Prue Salter’s Blog: Exploring the Power of Technology as a Learning Tool

Even though I explained in an earlier post why I decided to go with creating my own xml file and hosting my own audio files, I wanted to share on last thought on iTunes U.

Launched in 2007 (and that is about as much info as Wikipedia has - I have an untested theory that you can measure the popularity and how well-known things are by the amount of info on wikipedia…) this is Apple’s attempt to bring some academic respectability to the concept of iPods. Even now when I suggest to students they could put their study notes on their iPods they laugh - to them iPods are a fun tool and not to be confused with learning!

Apple is cleverly trying to merge the two perspectives by providing academic institutions with a means of distributing their material in a user-friendly fashion for students - a format and site they are already familiar with.

Here is how Apple describes iTunes U:

iTunes U puts the power of the iTunes Store to work for colleges, universities, and other education organizations, so users can easily search, download, and play education content just like they do music, movies, and TV shows.

Apple shares common goals with education—to advance teaching, learning, and research through innovation, and to engage and empower students. Students, as well as instructors and staff, expect a campus environment that accommodates their digital lifestyle, adapts to their individual learning and teaching needs, and encourages collaboration and teamwork. iTunes U provides a way to meet all these expectations.

Based on the same easy-to-use technology as the iTunes Store, iTunes U features Apple simplicity and portability and is designed as a service for institutions to manage a broad range of audio, video, and PDF content, and to make it available quickly and easily to students, instructors, staff, alumni, and, optionally, the public.

With iTunes U, users can access educational content, including lectures and interviews, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Users can browse content and download it to their computers, Mac or PC, regardless of their location. They can then listen to and view that content on their computers or transfer the content to an iPod, iPhone, or Apple TV for listening or viewing on the go.

With the iTunes U easy-to-use interface and web services, instructors and staff can easily post, change, and share content on their own without impacting their IT department. Instructors can also set a page to allow students to upload their own content for review or to share with other students in the class.

http://deimos.apple.com/rsrc/doc/AppleEducation-iTunesUUsersGuide/Introduction/chapter_1_section_1.html accessed 15th October 2008

My prediction, this is eventually going to be really really big. The early adopters are already in there and exploiting the technology to the full. But it will not take long before institutions automatically have an iTunes U page just like they have a website. Apple has the advantage of already having an easy to use organised interface in place and has set up good structures for institutions - allowing them to create specific courses and to tailor their iTunes U site to the needs of their learners.

So even though it was not the right match for my purpose, iTunes U gets a big tick from me.

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Some years ago, in a burst of Internet marketing enthusiasm, I purchased Camtasia, a product that allows you to record your screen as you navigate through with a voiceover. But I never got around to doing anything with it.

 Sometime later and now I needed a video tour of my site. So I decided to look at the available options and work out whether Camtasia was really the best option for what I wanted to do. Lots of people had lots of suggestions. So here is what I discovered.

First I followed a few dead ends:

• Profcast was my first lead. But Profcast is more for recording powerpoint presentations or podcasts.
• SnagIt sounded great - but it is just for static screen captures.
• Screencoder turned out just to be something written by some anonymous guy with lots of support complaints as far as I could see.
• XVidcap is an open source alternative but it only works with Linux systems, no go.
• Screenflow seemed liked an effective and cheap option but only for Macs.
• CamStudio 2.0 is an open source alternative but it only outputs to avi and I was wary again of support issues.
• vNc2WF was a free alternative for capturing what you are doing on the screen but you had to add the audio later which was a pain for what I was doing.
• Windows Media Encoding has a recording feature but output is only as a WMV file.

So it came down to 3 options:

- Captivate (by Adobe for around $600)
- Camtasia (by TechSmith for around $300 - but I’d already bought it anyway)
- Jing (also by TechSmith for free!)

