Interview with Garth Wigle (New Series - Life in the E-Learning Organization)

Welcome to Life in the E-Learning Organization, a series of interviews with e-learning and distance professionals. This week's interview is with Garth Wigle, who is involved in training for Canada's air navigation systems.

What is your name, and what is your involvement with e-learning?
Garth Wigle. I am an education specialist with Canada’s air navigation service provider looking for new ways to deliver training to a workforce of approximately 5000 people that is deployed throughout the country from coast to coast to coast. I initially became involved in e-learning as a way to continue my own edification while working shifts and traveling extensively.

I completed my Master of Arts via a combination of face-to-face and asynchronous e-learning. I also now facilitate online in a Bachelor of Education in Adult Education program with an Ontario university.

As a result of these activities, I suddenly became the “e-learning expert” in the company, hence my current focus on locating and implementing appropriate new learning technologies for training air traffic controllers, flight service specialists, and electronics technologists. My most recent project has been the acquisition and implementation of a virtual classroom platform to allow us to engage in synchronous e-learning activities.

How did you get interested in distance education?
My first foray into distance education was 30 years ago via a “snail mail” correspondence course as part of a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics.
The program was completed largely via audiocassette and mailed in assignments. The only face-to-face component would have been the required lab work. Needless to say, the long lag time between submitting assignments and receiving feedback made it difficult to stay motivated to complete the work in a timely fashion. With the advent of the Internet and the near real time communication capability of email, distance learning became a much more engaging prospect for me. Since 2000, I have garnered considerable experience both as a learner and as a facilitator in asynchronous e-learning environments.

What is your favorite new trend in distance education?
I am becoming intrigued with the idea of mobile learning: using personal audio/video devices, cell phones, PDAs, etc. to deliver just in time knowledge nuggets to people as they need them.

What is your favorite technology?
At the moment, I would say my favourite technology is the virtual classroom as it allows us to combine the personal interaction of face-to-face learning events with many of the advantages of computer-based training (e.g. reduced travel costs, engaging interactivity).

What kinds of instructional materials do you use in elearning?
In my asynchronous work I generally use assigned readings, asynchronous discussion boards, assignments, and some small group work. In the computer-based training or synchronous e-learning packages I use a combination of assigned readings, audio-visual aids, application sharing, polling, quizzes, group work, assignments, and discussions.

How do you use textbooks in e-learning?
For me, textbooks have always been additional resources in any learning environment whether online or face-to-face. In the e-learning environment textbooks may be either hard copy or electronic, but they are still resources for additional information beyond what is provided in the lesson itself. They are one place learners may go to help them make sense of the new knowledge or skill they are learning.

What is your favorite quote? or, what's a book that caught your eye recently?
My favourite quote, and one that is perhaps foundational to my personal philosophy as an adult educator, is from Einstein: “I never teach my pupils. I only try to provide an environment in which they can learn.”

Interview with Leah S. Piatt (New Series - Life in the E-Learning Organization)

Welcome to a series of interviews with e-learning and distance professionals. This week's interview is with Leah Piatt, Duke University, who is involved in corporate training and adult education.

What is your name, and what is your involvement with e-learning?
Leah S. Piatt. Relatively new to corporate training and adult education, I've been leading the way in our departmental work with e-learning. I've worked with Elluminate. I'm eagerly awaiting the day when I will get to actually moderate a class using this tool.

How did you get interested in distance education?
Some of our participants live and work an hour or more away from our training facility. We're really trying to alleviate travel and time obligations. I anticipate that e-learning will also help with the number of instructor lead classes we teach and bring about a more blended learning approach.

What is your favorite new trend in distance education?
I love the idea of continuing education via distance education. This could open up the amount of guest speakers we have both by eliminating travel time for the speaker as well as allowing someone who'd missed the session to hear the recording and view the presentation later.

What is your favorite technology?
Elluminate

What kinds of instructional materials do you use in elearning?
Power Point, Word, clip art, Snag-It, Captivate (soon, hopefully).

How do you use textbooks in e-learning?
We don't use textbooks, rather participant guides and job aids. These can be emailed before the session begins or converted to power point.

