to stay the same.
The governance of UCIPD is far from complex. There is no budget and no steering or advisory committees. The leadership emerged, and consists of a handful of people interested in investing the time and energy. Fall and Spring gatherings rotate around the province and are hosted by members at their institutions. Individuals are responsible for finding their own travel funds (and are not always successful in doing so, which is another story). Program committees form to plan those gatherings, although membership of that committee does not seem to change much from one year to the next. They really are committed!
This Community of Practice is not under the umbrella of an organization, and as such there is no obligation to report out on activities, and no formal monitoring or recognition of the work the group does. There is also no marketing.

At one stage (~2006) there was a request for a space in SCoPE, mainly to share and build resources together, but also to take advantage of what a forum tool has to offer such as centralized history and topic-based and threaded discussions. It started as a private space on the site, but then, with consensus among the members, was opened up for the public to read along, and even join. However, the transition to the new, open CoP space was slow. The members continued to use and prefer the listserv, no doubt because it was already part of their workflow. So we had a short period of a web presence, open sharing and dialogue, but then reverted back to earlier practices.

This group exists because of its intense willingness to share, collaborate, and learn. Members are devoted to their work, and also to sustaining the UCIPD Community of Practice. There is not a resistance to reaching out beyond the existing group, or to try new tools and activities. There is just caution, and for a good reason. When you have a rich CoP there's something to be said for staying the same. It serves the purpose of its members -- to learn from one another. The members, in turn, take that back to their own institutions.

On the other hand, it's hard not to wonder if more open practices would benefit our work across the post-secondary system. Furthermore, would the group benefit from a wider profile? And would a wider profile in turn give more attention to teaching and learning at our institutions? After all, these people are very quietly doing amazing work! Are there times when OPEN is not better? These are complex CoP questions.

This started out as a post about the UCIPD event held in Vancouver last week, but I found myself writing about the CoP itself. Thanks for listening while I write to make sense of things! And I promise, more about the event later. :-)

My Opening Education Conference Experience

2011-10-18T12:09:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I participated in the Opening Education Conference organized by BCcampus. I didn't have the time to participate in person, and, in any case, I hesitate to use travel funds to experience events unless I'm presenting or one of the organizers.

At BCcampus we always attempt to offer some kind of experience for individuals or groups who are unable to attend meetings and events in person. Sometimes this is simply a shared recording of one or more selected presentations. Other times we live stream, but don't plan for other ways to engage the online participants. Occasionally the engagement just happens, initiated by participants through twitter.

The Opening Education event had some intentional planning around engaging distributed delegates, and for me it felt like a nice balance. I certainly didn't feel completely involved; my attention wandered throughout the day to other projects I'm currently working on. But in many ways, that is the advantage of participating from your office. You participate according to your own time and interest.

Here are some observations from yesterday's event:

A big monitor brought me closer to the activity in the room. I wouldn't have felt as connected using a mobile device.
The split screen for viewing presentation slides and presenters simultaneously makes a big difference.
Good microphones, and remembering to use them, is a bonus!
Quality of the stream does matter. It's fun to watch spontaneous broadcasts from handheld devices, but it's not something you want to do all day. The live streaming done by SFU's Teaching and Learning Centre was exceptional.
A pre-determined and simple hashtag #opening11 helped to bring together participants on twitter quickly and efficiently.
Having a designated person to monitor the twitter stream (Tori Klassen - multi-tasker extraordinaire!) to respond, prompt, and also bring forward questions and comments to the place-based audience made a huge difference.
When participating from a distance it does help to know some of the people in the room.
Stating name/affiliation before speaking is a good practice, and especially helpful for those listening in. Sometimes the camera doesn't make it to the individual in time.
The sync.in page "OPENING EDUCATION: How do we create educator engagement with open education?" that David Porter fired up for the final session of the day was a great idea. Delegates on location formed small groups, and there were some who contributed to the sync-in page. (Designating scribes might have been better.) Online participants typed away. The real-time-ness of that activity made it especially compelling.
Attention to the details, like adding a time zone converter for the live webcast participants counts for a lot.

Here's a quick movie I put together to capture the experience of participating in the conference from my home office. It lingers on the final slide for way too long. Whatever! :-)

Designing and Developing an Online Course

2011-09-26T08:16:00.000-07:00

As someone who has worked with faculty to design and develop online courses, I recognize so many steps in this book that most authors take for granted people will understand. This book is practical, detailed, thorough, well written, and very well organized. Dr. Delich has researched, and more importantly, USED the tools and techniques she recommends. Suggested resources to learn more are embedded throughout the text, and are very selective. Attention to accessibility throughout the book is very refreshing -- something that is often left out of similar course design resources. Top rating from me! I will recommend this book to faculty, and individuals involved in a support role, for years to come.

Designing and Developing an Online Course: A Guide for Educators is available for download in several formats.

Reflections on a fantastic workshop

2011-08-02T11:49:00.000-07:00

Cross posted to Nancy White's blog. I'm honoured! Thanks Nancy!

What happened at the 2011 RosViz Graphic Facilitation Workshop? I'm not sure where to begin! It was 2 1/2 days of pure fun, intense learning, lively networking, and the occasional emotional tug. I created this little video in an attempt to capture the experience, which of course will be most meaningful to the participants but hopefully will also give others a glimpse of what the workshop is all about.

Following the introductory evening session and graphic jam we launched right into some activities aimed to, in Nancy's words, "L O O O O S E N up", create the unexpected, and most importantly, raise questions in our minds about how this all feels. I mean, how often have you started a drawing with a sopping wet tea bag? Comments after viewing our gallery: I would have never created this if you had just given me a blank piece of paper and markers.

Tea Bag Drawing Exercise

Giving a starting point, a tea bag splotch, we started to see potential -- familiar images formed in our minds from the shapes we saw in front of us. It was a very quick exercise, and aside from some drippy canvases we were ready for a gallery walkabout within minutes.

The same principles were applied in another exercise which can best be described as musical chairs but without the chairs, and with markers and chalk. As soon as the music stops markers are lifted and on you move to the next canvas.

By the time we were finished rotating through each station we had a collection of stunning art that, in most cases, was quite different from what the original artist envisioned. Questions continued to emerge through participation: What did it feel like to draw on someone else's work?

Musical Drawing

In keeping with Nancy's approach to just dive right in, more challenging activities were interspersed throughout the workshop. Sure she was careful to lay a bit of foundation, but rather than gradually build up to the big crescendo (live graphic recording without any clues about the topic), these experiences felt more like check points. Wow, that was way more difficult than I thought it would be! And neat, look what I created in just 6 minutes! What really stood out after several practice sessions, debriefs, and plenty of opportunities to network (the power of the snack table!) was the comfort level in the room. We had evolved into quite the uninhibited group!

Looking back on the graphic recordings of Matt Cutts' Ted Talk: Try Something New for 30 days it's astonishing to think that these images emerged from a talk that was less that 3 1/2 minutes long. (Violette Clark invites you to participate in her 30-day challenge -- a portrait a day for the month of August!)

TED Talk Graphic Scribes

There were some surprises as well. For one of the graphic recording exercises Violette Clark told her story and for all workshop participants this proved to be the most difficult exercise. I wanted to honour Violette and her amazing story, and I was afraid that I wasn't doing it justice in my drawing.

During the debrief, Violette talked about how overwhelming it was to see her life story represented in all the the incredible drawings around the room. Through this exercise we all experienced how emotional this visual practice can be; I think most of us were fighting back tears at that point!

Another useful practice session was the icon jam. It's amazing to me how often I can think of the perfect icon while I'm listening, but the right image just won't form in my brain. Oh! The recycle symbol would go perfectly in this spot. Then my mind goes blank. Others in the workshop shared this same experience. Nancy led us through a couple icon jams to tap into both sides of our brains. Here are some creations from a "throw out, throw in" activity. Nancy also offers an open invitation to contribute to this icon collection.

We weren't holding crayons every minute of the workshop. Our circle of chairs brought several debriefing conversations, a "fish bowl" activity, a chat with Susan Stewart from California via Elluminate (recording here) about her experiences using an iPad, and a final reflection on the entire workshop experience.

This sounds like a lot over a 2 1/2 day period, and believe it or not I've left out quite a bit! Other reflections on the Graphic Facilitation are continuing to pop up:

Also, the RosViz10 Facebook Group is bubbling, and you're all welcome to join us. (Advance apology -- we can't seem to flip a switch to make this group public so you'll need to wait for one of the admins to approve your membership.)

Next, while the experience is fresh in my mind, I plan to write about social reporting. But for now I'd like thank Michelle and Nancy for the opportunity!

Kick Off Graphic Jam

2011-07-14T12:19:00.000-07:00

Welcome sign by Michelle Laurie

Our workshop agenda

Yesterday we arrived in Rossland, British Columbia from a variety of locations for the 2nd annual Graphic Facilitation workshop. A few of us did some prep work to get ready for the kick of graphic jam -- hanging paper, prepping the floor space with plastic to catch chalk dust, and throwing open the curtains to let the natural light in.

It was exciting to put names to faces and learn about the various backgrounds and reasons for coming to the 3-day workshop. The first activity was a visual introduction. In 5 minutes the 20 participants came up with drawings that gave us a lot to talk about! We toured the room and participants described what they saw. Not your traditional round robin intros!

Violette Clark creating her visual introduction

Next Nancy made sure we warmed up properly and became aware of space around us by using our whole bodies. BIG circles! Rockin' straight lines!

From there Nancy introduced participants to basic concepts around lettering, spacing, colour, and everything else that emerged from the group. One thing I really appreciate about Nancy White's teaching style is that she uses the work of participants to point out different styles, design principles, impact of colour, use of space, and so on. We don't always work through all skills and concepts systematically. By the end of the evening graphic jam we were talking about what works, what frustrates us, what we're curious about... because we had plenty of time to experiment.

Yes we can! Close up of drawing by Sara Davis

We're capturing bits and pieces that will give you a glimpse of what happens in the #rosviz graphic facilitation workshop. On to day 2!

Flickr -- tag: rosviz
Twitter - tag: #rosviz, archived here
Facebook - RosViz10 group
YouTube - still uploading but they'll end up on my channel and tagged 'rosviz'

RosViz Social Reporting

2011-07-11T15:20:00.000-07:00

The last couple of months have been a bit of a whirlwind with planning, organizing, traveling, presenting, facilitating... It's the usual stuff that goes with my job, except lately a new, fun piece has been added to the mix. Drawing on walls! And not that I needed to have any more fun, but now something else has been added to the list: Social reporting!

I mentioned earlier that I will be participating this week in the Graphic Facilitation Workshop in Rossland, BC, facilitated be Nancy White and Michelle Laurie. I'm getting pretty good at packing supplies for these trips. This time in addition to the rolls of paper, variety of markers, coloured chalk, tape, xacto knife, etc I'll be bringing along a bag of items to support my roll as social reporter: video camera, iphone, laptop, cables, etc. I've also been reading up the role of the social reporter. Michelle pointed me to this report that has some good tips: Social Reporting from Conferences, Workshops and Other Events: A practical guide for organisers. It also has a good definition of social reporting:

Social reporting is a set of skills and tools mixing journalism, facilitation and social media to report collectively and live from an event, capture the moments of the event and develop interactive conversations.

I'm realizing that this concise sentence packs in a lot of skills and responsibility! I'm not a particularly fast writer, nor a brilliant multi-tasker. My photography could use some help, too. Hmmm, right person for the job? We'll see!

We have a few of the basics in place:

Twitter hashtag: #rosviz
Facebook Group (called RosViz2010 because who knew it would be an annual event?)
A collection of photos from last year, but we'll be adding more and using the 'rosviz' tag

Photo by Nancy White, taken at RosViz 2010

What else do we need? So many questions are beginning to whirl around in my head. Should I set up a separate ROSVIZ blog? What about possibilities for using Google+?

Getting ready for a road trip to Rossland, BC for a graphic facilitation workshop with +Nancy White and Michelle Laurie and thinking about how G+ might fit into the social reporting equation

Do you have experience with social reporting? Any advice to share? Whatever happens I plan to keep Nancy's concern in mind:

My worry? Distraction across too many media. So how do we keep it simple?

Oh, and more about my drawing on walls adventures will be posted soon!

Merging Blogs

2011-07-04T13:59:00.000-07:00

There's a bit of a history to this move, but the What's New blog, previously and also better known as Pink Flamingo Resources, is now here at Webbed Feat. It took me awhile to get up the courage to press that import button. Blogger Help has the basics of how to export and import xml fies, but I still had a lot of questions:

Will the post dates be maintained?
What about the tags (labels)?
How will this impact RSS feeds, both from What's New and Webbed Feat?
Will places like the ETUG community suddenly have over 800 blog posts dating back to 2005 showing up in the activity stream?

The one-and-only Pink Flamingo

After some research I was confident that merging the two blogs would be quick and easy. I even found a very clever workaround for moving away from the What's New blog without impacting the current subscribers (which is different from "followers", but there are very few readers using that option).

So after sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for the import to finish, I checked my blog and was so impressed that everything worked. Oh but wait! Here's the question I forgot to ask: Will the blog post authors stay intact? Turns out the answer is NO! Now it appears as if I wrote all of these imported posts, when in fact Kate Britt (aka Pink Flamingo) should be showing up as author for everything prior to April, 2009. Then after that we had a few posts from ETUG members, such as Amanda Coolidge and Leva Lee. Oh well, if you want to check those details you can always go back to the What's New blog. I'll leave everything intact over there. Meanwhile, thanks for reading the newly-merged blog!

Spam

2011-06-23T14:11:00.000-07:00

Now this is fresh. Someone who spammed SCoPE is concerned that he is receiving too much email from the site and is asking for my help.

Fortunately, spam is rare on the SCoPE site. One reason is that it takes time, energy, and a working email address for someone to create an account. The other is that I'm usually monitoring the site and am very quick to hit the delete button if anything suspicious pops up.

In this case I must have missed deleting the spammer's account so I'm grateful for the head's up! Maybe I should send him a few hundred email messages to let him know I've taken care of his inbox issue. :-)

ROSVIZ Graphic Facilitation Workshop

2011-06-23T08:04:00.000-07:00

Sylvia Currie here! Social Reporter for the upcoming Graphic Facilitation Workshop in beautiful Rossland, British Columbia. This will be my second time attending the workshop facilitated by Nancy White and Michelle Laurie. This year I was hesitating about attending, not for lack of interest, but for all the usual reasons that never seem important after a missed opportunity: time and budget challenges, too many projects, summer plans, etc etc. Earlier this month Nancy and Michelle crowned me with the title of "social reporter". How could I resist that! I'll be working hard to get the word (and of course visuals) out about what we're up to over the 3-day workshop.

This is what I had to say about last year's workshop (written to someone inquiring about the event, then posted as a testimonial)

I have so many good things to say about the workshop I don’t know where to begin! Nancy White, who will be leading this workshop, is the best facilitator I know. She is so much fun, and really knows how to keep everybody engaged. She really knows how to observe, and shift activities according to the needs of the group.

I don’t know if you already know Michelle Laurie, but one thing I love about her is that she is ready and willing to jump in and take risks. We both tippy-toed into the last Rossland workshop because we felt a little weak on, well, talent! But we found others in the same situation, and Nancy encouraged us to toss all inhibitions out the door.

I think this workshop would be AMAZING for someone with artistic ability because your focus would be on facilitation, and how to best capture dialogue. I came to the workshop with facilitation experience, but focussed in on the basics of how to draw — create space, convey ideas, use icons, add depth, etc etc.

Last year we gathered some photos in Flickr and we've kept in touch in Facebook.

I just heard that there were 2 cancellations, so if this workshop is of interest to you (and why wouldn't it be?!!) please join us!

Preparing for the ETUG Spring Workshop

2011-05-31T17:48:00.000-07:00

I'm heading to Nelson, BC tomorrow for the annual ETUG Spring Workshop. I'm excited about this event for a number of reasons -- too many to list so I'll start with a few.

I really like the theme Open4Learning (I mentioned earlier how the theme came about). I've been organizing and facilitating open learning activities for learning professionals since the first graphical web browser became available, and in my work with faculty over the years I have always encouraged open sharing and collaboration. Some people are more willing to open up their learning opportunities than others, but we've sure made a lot of progress in recent years!
I'm in touch with ETUG members on a regular basis, but I rarely get to see folks in person. I really enjoy the energy, enthusiasm, and belly laughs at these events.
A few of us are planning to do some graphic recording. Michelle Laurie and Rachael Roussin are driving up from Rossland to record Alan Levine's keynote with me. Plus we'll be recording Scott Leslie and David Porter's session on Open Educational Resources. For other sessions I plan to provide the paper and supplies, and hope others will decide to pick up a marker.
We get t-shirts! I just hope they're bigger than the ones we got last year. I gave that one to my teddy bear.
The workshop is in Nelson, a very special part of the world.