<My thoughts after exploring these options are:

• If you are looking for interactivity, quizzes, keyboard shortcuts, highlighting text, being able to print out slides, then Captivate is for you. Of course there is a trade-off for all this functionality, file sizes are big. But this is a great product if you want an interactive demo or a training experience.
• But if you are interested in something like a product tour (which is more what I was after), Camtasia is the better option. Although it doesn’t have the same level of interactivity available (for example you can do a quiz but can’t get feedback on your results instead the answers are sent to a lms or email) there is a huge amount of functionality. You can spotlight part of the screen, have background music, zoom in, choose the output size of the screen, record audio during the screen recording or add it later, use a web cam to insert a speaker, zoom in to part of the captured screen, edit and trim video easily, and you can also have clickable flash hot spots which take you to a certain section of the video or to an external web page.
• Another benefit of Camtasia over Captivate to my mind is that you can output to lots of different formats whereas with Captivate you can only output to swf (which you can’t upload to places like YouTube etc).
• The other thing I like about Camtasia is that the recording is all happening in real time. If you want to have the screen still while you talk about a feature that is what happens. But Captivate works differently. It only takes screen captures as the screen changes, so it is capturing a series of screens each containing a mouse click or significant mouse movement. But adding audio is much more cumbersome. Many users have reported problems adding audio and trying to synchronise the audio recording done later with the images or taking the time-consuming path of adding audio to each slide/section. 

So my path seemed clear. I had made the right choice in Camtasia. My $300 had not been wasted after all. 

I started creating my tour. It was relatively easy to learn and after all I did not need lots of special features, this was just to be a straightforward tour. After quite a few attempts I finally got a version I was happy with. I chose a viewer/player size and uploaded it. Despite the fact that the tour was less than 5 minutes long the file size was almost 20MB. It took so long to load the video (in fact I gave up waiting a number of times). So back I went to the drawing board. I made a shorter version. But it was still a couple of minutes long (if it takes less than 60 seconds to do the tour then there is probably no need for a tour!). It was still a huge file. So then I tried reducing the size of the viewer. It still took too long to load (and was too small to see).

The problem is that there is a lot happening on the screen and constant changes. This means a much larger file size. If you are filming someone a plain background and a person who doesn’t move too much will take much less file space then one with a changing background and lots of movement as the screen has to keep changing all over rather than just making incremental changes.

My next option was to use TechSmith’s hosting service Screencast.com. But it was not cheap and you are charged on bandwidth. Well with 60 schools of 500 kids that is 30000 potential users, I could be served with a hefty bill especially as I had no idea how much use the tour would get. I didn’t want to take the risk.

It looked like it was time for Jing to step up and be counted.

Why did I have to be so thorough and explore all options? Why didn’t I just go straight to Jing? I can see why so many people recommended it.

This is what I like about Jing:

• Jing is incredibly easy to use (the hardest part is the installation which takes awhile as you have to install Microsoft.Net as well). Click on the sun, choose your screen section and away you go.
• Jing gives you 2MB free space on Screencast.com. So with Camtasia (made by the same people as Jing, they released Jing in 2007) you pay for the product and pay for Screencast.com. With Jing it is free and you get 2MB free space on Screencast.com. Go figure.
• You can also save the video on your computer, on your server or send to flickr etc.
• It is a very user-friendly piece of software it is hard to stuff it up. The creation of the product and the uploading is integrated making it a very seamless process.
• You can send people the link where the video is or you can embed onto your web page.

So why is TechSmith giving Jing for free when it is so great? Well it is not perfect…. I guess the theory is you’ll like Jing but then say but gee I’d really like to do this this and this so the next natural progression is to purchase Camtasia.

Here are my problems with Jing:

• You can’t resize the screen to be viewed. If you recorded it as a 400×300 picture it will be displayed as 400×300 which is a pain when you are recording full screen but do not really want to display as full screen. Videos can only be viewed in the dimensions they are recorded.
• There are no keyboard shortcuts to start recording, pause or stop recording. So you have the mouse at one end of the screen and you are ready to finish but you have to see the mouse being dragged down the screen towards the stop button.

Some things that bother other people (but are not an issue for me):

• Maximum length of the video is 5 minutes.
• The video ends with the Jing logo.
• No real editing facilities if you don’t want to do it all in one go.
• You can’t add sound later.
• Only output is swf.