What is your favorite quote? or, what's a book that caught your eye recently?
quote: "While you teach, you learn." -- based on the words of Seneca the Younger, 4BC-65AD

book: The Primal Teen: What The New Discoveries About the Teenage Brain Tell Us About Our Kids --- Barbara Strauch

Louisiana Launches Grade-Level Expectation Training, NCLB Preparedness

Louisiana will provide teachers with online (or face-to-face) training to prepare them to meet No Child Left Behind requirements and other standards-based education and assessment. The program has been developed by the Louisiana Department of Education and consists of five individual modules, the first of which will launch September 24, 2007.

The program is known as GLEEM, which is an acronym for Grade-Level Expectations Educational Model. The program was developed by the Louisiana Department of Education (http://www.louisianaschools.net/lde/index.html), and is a statewide pilot initiative which, according to its website, is designed to do the following:

---Provide participants with a deeper understanding of the Grade Level Expectations (GLEs) and the state comprehensive curriculum.

--- Enable participants to deepen their understanding of effective instructional practices by exploring research-based strategies and instructional resources.

---Broaden participants' knowledge of standards, benchmarks, GLEs, and technology by applying them in the development of standards-based lessons and assessments.

--- Explore the potential of learning communities as they relate to professional development and student learning through collaborative learning experiences.

GLEEM is offered to participants in the form of five learning modules which may be taken sequentially as a series, or standalone. Upon successful completion of each module, each of which requires approximately 2 weeks, if taken online, the student will receive credit for continuing education and professional development.

Module 1: An Introduction

Module 2: Effective Classroom Practices

Module 3: Enhancing a Standards-based Lesson Plan

Module 4: Effective Assessment Practices

Module 5: Making the GLE Connection

While the courses are offered face-to-face as well as via the internet, the online version provides individuals with an opportunity to develop a learning community. Participants may be K-12 teachers in Louisiana, or individuals who are interested in the following:

Obtaining a deeper understanding of the grade level expectations and Louisiana’s state comprehensive curriculum;
Increasing his/her understanding of effective instructional and assessment practices as they relate to the comprehensive curriculum; and
Obtaining a deeper knowledge of standards, benchmarks, GLEs, and instructional technology through applications in the development of standards-based lessons and assessments. (from the GLEEM website)

The GLEEM program is impressive and it correlates well with the stated goals, vision, and mission of Paul Pastorek, Louisiana State Superintendent of Schools, who articulated his commitment to teacher development in his statement issued in July 2007.

Louisiana continues to meet challenges in the post-Katrina era, and GLEEM to be an inspiration for all states facing change and challenges.

Articles of Note: What Caught the Corgi's Eye... Aug 24, 2007

We dig through databases, online journals, an e-learning magazines for online learning articles of interest. In this weekly series, we present a few articles that you might find useful, thought-provoking, or simply interesting.

Instead of simply giving you the citation, we'll provide a brief overview and synopsis of the article. We hope you find this to be helpful!

Articles that caught the Corgi’s eye this week:

Ndasi, H. (2006) The use of innovative methods to deliver technology education laboratory classes via distance learning: A strategy to increase enrollment. Journal of Technology Education 17(2): 33-42. http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JTE/v17n2/ndahi.html

Ndasi reports on advances in the delivery of technology education laboratory classes using distance learning. The author addresses the decline in technology education and suggests that distance education can help correct the problem. “Technology education programs with a history of hands-on learning at the undergraduate level have been slow to implement distance learning techniques and strategies” (Ndahi, 2006, p.34).

The author analzyed where attempts are being made to incorporate distance lab classes and found that they include engineering mechanics, environmental monitoring, electronics, heat transfer, thermodynamics, strength of materials.

Instructional technologies and lab course delivery methods utilized include two-way audio and video, compressed video, Internet CDs, virtual software (simulations), and videotapes.

Instructional events and activities studied included learning kits, demonstration labs (especially if / when too dangerous), field trips, and residential and summer schools. The study concludes that the effectiveness of distance learning in replicating technology education laboratories is mixed. There is a need for more technology to result in more sustained student engagement. Assessment is very important as well.

The author concludes that technology education laboratories delivered via distance learning can be effective, and that they are improving. They, however, should not replace face-to-face labs, but should represent an alternative form. The study seems to reinforce a hybrid model of education.