After the Northern Voice conference (my blog about that is still in the draft folder!) I was hoping we would do something with QR codes, like use them for posting session descriptions, schedules, or maps. I don't think that's happening so I decided to generate my own to slide into my lanyard. Following Grant Potter's suggestion, it points to my profile in the ETUG community.

My session on Friday is called Facilitating in the Open, a title I'd like to use for a book on the same topic if I ever get around to it, and if you're interested in that topic please get in touch. The ETUG workshop program refers to my session as a "presentation" and to me as a "presenter". Everything but! This is one of my peeves about conference lingo.

Here's the description:

The increase in opportunities to participate in open, online workshops, courses, and events, calls for a unique set of skills and considerations for facilitators. What are the implications of open invitations? How do you design for the unknown? How do you plan for the unexpected? What facilitation strategies do you toss out the window? How does the facilitator’s role change? How do you spread the word? What do you need in your toolkit? That’s a lot of question! During this session we will look at examples of open, online learning activities (MOOCS, webinars, seminars, twitter chats…), collect our experiences as participants and facilitators, and work toward a new set of guiding principles to assist those who will be facilitating in the open in the future.

In the spirit of openness we'll be streaming and recording ETUG workshop sessions.

What makes effective community events?

2011-05-09T20:20:00.000-07:00

From the CPsquare blog...

Image by LaDonna Coy and Susan Stewart

CPsquare, SCoPE, and Online Community Enthusiasts are sponsoring a share fair on Thursday May 12 from 20:00 to 22:00 GMT about planning and running excellent online events for communities. (An event about designing events! How recursive!) It’s a great opportunity to share some of what we’ve learned about what works in our communities. Would you like to share?

The agenda and a launch pad to participate is here: http://meetingwords.com/VbOaSj0WHB. Here’s how the agenda stands at this moment:

1:00 p Introduction and welcome

Event logistics review: balancing broadcast & interaction,
Platform & technology components
Fall-back positions

1:10 p Morning Fish bowl report-out (format & conclusions)
1:20 p Planning an online symposium to launch a community with Linda Blong, Connie Silva-Broussard, George Triest, and Percy Young.
1:40 p LaDonna Coy and Susan Stewart: increasing participation by diversifying tools (See the diagram on the right.)
OCE Elluminate room (continued)

2:00 p #KMers chat report-out on excellent events http://www.kmers.org/chat
2:20 p Breakout # 2
2:40 p Breakout # 3

CPsquare Elluminate room

2:00 p Breakout # 1
2:20 p Breakout # 2
2:40 p Breakout # 3

We’re also having a Twitter chat at 18:00 GMT on Thursday May 12 http://www.kmers.org/chat on “Effective online vents from a KMer perspective”

Demystifying the Student Perspective

2011-04-26T10:10:00.000-07:00

Hilda Anggraeni and Diana Chan, two very talented co-op students from Simon Fraser University, have come up with a great idea. They have created the Demystifying the Student Perspective discussion space in SCoPE to bring together undergraduate students and post-secondary faculty to discuss issues around social media and educational technology. They are doing the planning from beginning to end, which has involved learning the ins and outs of Moodle and Elluminate, creating this excellent logo, experimenting with various ways to promote the event, designing the learning space.... the list goes on.

Here is their description and invitation:

Demystifying the Student Perspective was created to bridge the gap between post secondary instructors and undergraduate students. This was first established in response to the call for a better understanding between instructors and students to share their experiences to better teaching and learning.

Does feedback through in class evaluations improve teaching? How do educators accommodate students with different learning habits? Will social media help teachers reach students? What are the best ways to evolve teaching as social media progresses in everyday life? There are some of the questions that will be answered in this seminar.

By participating in our online discussion and seminar, this will strengthen collaborations between educators and students to enhance the teaching and learning experience.

They are kicking off with an event this week, April 26-29, 2011, that combines 4 days of asynchronous discussion with an interactive web conference.

April 26 & 27 :: Forum Discussions
April 28 :: Elluminate Discussion (10am PDT - check your time zone)
April 29 :: Wrap up Discussion

Also, a couple polls are waiting for your response, and a glossary that we will build together.

Hope to see you there!

Get Your Moose On!

2011-04-14T12:45:00.000-07:00

Michelle Laurie and I will be attempting to 'fly the visual flag' so to speak by carrying on the tradition started by Nancy White and Rachel Smith at previous Northern Voice conferences. We're rookies in comparison but really enthusiastic about sharing what we have learned! We hope you'll come to our Drawing on Walls session and get your hands dirty.

We'll also be setting up a sandbox at Moosecamp. We will bring supplies and provide a little coaching (and lots of enthusiasm) for participants to practice graphic recording during Moosecamp sessions.

Here's the description for our session. The schedule is TBA:
---
Sometimes our imaginations are sparked by a visual where words fail us. Think about when communities plan and imagine their futures, when teams consider the possible outcomes for their projects, when groups create maps to track their progress. These are all opportunities to use visuals to engage and deepen community dialogue. In this session we’ll touch the paper, play with the pens, and loosen up our drawing muscles. Warning: You will stretch beyond the confines of typing on a keyboard! Learn the basics and practice with us at Moose Camp!

Two events about events

2011-04-08T11:53:00.000-07:00

This is an open invitation to two upcoming events related to planning events (cross-posted at CP2)

1) SCoPE seminar (online)

Online Conferences: Professional Development for a Networked Era, a 2-week online seminar at SCoPE, begins on Monday, April 11, 2011. During this event we will share experiences and advice on how to plan or participate effectively in an online professional development conference. Our facilitators, Lynn Anderson and Terry Anderson, have written a book based on their research and experiences. It will be of interest to anyone who has participated in an online conference of any kind, which is just about everybody! As with all SCoPE activities, you are welcome to participate according to your own time and interests, and there is no registration required. Just show up! Please join the dialogue; together we can improve the online conference experience.
We will kick off the seminar with a Web Conference in Elluminate - Monday, April 11, 10:00 PDT, 17:00 GMT

2) Gathering of Online Community Enthusiasts
The second event is the 3rd annual Gathering of Online Community Enthusiasts, (OCE2011) May 12, 2011 in Vancouver, British Columbia. The theme this year is planning excellent community events and will be a full day of talking about and experiencing various event formats, strategies, and technologies. There will be an opportunity to participate from a distance as well, so watch the OCE2011 space in SCoPE. If you plan to attend, RSVP here.

MicroSCoPE: April 2011 Issue

2011-04-04T22:56:00.000-07:00

This newsletter is cross-posted from SCoPE.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MicroSCoPE: A Close Look at What's Happening in the SCoPE Community
April, 2011
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In This Issue
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. Open Learning & Open Collaboration
2. Online Conferences: Professional Developemnt for a Networked Era
3. Engaging Students in Inquiry Learning
4. Moodle 2.0 Workshop
5. Demystifying the Student Perspective
6. Quarterly Field Trip
7. Online Community Enthusiasts
8. SCoPE Improvements
9. Follow up from #LAK11
10 Cases in Online Interview Research
11. PeriSCoPE
12. About SCoPE
13. About MicroSCoPE

1. Open Learning & Open Collaboration
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
April 5, 2011, 20:30 GMT
Facilitators: Randy LaBonte
Join the 2011 Canada Moodle Moot program team for an interactive session about the upcoming conference May 1-5 online and in Edmonton, Alberta. Explore the panel topics, and find out more about what is in store for the closing plenary.

2. Online Conferences: Professional Development for a Networked Era
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
April 11-22, 2011
Web Conference: April 11 @ 17:00 GMT
Facilitators: Lynn Anderson and Terry Anderson
What contributes to the success of an online conference? How can we improve the experience for all participants? We will kick off this 2-week seminar with a 1-hour overview and discussion in Elluminate. This seminar is part of SCoPE's Professional Reading Group Series. Buy the book or download excerpts and related reading, and if you don't have time to do the background reading, join is anyway!

3. Engaging Students in Inquiry Learning
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This seminar and video series was originally scheduled March 21 - April 8 2011. We are postponing this seminar with Neil Smith until a later date. Meanwhile, SCoPE members were keen to get started! As Nicholas Bowskill put it: "In the spirit of open education we could always examine the issue amongst ourselves".

4. Moodle 2.0 Workshop
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Curious about Moodle 2.0? Plan to participate in a free, open, online workshop April 18 - May 13, with a 1-week hiatus for the Canada Moodle Moot conference. The workshop will be hosted at the KnowMoodle Sandbox, part of the Knowplace family of sites. More details will be posted on the sandbox site in the next week.

5. Demystifying the Student Perspective
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
April 26-29, 2011
Facilitators: Hilda Anggraeni and Diana Chan
This event is organized by students, for faculty! The first topic in this series will explore social media and educational technology. A 2-day asynchronous discussion will be followed by an interactive web conference in Elluminate, and a 1-day wrap-up discussion.

6. Quarterly Field Trip
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
For our next field trip we will visit KM4Dev, a community of international development practitioners who are interested in knowledge management and knowledge sharing issues and approaches. Field Trips are visits to living communities organized in collaboration with CPSquare, the community of practice on communities of practice. Check the wiki for a date and time later in April.

7. Online Community Enthusiasts
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The third annual gathering of online community enthusiasts will take place in Vancouver May 12, 2011. This year's theme is 'planning excellent community event'. Check the special interest group for details, ask questions and offer suggestions in the forum, and be sure to RSVP.

8. SCoPE Improvements
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thanks to Diana Chan and Hilda Anggraeni, our talented co-op students from Simon Fraser University, we have a new background for the SCoPE twitter page and a SCoPE badge for you to place on your own blog or website.

9. Follow up from #LAK11
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Calling all participants in the Learning and Knowledge Analytics course! Your involvement in this research on the use of the Student Activity Meter is much appreciated.

10. Cases in Online Interview Research
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In preparation for an upcoming book and SCoPE seminar scheduled for fall, 2011, Janet Salmons extends this invitation to individuals who a) teach qualitative research methods, b) sever on doctoral committees, or 3) are on IRB or other review boards.

11. PeriSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* The Flexible Learning Network (#FLNchat) hosts bi-weekly chats in Twitter to share resources and provide support to a learning community of higher education professionals. The next chat is scheduled for April 12 at 23:00 GMT.

* Registration for Canada Moodle Moot 2010! Participate online or on location in Edmonton, Alberta.
* MobiMOOC runs April 2 - May 14, 2011

* The next CIDER Session is 'The Chinese Top Level Courses: Improving the quality of online courses in a new educational climate', April 6, 2011. CIDER sessions are targeted at distance education researchers, graduate students, and practitioners. Each session features an active researcher talking about their project, methodologies used, and their results. Are you a Distance Education Researchers interested in sharing your research? Contact Lynn Anderson,
lynnlo@cogeco.ca, with a brief description of your proposed presentation.
* Just published: Special IRRODL issue on Connectivism.
* Keep up-to-date on the OER university planning.
* The next WikiEducator Learning4Content Online Workshop runs April 27-May 11, 2011.
* Space is available in the 2011 Graphic Facilitation Workshop located in Rossland, British Columbia, July 13-15, 2011.

12. About SCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*SCoPE brings together individuals who share an interest in educational research and practice, and offers opportunities for dialogue across disciplines, geographical borders, professions, levels of expertise, and education sectors. Our activities are facilitated by volunteers in the community, and membership is free and open to everyone. Past SCoPE seminar discussions and other open events are always available for reading and afterthoughts. We welcome requests to host or promote professional development activities related to teaching and learning.

SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This is a mutual exchange of support and services.

Self-register at http://scope.bccampus.ca
Join the SCoPE group at Linkedin to connect with others who are interested in employment in education or in connecting professionally on projects, follow SCoPE on Twitter and check out the SCoPE Facebook Page to keep in the loop. We gather our seminar resources in Diigo, and maintain a list of upcoming events in the Learn Together Collaboratory.

13. About MicroSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE members receive MicroSCoPE issues automatically. If you prefer to read MicroSCoPE on the website or via RSS, login to SCoPE and manage your subscription here:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?f=5

MicroSCoPE is prepared by Sylvia Currie (scurrie@bccampus.ca).

Please spread the word about SCoPE activities. Distribute this newsletter!

BC Healthy Minds, Healthy Campuses Summit

2011-04-04T17:04:00.000-07:00

In preparation for our 3rd annual Gathering of Online Community Enthusiasts (OCE2011) to be held in Vancouver on May 12, 2011, I am revisiting examples of community events that I've been collecting. The theme for OCE2011 is Planning Excellent Community Events.

The "Healthy Minds, Healthy Campuses" Dialogue for Change held on October 1-2, 2010 is a fantastic example of how to run an event. This 2-day Summit used an Open Space format, and was a huge success. There were 75 participants, of which 25 were students.

A few things that stand out:

Well organized website
Graphic recording, which became part of the proceedings
Opportunities for dialogue before, during, and after the event
Advanced organizer in the form of four themes to catalyze discussion at the summit
Use of Eventbrite, which makes it easy to register AND help to promote the event through Facebook and Twitter

Scrumblr

2011-04-04T05:34:00.000-07:00

I came across Scrumblr last week just as I was getting my head into ways to bridge online and on location participants for the upcoming Online Community Enthusiasts event. I gave it a quick test drive, then during a meeting with Susan Stewart and LaDonna Coy, two colleagues with whom I am exploring ways to design venue-challenged learning activities (for lack of a better way to describe it!), we played around with Scrumblr some more. The verdict: this simple little tool has heaps of potential! Click on the image to see some of the notes we made on advantages and tips for implementation.

Scrumblr is designed by Ali Asaria from Ottawa. As a side note, I got a kick out of his website.

My Practice Series

2011-03-31T21:26:00.000-07:00

There is an interesting activity that takes place during the first 10 days of each month at CPsquare called My Practice Series. The idea for the series emerged during a conversation between John Smith and Sue Wolff. Sue was chatting with John about some of the interesting challenges in her own practice. They realized that, while there are many conversations and types of events at CPsquare, there really weren't many opportunities to give attention to individual practice and experience.

The series has been running for about 18 months now, and there have been some fascinating conversations. In fact, the practice of sharing a practice has emerged with some guidelines of its own. For example, it's human nature to jump in to offer advice. But that really isn't the point of this activity (unless the person in the hot seat asks for advice). Instead, if participants ask questions and make observations (much like an interview), they articulate what they are curious about, and at the same time this provides an opportunity for the individuals in the hot seat to reflect on their own practice. So it becomes more about discovering what participants are curious about, rather than predicting what they might be interested in.

I was honoured to be invited to share my practice this month April 1 - 10. My hosts, Lotte Krisper-Ullyett and LaDonna Coy, suggested I begin by posting a brief introduction -- "perhaps something about the path that’s brought you where you are or where you contemplate going". They also provided a bit of a template to offer some consistency from one My Practice session to the next. Here's what I wrote:

Sylvia's Practice

Job: I support leaders of several Communities of Practice, steward two communities for educational practitioners: SCoPE and ETUG, and coordinate online and on ground workshops, conferences, and a variety of other events.
Organisation: BCcampus
Location: Lac Le Jeune, British Columbia, Canada
Links: My mish mash profile

To be sharing my practice like this I feel that I should have a good story about how I came to do what I do, like maybe that I stood up in my grade 2 class alongside all the wanna-be nurses and fire fighters and and shouted "I want to be a community steward!" But none of my work life has been very well planned. Quite the opposite. My formula is this: I do what I find interesting and feels right at the time, get energized by people I meet along the way, take risks, and always have faith that if my current situation isn't keeping me on the edge of my seat then there is something new and exciting around the corner. And guess what? There IS always is something around the corner!

I started down the path of working with communities of practice (it's only in hindsight I know what to call them) through software research and development projects at Simon Fraser University. The first was in 1997 working with a group of teachers to integrate project-based learning into the curriculum using an online wiki-like platform called Zebu. As a fresh graduate student, escaping from my job in university administration where I was no longer sitting on the edge of my seat :-), I was handed a project called EEP (empowering educators program). So many of the elements and design principles that emerged through participation in EEP are still priorities in my world today: open sharing and reusing resources, reflective practice, teacher as researcher, participatory design, collaborative professional development, and distributed expertise. I will be forever grateful for the mentorship, trust, and wisdom of the two professors who took me under their wings. It not only resulted in a complete career path change, but also introduced me to new ways of working and what it really means to collaborate.