But for my purpose, Jing was fine. My only concern is what happens if you go past the 2MB bandwidth per month limit. Does the video just stop showing? I have put a query in to tech support but no reply yet.

So my thoughts are. See how I go with the existing video in terms of bandwidth. If it is a problem, reduce the video size and track the usage. If I can get a handle on the usage then I can decide whether it is viable for me to open a paid Screencast.com account and advance to the extra functionality of Camtasia.

PS. One last thought. Your recording is only as good as the hardware supporting capture. I have one laptop where the fan whines and another where it loads the web pages really slowly. Not ideal for screen recording. And despite trying a number of microphones, even the expensive ones do not give perfect sound quality. Plus when you live in a small apartment where traffic noise and even the noise of the lift start to intrude on the quality of the recording you realize how a professional recording studio would make a world of difference. Plus I bet they don’t have two cats meowing and hurling themselves at the door because they are desperate to know what exciting things you are doing in there with the door shut!

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An interesting experience when you create your first podcast.

I had decided I did not need a script as I felt very confident I knew what I wanted to say.

So off I went. It ended off being 7MB and lasted about 7 minutes. I discovered that even with pointers of what I wanted to say, if I wanted a tight recording, I did need a more scripted approach. I found that I was repeating myself at times and the ending was very weak.

So I wrote a script and recorded it again. This time it was about 3MB and 3 minutes (hmm, around 1MB per minute?). Despite being half the length, I still covered the same content. Just in a less waffly way!

So here are my first two attempts:

Without scripting:          With scripting:    

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Once you have recorded your mp3 file for your podcast you can either:
- Put it on a site that supports an RSS feed.
or
- Put it on your own site if you have one and create an RSS file that will then allow people to subscribe.

So what is RSS? Really Simple Syndication content can be read easily by software that will collect all your downloads for you. Once you have subscribed to a feed (by entering in the feed’s link into the reader or by clicking an RSS icon) the software will check regularly for updates and download anything new. Clever heh!

Here’s the Commoncraft explanation:
.

You can also see it at: http://www.commoncraft.com/rss_plain_english

The most common formats for feeds are RSS and ATOM (although I rarely saw Atom mentioned anywhere). All web feed formats are based on XML (Extensible Markup Language) which is a text-based language used to describe and distribute data. If you are familiar with HTML at all, it is not too difficult to work out what is going on in XML code.

Why did I decide to go down this path? Wouldn’t it be easier to just upload my files to a podcasting site where all this RSS stuff is done behind the scenes?

Yes it would be. But as I run a subscription based site I really wanted my audio files, like my video files, to be hosted on my site rather than an external site. I already have my own site, space is not an issue. If you didn’t already have a website I don’t think you would bother going down this path. But every month we currently have to check anything that is on an external site as we have had issues with links changing, things no longer working and so on. By creating my own RSS file I would have much greater control over my content (not that I am a control freak, ok, maybe a little bit of a control freak). I could also choose how I wanted the files set up and how I wanted them formatted.

So I worked out that I needed to create an RSS file and upload that file and my audio file to my website. Some sites save the file as .rss but the majority save the file as .xml. I decided to go with the majority.

I found that a number of sites offer a service where you type in your info and it will supposedly create the RSS file for you. Lovely! Well none of those worked perfectly (the best was probably http://www.feedforall.com/) but when I looked at the code from these I started to see a pattern. So I checked out the code on some more sites that offered podcasting and eventually worked out a basic structure. I much prefer if I know what the code is doing as it makes it much easier to then change.

 Here is my version of the code (cobbled together from multiple sources!) if you’d like to try. You would work on this file in something like notepad and save it as an .xml file.