Simpson, V. and Oliver, M. (2007). Electronic voting systems for lectures then and now: A comparison of research and practice. Australasian Journal of Education Technology. 23(2): 187-208. http://www.ascilite.org.au/ajet/ajet23/simpson.html

The authors report on the results of two separate literature reviews on the use of electronic voting systems in online education, the first conducted in 2002, the second in 2006. They also compare and contrast the results, with the goal of finding strategies to address the problem of lecture-dominated online learning: “Lectures are still seen as the dominant form of teaching and are associated with the tendency to emphasize content transmission over student engagement (Simpson & Oliver, 2007, p. 188).

The search included indexes of journals and scholarly publications, as well as web-based search engines. In 2002, the study found that electronic voting systems were often used in science and engineering disciplines. In 2006, articles had also been published on the use of electronic voting systems in economics, management, psychology, philosophy, medicine, and statistics. In 2002, electronic voting systems were used mainly in large groups. In 2006, large groups still prevailed, but small groups were also beginning to use them.

The electronic voting systems helped students and instructors know more about themselves and each other. On the instructor side, the systems helped the lecturers increase their understanding of the students and gauge effectiveness. On the student side, the systems helped them understand the material, check their knowledge, gain an idea of instructor expectations, and helped mastery of difficult materials. Pedagogically, the systems address the fact that content transmission is not the most effective way to teach, and that in order to achieve student learning goals, it is important to improve student engagement and to provide quality feedback. The electronic voting systems address those pedagogical issues. The electronic voting systems also can be used in order to provide an environment of constant attunement and to help improve teaching and teaching methods.

Falowo, R.O. (2007). Factors impeding implementation of web-based distance learning. AACE Journal, 15(3), 315-338. http://www.editlib.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Reader.ViewAbstract&paper_id=21710

This is a good web-based distance education overview for a person who is new to web-based learning and who would like to have an idea of definitions, history, contexts, opportunities, expectations, and challenges. The article begins with current definitions of distance learning, and then follows with a discussion of the demographics of distance learning and characteristics of distance students.

The reader will find basic, yet useful discussion of student, faculty, and organizational institutional barriers. Student barriers include technological problems, lack of instructor feedback, and ambiguous directions. Faculty barriers include legal issues, copyright and ownership questions, perceived negative impact on the pursuit of tenure, lack of prestige, inadequate training. Organizational institutional barriers include undercapitalized and under-funded distance learning efforts (insufficient personnel, supplies, budgets), lack of funds, lack of training and technology, and finally, course quality concerns.

The article provides a very nice overview, especially for someone new to the field, or an administrator who is seeking to add distance education to face-to-face offerings. This is not a report on the latest research, but a useful overview for newbies.

About the Corgi (the Queen's companion animal of choice):


The Corgi digs through databases, online journals, an e-learning magazines for online learning articles of interest. In this weekly series, we present a few articles that you, dear reader & faithful E-Learning Queen (or King), might find useful, thought-provoking, or simply interesting. Instead of simply giving you the citation, we'll provide a brief overview and synopsis of the article. We hope you find this to be helpful!

Learning with Audio: Lessons from Television - Monk, House, MD, and NCIS

Borrowing the "in media res" techniques of popular programs, Monk, House, and NCIS, among others, can help make online and untethered mobile learning more effective. In the early days of e-learning, it was common to tape a classroom lecture, digitize it, and then stream it over the web for students to view. Sometimes it was synchronous, and one had the opportunity to use a whiteboard and text message. Needless to say, that approach was quickly discredited as passive. To solve the problem, designers started adding overlays of learning objectives and outcomes, along with review questions at the end.

Podcast / downloadable mp3 file

Television technique: switch to "in medias res." Literally meaning "in the middle of the thing," this technique is employed in almost all programs designed for television, as well as a significant percentage of feature-length films. It's a familiar technique: the viewer is catapulted immediately right into the middle of the action, usually a dramatic pivotal moment upon which the rest of the plot is constructed. For example, in NCIS (Naval Criminal Investigative Services) a spin-off of JAG, the episode opens with a 2 or 3-minute dramatic situation, usually resulting in a murder. The investigation of the murder is what constitutes the rest of the episode.


NCIS
Similarly, in House, M.D., the episodes open with a medical crisis, which takes one by surprise. We see a person going about their daily life when a catastrophic medical emergency besets them. The medical condition is life-threatening, and time is of the essence. Will the team of forensic diagnosticians be able to determine the cause before the patient dies? This adds to the urgency, as well as the emotional involvement of the viewer.