This story has sort of repeated itself a few times over the past 15 years. Around each corner I encountered new and exciting projects and connected with fantastic people who have had a profound influence on my work life.

Fast forward to today... Someone challenged me to write a bio in twitter-style 140 characters or less. This is what I came up with:

I am client services manager for BCcampus online communities and spend my days working with people who want to learn from other people.

What I like about this description is that it puts me right in the middle of a flurry of activity. Nothing is more rewarding than watching others around you take on a leadership role. I've been working with BCcampus for 3 years and I have to say, this is my dream job. I support several Communities of Practice, steward two communities for educational practitioners: SCoPE and ETUG, and coordinate online and on ground workshops, conferences, and a variety of events.

My bad habits:

Jumping to do something because I know it's faster and easier than explaining, planning, consulting, getting consensus, etc etc
Ignoring the dust bunnies (I work from home)

Things that make me squirm:

When people seek advice without first investing time themselves to think through the issues and solutions
When colleagues give me credit without including the many other people around us who have contributed

Some of the things I'm thinking about these days:

Various CoP governance models and ways of communicating
Facilitating in the open
How to improve conferences and other events
Writing more about my practice
Slowing down

Communicating online: email

2011-03-30T16:03:00.000-07:00

I came across this hilarious comic: If you do this in an email, I hate you at The Oatmeal a couple years ago, and popped it in a draft blog post thinking I'd gradually compile a list as I notice things in email sent to me. Here are the items I've accumulated so far, offered in the form of advice. There's probably nothing new, and I don't hate you :-), but sometimes reminders can be a good thing! Also, many of these habits jump out at me because I have a high volume of email. I'm sure if you only receive a handful of email messages each day, there are some suggestions you won't agree with.

I have a few items specific to mailing lists that I'll save for a separate post. I'm also working on a list for communicating on the web, and on twitter, and...

Envelopes on the side of a delivery truck by PinkMoose

Here goes:

Take the time to write clearly so that you're not requiring the recipient to take extra time to decipher what you want to say. You may be rushed, but it's not appropriate to assume others have more time than you do.
Don't use "hi" or "stuff" as subject headings. Meaningful subject headings are helpful to busy people. Besides, those messages often get whisked away by spam filters.
Rather than attach a short document to an email message, paste the contents into the body of the email message.
If you're sending a message from a handheld device or on twitter then skimping on punctuation, using all lower case, and inventing abbreviations are all okay. Don't carry these practices over to all electronic correspondence.
Keep to the topic of the email message. If you have other topics to write about, send it in separate messages.
Some people have several email accounts. Don't send your message to all of them. Chances are they are managing their own email and they don't appreciate receiving several copies of the same message.
Don't send a reply to say you are about to do what was requested in the original message. Save it until you've actually done it!
Don't feel you need to immediately acknowledge every message you receive. This wastes everybody's time: "Thanks! I'm at the landromat so will read your message more carefully when I get home". Wait until you have something to say before you reply.
If you need to send a very short email message that doesn't require a response, use the subject heading with 'eom' at the end (eom = end of message). That way the recipient doesn't need to open the message to read it. For example: "The link works now. Thx! eom". The key here is that it needs to be short enough that the recipient doesn't need to click on the message subject heading to read it.
Email signatures can be short and also interesting! (I have more to say about email signatures; I think it needs a separate blog post!)
Sending plain text emails is a safer bet than HTML because you can be pretty sure that everyone will be seeing the same thing.
There are times to include the previous replies in an email message, and times to prune them. You need to use judgment, but in general you don't need to include the entire history of replies.
Decide if you need to use 'reply' or 'reply all'. All this means is don't automatically do one or the other.
Large or multiple attachments might be better transfered using a service like Dropbox or uploaded to Google Docs.
If you are referring to a specific online resource that is relevant to understanding or taking action on your message, include the URL.
Consider letting the recipient know if you are not expecting a response, or if a response is optional.
Don't offload your email management issues on to others: "Please use my home email address on the weekend because I only check my work email during the week. "
Last one! (for now)...If the purpose of your email message is to schedule an appointment or event, offer enough information or use a tool like Doodle so that a decision can be made quickly and easily, without several replies back and forth.

Do you have anything to add to the list?

Nancy Hall

2011-03-29T13:59:00.000-07:00

Nancy Hall, Gathering of Online Community Enthusiasts, May 2009

Members of the Healthy Minds/Healthy Campuses community, the BC Online Community Enthusiasts Group, and many, many, many others were deeply saddened to hear that Dr. Nancy Hall died on March 23, 2011. She was 60 years old.

I first met Nancy in 2008 when we began discussions about creating a community of practice for practitioners and researchers in BC colleges, universities, and local communities with the goal to support the mental health of post-secondary students.

What I remember most about our email correspondence during those early planning days was that I always imagined Nancy to be sitting on the edge of her seat -- such enthusiasm for her work, always positive and loaded with exclamation marks and witty comments that made me smile. Even during challenging times Nancy's notes were optimistic, like when she wasn't able to attend the 2010 Gathering of Online Community Enthusiasts in Vancouver last May: "I am really quite well, though compromised it would seem."

Oh but in person Nancy was even more incredible. Her passion for helping others and for learning was so contagious. She kept us engaged with stories and challenged us with important questions. She listened so carefully, but never quietly. And how many times did she say thank you? Nancy always acknowledged and appreciated the people who surrounded her, who learned from her. This Globe and Mail article captures Nancy's vision, and impact on our thinking about mental health.

CanadaMoot 2011

2011-03-28T21:13:00.000-07:00

Getting ready for CanadaMoot 2011! A "moot" is a conference dedicated to Moodle users, developers and administrators. I've been using Moodle since summer, 2003 so I was probably pretty close to being one of the 2500 downloads the first week after version 1.0.9 was released. With founder Martin Dougiamas' help, we got Moodle up and running at Nicola Valley Institute of Technology, complete with an institutional theme, course shells and training for faculty, in just the few weeks leading up to the start of the 2003 semester. Exciting times!

This is where most of my Moodle work has been centred:

Manager of Client Services -- Online Communities for BCcampus, which includes a community of Moodle users through the shared services program
Program Committee for Canada Moodle Moot 2009
First Nations Pedagogy Project, and Educational Technology Facilitator at Nicola Valley Institute of Technology
Community Steward for SCoPE, a free, online community for individuals interested in educational research and practice
Co-facilitator for the Learning and Knowledge Analytics MOOC
Instructor, course designer, and loyal knowmate at Knowplace
Moodle Admin for selected events hosted by University of Manitoba's Learning Technology Centre

When I went digging back in past Moodle presentations and workshops I've facilitated, I found quite a few! Looking through this list brought back some great memories.

Moodle Moot - April, 2009

"SCoPE - An open, online community for people like you"
"How we do what we did" with Jill Calliou, Randy LaBonte, and Frances Long
"University of Manitoba: Moodle for conferences and massive open online courses"
Coordinator and Moderator: "Showcasing Saskatchewan and Manitoba" with Patricia Yeske, Delise Fathers, and Rob Wall
Moderator: "Finishing the Moodle Canvas - Encouraging Greater Usability" with Scott Tearle
Moderator: "Moodle Theming Workshop" with Julian Ridden

CPSquare.org Long Live the Platform Conference, January 11 - February 1, 2008

Moodle Platform Spokesperson and Support

BCcampus Educational Technology Users Group Spring Workshop May, 2007

"In the Moodle" workshop with Tracy Roberts

Moodlemoot May, 2007

Birds of a Feather Facilitator: "Moodle for Community"
"Using Moodle for Online Community"
"Dealing with the Challenges Remote Communities Face with Online Learning", with George Cavaliere

BCcampus Educational Technology Users Group Spring Workshop, 2005 Merritt, British Columbia

Workshop: "Build a Course in Moodle", with G. Bennett, H. Jackson, F. Long, S. Cooper, S. Morrison

Adult Basic Education Association of British Columbia Conference, May 2005, Celebrating Heritage, Culture and Education, Merritt, British Columbia

Presentation: "Implementing Moodle at an Aboriginal College", with D. Gambler

BCcampus Educational Technology User Group Fall Workshop, 2004 Vancouver, British Columbia

Presentation: "Why Moodle?", with D. Gambler and C. Littlewood

This year I won't be attending the Moodle Moot in person but I'm still involved in a variety of ways:

Sharing the responsibility to keep the Moot twitter feed active
Designing and coordinating a 3-week Moodle 2.0 Workshop (free, open to all) April 18-May 13, with a one-week break May 2-6). More information about this soon!
Online presentation: Facilitating in the Open
Description: The increase in opportunities for educational practitioners to participate in open, online workshops, courses, and events, calls for a unique set of skills and considerations for facilitators. This session will focus on examples of facilitation using Moodle among the mix of social networking tools to support a variety of open learning activities.

Also, once again my employer BCcampus is a sponsor partner for the Canada Moot 2011.

Another transition for this blog

2011-03-10T16:20:00.000-08:00

Two years ago Kate Britt retired from working on this blog and after a selection process to find someone to carry on the tradition of sharing information about tools and resources of interest to educational practitioners, passed the torch to the Educational Technology Users Group (ETUG). Well, actually what happened was she passed the torch to me, and then I brought the idea of ETUG members maintaining the blog to the Steering Committee (of which I am a member). The history of this transition process is tagged 'from pink to green'.

The Steering Committee saw this as an opportunity for ETUG members to give back to the wider edtech community by sharing the many tools and resources they come across, test, evaluate, and critique on a daily basis. These types of conversations weren't happening as we had expected in our own community space, and we felt that posting to this active blog (using Blogger -- so easy!) would encourage more sharing. We also saw a shared space as a way for members to ease into a blogging practice.

We're now at a point where we are revisiting this decision. A few things have happened during the time since we took on this project -- some unexpected, some not so surprising in hindsight, and some very exciting!

Few ETUG members stepped up to become a blog author.
More post secondary institutions in British Columbia (where most ETUG members are employed) now have their own blogs for sharing tools and resources related to teaching and learning, and educational technology.
Some of us have our own personal educational blogs, so coming to this blog to post seemed like an extra step. (In fact, I often cross-posted to my own blog, because the content seemed appropriate for both.)
ETUG now has a new community site using WordPress / BuddyPress (still in the very early launch phase), where we expect to see a higher level of activity than our previous community space.

From the beginning we talked about changing the URL for this blog, and possibly moving away from blogger altogether. It feels like the right time to make a change, and here's what I'm proposing:

I will merge this blog with my own blog, Webbed Feat, where I will continue to post items of interest to educators... and likely more frequently!
All blog posts appear in the ETUG community, along with blog posts from other ETUG members, so ultimately we're still carrying on the tradition that Kate began.

Does this seem like a reasonable plan? Feedback and better ideas always welcome! I'll hold off for a week before making any moves.

Open 4 Learning

2011-03-10T16:01:00.000-08:00

The call for proposals is open for the ETUG Spring Workshop June 2 - 3. This year the workshop will be held at Selkirk College in beautiful Nelson, British Columbia. Mountains! Lakes! I'll be packing my hiking boots and pfd.

I've been on the steering committee for ETUG since 2006, but more closely involved in all aspects of the community since 2008 when I began working at BCcampus, the organization that provides support for ETUG activities. Historically, presenters and session leaders at ETUG Workshops were invited by the steering committee. However, in the past year the fall and spring workshop programs have been shaped through a call for proposals. I really prefer this invitation to the wider community to come forward with topic ideas, and to be innovative about session formats.

For this round I was also excited to see ETUG members engaged in brainstorming ideas for a workshop theme. Back in February, there was a flurry of activity in twitter, et voilà... the perfect theme emerged thanks to Clint Lalonde.

The beautiful logo was created by the very talented Hilda Anggraeni, a co-op student from Simon Fraser University. Hilda also did a remarkable job guiding the distributed design by committee process!

So get your proposals in!

MicroSCoPE: February 2011 Issue

2011-02-01T09:43:00.000-08:00

(This is cross-posted with the SCoPE community)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MicroSCoPE: A Close Look at What's Happening in the SCoPE Community
February, 2011
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In This Issue
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

1. Today! Implementing Mobile Technologies
2. Learning and Knowledge Analytics
3. OER university
4. Online Conferences: Professional Development for a Networked Era
5. SCoPE Facebook Page
6. Activity Recap
7. PeriSCoPE
8. About SCoPE
9. About MicroSCoPE

1. Today! Implementing Mobile Technologies
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
February 1, 2011, 20:30 GMT
Join Susan Crichton and Brown Onguko from University of Calgary for a 90-minute interactive web conference. This session is part of our Professional Learning Series, organized by BCcampus, eCampusAlberta, and Alberta North.

2. Learning and Knowledge Analytics
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
January 10 - February 20, 2011
Facilitators: George Siemens, Jon Dron, Tanya Elias, Sylvia Currie, Dave Cormier
We are moving into week 4 of LAK11, a 6-week open course that serves as an introduction to the growing field of analytics in teaching, learning, training, development, and organizational knowledge. The focus this week is on visualization tools and examples. It's not too late to join the 647 people who signed up to learn more about learning and knowledge analytics! There are many ways to participate, so if you need help finding your way around don't hesitate to ask.

3. OER university
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
February 16 - March 2, 2011
Facilitator: Paul Stacey
On February 23 UNESCO is sponsoring a live web stream of the inaugural meeting to be held at Otago Polytechnic, New Zealand to discuss OER for assessment and credit for students. The 2-week SCoPE seminar before and after this meeting is intended to generate discussion and input on the context, problem, concept, partners, and objectives of an OER university, as well as an opportunity for summary, follow-on discussions, and recommendations.
4. Online Conferences: Professional Development for a Networked Era
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
April 11-22, 2011,
Web Conference: April 11 @ 17:00 GMT
Facilitators: Lynn Anderson and Terry Anderson
Start reading! For our next book discussion we will share experiences and advice on how to plan or participate effectively in an online professional development conference.

5. SCoPE Facebook Page
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We have archived the SCoPE Facebook group in favour of a SCoPE page for keeping everyone up-to-date on community activities.

6. Activity Recap
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* We summarized the December Motivation and Adult Learning Online seminar, facilitated by Firat Sarsar, by organizing contributions based on four themes: 1) what is motivation? 2) motivational factors 3) promoting motivation, and 4) measuring motivation.
* If you missed the Open Educational Resources web conference with Paul Stacey, the recording and presentation slides are available.

7. PeriSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* You are invited to join these 2 University of Northern British Columbia campus sessions with Paul Stacey via Elluminate on February 3, 2011: 1) The Opportunity Side of Open and 2) Finding and Using Open Educational Resources.

* Registration is open for Canada Moodle Moot 2010! Proposals are accepted until February 25, 2011. Present/participate online or on location in Edmonton, Alberta.

* The next CIDER Session is 'The use of online role play for teaching and assessing interpersonal skills', February 2, 2011. CIDER sessions are targeted at distance education researchers, graduate students, and practitioners. Each session features an active researcher talking about their project, methodologies used, and their results.
* The list of webinars is growing! Plan to attend 2011 Connecting Online conference a free, online conference February 4-6, 2011.
* SCoPE member Curt Bonk has published 27 videos addressing the design and best practices of Distance Education courses.
* Norm Friesen's article Education and the social Web: Connective learning and the commercial imperative is available in the December issue of First Monday.
* The next WikiEducator Learning4Content Online Workshop runs February 2-15, 2011.
* Space is available in the 2011 Graphic Facilitation Workshop located in Rossland, British Columbia, July 13-15, 2011.

8. About SCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE brings together individuals who share an interest in educational research and practice, and offers opportunities for dialogue across disciplines, geographical borders, professions, levels of expertise, and education sectors. Our activities are facilitated by volunteers in the community, and membership is free and open to everyone. Past SCoPE seminar discussions and other open events are always available for reading and afterthoughts. We welcome requests to host or promote professional development activities related to teaching and learning.
SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This is a mutual exchange of support and services.
Self-register at http://scope.bccampus.ca
Join the SCoPE group at Linkedin to connect with others who are interested in employment in education or in connecting professionally on projects, follow SCoPE on Twitter and check out the SCoPE Facebook Page to keep in the loop. We gather our seminar resources in Diigo. and maintain a list of upcoming events in the Learn Together Collaboratory.

9. About MicroSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE members receive MicroSCoPE issues automatically. If you prefer to read MicroSCoPE on the website or via RSS, login to SCoPE and manage your subscription here:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?f=5
MicroSCoPE is prepared by Sylvia Currie (scurrie@bccampus.ca).
Please spread the word about SCoPE activities. Distribute this newsletter!