 <?xml version=”1.0″ encoding=”UTF-8″?>
<rss xmlns:itunes=”http://www.itunes.com/dtds/podcast-1.0.dtd” version=”2.0″ xmlns:atom=”http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom”>
<channel>
<atom:link href=”LINK TO YOUR XML FILE” rel=”self” type=”application/rss+xml” />

<title>YOUR PODCAST PAGE TITLE</title>
<description>DESCRIPTION OF YOUR PODCASTS!</description>
<link>YOUR WEBSITE</link>
<language>en-au</language>
<copyright>Copyright 2008</copyright>
<lastBuildDate>Wed, 23 Aug 2006 00:56:00 GMT</lastBuildDate>
<pubDate>Sat, 25 Mar 2006 11:30:00 -0500</pubDat>
<webMaster>YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS (MAY ALSO HAVE TO PUT NAME IN BRACKETS)</webMaster>

<item>
<title>FIRST PODCAST TITLE</title>
<link>LINK TO THE PODCAST PAGE</link>
<guid>LINK TO THE MEDIA FILE</guid>
<description> DESCRIPTION OF PODCAST</description>
<enclosure url=”LINK TO THE MEDIA FILE” length=”36864″ type=”audio/mpeg”/>
<category>Podcasts</category>
<pubDate>Sat, 25 Mar 2006 11:30:00 -0500</pubDate>
</item>

<item>
<title>SECOND PODCAST TITLE</title>
<link>LINK TO THE PODCAST PAGE</link>
<guid>LINK TO THE MEDIA FILE</guid>
<description> DESCRIPTION OF PODCAST</description>
<enclosure url=”LINK TO THE MEDIA FILE” length=”36864″ type=”audio/mpeg”/>
<category>Podcasts</category>
<pubDate>Sat, 25 Mar 2006 11:30:00 -0500</pubDate>
</item>

</channel>
</rss>

You would enter in all your own info in the CAPS sections. You would also need to change data like the length of the file and the date information (I have left the date info in the format you need to include it - the last bit refers to time with reference to GMT time). To add another new podcast, you’d just copy and paste the section between <item> and </item> and change the relevant info then upload the RSS file again and the new media file.

It took some time, like many many hours, to come up with the above code.

It is also a good idea to test that your code works and there are free sites that let you do this. I got some strange errors from some of these, then one that worked best for me was: FeedValidator.org at http://feedvalidator.org/

 Of course, nothing is ever simple, even though my code was supposedly valid it still wouldn’t work. Eventually I worked out it was the password protection on the site causing the issues so changed the location of my xml file and then had no problems.

 I tested the feed three ways:
1. By clicking on the RSS feed and checking it worked in Internet explorer.
2. By subscribing via my aggregator (Netvibes).
3. By selecting ‘subscribe to a podcast’ through iTunes.

Because iTunes is one of the most popular ways of managing audio files, I decided to do all I could to make my feeds iTunes friendly.

This meant adding additional code:

 Just before the each first item I added:
<itunes:author>Study Skills Handbook</itunes:author>
<itunes:subtitle>Podcasts about study skills. </itunes:subtitle>
<itunes:summary>Podcasts about study skills. These podcasts cover the skills you need to be successful at school. </itunes:summary>
<itunes:owner>
<itunes:name>Study Skills Handbook</itunes:name>
<itunes:email>info@studyskillshandbook.com.au</itunes:email>
</itunes:owner>
<itunes:explicit>No</itunes:explicit>
<itunes:image href=”http://www.studyskillshandbook.com.au/images/additionals/icon3.jpg”/>
<itunes:category text=”Education”>
<itunes:category text=”K-12″/>
</itunes:category>

and for each item, after the publish date tags but before the </item> I added:
<itunes:author>ELES Study Skills Handbook</itunes:author>
<itunes:explicit>No</itunes:explicit>
<itunes:subtitle>Study Skills </itunes:subtitle>
<itunes:summary> All about study skills.</itunes:summary>
<itunes:duration>00:24:30</itunes:duration>
<itunes:keywords>education, studyskills</itunes:keywords>

 Some more resources on this topic:
http://www.rss-info.com/
http://www.rss-specifications.com/rss-specifications.htm
http://radio.about.com/od/podcastin1/a/aa030805a_3.htm

 Now if this all seems like WAAYYY too much effort for you, the next post I will look at what I think is the best option for the non-technies among us, iTunesU.