In rhetorical terms, what is activated is emotional involvement, "pathos," to use Aristotelian terms. The situation engages the emotions, and the viewer is held, rapt, in a state of hyper-involvement and hyper-identification with the victim, and the race against time.

Typically, authority is invoked in the persona of a "difficult" voice. In this case, "difficult," means that there is distance between the audience / listeners and the voice. Distance is created through formality, power differentials, subject-matter knowledge gaps, intimidation (shaming or threatening harm), refusal to be admitted to an "in" group.

The danger with this approach is that authority is off-putting, which can war against learning. Sometimes the most off-putting authority comes in the characters of "the professor" or the "scolding parent." The content delivered by the authoritative voice can be more accessible when it comes packaged in a character who begins to approach that of a tragic hero, which is to say that the protagonist hero is flawed, which makes the audience identify with him or her all the more.

To be effective, authority must be mediated with human frailty.

Gregory House, M.D., of House, M.D. is a brilliant diagnostician, but suffers from chronic pain from a nerve-damaged leg and has become addicted to painkillers.

Adrian Monk, of Monk, is a brilliant detective who can hold forth on a number of technical areas, but he never bores the audience. Instead, they feel for him, they cheer him on as he seeks to overcome his obsessive-compulsive disorder, and his grief over the loss of his wife, Trudy.

Monk

Likewise, the team of agents and investigators of NCIS are brilliant, but quirky. In fact, the concept of professorial lectures is lampooned by Special Agent Jethro Gibbs, who typically cuts off the endearing yet long-winded medical examiner, Dr. "Ducky" Mallard, and asks him to keep to what is relevant. The other technical experts in the team fare no better - Abby, brilliant in all manner of forensics - computer and biological - loves the long-winded technical explanation, which is also often cut off abruptly, with the question, "How does this relate?" stated in so many words. Special Agent McGee, an MIT graduate and computer whiz is also cut off. As an audience, we gain knowledge by seeing the theories in action, applied to the case.

In NCIS, technical details, analogues, personal anecdotal asides are permitted, but only to the degree that they contribute to an understanding of the case at hand. What this means, in some terms, is that we are looking at "situated learning" in action.

In the case of House, M. D., the fact is clear that we are observing an open critique of education, and a subversion of the typical classroom lecture, filled with professorial quirks, long-winded digressions, asides, and self-serving ego inflation in front of a captive audience.

The action takes place at Princeton Medical Center, a teaching hospital, and many of the episodes incorporate scenes from the lecture hall, where medical students regurgitate concepts they have memorized from their texts, and demonstrate that they have no idea how the concepts apply in real life.
Similarly, in the comedy series, Scrubs, hazing of the "newbies" often centers around the gap between "textbook" knowledge and situated, operational knowledge. The amount of information that is presented in a television drama, crime procedural, or sitcom can be quite surprising. It's not trivia, but is situated in a real-life or life-like setting, which makes understanding, retention, and application more effective.

In a world where distance learners are likely to be very film and television literate, it is likely that they, too, feel a deep-seated disdain for subject matter authority that is dislocated from its objective correlative, which is to say, the way the subject exists in the world of phenomena.


Scrubs

What this means to all the programs seeking to repurpose old-school lectures delivered by rambling, self-absorbed professors who managed to tape themselves at a chalkboard for 30 or 40 hours is that every dime they invest in digitizing those old assets will be utterly wasted.

The charismatic professor of the past ruled through a cult of personality, and he or she elicited all the emotions that one might expect of the leader of, say, a cult or a gang of grifters.

The charismatic professor of the untethered world of mobile learning reigns supreme by encouraging extreme identification - by imbuing authority with anti-hero or tragic hero elements. If not, the dehumanizing aspects of technology will prevail, and students will simply move on to educational interactions they find more engaging.