Free online event: Blastoff - Taking Education into OERbit

2010-12-07T10:07:00.000-08:00

You are invited to participate in this free online event!

December 7, 20:30 - 22:00 GMT
Facilitator: Paul Stacey

Join Paul Stacey on the Starship BCcampus in this journey through the universe of Open Educational Resources (OER). Learn how OER are opening up a new education frontier. Visit OER colonies throughout education space and see for yourself what an OER is and how they are being used to create credentials. Find out how you can use OER in your own teaching and learning practice. Discover how the future of OER is being shaped by Foundations, public government Ministries, and everyday educators who simply choose to become OER space cadets. Buckle up as Paul takes you into OERbit! This session is part of the Professional Learning Series organized by BCcampus, eCampusAlberta, and Alberta North.

Access the details in the Professional Learning Series group at SCoPE.

Free online event: Blastoff - Taking Education into OERbit

2010-12-07T10:04:00.000-08:00

What is our experience with blogging?

2010-11-09T15:34:00.000-08:00

Glenn Groulx launched the SCoPE seminar: Blogging in Professional Networks with the question: What is our experience with blogging?

He provided some guiding questions, and an option to post responses on our blogs rather than in the forum. Nice idea! It makes sense to use blogs in a seminar about blogging.

What are a couple main reasons for why you blog?
I'll try to keep this response to "a couple" :-) One reason is to keep track of my work life, although I confess that I don't do a very good job of this. If I present at a conference, or participate in a workshop, I like to document and reflect on the experience on my blog. Which brings me to the next reason -- reflection. I find taking the time to write causes me to pause and think about what I do. It's a fast life, and it's very easy to just jump from one event to the next without thinking about how you are benefiting, or what you would do differently next time.

I contribute to several other blogs in addition to this one, related to work as well as home life.

What roles does the blog play?
Hopefully, the blog is a glimpse on my professional life, mainly my involvement in online communities. Also, in my role as community steward I use my blog to help promote events the people who are involved. I've also used my blog to participate in online courses, like the 2008 Facilitating Online Communities course facilitated by Leigh Blackall.

What other bloggers do you follow? Why?

I follow MANY bloggers, mostly because I learn so much from people who are involved in similar work. I also follow bloggers that just plain have interesting things to say. Dave Pollard's how to save the world was the first blog I ever subscribed to, and is still one I look forward to reading.

As a community steward I also subscribe to members' blogs as a service back to the community. For example, for the Educational Technology Users Group I use the RSS feed from Google Reader to display the latest blog posts on the community site. I also send a quick note out on twitter to draw attention to new posts by ETUG members.

What is your preferred style of writing?
I'm not sure how to describe my style. Informal for sure.

How frequently do you post?
I have bad blogging habits. I tend to write way more than I post. Usually it's because I plan to return to the draft to refine it, and that just doesn't happen. Right now I have 44 draft blog posts.

Has your blogging changed over time?
Hmmm, maybe it has. For sure I don't blog as frequently because it's difficult to find the time. Also, twitter has taken my attention away from reading and posting to blogs.

What are your experiences with blogging? Join the discussion at SCoPE!

30 Web Tools in 30 Minutes

2010-11-09T08:25:00.000-08:00

Dean Shareski from Prairie South School District in Saskatchewan prepared this slide show of 30 Web Tools in 30 Minutes for an IT meeting. There are some great recommendations here! 30 for 30

View more presentations from Dean Shareski.

Spotlight on SCoPE

2010-11-08T19:36:00.000-08:00

Last week at the ETUG Fall Workshop I was interviewed by Glenn Groulx, researcher from Athabasca University and faculty member at Northwest Community College. I've been following Glenn's work for a long time, and have been waiting to meet him in person. Of course when he asked for an interview I said absolutely! From (one of) Glenn's blogs:

In this podcast, Sylvia and I sat down during the ETUG workshop to talk about the SCoPE community, an international voluntary organization of educators interested in colloborating and exchanging ideas about the use of technologies in education. We talk about the nature of SCoPE, its early beginnings, how its participants have (or have not) changed, and methods for effective stewarding.

Talking with Glenn about the early days of SCoPE brought back a lot of memories, and now listening to this podcast I realize that I neglected to mention how grateful I am to the many members who have contributed to SCoPE over the years, and to SFU and then BCcampus for providing support for this online community.

Glenn is facilitating a seminar at SCoPE for the next 3 weeks: Blogging in Professional Networks. I hope you'll join us!

SCoPE Seminar: Blogging in Professional Networks

2010-11-08T09:15:00.000-08:00

Facilitator: Glenn Groulx
November 8-26, 2010

Description:
This 3-week seminar will cover blogging strategies for participating effectively within professional networks. Topics will include strategies for gathering information from various online sources, organizing these sources within blog posts, and connecting with experts and peers by engaging in way-making activities to explore, find and connect with others.

SCoPE seminars are free and open to the public, and are facilitated by volunteers in the community. There is no need to register. Just show up! To contribute to forum discussions you will need to create an account on the SCoPE site -- a quick process.

Direct link to Blogging in Professional Networks seminar:
http://urls.bccampus.ca/ssproblog

"Getting Organized in the Google Era"

2010-10-27T20:50:00.000-07:00

In “Getting Organized in the Google Era” author Douglas C. Merrill, former CIO for Google, gives us some good tips for optimizing how we manage the information we deal with daily and improve our retention and learning. He provides a good rationale for why we should better use the power of “search”, labels and filters on our email, and share our work in the "cloud". In addition, he outlines how he combines both digital and paper-based techniques for information management. Particularly helpful are the chapter book summaries which he entitles “Encode This”. The final chapter is an annotated list of the authors' favorite software tools, browsers, apps, and gadgets. While the book strongly favours Google applications (no surprise here), Merrill is quick to admit his bias and offers alternate tools we can use. "Getting Organized in the Google Era" is a great primer and particularly helpful for those looking for practical suggestions on how to be more organized, less stressed and integrate work and home life.

How to Be an Excellent Online Instructor

2010-10-17T08:27:00.000-07:00

How to Be an Excellent Instructor is a podcast with Rena Palloff and Keith Pratt about good online instruction and faculty training. These topics are the subject of their forthcoming book, The Excellent Online Instructor.

Palloff and Pratt, authors of several excellent books on online teaching and learning, will be presenting at the 2010 Online Teaching and Learning Conference (OTL2010), October 19-21, 2010.

7 Fantastic Free Social Media Tools for Teachers

2010-10-16T16:21:00.000-07:00

Today from Mashable, 7 Fantastic Free Social Media Tools for Teachers.

The possibilities for social media tools in the classroom are vast. In the hands of the right teacher, they can be used to engage students in creative ways, encourage collaboration and inspire discussion among even soft-spoken students. But we’ve already made our case for why teachers should consider using social media in their classrooms. What about the how?

What fantastic tools are you using?

Sign Up Genius

2010-09-26T15:36:00.000-07:00

Last week John Goldsmith posted about Sign Up Genius, a free online tool for creating and managing group sign up lists. This is one of those tools that you don't know you need until it exists! As someone who is always has projects on the go that involve organizing volunteers and planning events -- from sporting events to conferences -- these sign up templates will certainly come in handy. And what a perfect way for students to manage the details of group projects!

This Habitat for Humanity sign up sheet nicely illustrates how it works:

MicroSCoPE: September 2010 Issue

2010-09-12T21:02:00.000-07:00

(This is cross-posted in the SCoPE community )
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MicroSCoPE: A Close Look at What's Happening in the SCoPE Community
August, 2010
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In This Issue
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. Starts tomorrow! Humanizing the Online Experience 2
2. Professional Learning Series
3. Mark Your Calendars
4. Activity Recap
5. Collaborating Partnerships
6. PeriSCoPE
7. About SCoPE
8. About MicroSCoPE

1. Starts tomorrow! Humanizing the Online Experience 2
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
September 13 - 30, 2010
Video Conferences each Monday: September 13, 20, 27 at 18:00 GMT
Facilitator: Jesai Jayhmes
Expect to roll up your sleeves in this seminar as we explore the use of video to make our courses engaging and interactive. We kick off the week tomorrow with a CoroCall high-quality video conference. Thanks to the great folks at Coroware.com for making that possible!

2. eCampusAlberta Online Curriculum Development: Course Overview & Directions
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
September 14, 20:30 GMT
Facilitator: Randy LaBonte
Join us online via Elluminate for a profile of upcoming courses funded under eCampusAlberta’s Online Curriculum Development Fund. Learn what new courses will be available, development plans of the successful recipients, and join in a discussion about design principles and quality in online learning. This session is part of the Professional Learning Series organized by BCcampus, eCampusAlberta, and Alberta North.

3. Mark Your Calendars
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*Educational Uses of iPads, facilitated by Brent Lee: October 18 - 29, 2010
Check upcoming seminars for updates to the seminar schedule.

4. Activity Recap
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* For the August Quarterly Field Trip, organized in partnership with CPSquare, Jonny Morris took us on a tour of Healthy Minds / Healthy Campuses, a community of practice to promote campus mental health in British Columbia.
* We launched the academic year with our annual Reflections and Next Steps gathering for SCoPE members to reflect and plan for the future. As usual, SCoPE members have a lot of great ideas for enhancing the community!

Past SCoPE seminar discussions are always available for reading and afterthoughts.

5. Collaborating Partnerships
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This month CoroWare is offering their video conferencing services for the Humanizing the Online Experience seminar.

6. PeriSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* The Personal Learning Environments course begins this week! This open course is a joint venture between the National Research Council of Canada, The Technology Enhanced Knowledge Research Institute at Athabasca University and the University of Prince Edward Island.

* Glenn Groulx is offering a 3-part series on EduBlogging. The first in the series is scheduled for September 23, 2010, 19:00 GMT

* The deadline for the Call for Proposals for the Electronic Village Online 2011 is September 25, 2010

* Taking OER beyond the OER Community is a free, online seminar series to raise awareness and promote informed discussion and debate.
23 – 29 September Taking OER beyond the OER Community: Policy and Capacity
20 - 26 October What works, what does not and under what conditions?
10 - 16 November Copyright and the development and re-use of OER

* Several SCoPE members have published chapters in the Athabasca University Press publication: Emerging Technologies in Distance Education, edited by George Veletsianos

* The next 3 themes for Transformative Dialogues are listed on the Call for Submission page. A variety of digital formats are encouraged.

* In Education a peer-reviewed, open access journal, is looking for quality papers for consideration for the Spring 2011 issue.

* The next CIDER Session is Implementing Digital Story Telling in a Computers in Education Course, October 7, 2010. CIDER sessions are targeted at distance education researchers, graduate students, and practitioners. Each session features an active researcher talking about their project, methodologies used, and their results.

7. About SCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE brings together individuals who share an interest in educational research and practice, and offers opportunities for dialogue across disciplines, geographical borders, professions, levels of expertise, and education sectors. Our activities are facilitated by volunteers in the community, and membership is free and open to everyone.

SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This is a mutual exchange of support and services.

Self-register at http://scope.bccampus.ca

* Join the SCoPE group at Linkedin to connect with others who are interested in employment in
education or in connecting professionally on projects, follow SCoPE on Twitter and check out the SCoPE Facebook group and page to keep in the loop.

* We gather our seminar resources in Diigo.

8. About MicroSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE members receive MicroSCoPE issues automatically. If you prefer to read MicroSCoPE on the website or via RSS, login to SCoPE and manage your subscription here:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?f=5

MicroSCoPE is prepared by Sylvia Currie (scurrie@bccampus.ca).
Please spread the word about SCoPE activities. Distribute this newsletter!

MicroSCoPE: August 2010 Issue

2010-08-17T20:58:00.000-07:00

(This is cross-posted in the SCoPE community )

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MicroSCoPE: A Close Look at What's Happening in the SCoPE Community
August, 2010
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In This Issue
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. Quarterly Field Trip: Visiting Healthy Minds / Healthy Campuses
2. Reflections and Next Steps
3. Humanizing the Online Experience - Part 2
4. Mark Your Calendars
5. Activity Recap
6. Recent Publications by SCoPE Facilitators
7. Collaborating Partnerships
8. PeriSCoPE
9. About SCoPE
10. About MicroSCoPE

1. Quarterly Field Trip: Visiting Healthy Minds / Healthy Campuses
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Web conference August 18, 2010 11 - 12:00 PDT, 18:00 GMT
This quarterly excursion will be to the Healthy Minds / Healthy Campuses, a community of practice to promote campus mental health in British Columbia. Host and community steward Jonny Morris will guide through the community environment and we'll leave plenty of times to talk about successes and challenges. Field Trips - visits to living communities - are organized in collaboration with CPSquare, the community of practice on communities of practice.

2. Reflections and Next Steps
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
August 23 - 31, 2010
Facilitator: Sylvia Currie

We'll launch the academic year with our annual gathering for SCoPE members to reflect and plan for the future. Your input is important!

3. Humanizing the Online Experience Part 2
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
September 13 - 30, 2010
Web Conferences each Monday: September 13, 20, 27 at 18:00 GMT
Facilitator: Jesai Jayhmes

During Part 1 of the Humanizing the Online Experience series we explored a variety of synchronous communication platforms and strategies for making real-time sessions engaging and interactive. We also tried our hand at creating videos and practiced speaking to the camera. Expect to roll up your sleeves during Part 2 in this series as we continue the exploration!

4. Mark Your Calendars
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*Educational Uses of iPads, facilitated by Brent Lee: October 18 - 29, 2010
Check upcoming seminars for updates to the seminar schedule.

5. Activity Recap
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* In our May/June ePortfolio seminar Catherine Paul and Roselynn Verwoord introduced us to University of British Columbia's Portfolio Community of Practice and encouraged seminar participants to share their experiences with portfolio projects of all types. Resources were gathered into a wiki.
* In the June/July Shared Thinking seminar Nicholas Bowskill challenged us with the question: How can we make group thinking visible, and what is the value for learning, reflection, and community participation? We were also introduced to the Shared Thinking research and development work through University of Glasgow.

Past SCoPE seminar discussions are always available for reading and afterthoughts.

6. Recent Publications by SCoPE Facilitators
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* Michael Griffith, facilitator of the 2007 SCoPE seminar Blogging to Enhance Learning Experiences, co-authored a chapter Empowering Adult Learners through Blog: An Australian Case Study for the 2010 book Adult Learning in the Digital Age: Perspectives on Online Technologies and Outcomes.
* Janet Salmon's book "Online Interviews in Real Time" was reviewed in the latest edition of eLearn Magazine. Janet's 2010 SCoPE seminar featuring this book was Guiding the E-Researcher.
* Alvaro Galvis, case presenter for the 2009 seminar Exploring Networks of Communities, published Establishing a PLACE for Teaching Technologies.
* John Smith, facilitator of Exploring Networks of Communities and the Quarterly Field Trips, and Nancy White, facilitator of Informal Learning, co-authored Digital Habitats, Stewarding Technology for Communities with Etienne Wenger

7. Collaborating Partnerships
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. Our latest partnerships include CoroWare and Integrating Technology for Active Lifelong Learning.

8. PeriSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* A SCoPE case study focusing on community enablers by Barbara Berry is featured in the University of Birmingham resource: Communities of Practice in Higher Education, along with a video where Sylvia Currie talks about how the community has developed since that case study.

*The latest issue of Transformative Dialogues is a special issue dedicated to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning.
* The CPsquare Seeding 2.0 conference begins this week. To participate simply become a community member.
* The next WikiEducator Learning4Content workshop begins August 25, 2010
* In Education a peer-reviewed, open access journal, is looking for quality papers for consideration for the Spring 2011 issue.
* The next CIDER Session is Learning Issues for Online Graduate Students, September 8, 2010. CIDER sessions are targeted at distance education researchers, graduate students, and practitioners. Each session features an active researcher talking about their project, methodologies used, and their results.

9. About SCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE brings together individuals who share an interest in educational research and practice, and offers opportunities for dialogue across disciplines, geographical borders, professions, levels of expertise, and education sectors. Our activities are facilitated by volunteers in the community, and membership is free and open to everyone.
SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This is a mutual exchange of support and services.
Self-register at http://scope.bccampus.ca
* Join the SCoPE group at Linkedin to connect with others who are interested in employment in education or in connecting professionally on projects, follow SCoPE on Twitter and check out the SCoPE Facebook group and page to keep in the loop.

* We gather our seminar resources in Diigo.

10. About MicroSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE members receive MicroSCoPE issues automatically. If you prefer to read MicroSCoPE on the website or via RSS, login to SCoPE and manage your subscription here:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?f=5
MicroSCoPE is prepared by Sylvia Currie (scurrie@bccampus.ca).
Please spread the word about SCoPE activities. Distribute this newsletter!