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As the Master of Education at UTS draws closer to the end I am getting excited about my study for next year.

Ok so I plan to start my PhD next year (topic still slippery but something around online learning) but the really exciting bit is that I am also doing a TAFE course - Certificate 11 in Animal Care (why is there no Cert 1, only Cert 11 and Cert 111, don’t know) through Taronga Zoo. Talk about opposite ends of the educational spectrum.

Taronga Zoo took awhile to process my application and I started getting worried, the form said that you need NSW School Certificate, perhaps with almost 5 higher degrees they had decided I was too overqualified! But I have been accepted and start next year. In addition to a fortnightly class I also do 12 practical days during the year at the zoo. I know the website says that it is not all playing with baby animals instead lots of scooping up poo, but…. I am going to get to play with baby animals!  I am sure they didn’t mean it about the poo.

Will also be interesting as some of the students I now run sessions for end up going to TAFE instead of Uni and I make the point that the skills I am teaching around study skills are relevant regardless of which direction they go. So it will be interesting to see if there are other skills they need at TAFE style courses that I do not currently address. Also interested to see where TAFE fits on the scale of spoon-feeding at school versus a more independent approach needed at uni.

Did I mention the baby animals?

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I thought I’d share all the resources I found most useful when exploring podcasts:

HOW TO PODCAST TUTORIALS AND ABOUT PODCASTING:

I think these are my favourites:
- http://aquaculturepda.wikispaces.com/podcast
- http://www.how-to-podcast-tutorial.com/00-podcast-tutorial-four-ps.htm
- http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/help.htm
- http://radio.about.com/od/podcastin1/a/aa030805a.htm

But these have some good stuff too:
- http://ourmedia.org/node/273304
- http://www.podcast411.com/page5.html
- http://www.guidesandtutorials.com/podcasting-tutorial.html
- http://www.macworld.com/2005/04/secrets/junecreate/index.php?pf=1
- http://homepage.mac.com/ilife06/learn/learn-to-podcast.xml
- http://learninginhand.com/podcasting/index.html
- http://learninginhand.com/blog/2006/03/videos-about-podcasting.html
- http://chatt.hdsb.ca/~magps/boylit/Podcasting%20in%20Education
- http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-10163_7-6246557-1.html?tag=nl.e404
- http://www.stager.org/podcasting.html
- http://schoolofpodcasting.com/
- http://www.jasonohler.com/storytelling/storytech.cfm#power_of_music
- http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/audiovideo/sites/about/pages/recordingothers.shtml

AUDACITY RESOURCES:

- http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/
- http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=ccc0b7577fcc340bb99f
- http://audacity.sourceforge.net/manual-1.2/tutorials.html
- http://aquaculturepda.wikispaces.com/Podcast4
- http://etc.usf.edu/te_win/movies/audacity.html
- http://audacityined.wikispaces.com/
- http://www.audacityteam.org/wiki/index.php?title=Audacity_Wiki_Home_Page
- http://audacity.sourceforge.net/help/faq?s=install&item=lame-mp3
- http://www.lifelonglearner.us/other/audacity/
- http://www.guidesandtutorials.com/audacity-tutorial.html
- http://www.how-to-podcast-tutorial.com/17-audacity-tutorial.htm
- http://altec.colorado.edu/howto/audacity/aud_hlp01.shtml

GARAGEBAND:

- http://www.apple.com/ilife/garageband/
- http://www.apple.com/support/garageband/podcasts/