To conclude, a few ideas and suggestions can be made, and lessons can be learned from the failures of educational programs to interest the learners. In a pragmatic sense, what this means is the following:

a) Structure audio and video in a way that dramatically captures the imagination and reflects the very heart of the concept being presented in the module or unit. One effective approach is the "in medias res" approach.

b) Find a persona who will be your subject matter expert and make him or her deeply flawed. The flawed authority figure does not need to be morally reprehensible; quite the contrary. He or she should have flaws that are more exaggerated than those of the general public, but only to the degree that the audience finds the character to be very human, engaging, and ultimately disarming.

c) Consider moving subject matter authority around. For example, if one is discussing psychological disorders, instead of focusing on a professor who will discuss facts and figures, write a script that features a person who is suffering from one of the issues under discussion. She can discuss her condition, and the compare and contrast her situation with that of others. This allows the listeners to begin to relate to it, and to connect her situation to their own. It situates the material within a real person's experience.

Maya Angelou in Stamps, Arkansas

Maya Angelou writes a memoir about growing up in Stamps, Arkansas, in the segregated South. Her depiction is searingly honest, and it gives faces, places, and specific names and feelings to what could be viewed as the collective experience of many growing up in the South in the first 100 years after slavery was abolished in the U.S.

videography: dave feiden

As young African-American females, Maya Angelou and others are automatically relegated to the position of being marginalized by white society. The sense of being on the outside looking in is made even more poignant and harrowing by the fact that antebellum aristocratic values of European origin are imposed on blacks. They consciously or unconsciously buy into the vocabulary and practices of elitism by embroidering knick-knacks for a dowry chest, learning the rules of etiquette involved in setting an elaborate table, and using the language of the debutante to describe one’s coming of age. Such activities primarily function to reinstate difference as the only way of knowing each other, and reinforce the distance that exists between white women and the black women who present such a potent threat to them. To Angelou, the linguistic and social practices of the South are a cruel joke, particularly when the more typical role of a young black girl was to be a servant in a white woman’s home.

The young black female is considered an outsider – an outsider who possesses little or no power. Her powerlessness is illustrated when the white woman has the power to erase and then reconstruct identity by renaming. Angelou provides an example of this in the selection printed here. She is working in a white woman’s kitchen, in what Angelou characterizes as a perverse finishing school, where she learns the finer points of setting a table, etc. Her employer, Mrs. Cullinan, is descended from Virginia plantation owners. She surrounds herself with white friends who consider themselves entitled to “culture” and to be waited on by black servants, in an ugly echo of “the good old days.” The sense of the employer’s power becomes ominous with the power of naming. “Margaret” is deemed too long and is shortened to “Mary.” “Hallelujah” was long ago renamed “Glory” in a creepy echo of The Battle Hymn of the Republic.

If renaming can dehumanize, negate, invisiblize and nullify, does the act of naming have generative powers as well?

The mindset examined in this selection is one that looks closely at the way language is used to either empower or strip away entitlement or rights. Conversely, there is an awareness that one can empower oneself by naming, and it can be used for the good.

In writing about how black girls and women were subjected to nullifying linguistic and social practices in Stamps, Arkansas, Angelou also corrects the misconception that silence denotes acquiescence or agreement. The women to whom the psychological assaults are not sufficiently empowered to be able to question or counter the practices directly. Indirect rebellion seems to be their only way to resist. Thus, when Angelou considers her situation, she seeks revenge rather than rapprochement, and obtains it when she deliberately breaks a family heirloom from the old plantation in Virginia. Sadly, no one understands the message behind Angelou’s gesture, so her speaking and acting out are misunderstood and worse – processed through the unknowing and unenlightened mindset of her employer.

One does see how erasures of identity are always a part of the outgrouping process. A key lesson is that the converse is possible: ingrouping and inclusion are possible when one names oneself into it.

Angelou, Maya. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. 104-119.

Short Answer: Maya Angelou
(questions by Elaine Bontempi)

1. How was Maya marginalized by white society?

2. What does the author have to say about naming?

3. How does the author resist psychological assaults?

4. Explain the irony in the location of the author’s finishing school, and the irony of it all.

5. What was the purpose of Maya’s learning the things that she was taught where she was working?

6. Why was it so insulting for the author to be called Mary? What did this mean to her and others in her community?

7. How is the author’s status as an outsider with little or no power made evident in this reading?

8. Explain what the author meant when she wrote, “Her husband remains, in my memory, undefined. I lumped him with all the other white men that I had ever seen and tried not to see.”