Screenjelly - What's on your screen?

2010-07-23T16:19:00.000-07:00

Stephen Downes mentioned Screenjelly on his blog this week. It's a quick and easy way to share what's on your screen. The recording is limited to 3 minutes which forces you to be concise -- not a bad thing! :-) There are many obvious educational uses for this tool.

Screenjelly records your screen activity with your voice so you can spread it via Twitter or email. Use it to quickly share cool apps or software tips, report a bug, or just show stuff you like. To start recording, click on the red button. No need to install or download anything!

Ediscio

2010-07-13T09:10:00.000-07:00

Wendy McElroy from Camosun College gave a shout out about this tool via Twitter as one of the fun Web 2.0 tools she wants to try. Ediscio is a free service for creating and sharing flashcards online. Ediscio is useful for individuals and for studying in groups. You can also share your cardboxes with others. Here is a list of main features:

Create and share flashcards online
Work collaboratively on flashcard sets
Enrich flashcards by images (upload), videos, and LaTeX-based math formulas, and many text formatting possibilities (Word-like interface)
Automatic, customizable learning schedule according to Leitner system
Query modes which help focusing on weak spots
Query options include swapping of question and answer, and an automatic comparison mode
Learning statistics as tag-cloud, based on keywords which are assigned to flashcards
Visualization of learning progress as a diagram
Long-term statistics and after each learning session
Rights management for each cardbox
Catalog of all cardboxes which are configured for public access
Import, export, (XLS, CSV, Html) and print flashcards
Social network features like making friends, mail; and automatically finding experts for specific keywords among friends
Classroom features which help a teacher to assign cardboxes to a whole class
Newsfeed about activities in cardboxes of class
Learning statistics which relate to a whole class

Shared Thinking

2010-06-22T07:28:00.000-07:00

Shared Thinking: June 23-July 2, 2010
Facilitator: Nicholas Bowskill

How can we make group thinking visible? What is the value for learning, reflection, and community participation? During this 10-day seminar we will be introduced to the research and development work on the Shared Thinking project through University of Glasgow.

Access the SCoPE seminar discussion directly:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?id=8341

A.nnotate.com

2010-06-10T08:44:00.000-07:00

John Goldsmith aka @detools brought our attention this morning to a new service called A.nnotate.

A.nnotate is an online annotation, collaboration and indexing system for documents and images, supporting PDF and MS Office formats. Instead of emailing different versions of a document back and forth you can now all comment on a single read-only copy online. Unlike online word processors, the document is displayed in high quality with fonts and layout just like the printed version. It is easy to use and runs in all common web browsers, with no software or plugins to install.

This tool has a number of uses from individual knowledge management (what you write in the margins as you read) to collaborative projects.

MicroSCoPE: May 2010 Issue

2010-05-31T22:23:00.000-07:00

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MicroSCoPE: A Close Look at What's Happening in the SCoPE Community
May, 2010
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In This Issue
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. Starts Today! ePortfolios
2. Quarterly Field Trip: Visiting the Global Talent Network
3. Professional Learning Series: BYOVLC
4. Learn Together Collaboratory
5. Activity Recap
6. Collaborating Partnerships
7. PeriSCoPE
8. About SCoPE
9. About MicroSCoPE

1. Starts Today! ePortfolios
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
May 31 - June 13, 2010
Web conference June 1 at 13:00 PDT, 20:00 GMT
Facilitators: Catherine Paul and Roselynn Verwoord
During this 2-week seminar Catherine and Roselynn will introduce us to University of British Columbia's Portfolio Community of Practice. They have invited members of the CoP to share their teaching and course eportfolios and encourage all seminar participants to discuss their experiences with portfolio projects. This seminar will be of interest to those involved in or curious about portfolio projects, as well as to those interested in building and facilitating faculty communities of practice.

2. Quarterly Field Trip: Visiting the Global Talent Network
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
June 1, 2010 - 10:00 PDT, 17:00 GMT
It's time for our next Quarterly Field Trip! This excursion will be to the Global Talent Network community with host Lauren Klein. Field Trips - visits to living communities - are organized in collaboration with CPSquare, the community of practice on communities of practice.

3. Professional Learning Series: BYOVLC
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
June 1, 2010 - 13:30 PDT, 20:30 GMT
eCampusAlberta, ABNorth, and BCCampus invite you to attend the last joint professional development web conference of the 2009/10 academic year. BYOVLC (bring your own virtual lawn chair!) and join us to discuss the year's highlights and topics and speakers for next year's professional development series. This will be an informal wind up of the year's activities and a chance to say goodbye for the summer to others in our online community.

4. Learn Together Collaboratory
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We're making progress on the Learn Together Collaboratory! The goal is to use this site to centralise information about people, events, opportunities, and quality teaching and learning resources in higher education. It's simple; the more you contribute the more we all benefit.

5. Activity Recap
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* The 2nd annual Gathering of Online Community Enthusiasts, facilitated by Nancy White and Alice MacGillivray, took place in Vancouver on May 6, 2010. We're gradually collecting our notes and artefacts.
* In anticipation of the upcoming book Education for a Digital World - Edition 2.0, we held a webinar series with chapter authors
* All videos and session archives for the April Culturally Diverse Learners seminar are available
* Our summary for the March seminar: Tools for Collaborating Online is a collection of images

Past SCoPE seminar discussions are always available for reading and afterthoughts.
6. Collaborating Partnerships
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This is a mutual exchange of support and services. We're happy to be working with CoroWare to host events and showcase products to the educational community. Coroware delivers HiDef videoconferencing solutions, including its CoroCall monthly subscription service, desktop audio and video conferencing equipment, and affordable videoconferencing room systems from Vidyo.
7. PeriSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

* Social Media: Trends and Implications for Learning is a free monthly discussion, hosted by AACE and facilitated by George Siemens and David Cormier. The next session is June 17, 2010.
* In Education is looking for quality papers for consideration for the Autumn 2010 issue.
* The next CIDER Session is Exploring Distance Education Research, June 2, 2010. CIDER sessions are targeted at distance education researchers, graduate students, and practitioners. Each session features an active researcher talking about their project, methodologies used, and their results.
The Canadian Institute of Distance Education Research (CIDER) is seeking presenters for the fall series of online CIDER Sessions. These sessions are targeted at distance education researchers, graduate students, and practitioners. Each session features an active researcher talking about their project, including methodology, observations, results and research implications. You are invited to share your research related work with our community in one of our upcoming CIDER sessions. If you have a current study that you are willing to present, please submit a brief proposal of your presentation to Lynn Anderson atlynnlo@cogeco.ca

8. About SCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE brings together individuals who share an interest in education research and practice, and offers opportunities for dialogue across disciplines, geographical borders, professions, levels of expertise, and education sectors. Our activities are facilitated by volunteers in the community and membership is free and open to everyone.
SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This is a mutual exchange of support and services.
Self-register at http://scope.bccampus.ca
* Join the SCoPE group at Linkedin to connect with others who are interested in employment in education or in connecting professionally on projects, follow SCoPE on Twitter and check out the SCoPE Facebook group and page to keep in the loop.

* Do you blog? Add it to our SCoPE member blogs database.
* We gather our seminar resources in Diigo.

9. About MicroSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE members receive MicroSCoPE issues automatically. If you prefer to read MicroSCoPE on the website or via RSS, login to SCoPE and manage your subscription here:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?f=5

MicroSCoPE is prepared by Sylvia Currie, Community Steward (scurrie@bccampus.ca).
Please spread the word about SCoPE activities. Distribute this newsletter!

Effective Practices: Twitter

2010-05-28T05:24:00.000-07:00

I often come across communication practices that grab my attention. This tweet from Alice MacGillivray was directed at me and others, but is certainly something I would have noticed in any case. Alice is taking a moment to thank individuals for recent engagement. It's not automated -- just a thoughtful way to show appreciation and perhaps draw attention to individuals in your network who may be of interest. Simple and effective!

Read It Later

2010-05-26T10:57:00.000-07:00

Looking for ways to manage your work flow better? Kathreen Riel suggests Read It Later, a tool for creating a list of items you come across on the web but need to defer reading until later.

List of web 2.0 tools for instruction

2010-05-04T08:28:00.000-07:00

This article and list of tools comes via Tony Bates' blog: Do you have experience using these tools in teaching?

Lloyd, M. (2010) 18 Web 2.0 tools for instruction Campus Technology, April 28
This very useful article asks two experts, Sarah Robbins (aka Intellagirl), of the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University-Bloomington, and Mark Frydenberg of Bentley University, to pick their favourite web 2.0 tools for instruction. Here’s their choices (read the article to find out why, and how they’ve used them):
Sara:
Magma
Flook
Sidewiki
UStream Mobile
Thwapr
Jing
Mark
Delicious, Diigo, and Twine
Screentoaster
Doodle
CoverItLive
WolframAlpha
Dimdim

Book chapter and presentation

2010-04-21T10:22:00.000-07:00

Earlier this month Patricia Delich, Paul Stacey, and I presented our chapter for the upcoming book Education for a Digital World - Edition 2.0. (more details in earlier post) The presentation itself was a bit of a challenge -- an overview of a chapter in 30 minutes, giving enough of a context so it made sense to people who haven't read the chapter, and allowing enough time for questions. This is where collaboration really shines. Patricia was ACE at managing the preliminary planning for this. She prepared the presentation, offered several options for how to structure it, and guided us about how much time we should spend on each portion and what to emphasize. Best of all, she started EARLY with the whole process. Paul is the ultimate web conference facilitator, but he stepped back so that I could get some practice. Like Patricia, Paul emphasizes the importance of planning ahead. That involves writing a script, rehearsing, identifying roles, and arriving early to upload files, test audio, and so on. There's a lot more to this than people realize! I've learned so much from participating in live sessions with Paul, but I have a long way to go!

For our session we introduced ourselves, each talked briefly about our communities, then highlighted some recommendations based on our experiences with each community. Then we zoned in on common themes that emerged for us in the final analysis of our case studies. In keeping with the 30-minute time frame we held off on responding to questions until the end, but encouraged participants to post questions in the text chat as they came to mind.

Here is the latest draft of our chapter: Cultivating communities of practice: Analysis of 3 cases studies using the 7 principles and the Elluminate recording of our presentation.

As a side note, at CPSquare we've started a practice of rehearsals as a way to get feedback from community members on upcoming presentations. A nice idea, and it's proving to be very worthwhile!

Book Chapter Presentation

View more presentations from Webbed Feat.

Online Communities: Indicators of Success

2010-04-19T10:00:00.000-07:00

In my role as community steward and moderator for SCoPE I'm always looking for indicators of success. I do the usual routine checks, like how many people are creating accounts, logging in, contributing to discussions, accessing resources, and so on. (I say "and so on" realizing that I don't do enough in this area, and I have a lot to learn about what that "and so on" should include.)

I also keep an eye out for blog posts that mention SCoPE. Some bloggers help to spread the word about SCoPE events, and others link back to SCoPE discussions, such as this recent post by Clint Lalonde on his reflections during the Tools for Collaborating Online seminar.

But sometimes these indicators jump out at me in twitter, like Nancy White letting me know she mentioned SCoPE during her keynote presentation at the eLearning 2010 in Forth Worth, Texas (slides are here, and it's also available to watch online).

Nancy also added a couple links to contributions by SCoPE members on her History and Future of Online Facilitation wiki page.

Other times positive feedback from SCoPE members will land right in my inbox. This is a recent post by Colby Stuart, a member since 2007.

Through my decades of collaboration in everything from the creative industry through to academic scientific communities and into the WWW or social networking, I have found SCoPE to be a place where the sheer joy of sharing, participation and playful encounter comes alive. In this space we share ideas, demonstrate tools, take each other into experiences with tools, platforms and spaces.

SCoPE has captured the essence of what creates a safe collaboration space. No one is left behind. There is room for each person to contribute and ask questions and never feel like they fall short in doing so. Even if we have no time, we still can follow and join in when time permits. It's our choice.

The platform and tools in SCoPE have grown as the people and group have communicated what they needs to grow. In other words, SCoPE services the continual growth of communication and collaboration by listening with resonance. Through that, SCoPE has serviced us all - so that we can focus and continue to share and learn from one another - on all levels.

SCoPE "is" a fine example of collaboration and the value that comes from that.

Thank you, Sylvia and everyone for that. We appreciate how much we enjoy this space to share, learn, contribute.

And a few others in the last month or so:

Theresa Weel, in a forum post:

Scope is a great source for learning about collaborative tools, particularly because we roll up our collective sleeves and use them.

And in the same forum, a post by Deirdre Bonnycastle:

I agree even though my time is really minimal, I try to read something from SCoPE once a day.

So THANK YOU SCoPE members. These are all great examples of indicators of success in an online community! This type of feedback sure perks me up.

Some solutions for your community, anyone?

2010-04-15T15:40:00.000-07:00

There is a lot of chatter today about the announcement by NING that they will no longer offer a free hosting option. In fact, if you do a twitter search on 'ning' you'll see many, MANY new updates waiting for a page refresh within a fraction of a second of accessing the page. Aside from sympathy for the employees at NING who were laid off, and also for those who have invested a lot of energy into their NING communities without realizing that they can't move their content elsewhere, I'm feeling indifferent about this move. I've never warmed up to NING as a platform, and got a little bored checking out all the new communities popping up that sounded interesting, but alas, fizzled very quickly. Perhaps a fee-based service will help to reduce the number of inactive spaces.

In any case, the real reason for this blog post is to point to something fantastic that is happening RIGHT NOW as a result of this announcement from NING. Alec Couros fired up an Alternative to Ning Google Doc that took off like wild fire. He posted this to Twitter:

There was such a rush to collaborate on this project that many people were getting error messages when trying to access the document. I fired up Jing to record the the first few minutes of editing in progress. It's cool to watch! I also added a snippet about SCoPE, since we'll gladly offer Moodle SIG space for educational practitioners and researchers.

This project could develop into quite the useful toolkit for community stewards!

Culturally Diverse Learners

2010-04-11T22:51:00.000-07:00

We're gearing up for a SCoPE seminar on a topic that should be of interest to all educators: Culturally Diverse Learners, facilitated by Emma Bourassa, Kyra Garson, and Wesley Eccleston from Thompson Rivers University. The seminar is anchored on a series of filmed scenarios aimed to enhance intercultural competencies by providing a spring board for dialogue and reflection on best practices for intercultural learning environments. There are eight videos altogether -- in addition to the scenarios there are four "extras" that include interviews and a couple segments on the making of the series.

The seminar kicks off with a live session April 12 at 12:00 PST, 19:00 GMT in Elluminate.

As with all SCoPE seminars, this event is free and open to the public and designed for busy professionals. You can participate according to your own time and interests. All seminars are moderated by volunteers in our community and are archived for future reference. We welcome newcomers and latecomers, and reading along is VERY acceptable.

Education for a Digital World - Edition 2.0 Webinar Series

2010-03-31T14:06:00.000-07:00

The Education for a Digital World - Edition 2.0 webinar series is based on the soon-to-be-released book Education for a Digital World - Edition 2.0, edited by Sandy Hirtz and Kevin Kelly. The series is organized in partnership with Steve Hargadon, manager of Learn Central. Book chapter authors are invited to give an overview of their chapter, followed by Q&A from the live audience. These 30-minute sessions will be recorded.

The collaboratively authored book, and its predecessor Education for a Digital World, represent a shift in how educators are sharing their research, experiences and best practices in online teaching and learning. Facilitated completely through virtual interactions, this new model of authoring went beyond writing and editing to become an international effort in community building and professional growth.

book cover design by June Kaminski

Education for a Digital World - Edition 2.0 Webinar Series

2010-03-31T11:08:00.000-07:00

This webinar series starts today and the details will be updated as they become available at SCoPE. Patricia Delich, Paul Stacey, and I are first up to talk about our book chapter. I've copied that section here:

This webinar series is based on the soon-to-be-released book Education for a Digital World - Edition 2.0, edited by Sandy Hirtz and Kevin Kelly. The series is organized in partnership with Steve Hargadon, manager of Learn Central. Book chapter authors are invited to give an overview of their chapter, followed by Q&A from the live audience. These 30-minute sessions will be recorded.

The collaboratively authored book, and its predecessor Education for a Digital World, represent a shift in how educators are sharing their research, experiences and best practices in online teaching and learning. Facilitated completely through virtual interactions, this new model of authoring went beyond writing and editing to become an international effort in community building and professional growth.

