« Offsetting some of the dangers of outsourcing | Main | Twittershow - I don't know if I want it but it's fun »

10/04/2008

Comments

Tony Hirst

Whilst I like the idea of this, I think the execution is a little confused maybe? (hah - pot, kettle etc etc!)

I think worked cases, showing examples of actual example uses/screenshots with real tools showing how to really plug them together would be interesting and maybe more useful? Certainly this is what I had in mind when we were chatting around app interop design patterns...

As it is, statements like "She saves this to her study list in her learner profile, with the tags 'vet', 'pigs', and studying it is automatically added to her To Do list in Remember the Milk, so she will study it later." confuse the issue i think? What is this study list and learner profile, how does it relate to other tools, does Ellen ever make use of it etc etc (the devil is *always* in the detail...

eg 3 months ago you'd have built this around facebokk, now twitter is the core focus; we maybe all have pounce and friendfeed accounts, but what role do they play in everyday life? what role does the learning list play?

If we try to build real worked though examples with real apps, we can maybe spot where apps or glu are missing? the 'aargghhh - it would be so handy if i could....' insights that we can use as itches to scratch in moving the sociallearning thing on...

and those itches may either be real requirements for new apps - "we need this app, that does this, and this is when i will use it, and how i will use it" - or they may be operational issues wrt apps that already exist - "arghh - i know i should be able to do this with with current apps, but can't see how to" or "arrgh - if only x had an rss output feed" or "arghh if y could only talk to z"

The other technique we might use it to mark up tools on jane's learning design list against the pedagogy principles/criteria for apps that grainne identified ( http://e4innovation.com/?p=165 ), and see if any apps could be strengthened by supporting additional prinicples in some way?

This principles view could also be used to analyse any app interop use case patterns we come up with too, maybe?

confused? I am ... ;-)

Martin

Tony, I think it's different strokes - I tend to use scenarios because they are non-techie and so more people can relate to them. But maybe for a techie audience they're a bit 'just so' (or 'so what?'). I'd love to see you do a narrative based around some of your mashups and tools. It would bring them alive and let us see how they fit in to a wider context and also as you say, where the gaps are.
Fancy having a go?

Brian Lamb

I see Tony's point, and those kind of fully rendered 'real tool' uses that come so fluently from the Psychemedia universe are very important.

But having said that, I see lots of value in this approach as an integral component to the task. When I get asked "what is EduGlu?" (which happens about twice a week, though half of those queries are just Jim Groom jokes) I find something along these lines is usually what gets the best response.

That said, I don't think I've ever spun a tale of demented syndication quite so perfectly rendered. Love the cultural markers you sprinkle in there... I'll need to get mulling my own scenario lest I get tagged down the line.

The idea of using a blog-meme to help flesh out a real problem is itself inspired.

AJ Cann

Our eduglu is called Joanna:

http://joannahughes.wordpress.com/
http://joannahughes.wetpaint.com/
also PebblePad - yah boo sucks!

(all works in progress)

Martin

@Brian - thanks, looking forward to yours. I expect it to contain mashup skills being learnt/taught. I still don't think I've got at what eduglu really benefits you in this scenario, so we need to build on this.
@Alan - nice, give me hope Joanna! I would humbly point out that this is all formal ed, I'm keen to explore beyond these boundaries too (although that is more a cultural than technological issue).

AJ Cann

Martin, could you unpack that last comment please?

Martin

Which bit Alan? About it being a cultural issue? What I meant was that formal, proper, accredited learning has social currency - it is recognised. Whereas informal is much more difficult to guarantee and convey. So, if we wanted to help support and surface informal learning, it's more than just technology, you'd need to find ways of having this assured and recognised, so it was worth doing.
Is that the part you wanted unpacking? And if so, is that sufficiently unpacked?

AJ Cann

That'll do fine, thanks. The OU remit is much wider than our particular remit in Leicester.

The comments to this entry are closed.

Flickr

  • www.flickr.com
    This is a Flickr badge showing public photos and videos from edtechie99. Make your own badge here.

Twitter Updates

    follow me on Twitter