9. Explain how Maya’s identity was stripped away from her.

10. What does re-naming do to one’s sense of inclusion?


see other authors: http://www.fringejournal.com

Video Clips / Vodcasts for Online Literature Courses: The Allure of the Moving Image

I started incorporating digital video in online courses about ten years ago. I wasn’t following the lead of the “streaming lecturer” or “talking head.” Instead, I filmed myself with my Logitech MiniCam and kept the discussions to about 3 minutes or less. I also recorded a number in a studio in Oklahoma City that was incredibly ahead of its time. They had the idea of being a YouTube or a Google Video, and were helping film and host digital libraries of digital video.

It was a great idea, and they even hosted the video, so that one would not need to worry about bandwidth or capacity in one’s own server.

It was not a viable business model. No one paid for the service. Worse, it rarely worked on everyone’s computer. In theory, the mpeg file could play on the latest or next-to-latest version of RealPlayer, Window Media Player, or Quick Time. In reality, users had trouble downloading the right version of the media players. Even when they could get the media player to work, for some reason, the video would not always play. Sometimes, there was insufficient bandwidth and sometimes the connection was too slow.

Times have changed – note the recent acquisition of YouTube by Google Video. Now, people regularly host video they’ve captured on their digital cameras, cell phones, or laptops on YouTube or Google Video, and they embed the video in their websites and weblogs and social networking spaces such as MySpace, LiveJournal, Xanga, Blogger, etc. They can even e-mail their video casts.

What is the difference? The difference is in the “jukebox” – the little portable media player that does not have to be downloaded, but sits inside your website and allows you to click a button and it plays. You do not even have to download the video file! What is nice, is that services such a YouTube and Google Video will optimize your uploaded file. Say, for example, you upload a 80 MB wmv file that came straight from your Fuji F-10 digital camera. If it is in Google Video, your viewers can download the file to their iPod. When they do that, the file is converted into a mp4 file, which might have 4 MB instead of 80 MB. Amazing!

The bottom line is that basically everyone can capture and incorporate video in their websites, and basically everyone is.

The fact that the video will play does not mean that it is of high quality, though. In fact, there may actually be very little educational value beyond engaging initial interest.

So, it is good to look at where we are, and to review the fundamentals of using instructional media for positive educational effect. I’ll use the case of an online literature course, because it makes an interest example of how something that is essentially textual (a work of literature) translates to the moving image, with audio, often with spectacular success. There can be spectacular failures, too – and we want to avoid those.

videography: dave feiden

Video Clips in an Online Literature Course: What Works

*--Create ideal conditions for learning by capturing the students’ attention. Say something provocative about the work or the author. Find the heart of the issues that surround the work and focus on them in order to engage your reader.

*--Arouse emotions and curiosity.

*--Do not drone on too long. Keep it short – usually between 45 seconds and a minute and a half. Remember, you’re engaging the learner and trying to inspire him / her to want to delve in to the text and also to ask questions and engage in a dialogue, even a debate.

*---Go for sizzle. Have fresh settings, nice backgrounds, interesting venues.

*---Keep it real. Students respond in a positive way to the real presence of their professor or a subject matter expert, and if it is a bit rough around the edges, it comes across as authentic.

*---Try for the human interest angles. Find intriguing factoid about the author or the work itself and mention it. Establishing a connection with your viewer within 3 – 5 seconds is absolutely critical. In those first seconds and nanoseconds, the viewer makes the decision whether or not to pay attention or to switch to something else. You have 5 seconds to get their attention. Do you like challenges?

Video Clips in an Online Literature Course: What to Avoid

Here are a few natural mistakes that will result in less-than-ideal implementation and outcome.

*--Don’t focus your eyes on the ground or the sky. Keep your eyes on the camera. The direct eye connection makes a difference.

*--Avoid the “talking head” approach. It doesn’t work! Talking heads (a head that fills the screen and drones on and on) do not engage viewers. Learners become passive and stop paying attention, even if you think you’ve fancied it up with whiteboard.

*--Avoid the endless script. Don’t tape yourself writing on a chalkboard and trying to approximate the experience of reading. Don’t try to imitate the classroom lecture, either. Students stop paying attention.

*--Don’t read poetry from a script that you hold in your hand. I tried it. It is horrible. While watching myself, I immediately felt as though I were attending a painful poetry reading in which the poet has gone on entirely too long. I just wanted out. I clicked “pause.”