This schedule is still evolving so be sure to check back often!

Wednesday, March 31
12:00pm PDT, Elluminate: http://tr.im/edw20

Cultivating communities of practice: Analysis of 3 case studies using the 7 principles

Facilitators: Sylvia Currie, Patricia Delich, and Paul Stacey

In this session we will describe 3 case studies using Wenger, McDermott, & Snyder's (2002) 7 Principles for Cultivating Communities of Practice. This framework provides a close look at how our decisions about community design and technologies to support community activities were made and revised, as well as a consistent and rich view to help those involved in online and hybrid communities learn from our experiences.

About our facilitators:

Sylvia Currie is Manager, Client Services - Online Communities at BCcampus where she works with educational professionals who are interested in creating online communities of practice to support learning. She is a community steward and moderator for two online communities: SCoPE, an award winning international online community for individuals interested in educational research and practice, and the BC Educational Technology Users Group. Sylvia also coordinates and promotes professional development opportunities and services related to teaching and learning. Sylvia has been involved in online education since 1995 in many different roles. Her master's degree from Simon Fraser University focused on online communities of practice.

Dr. Patricia Delich has been guiding teachers in the use of online educational technologies for more than 15 years working with hundreds of educators throughout California and the U.S., and around the world. Dr. Delich was instrumental in developing City College of San Francisco’s successful distance education program and obtained recognition for faculty by acquiring 2 national and 11 statewide awards for exemplary online courses. As an eLearning consultant, Dr. Delich extends her expertise to colleges and universities to assist them in their online learning initiatives. Dr. Delich holds a doctorate degree in educational technology from Pepperdine University and focused her study on online course design, development, and teaching.

Paul Stacey is the Director, Communications, Stakeholder and Academic Relations at BCcampus, a collaborative online learning agency that supports British Columbia’s public post-secondary institutions in meeting their students’ learning needs. Paul leads initiatives to forward shareable online learning resources, online communities, and professional development for educators in all of BC’s public post-secondary institutions. Paul has three undergraduate degrees, and at the age of 50 completed a 100 percent online graduate program in Adult Learning and Global Change with a cohort of learners from around the world. He also serves as Associate Faculty member at Royal Roads University where he co-developed and taught an online International and Global Distance Education course for the Master of Arts in Learning and Technology program. He is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences, a webcast and workshop facilitator, and an award winner for his innovative work with educational technology.

Wellcome Collection

2010-03-25T10:01:00.000-07:00

The Wellcome Collection, "200 years of human culture", has very interesting images that are freely available for download for personal, academic teaching or study use, under one of two Creative Commons licences.

L0024012
Credit: Wellcome Library, London
MANUSCRIPTS: WIHM Western MS 4268
ROSSI Bernardino, a notebook of surgical lectures,
Naples 1738.
Illustration of dental instruments. Collection: Archives & Manuscripts
Library reference no.: WMS and MS 4268
Copyrighted work available under Creative Commons by-nc 2.0 UK: England & Wales

Teaching and Learning in Networks

2010-03-24T05:34:00.000-07:00

This online event is open to everyone!

eCampusAlberta, Alberta-North, and BCcampus invite you to a 90-minute web conference as part of the Best Practice in Upgrading Online Conference organized by Bow Valley College and NorQuest College.

When: March 24, 2010 @ 13:00 pm PDT (your time zone)
Presenter: - George Siemens
Where: Elluminate Live (see details)

Moderator:
Randy LaBonte, PD Coordinator, Alberta-North

Presenter:
George Siemens, Social Media Strategist, Technology Enhanced Knowledge Research Institute (TEKRI), Athabasca University.

Session Description
Social media and networked technologies have become prominent in society. In response, educators have started to actively research how social and technological networks impact the role of the teacher. Decentralized learning content and distributed learner interactions call into question many of the activities teachers perform in traditional courses and classrooms. This presentation will explore participatory pedagogy and highlight practical activities teachers can utilize to increase learner involvement in networks.

Nine Tools for Collaboratively Creating Mind Maps

2010-03-16T21:26:00.000-07:00

This is an excellent overview of tools for collaboratively creating mind maps from the Free Technology for Teachers blog.

Mind maps or graphic organizers can be invaluable tools for visual thinkers and visual learners. The process of creating a mind map can help students gain an overview perspective on complex, multifaceted concepts. Mind maps can also help students outline an essay or story they're planning to write. The following list contains nine tools that can be used by students to create mind maps independently or collaboratively.

This list is of particular interest in light of the current Tools for Collaborating Online seminar discussion at SCoPE. There is a discussion on mind maps underway now. (Newcomers and latecomers are always welcomed in SCoPE discussions.)

Screencasts with Screenr

2010-02-27T18:12:00.000-08:00

Screenr is VERY easy to use! Click record and off you go creating a screencast up to 5 minutes in length. There is nothing to download and it is free.

Here is an example created by Amanda Coolidge, Communication Chair for the BC Educational Technology Users Group, to highlight upcoming activities. Through the Screenr site Amanda published a link to her screencast directly to Twitter.

Virtual Field Trip

2010-02-21T10:59:00.000-08:00

CPsquare, the community of practice on communities of practice, and SCoPE are working together to organize virtual Quarterly Field Trips. The practice of visiting communities has a long history in and around CPsquare, and during the 2009 Online Community Enthusiast event in Vancouver, British Columbia we decided to organize these field trips as a way to provide opportunities for a mutual exchange among community leaders and enthusiasts. Tourists (enthusiasts) can get ideas and insights from seeing other communities, and the tour guides (leaders) can benefit from the expertise of the enthusiasts.

Our third field trip is scheduled for February 22, 2010 at 20:00 GMT. This excursion, outlined in the CPSquare Wiki, will be to the Wikisourcing Sustainable Enterprises (WSE) community. Host Jenny Ambrozek will show us the WSE community as it is today using this informal community comparison framework adapted from the C4P model for our quarterly field trips:

Content: What explicit knowledge objects such as documents or video clips are created or shared in this community?
Connections: What interpersonal contacts between community members (e.g., that facilitate relationship-building between community members) can you observe?
Conversation: What face-to-face or online conversations are going on?
Context: What context gives meaning to the content, connections and conversations in this community?
Purpose: What is the reason for which the members come together in this community?

When: Monday, February 22, 2010 at 12:00 PST, 20:00 GMT (your time zone)
Where: SCoPE Community Enthusiasts Elluminate Room

I will be co-moderating this session with John Smith. It's open to everyone so please spread the word!

MicroSCoPE: February 2010 Issue

2010-02-12T10:50:00.000-08:00

This newsletter is cross-posted in the SCoPE online community.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MicroSCoPE: A Close Look at What's Happening in the SCoPE Community
February, 2010
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In This Issue
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. Starts Today! Pimp Your Post
2. Quarterly Field Trip: Visiting Wikisourcing Sustainability Enterprises
3. SCoPE Seminar: Collaborating Online
4. Online Courses and Workshops
5. Mark Your Calendars
6. Activity Recap
7. PeriSCoPE
8. About SCoPE
9. About MicroSCoPE

1. Starts Today! Pimp Your Post
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
February 12 - 19, 2010
Web conference February 12 at 19:30 GMT
Facilitators: Tracy Roberts and Gina Bennett
During this combined 1-hour web conference and 8-day 'sandboxing' discussion we will explore (easy, fun, and free) ways to go beyond plain text to jazz up introductory posts in online courses. This event is organized by the British Columbia Educational Technology Users Group.

2. Quarterly Field Trip: Visiting Wikisourcing Sustainability Enterprises
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
February 22, 2010 12:00 PST, 20:00 GMT
It's time for our next Quarterly Field Trip! This excursion will be to the Wikisourcing Sustainability Enterprises community with host Jenny Ambrozek. Field Trips - visits to living communities - are organized in collaboration with CPSquare, the community of practice on communities of practice.

3. SCoPE Seminar: Collaborating Online
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
March 1 - 19, 2010
Facilitator: Emma Duke-Williams
Collaboration is a term that is used quite loosely. What do we mean when we say we are collaborating? What are the key characteristics that differentiate collaboration from cooperation and working independently? What tools support the collaborative process online? During this 3-week seminar we will use Google Wave to explore its potential for supporting online collaboration while addressing these and other questions.

4. Online Courses and Workshops
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* Instructional Skills Workshop Online
May 3 - 28, 2010
Royal Roads University
This course is designed to help new and experienced instructors achieve success in facilitating learning in an online environment.

At SCoPE we will be featuring free and fee-based online courses and workshops offered by British Columbia post-secondary institutions.

5. Mark Your Calendars
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* Best Practices in Upgrading Online -- online conference March 24-26, 2010
* Culturally Diverse Learners: April 12 - 30, 2010. This seminar will showcase a video series produced by Thompson Rivers University.
Check upcoming seminars for updates to the seminar schedule. The Learn Together Collaboratory has a list of events of interest to educators. Please contribute to the list!

6. Activity Recap
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* Guiding the E-Researcher, facilitated by Janet Salmons, explored key e-research steps needed to use synchronous tools for scholarly interviews. The seminar was part of our Professional Reading Group Series, and built on Janet's new book: Online Interviews in Real Time.

* We kicked off the 2010 Professional Learning Series in January with an interactive session on authentic assessment. In February our Course Showcase featured 'Communicating Effectively' from Lakeland College and Royal Roads Univesity's online 'Instructional Skill Workshop Online' (ISWO). Recordings are available for all of these events organized by collaboratively by BCcampus, eCampusAlberta, and Alberta North.

* We had a lively gathering for the December 21st World is Open Q&A session with Curtis Bonk. The recording and text chat transcript are available.

Past SCoPE seminar discussions are always available for reading and afterthoughts.

7. PeriSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* Social Media: Trends and Implications for Learning is a free monthly discussion, hosted by AACE and facilitated by George Siemens and David Cormier.

* Moodle for Teachers is a free online workshop facilitated by Gladys Gahona and Nellie Deutsch, March 2-31, 2010

* The next CIDER Session is Moving Online: taking teaching and learning beyond four walls, March 3, 2010. CIDER sessions are targeted at distance education researchers, graduate students, and practitioners. Each session features an active researcher talking about their project, methodologies used, and their results.

* The call for proposals is open until Feburary 22 for the upcoming online conference hosted by Knowplace: 21st Century Learning & Sharing: Engaging for Success April 22-24, 2010.

8. About SCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE brings together individuals who share an interest in education research and practice, and offers opportunities for dialogue across disciplines, geographical borders, professions, levels of expertise, and education sectors. Our activities are facilitated by volunteers in the community and membership is free and open to everyone.

SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This is a mutual exchange of support and services.
Self-register at http://scope.bccampus.ca

* Join the SCoPE group at Linkedin to connect with others who are interested in employment in education or in connecting professionally on projects, follow SCoPE on Twitter and check out the SCoPE Facebook group and page to keep in the loop.

* Do you blog? Add it to our SCoPE member blogs database.

* Leave a message on the SCoPE Voicethread

9. About MicroSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE members receive MicroSCoPE issues automatically. If you prefer to read MicroSCoPE on the website or via RSS, login to SCoPE and manage your subscription here:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?f=5

MicroSCoPE is prepared by Sylvia Currie, Community Steward (scurrie@bccampus.ca).
Please spread the word about SCoPE activities. Distribute this newsletter!

Teach-In for Climate Justice

2010-02-11T11:55:00.000-08:00

The annual goBEYOND Teach-In for Climate Justice is March 1-12, 2010. By signing up for the teach in, educators from all disciplines across the globe can have an enormous impact in raising awareness and creating change.

From the Teach-In information package:

The Teach-In is a dialogue that is grounded in ideas, but directed toward action. We’re asking faculty to donate class time or assignments to engage their classes in ideas about climate justice, and the actions our colleges and universities can take to focus their incredible resources on generating equitable climate solutions.

Faculty need not be experts on climate change, as the exercise is about a two-way discussion that encourages us to explore how each of our disciplines – from social sciences, engineering, and visual art, to economics, forestry, education, and everything in between – can contribute to solving this global issue. And not to worry - we provide the discussion questions!

The Teach-In is a powerful tool because it unifies so many different schools and disciplines, and builds momentum toward a common vision. This year, the Teach-In is going beyond British Columbia’s borders – the Sierra Youth Coalition is helping to bring it across Canada, and the Inter-Varsity Environmental Network will bring it to campuses across Africa. GoBEYOND has previously held two successful Teach-Ins, with participation from nearly 400 professors and 15 post-secondary institutions, reaching a total of approximately 20,000 students! This year marks the first ever international goBEYOND Teach-In.

Check the goBEYOND Teach-In toolkit and sign up!

BCcampus Online Communities supports the Campus Climate Network community.

Pimp Your Post

2010-02-11T09:35:00.000-08:00

Why use text when you can talk from a coffee cup!! :-D Research and experience shows that a strong start toward building community can do wonders for learning and engagement in your online course. For most online courses, this begins with the introductory post or icebreaker activity. Join us for Pimp Your Post -- Jazzing up Introductory Posts in Online Courses, a 1 week extravaganza of exploring easy, fun, and free ways to go beyond the plain text forum post. We'll kick off with a 1-hour web conference on February 12, and carry on a week of "sandboxing" at SCoPE.

What:
* Combination of synchronous and asynchronous discussions
* Participate in all or any portion of this event

Facilitators:
Gina Bennett and Tracy Roberts

Where:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?id=6301

When:
* Web conference: February 12, 2010 at 11:30 PST, 19:30 GMT (check your time zone)
* Asynchronous discussion February 12 - 19, 2010

How:
* No registration required
* Create an account on the SCoPE site to contribute to discussions and to customize your visits

This web conference and seminar is brought to you by the British Columbia Educational Users Group.

FREE online educational games, learning activities

2010-02-05T15:00:00.000-08:00

Sheppard Software says, "We make learning fun."

FREE online educational games, learning games, and activities for kids of all ages. Articles, quizzes, and more, all quickly accessed online. There's even some good Canadian content there; for example, Canadian geography tutorials and games.

ALSO from Sheppard Software: Free software for teachers & Schools. "We design educational software and online games with these goals:

To add sound and visual effects to make learning fun and more memorable.
To design games with many difficulty levels so that players will continue to be challenged no matter how far they progress.
To provide games that will exercise players' brains."

...........

Kate's little side note: So, this guy calls me on the phone, raves about my site, PinkFlamingo's Resources Lists, then asks me to provide a link to Sheppard Software on the site. In the 10+ years I've had the site, I've had many link-exchange contacts, but never before by phone. But it was really the compliments that worked on me; whether or not they were just a marketing ploy, they worked. Good thing to keep in mind as an approach to take when trying to get anybody on board about anything -- the compliments go a long way, don't they?

BCIT Guide to Developing Online Courses

2010-01-29T14:44:00.000-08:00

The idea behind British Columbia's Institute of Technology's Developing Online Courses site is to bring together a basic guide to online course development, with accompanying resources, such as checklists and templates, that will be useful to a variety of people involved in creating online courses.

Guiding the E-Researcher

2010-01-28T22:22:00.000-08:00

We're coming to the end of the final week of the Guiding the E-Researcher seminar at SCoPE. The discussion is facilitated by Janet Salmons, author of the book Online Interviews in Real Time. It's been a fascinating discussion, mostly focused on conducting online synchronous interviews, but also more broadly on scholarly research in general. And it's has gone far beyond the idea of trying to replicate face-to-face interviews in an online environment.

Earlier this week we explored the use of multi-channel meeting spaces for online interviews using Elluminate. The recording of that session is available, as well as an audio only (MP3) version.

January 29, 2010 we'll be exploring Vidyo, an example of using desktop videoconferencing for onine interviews. Martin Harvey and Joshua Sherman from Coroware have been fantastic in helping to organize this session. A couple weeks ago we met up to try out Vidyo and to talk about the upcoming session. Martin beamed in from Niagara-on-the-Lake in Ontario (top), Janet from Boulder, Colorado (bottom middle), Joshua from Seattle, Washington (left), and I was in Lac Le Jeune, British Columbia (bottom right).

During our trial run there were no technical issues, and the quality of the video and audio was amazing. Some issues may arise during our sessions tomorrow because Vidyo isn't intended for a large groups, but we're giving it a whirl! You're welcome to join us! (details here) To ensure we keep the communication channels open, we have set up an e-research text chat using BackNoise.

2010 Horizon Report

2010-01-15T09:35:00.000-08:00

The New Media Consortium 2010 Horizon Report is now available!

The annual Horizon Report describes the continuing work of the NMC’s Horizon Project, a research-oriented effort that seeks to identify and describe emerging technologies likely to have considerable impact on teaching, learning, and creative expression within higher education.