*---Don’t recite statistics. Avoid being too “canned.” Biographical details and statistics may be important pieces of information, but the mind does not hang onto them. Our minds love narrative in conjunction with the moving image. Therefore, it is good to connect the moving image with a story.

These are just a few practical suggestions from an “in the trenches” point of view. While the technology has improved immensely and it has made the incorporation of video both inexpensive and easy to use, it is clear that we are in a “rapid evolution” phase of technological development. So, keep an open mind, be willing to experiment, and keep up to date by continuously scanning the environment and trying technology.

The key is to uncover the real behaviors of your students and design a use of video that builds on how they are comfortable with using the technology.

Don’t try to impose an artificial behavior or awkward way of using technology. Instead, learn how it is being used, and incorporate that activity into your instructional strategies.

Perhaps the most compelling reason to try incorporating video clips in your online courses is that it is fun and effective! You’ll find that you are engaging students’ interest, creating conditions that are ideal for learning, accommodating learner preferences and styles, rehumanizing the e-learning space, and inspiring students to delve deeply into the text -- make connections, analyze in a new way, and think critically.

videography: dave feiden

Wi-fi and Computer Labs for Every Nursing Home Now

Podcast / downloadable mp3 file.

Prevailing views hold that seniors are computer-phobic, but the reality is that seniors use and benefit from blogs, podcasts, myspace (etc), Skype (etc), as well as from e-mail and access to the Internet. The truth is, seniors are avid users of the Internet, and there should be no reason that failing eyesight, hearing, mobility (arthritis, etc.), or cognitive disabilities should cut them off from the world, and from regular contact with loved ones – even if they are in assisted living, a nursing home, and no longer able to live at home or with family. In fact, assisted access to the Internet could serve as powerful motivation to stay intellectually engaged with the world, to maintain healthy habits, and to combat the loneliness and depression that often follows a senior as they move into their new habitat.

Granted, the man or woman who came of age in the 1940s or 1950s has seen huge changes in terms of communication, information dissemination, and technology. Chances are, they came of age in a time when all data entry and processing was done by someone else, and the computing capacity you hold in the palm in your hand used to require a city block of computers.

Nevertheless, we tend to forget that older citizens do not categorically resist technological change. How could they? If the stereotypes were true, not one senior would be able to function in a society that has been typified by rapid and persistent technological change.

After reading an article about elder neglect in nursing homes, I started to think of how one could help combat the problems. After discussing the issue in an online forum, I started to formulate a few ideas about how to start implementing access to e-mail, etc. in a nursing home.

Here are some of the benefits of having a three or four-station computer lab with a college intern tech-support person to help, and with low-vision and low-hearing equipment, with accommodations for mobility issues and cognitive impairment.

1---Stay in touch with relatives.
-send and receive photos and movies of relatives
-send and receive daily updates from relatives and friends, which can provide a real boost to the senior, who now has something to look forward to.

2---Overcome disabilities due to low vision, low hearing, arthritis, cognitive issues
-using large icon navigation on 17-inch monitors gives seniors a renewed sense of self-efficacy and self-determination;
-Skype and other voice-over telephony can help with low-vision, especially with the kind of headphones that fit over hearing aids; vodcasts and image-enhanced telephony can help gain a sense of a real person on the other end of the line.

3---Provide updates on conditions in the nursing, which gives the administration a chance to
-showcase positive aspects and to have website and weblogs to answer questions.
-post photos to show conditions, which could be great publicity, marketing, and a wonderful generator of goodwill and a spirit of openness.

4---Answer questions via bulletin board and discussion forum.

5---Send electronic greeting cards, keep key birthdates in calendar.

6---Use expertise to design cards, create online art, providing consulting and expert advice, and otherwise stay engaged in one’s former life / area of expertise.

7---Take online courses for intellectual engagement. Popular courses could be memoir-writing, writing a historical novel, learning about alternative medicines, exploring culture, science, etc.

8---Create audio messages to download to mp3 player.

The benefits to the seniors and to the nursing home / assisted living center could be staggering. The first benefits might be an alleviation of a sense of isolation. It could serve as an effective intervention for those who are running the risk of running beginning to develop negative beliefs about themselves, and to think of themselves as helpless and isolated. With a well-equipped lab with equipment that accommodates disabilities and special needs, it would be possible to create a sense of access, empowerment, and renewed self-efficacy. Instead of being cut off and isolated, seniors could feel a renewed sense of community and could feel vital, alive, and relevant to their family, friends, and the world at large.