SynchTube Beta : Watch Videos With Friends in Real Time

2010-01-07T11:55:00.000-08:00

Nik Peachy tweeted about synchtube this morning, so I thought I'd try it out. This is a specific need I've had in the past as an online facilitator -- how to have a conversation while viewing/analysing video clips. This simple tool works very well!

From the synchtube beta site:

Watch Videos With Friends in Real Time: "Simply paste a YouTube link and create a room. You can share this room with others, and watch videos in real-time... well enough talking, just try it already!

The World is Open

2009-12-18T11:25:00.000-08:00

This book comes highly recommended: World is Open: How Web Technology is Revolutionizing Education by Curtis Bonk (aka TravelinEdMan). As a special holiday bonus event at SCoPE Curtis will be joining us for a Q&A.

When: Monday, December 21, 2009, 22:00 GMT

Where: Elluminate

If you don't have the book, visit the World is Open site to access the book prequel and postscript, links to the original articles, many book excerpts, and Web resources. Or if you don't have time to read, come anyway!

We're gathering YOUR questions ahead of time in this SCoPE forum.

The World Is Open

2009-12-15T17:15:00.000-08:00

I've been reading the World is Open: How Web Technology is Revolutionizing Education by Curtis Bonk (aka TravelinEdMan) in preparation for our upcoming event at SCoPE. Well, I would have read it in any case because I've been a Bonk fan for awhile. If you have ever listened to Curt speak, or read some of his work, you'll know that he has a knack for organizing complex ideas into a simple framework, often using lists like this 2009 article: The World is Open for Reason: Make that 30 Reasons! Or the WE-ALL-LEARN model outlined in the book:

Web Searching in the World of e-Books
E-Learning and Blended Learning
Availability of Open Source and Free Software
Leveraged Resources and OpenCourseWare
Learning Object Repositories and Portals
Learner Participation in Open Information Communities
Electronic Collaboration
Alternate Reality Learning
Real-Time Mobility and Portability
Networks of Personalized Learning

So, in a true Bonk style, I'll give the you 10 reasons why I admire Curt's work.

He weaves interesting stories throughout his work. It's like sitting on the front porch swing and listening to a story teller.
He doesn't work alone. He is always communicating, always networking, always seeking out more people to connect to.
He doesn't take credit for all of the ideas he writes about. Case in point: 5 pages of acknowledgments in The World is Open, including the Twelve Girls Band from China "for their mesmerizing CD, Eastern Energy, which I listened to over 250 times while writing this book."
He's so organized! I mean he counted the number of times he listened to that CD!
He asks a lot of questions, and because he really wants to know the answers.
He's so entertaining. Expect him to show up in costume, or carrying a box of props to a talk. This YouTube video just cracks me up.
He writes about interesting topics, and uses real-life examples.
He's a practitioner. He can write about teaching because that's what he does.
He is always paying attention to your interests, and introducing you to other people with similar interests. When you meet him expect to hear "Oh! you really need to talk to so and so...here's her email address"(which he'll happen to have at his fingertips. I mentioned he's organized.)
He spreads the word about people doing good work. I learned all about Lucifer Chu and the Opensource Opencourseware Prototype System (OOPS) project through Curt, and was then introduced to him (by Curt, of course...see #9!) at the 2005 eLearn conference in Vancouver. And, of course, I'm flattered that he includes my work and SCoPE on his list. He even sent me an autographed copy of his book. :-)

So plan to attend the SCoPE event for The World is Open Q&A where you'll get to meet Curt, and ask him questions about his book or anything else you want to know about the impact of technology on learning. Guaranteed he'll have answers!

Where: Elluminate
When: December 21, 2009 at 2:00 PST (your time zone)
How to prepare: If you don't have the book, visit the World is Open blog to access the book prequel and postscript, links to the original articles, many book excerpts, and Web resources. Or if you don't have time to read, come anyway!
Dress: Informal

MicroSCoPE December 2009 Issue

2009-12-11T05:17:00.000-08:00

This newsletter was sent out to members of the SCoPE community. I'm posting it here to make sure it reaches as many people as possible!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MicroSCoPE: A Close Look at What's Happening in the SCoPE Community
December, 2009
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In This Issue
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. Today! Digital Tattoo Project
2. World is Open Q&A
3. Authentic Assessment
4. Instructional Skills Workshop
5. Mark Your Calendars
6. Activity Recap
7. PeriSCoPE
8. About SCoPE
9. About MicroSCoPE

1. Today! Digital Tattoo Project
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
December 11, 2009 at 11:00 a.m. PST | your time zone
Facilitators: Trish Rosseel and Cindy Underhill
Moderator: Bonnie Johnston
Join us for a tour and discussion of University of British Columbia's Digital Tattoo project today in Elluminate. The project’s goal is to help students become aware of their rights and responsibilities as creators and consumers of digital information in their personal, academic and professional lives. This web conference is part of the 3-week seminar on Digital Identity which runs until December 18, 2009. Latecomers welcome and expected!

2. World is Open Q&A
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
December 21, 2009 at 2:00 p.m. PST | your time zone
Have you dipped into The World is Open: How Web Technology is Revolutionizing Education, by Curtis Bonk? Here's you chance to ask the author YOUR questions! Drop into the forum in the days leading up to the World is Open Q&A.

3. Authentic Assessment
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
January 5, 2010
Facilitators: Doug Hamilton and Sandra Rogers
We will kick of the 2010 Professional Learning Series with an interactive session on authentic assessment, including a look at a special project under development at Royal Roads University. BCcampus, eCampus Alberta, and Alberta-North are teaming together to organize this series focusing on emerging topics in elearning.

4. Instructional Skills Workshop
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
January 25 - February 19, 2010
Facilitator: Doug Kerr
Royal Roads University
This course is designed to help new and experienced instructors achieve success in facilitating learning in an online environment. Watch SCoPE for more online courses and workshops offered by British Columbia post-secondary institutions.

5. Mark Your Calendars
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* Guiding the E-Researcher, facilitated by Janet Salmons, January 18 - 29, 2010. This seminar will explore ways that educators can guide learners through a few key e-research steps needed to use synchronous tools for scholarly interviews. The seminar is part of our Professional Reading Group Series, and will draw on Janet's new book: Online Interviews in Real Time.
* Culturally Diverse Learners: February 1-19, 2010
Check upcoming seminars for an updates to the seminar schedule. The Learn Together Collaboratory has a list of events of interest to educators. Feel free to contribute to the list!

6. Activity Recap
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* Course Design Principles for Engagement
December 8, 2009
Sheila Whitmore, Quality Manager for eCampusAlbertaDuring invited course developers to take us on a tour of six great courses! The recording has been posted and the forum remains open for participants to pose questions and give feedback.

* Re-Thinking E-Learning Research
November 9 - 27, 2009,
This book discussion was facilitated by Norm Friesen, Canada Research Chair in E-Learning Practices. Visit the seminar wiki for links to book chapters and related resources.

* Virtual Field Trip: Cloudworks
November 16, 2009
During this Field Trip, organized in partnership with CPSquare, Grainne Conole took us to Cloudworks, an evolving, dynamic community for learning design developed and hosted by the Institute of Educational Technology at The Open University. Naturally, we created a Field Trip Cloud!

* The Art of Teaching
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
October 19 - November 6, 2009
This seminar, faciliated by Neil Smith, Nancy Randall and Andrew Marchand, was organized around Vancouver Island University's Art of Teaching video series. The 8-part series is now available on YouTube.

Past SCoPE seminar discussions are always available for reading and afterthoughts.

7. PeriSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* The nominations are up and voting is now open in the 2009 Edublog Awards.
* Social Media: Trends and Implications for Learning is a free monthly discussion, hosted by AACE and facilitated by George Siemens and David Cormier.
* The next Learning4Content online workshop is December 14-18, 2009
* The next CIDER Session is Blended Online Learning Design: Shaken not Stirred, January 5, 2010. CIDER sessions are targeted at distance education researchers, graduate students, and practitioners. Each session features an active researcher talking about their project, methodologies used, and their results.

8. About SCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE brings together individuals who share an interest in education research and practice, and offers opportunities for dialogue across disciplines, geographical borders, professions, levels of expertise, and education sectors. Our activities are faciliated by volunteers in the communitiy and membership is free and open to everyone.

SCoPE forms collaborating partnerships with many organizations to implement and promote community activities and products. This is a mutual exchange of support and services.

Self-register at http://scope.bccampus.ca

* Follow SCoPE on Twitter and Facebook
* Join the SCoPE group at Linkedin to connect with others who are interested in employment in education or in connecting professionally on projects, follow SCoPE on Twitter and check out the SCoPE Facebook group and member networking as a way to keep in the loop.
* Do you blog? Add it to our SCoPE member blogs database.
* Leave a message on the SCoPE Voicethread

9. About MicroSCoPE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SCoPE members receive MicroSCoPE issues automatically. If you prefer to read MicroSCoPE on the website or via RSS, login to SCoPE and manage your subscription here:
http://scope.bccampus.ca/mod/forum/view.php?f=5

MicroSCoPE is prepared by Sylvia Currie, Community Steward (scurrie@bccampus.ca).

Please spread the word about SCoPE activities. Distribute this newsletter!

Digital Identity Seminar

2009-12-01T08:16:00.000-08:00

A seminar is starting up at SCoPE today. As with all SCoPE activities, the Digital Identity seminar is facilitated by volunteers in the community, and participation is free and open to the public. Here is the description. Hope to see you there!

Digital Identity: December 1-18, 2009
Facilitators: Trish Rosseel & Cindy Underhill

From Wikipedia: Digital identity refers to the aspect of digital technology that is concerned with the mediation of people's experience of their own identity and the identity of other people and things.

How do you manage and make informed choices about your digital identity? What does all of this mean in an educational context? What are the questions YOU need to ask of your learners to educate them about their digital identities? Join two of the developers behind University of British Columbia's Digital Tattoo project for a discussion about digital identities and what we all need to know.

Using the resources on the Digital Identity Wiki as fodder for discussion, we'll focus on a different themes for each of the three weeks:
Us
Our Learners
Our Institutions
Each week, we'll highlight a few of the questions we think are important and (hopefully) draw out some of the themes that are important to you. On Friday, December 11th at 11:00 a.m. we'll host a synchronous session in Elluminate - focusing on the Digital Tattoo project that we're involved with.

We look forward to the discussion in the coming weeks!

Digital Identity Seminar

2009-12-01T08:10:00.000-08:00

Digital Identity: December 1-18, 2009
Facilitators: Trish Rosseel & Cindy Underhill

From Wikipedia: Digital identity refers to the aspect of digital technology that is concerned with the mediation of people's experience of their own identity and the identity of other people and things.

How do you manage and make informed choices about your digital identity? What does all of this mean in an educational context? What are the questions YOU need to ask of your learners to educate them about their digital identities? Join two of the developers behind University of British Columbia's Digital Tattoo project for a discussion about digital identities and what we all need to know.

Using the resources on the Digital Identity Wiki as fodder for discussion, we'll focus on a different themes for each of the three weeks:
Us
Our Learners
Our Institutions
Each week, we'll highlight a few of the questions we think are important and (hopefully) draw out some of the themes that are important to you. On Friday, December 11th at 11:00 a.m. we'll host a synchronous session in Elluminate - focusing on the Digital Tattoo project that we're involved with.

We look forward to the discussion in the coming weeks!

Doodle for easy meeting coordination

2009-11-30T13:04:00.000-08:00

As the organizer of many meetings with busy colleagues, life can be akin to “herding cats” when chasing down people and dates.

But Doodle, a polling tool I’ve been using of late, has made this task so much simpler. All you do is setup a Doodle poll with your dates and send participants the link. As creator of the poll, you are able to monitor responses and get the full tally on which date works best for most people. The meeting practically organizes itself. Then you have way more time to work on important matters like the agenda! I love this tool. Thanks to colleague Sylvia Currie for passing on the tip.

Wordpress Multi-User

2009-11-29T16:57:00.000-08:00

Ever dream of running hundreds of thousands of blogs with a single install of WordPress? WordPress MU, or multi-user, is designed to do exactly that.

Several post-secondary institutions in British Columbia are using WordPress MU -- UBC, UNBC, Langara, Camosun... (I've missed some, I'm sure.) What's interesting is to see WordPress MU being used for for variety of purposes. We think of it as blogging software, but in fact it is a very flexible content management system (CMS) and is being used at these institutions for developing professional e-portfolios (see UBC's Faculty of Education e-portfolios for teacher candidates), maintaining department websites (see Langara's iweb), and managing course content and discussions. In fact Clint Lalonde from Camusun has begun to document the process of piloting WordPress MU at Camosun College, and he offers this advice about referring to WordPress MU as a blogging tool:

I’ve avoided using the word blog when I refer to these sites. I’ve found that the term blog carries with it preconceived notions, both good and bad. So, in order to avoid the whole “I don’t want a blog, I want a website” circular logic wheel that I have witnessed when people talk about WP as a CMS, I have been using the term website when talking about our pilot sites.

The CUBE at BCIT uses 3D simulation technology and takes teaching and learning to new levels

2009-11-26T08:06:00.000-08:00

From BCIT's Update Newsletter: http://www.bcit.ca/update/node/635

It’s not what it is, it’s what it does. The CUBE transforms the way instructors teach and the way students learn at BCIT. It will bring the workplace into the classroom and enrich curriculum – virtually.

Unique to BCIT, the CUBE initiative places 3D simulations of expensive, rare, and leading edge equipment into the hands of BCIT students, anytime, anywhere allowing learners to explore complex components and systems in a 3D virtual world before they touch the real thing.

Students will manipulate virtual objects from jet engines to knee joints and even disassemble, assemble, and cross-section them using computers.

With a US $1million grant from Lockheed Martin and $380,000 in software contributions from NGRAIN (Canada) Corporation, the CUBE transforms learning through the development of interactive 3D simulations which enhance the learner's experience. Watch the video to see the CUBE in action, and check out the BCIT news release for more info.

Stopwatch

2009-11-25T06:01:00.000-08:00

Stopwatch: Would you like to know how long it takes to load a webpage? This program will measure the time for you. Enter the URL to be measured and watch the top of the window.

Screencasting

2009-11-23T12:51:00.000-08:00

Screencasting is a great way to demonstrate how to use various technologies or enhance a presentation. If you have tried screencasting in the past you know that although time consuming these a screencast can be an effective way to grab audience attention.

The site, Lifehacker, has put together a list of the five best screencasting tools. There are a couple of free tools highlighted that are definitely worth a try!
http://bit.ly/5Wj6GH

BCIT has recently developed a series of video tutorials, using Adobe Captivate, for Desire2Learn. The video tutorials were created for Instructors across the Institute and focus on how to use D2L. Check them out at: http://learn.bcit.ca under Instructor Resources.

Clickers

2009-11-23T12:49:00.000-08:00

Active student engagement in large classes is a pedagogical topic that is a constant buzz at many meetings, workshops, and conferences. One solution to engaging students in a large class is to use Clickers. Both the Vancouver Community College and University of Victoria are introducing clickers to their institutions and Vancouver's Georgia Strait recently featured a Professor from the University of British Columbia on his use of Clickers in the class- check it out "Clickers give students incentive to go to class".

For more information about Clickers read Educause's article on "7 things you should know about clickers".

Gliffy

2009-11-20T13:41:00.000-08:00

Gliffy is a fantastic tool for everything from planning how to organize the furniture in your classroom to collaboratively brainstorming and organizing ideas. Thanks to Grant Potter for introducing us to this tool during a working group meeting to rethink and redesign the Educational Technology Users Group community. Here's our spidergram (taken from this spidergram activity).

At Gliffy, we believe that communicating with visuals gets people to the same space a lot faster because a picture takes the thoughts in your head and makes them tangible.

With a tool that makes it easy to create, share, and collaborate on a wide range of diagrams, Gliffy users can communicate more clearly, boost innovation, improve decisions, and work more effectively.

Virtual Field Trip

2009-11-13T10:14:00.000-08:00

CPsquare, the community of practice on communities of practice, and SCoPE are working together to organize virtual Quarterly Field Trips. The practice of visiting communities has a long history in and around CPsquare. We decided that the opportunity to visit communities with the help of a tour guide, and using a specific framework as a lens on the community, would be an excellent mutual exchange among community leaders and enthusiasts. Tourists (enthusiasts) can get ideas and insights from seeing other communities, and the tour guides (leaders) can benefit from the expertise of the enthusiasts.

Our next field trip is scheduled for November 16, 2009 20:00 GMT. This excursion will be to Cloudworks, an evolving, dynamic community for learning design developed and hosted by the Institute of Educational Technology at The Open University. Grainne Conole, Professor of e-learning at OU, will be our tour guide. We are organizing the background information and details of the trip on the CPsquare wiki.

I will be co-moderating this session with John Smith. It's open to everyone so please spread the word!

When: Monday, November 16, 2009 12:00 PDT 20:00 GMT (your time zone)
Where: SCoPE Community Enthusiasts Elluminate Room

Photo uploaded on October 1, 2009
by djdroga

The Complete Guide to Google Wave

2009-11-13T07:28:00.000-08:00

The Complete Guide to Google Wave: How to Use Google Wave: "The Complete Guide to Google Wave is a comprehensive user manual by Gina Trapani with Adam Pash.

Google Wave is a new web-based collaboration tool that's notoriously difficult to understand. This guide will help. Here you'll learn how to use Google Wave to get things done with your group. Because Wave is such a new product that's evolving quickly, this guidebook is a work in progress that will update in concert with Wave as it grows and changes. Read more about The Complete Guide to Google Wave, and follow us on Twitter for updates and Wave tips."

How do YOU connect online?

2009-11-05T11:17:00.000-08:00

ETUG member D'Arcy Norman is asking this question for his non-traditional assignment in a graduate level course he is taking on Technology & Society:

How do YOU connect online?

More information about the project and how to submit your contribution is available on the Connect Project site.

Cloudworks

2009-11-05T09:43:00.000-08:00

I've been following the work of Gráinne Conole from UK's Open University for some time. I believe the first time I corresponded with her was during the Shaping Our Future conference in May, 2008 at SCoPE where we invited her to provide an international perspective on e-learning research, policy, and practice. Then later that year I participated in her remote presentation on Cloudworks at the 2008 Tech It Up conference at Thomposon Rivers University in Kamloops.

That Coudworks presentation really sparked my interest. At that time the website was still in the very early phases of development, but the potential was obvious. It reminded me of some of our early 90s work done in the Virtual-U project lab at Simon Fraser University when we were busy mocking up designs that would provide a way for instructors to share their online course activities in a way that provided implementation and iterative design context.

Cloudworks is a site for finding, sharing and discussing learning and teaching ideas, experiences and issues. The aims are to:
enable people to find, share and discuss learning and teaching ideas
connect people with similar educational interests through social networking
provide inspiration on designing learning activities and developing resources
showcase the work of individuals and communities who want to reach existing but also new audiences
provide a place for different communities to discuss, collaborate and aggregate relevant materials, ideas and designs
encourage sharing, especially among people who have not shared learning and teaching ideas and experiences before.

The appeal of Cloudworks is that the focus shifts away from sharing course resources (repositories) to representing teaching designs, practices, and resources in a way that is context rich and reusable by others. Moreover, members' contributions are open and available for others to build on in a number of interesting ways.

Unlike many existing educational repositories, the emphasis is on building a dynamic collection of ideas and experiences; via a variety of educational content (learning designs, case studies, resources and tools) plus active discussions about the use and effectiveness of this content in different contexts. The voice of users of the site, their experience, reviews and reflections on the content of the site is a central feature.

Last month I had the pleasure of spending some time with Gráinne at the ETUG Fall 2009 workshop in Vancouver, on an unexpected road trip to Kamloops because our flight was cancelled, then briefly at the TechItUp conference where we live-blogged John Seely Brown's keynote together. I was able to get immersed in Cloudworks and also experience Gráinne's enthusiasm. It was a great combination.

First... the ETUG Fall workshop. Gráinne Conole treated participants to a full-day workshop and plenary talk on learning design. She was also an extremely active participant in the 2-day event overall, first by helping the planning committee by creating a workshop 'cloudscape' at Cloudworks ahead of time, then by continuing to populate the various clouds with links, live blogs of sessions, comments, and keeping workshop the #etugdesign twitter stream active.

Aside from helping us to build a fantastic online resource for our 2-day event that we can continue to revisit and build over time, Gráinne really modelled for our community how we can (and should!) collectively create artefacts of our activities, and find ways to involve members who are unable to travel to f2f events. And it was very interesting to see Cloudworks in action!

Second...the unexpected road trip. We had a very early flight out of Vancouver I was returning home after the ETUG Workshop and Gráinne was going on the the TechItUp conference. We caught a 5:30 a.m. cab to the airport only to find that the flight had been cancelled due to fog. We're actually still trying to figure out why the flight was so early! We thought it was because Gráinne needed to be at the TechItUp conference. Anyway, we retrieved our luggage then headed off to the car rental area. No cars left! We tried one company after another. Then in the last line-up we started chatting with Jarrod Bell from School District #60 in Fort St. John. It turned out he was also heading to the TechItUp conference AND we found out there was a car available. So we all drove up together. What a terrific experience! We felt like we were playing hooky -- stopping at coffee shops, checking out the views, fitting in a little fine dining, and having a fantastic conversation.

Third...John Seely Brown's keynote at the TechItUp conference. Thanks to Tara Murray from School District #73 (Kamloops/Thompson), one of the conference organizers, I was able to pop in on Saturday morning just for the keynote. By this time I was very familiar with Cloudworks, so was able to quickly find the cloud Gráinne had created and start live blogging within seconds of opening my laptop.

I think this last point is what will really contribute to the increase in Cloudworks membership and the growth in valuable resources and opportunities for dialogue. It is so easy to use, and there are many ways to contribute. The idea is to:

Ensure a low barrier to entry for new contributions. We believe that one of the main barriers to contribution to other repositories is the level of detail and metadata required, cumbersome quality control processes and issues around ownership.
Give the site a people-orientated focus. It is conversation and shared experiences that will draw people to contribute to the site and make it sustainable. Finding the right person to talk to is often as important as finding the right resource.

When I returned home after my few days with Gráinne I began to think about how Cloudworks could be used for other projects I'm involved in. One that came to mind was an Improving Conferences (and other events) project I've been hoping to get off the ground with colleagues in BC as we gather ideas and feedback from the events we organize. We have so much material, but it needs to be brought together somehow. And obviously this won't be a static resource; we need to continue to build on it. Cloudworks! I fired up an Improving Conferences Cloudscape and a few clouds to get going. The next day I noticed that Martin Weller had started a cloud called Changing nature of conferences so I snapped that into my Cloudscape. I'll continue to look for other clouds related to this theme. I'll also continue to get the word out that the cloudscape exists. I haven't even mentioned it to my colleagues, and they might not be as keen to jump in. But that's okay. Even if we end up with A MANUAL , it can still be included in the cloudscape. And hopefully I'll bump into new people in the clouds who interested in this topic. In any case, I'll just pick away at this project, adding #improveconf to relevant tweets, links to interesting resources, questions and new clouds as they come to mind. Suddenly creating a good resource on improving conferences feels very manageable. :-)

Interested in learning about Cloudworks in a community of practice context? Mark your calendars for a Virtual Field Trip organized by SCoPE and CPSquare, November 16
November 16, 2009 12:00 PDT 20:00 GMT (your time zone). More details will be posted soon!

International Symposium on Wikis - conference report

2009-11-04T16:57:00.000-08:00

This is a source of current academic research from the International Symposium on Wikis. The paper titled "Herding the Cats: The Influence of Groups in Coordinating Peer Production?" (pdf) by Aniket Kittur, Bryan Pendleton, and Robert E. Kraut caught the eye of several people on the Wikieducator mailing list. Looks like some good reading.

Selective Twitter Status on Facebook

2009-10-30T19:53:00.000-07:00

There has been a lot of discussion recently about how to separate (and combine) participation in Twitter and Facebook. Many people use Twitter for work and Facebook for personal communication. For others this distinction is less clear. In any case, having all twitter updates appear in your Facebook status is redundant, and often annoying to your "friends". Here's a solution that might help.

Selective Twitter Status on Facebook: "Selective Twitter Status lets you update your Facebook status from Twitter - BUT you can choose which tweets you want - just end a tweet with #fb when you want to post it as your Facebook status - simple!"

Cloudworks in action

2009-10-28T07:20:00.000-07:00

At the ETUG Fall 2009 workshop in Vancouver this month, Grainne Conole from UK's Open University treated participants to a full-day workshop and plenary talk on learning design. She was also an extremely active participant in the 2-day event overall, first by helping the planning committee by creating a workshop 'cloudscape' at Cloudworks ahead of time, then by continuing to populate the various clouds with links, live blogs of sessions, comments, and keeping workshop the #etugdesign twitter stream active.

Aside from helping us to build a fantastic online resource for our 2-day event that we can continue to revisit and build over time, Grainne really modelled for our community how we can (and should!) collectively create artefacts of our activities, and find ways to involve members who are unable to travel to f2f events. And it was very interesting to see Cloudworks in action! Check it out.

Cloudworks is a site for finding, sharing and discussing learning and teaching ideas, experiences and issues. The aims are to:
enable people to find, share and discuss learning and teaching ideas
connect people with similar educational interests through social networking
provide inspiration on designing learning activities and developing resources
showcase the work of individuals and communities who want to reach existing but also new audiences
provide a place for different communities to discuss, collaborate and aggregate relevant materials, ideas and designs
encourage sharing, especially among people who have not shared learning and teaching ideas and experiences before.

The Art of Teaching

2009-10-18T10:18:00.000-07:00

This is a professional development opportunity at SCoPE for EVERYONE interested in teaching. It is free and open to the public. This event is organized as part of the Professional Learning Series, a collaborative partnership with eCampus Alberta, Alberta-North, and BCcampus. Invite your colleagues!

What: A 3-week asynchronous discussion combined with weekly Elluminate sessions on the art of teaching.

When: October 19 - November 6, 2009

Elluminate Sessions
Week 1: Intro, Bridging, Outcomes
Monday, October 19, 10 - 11:00 PDT (your time zone)

Week 2: Pre-assessment, Participation
Monday, October 26, 10 - 11:00 PDT (your time zone)

Week 3: Post-assessment, Summary
Monday, November 2, 10 - 11:00 PST (your time zone)

Facilitators:
Neil Smith, Professor, Faculty of Education, Vancouver Island University
Nancy Randall, Past Head of the Vancouver Island University Teaching and Learning Centre
Andrew Marchand, Educational Technologist, Vancouver Island University

How to participate:
Each week of this 3-week seminar will be launched with an Art of Teaching video and live discussion in Elluminate. To participate in the seminar discussion you will need to create an account on the SCoPE site. This is a quick process.

Free book on mobile learning in higher education

2009-10-15T20:31:00.000-07:00

Free book on mobile learning in higher education « Tony Bates:

"Jan Herrington, Anthony Herrington, Jessica Mantei, Ian Olney and Brian Ferry (editors), (2009) New technologies, new pedagogies: Mobile learning in higher education, Wollongong, Australia: Faculty of Education, University of Wollongong, 138p

This book is fully downloadable from here.

The purpose of this e-book is to explore the use of mobile devices in learning in higher education, and to provide examples of good pedagogy."

Thanks to Tony Bates for bringing this book to our attention, who in turn thanks Richard Elliot. :-)

The Art of Teaching

2009-10-14T07:32:00.000-07:00

TERMIUM is now free!

2009-10-09T08:40:00.000-07:00

"Until now, TERMIUM Plus®, one of the largest terminology and linguistic data banks in the world, was available only to employees of the Government of Canada and to subscribers. Those days are over! All Canadians-and all Web surfers, wherever they are-can now consult the Translation Bureau's flagship product free of charge."

Copyright: Aftermath of the Canadian Copyright Consultation

2009-10-05T17:29:00.000-07:00

eCampusAlberta, Alberta-North and BCcampus invite you to attend the second web conference in a new 2009 - 2010 Online Professional Learning Series.

When: Tuesday, October 6, 2009 13:30 - 15:00 (PDT) check your time zone

Presenters: Maureen Baron, President, Canadian Network for Innovation in Education

Agenda:
1. Context for copyright – users and developers
2. Issues for copyright in online learning
3. Canadian Copyright Consultation and Legislation
4. Course showcase
5. Upcoming events

To join the Elluminate live session on Tuesday, click the link below up to 30 minutes before the start of the session:
http://tinyurl.com/yb33utj
To log in, just type your first name, and the initials of the institution where you work (for example Bart UNBC).

You'll need an audio set up with a microphone, for example a headset with a mic, and Internet access.

If you have not previously attended an Elluminate Live web conference, please take 5 minutes well before the session and visit www.elluminate.com/support and follow the steps for first time users. A small Java applet will request access to your PC the first time you use Elluminate, but only the first time.

Randy LaBonte, Consultant and PD Coordinator for Alberta-North, will be moderating this series of practical and fascinating sessions this fall.

Copyright: Aftermath of the Canadian Copyright Consultation

2009-10-05T17:21:00.000-07:00

Open Access Week

2009-10-05T07:52:00.000-07:00

Open Access is a growing international movement that uses the Internet to throw open the locked doors that once hid knowledge. It encourages the unrestricted sharing of research results with everyone, everywhere, for the advancement and enjoyment of science and society.

Plan to participate in Open Access Week, October 19-23, 2009. Activities are planned for that week by organizations all over the world. Of particular interest is a series of noon hour webcasts organized by Athabasca University.

The objective of AU’s Open Access Week is to promote understanding, adoption, use and production of open access resources for formal and informal teaching and learning.
Athabasca University will present a series of five noon-hour webcasts exploring major issues and opportunities presented by open access. Each session will feature an internationally known promoter and developer of open access resources, research or ideas.
Each session will be offered via Elluminate web conference from noon to 1 p.m. Mountain Time (11:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. Pacific)

Monday, October 19 - The Open Access Scholar

The review, publication and interaction associated with open access dissemination of research is the focus of this presentation, featuring Dr. Terry Anderson, editor of the open access journal The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning.
http://tinyurl.com/obwmka

Tuesday, October 20 - Open Access Research Opportunities and Strategies

Much remains to be discovered in relation to the technology, economy, politics and psychology of effectively producing and using open access content. Patrick McAndrew and Candice Thiele are co-directing OLnet, an international research network designed to assist with and co-ordinate research into the most effective use of these opportunities and to gain both basic and applied knowledge relating to open access content. In this session, they will highlight research opportunities, methodologies and results of current projects.
http://tinyurl.com/npuhh7

Wednesday, October 21 - Open Access Publication

Publication models for scholarly monographs, featuring the pioneering work of Athabasca University Press, Canada’s first open access press. Dr. Frits Pannekoek, president of Athabasca University, will discuss the vision and the challenges of editing, producing and distributing paper books, while licensing the free download of the full text.
http://tinyurl.com/qne9b4

Thursday, October 22 - Open Access Archives and Repositories

Governments and research funding organizations are increasingly reluctant to fund research that is not widely distributed and affordable, creating the need for repositories through which scholars can legally distribute their research results and data. Steve Schafer, director of Athabasca University Library, will discuss how open access relates to and enhances library services. Tony Tin, founder of Athabasca University's repository, AU Space, will talk about and demonstrate AU’s growing collection and discuss the challenges and opportunities of self-archiving.
http://tinyurl.com/ogwgcj

Friday, October 23 - Open Educational Resources

The production, licensing, use and re-use of learning objects accessible through open access distribution will be the focus of this presentation. Noted author and scholar Dr. Rory McGreal will share his knowledge of the increasing opportunities and challenges associated with the open access publication of learning materials.
http://tinyurl.com/kv87un

16 Apps That Make Sharing Large Files A Snap

2009-10-02T10:27:00.000-07:00

This blog post got my attention because it was tweeted by @clintlalonde and bookmarked by Scott Leslie. It comes up quite often that we need to exchange large files with others. This list will help to zone in on the service that suits your purpose.

16 Apps That Make Sharing Large Files A Snap: "In this post, I compare 16 file-sharing services. I took three main issues under consideration when creating the comprehensive app list below: Free, Fast, and Useful . . .

Most of the services suggested require no registration. None of them will ask you to download anything to your computer, and all of them are easy to use, and worth using."

EtherPad: Realtime Collaborative Text Editing

2009-09-30T12:46:00.000-07:00

Used Etherpad http://bit.ly/xOXdr today in class with 50+ students for classwide brainstorming - worked brilliantly

ETUG member, Grant Potter, tweets some success with EtherPad today. It looks like a very useful and robust tool for the classroom or any type of group collaboration.

EtherPad is the only web-based word processor that allows people to work together in really real-time.

When multiple people edit the same document simultaneously, any changes are instantly reflected on everyone's screen. The result is a new and productive way to collaborate on text documents, useful for meeting notes, drafting sessions, education, team programming, and more.