I’d like to see a couple of pilots started and would love to get involved. If anyone would like more suggestions or ideas, please contact me. susan at beyondutopia dot com

[seniors, wifi, nursing homes, assisted living, assisted access for assisted living, elder-computing, eldercare computing]

Fighting Intrusive Thoughts Using Podcasts: A Strategy for Effective E-Learning

Podcasts.

(presented at INSITE, June 2006). Podcasts can be used in e-learning to combat intrusive thoughts. They can be a part of an effective self-regulatory strategy which also accommodates multiple learning styles while overcoming intrusive thoughts and the anxiety that accompanies them. As a result, academic performance can improve, while increasing self-concept and self-efficacy.

For the full article, please visit Proceedings of the INSITE Conference:
http://proceedings.informingscience.org/InSITE2006/ProcNash137.pdf

Best Practices Gaps, Part I

Podcast.

Best practices and online learning benchmarks are good, but limited. They fail to identify the places where institutions are likely to fall short, and they do not provide the kind of information that one needs when all systems fail, and students, faculty, support staff, and administrators are at their wits' ends because demand has outstripped capacity, and the only way to meet commitments is to go desperately into the red (fiscally speaking), and to ignore learner outcomes, although they are now mandated by the State in which the institution makes its home. This article explores gaps. This is Part I.

Committed Institution

Overview. The learning organization must prioritize distance and flexible learning, and in doing so, must demonstrate support that is realistic, appropriate, timely, and expandable for the future.

Possible Gaps.

---Program "force-fit" to institutional mission.
In their eagerness to offer online courses and programs, institutions may force-fit the program to the institution's vision and mission. The vision and mission of a university may be grounded in face-to-face interactions, and the philosophy that underlies the instructional strategy may require an environment that the faculty and staff understand only in terms of face-to-face instruction, or in traditional bricks and mortar arrangement. This becomes problematic because it creates a culture gap within the institution.

Although there may not be open resistance, the institution could find itself confronting underground backlash, and troubled with factions, divisive camps, and a breakdown of the vision itself. In this case, the institution must remember that it is reshaping the vision, and for it to be effective, all stakeholders must have buy-in. In other words, they need to have a role in shaping it, and mapping it to their own lives and agenda.

---Revenue generation perceived as more important than the education experience provided.
Although there are few people who believe this any more, the early days of online education were typified by the academic equivalent of get-rich schemes. Later, it became clear that the initial investment of online courses can be steep, and it requires ongoing maintenance and operating expenses, as well as what can be quite steep costs for instruction and student services. When expectations are not met, there is a tendency to try to retrench and cut costs. What results is a focus on costs rather than quality. Further, it becomes tempting to outsource services and to obtain open-source content that has not be reviewed or adapted to one's own instructional and institutional goals.

Learner-Friendly Environment

Overview.
Students, faculty, and other users find the services provided by the learning organization easy to use, accessible, and thorough. The learning organization provides online services such as registration, records, bursar, and library access. Technology utilized is up-to-date and appropriate for the user's actual environments and work patterns.

Possible Gaps.

---Ambiguous needs assessments. A successful online or hybrid program requires clear and realistic alignment with learner needs. In order to accomplish this objective and to attune courses and delivery with learner needs in the present (and not the past), it is important to utilize multiple methods of collecting data to gain understanding of the needs of the students. Current needs are important, as are what are projected to be important needs in the future. Focus groups, online surveys, random surveys, and interviews are effective methods and should be done on a regular basis.

---Always a half-a-beat behind the technology curve. It is false economy to have outdated technology, or to think that investing in online infrastructure is a one-time expenditure. Some of the most common ways that institutions find themselves behind the technology curve are:

-Insufficient bandwidth, and no plan to do "edge computing" to "load-share" surges in volume.

-Old, unworkable home pages and portals, with outdated java applets, javascript, etc.

-Old websites using out-of-date plugins (old versions of flash or shockwave, etc.)

-Failure to update software, holding on to old versions of learning management systems.

-Failure to hire adequate numbers of appropriately trained staff, support staff, and faculty.