MUSIC

- http://iodapromonet.com/login.php
- http://www.freesound.org/
- http://www.sounddogs.com/
- http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/
- http://www.shockwave-sound.com/
- http://www.pbtmlive.com/
- http://www.sounddogs.com/
- http://www.musicbakery.com/
- http://www.soundsnap.com/
- http://bumpermusic.blogspot.com/
- http://www.podsafeaudio.com/
- http://magnatune.com/
- http://www.archive.org/audio/
- http://www.archive.org/details/opensource_audio
- http://www.podsafeaudio.com/
- http://www.cinemavolta.com/daily/index.html
- http://www.pdxbands.com/podsafe/
- http://ruccas.org/
- http://www.resources.bravenet.com/audio_clips/
- http://www.jamglue.com/
- http://www.audionetworkplc.com/
- http://ourmedia.org/learning-center/open
- http://delicious.com/kolson29/freemusic
- http://collaborationnation.wikispaces.com/Music+and+Sounds
- http://freeplaymusic.com/
- http://soundtransit.nl/search/
- http://www.flyinghands.com/
- http://www.archive.org/details/etree
- http://incompetech.com/m/c/royalty-free/
- http://www.soundclick.com/default.cfm
- http://www.artistserver.com/music.cfm

HOSTING

- http://www.odeo.com/
- http://www.podomatic.comand
- http://www.blip.tv/
- http://www.houndbite.com/
- http://www.divshare.com/
- http://www.easypodcast.com/
- http://www.esnips.com/
- http://www.gcast.com/?nr=1&&s=90753817

PODCASTING DIRECTORIES

- http://www.ipodder.org
- http://www.itunes.com
- http://www.podcastalley.com
- http://www.podcastcentral.com
- http://www.podcast.net
- http://recap.ltd.uk/podcasting/index.php
- http://epnweb.org/
- http://www.learnoutloud.com/Podcast-Directory
- http://www.podcastbunker.com/
- http://teacherspodcast.org/

PODCASTING EXAMPLES

- http://www.heppell.net/bva/bva3/sandaigschool.htm
- http://mylcpodcasts.blogspot.com/
- http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/default.aspx
- http://www.englishcaster.com/idioms/
- http://www.meaghersphysics.podomatic.com
- http://meaghersclasses.podomatic.com/
- http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/
- http://kinderteacher.podomatic.com/
- http://www.abc.net.au/rn/edpod/
- http://www.summahistorica.com/podcast-archive.htm
- http://itunes.stanford.edu/
- http://www.adrianbruce.com/acekids/index.htm
- http://thedowns.edublogs.org/category/podcasting/
- http://mrmayo.typepad.com/podcasts/
- http://www.mpsomaha.org/willow/radio/index.html
- http://bobsprankle.com/blog/
- http://web.mac.com/michael_cowling/
- http://www.radiowaves.co.uk/
- http://bhwilkoff.podomatic.com/
- http://podcastbangla.blogspot.com/
- http://www.mpsomaha.org/willow/radio/index.html
- http://web.mac.com/michael_cowling/Classy_IT/Podcast/Podcast.html

SOME TECHNICAL STUFF

- http://ourmedia.org/node/273297
- http://digitalmedia.oreilly.com/2006/10/26/quickstart-digital-audio-editing.html
- http://www.profcast.com/public/index.php (a more professional recording tool)

LEGAL GUIDES

- http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Podcasting_Legal_Guide
- http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Image:Podcasting_legal_guide.png

PODCASTING READER

- http://juicereceiver.sourceforge.net/

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After immersing myself in podcasting sites and info for the last six weeks I have come to a number of conclusions:

- There is a huge amount of information on the web about podcasting (too much!).
- Most of the sites pretty much say the same thing although some make the information clearer than others.
- As with most things on the web, there are very fewstandards and multiple paths you can take to reach similar outcomes.
- Podcasts vary widely in quality, content and style and purpose. As one site aptly explained, you could cough into a microphone each week and upload it and call yourself a podcaster.
- There are many levels of complexity, you can choose either not to worry your pretty little head too much or you can delve deep into the complexities of codecs and compression and all sorts of audio quality issues.
- The best podcasts are those where the style is most suited to the content and the audience needs.

So here is my summary for those who don’t know much about podcasting:

A podcast can now refer to both audio and video files that are available on the web for listeners to subscribe to. If you just upload an audio mp3 file to your website for people to download then technically it is not really a podcast. The term podcast implies that it is part of a series of media that is uploaded over a period of time and that it gives the listener the ability to subscribe the subsequent podcasts so that updates are taken directly to the listener (rather than the listener having to come back all the time and check if there is anything new available).

Of course, Commoncraft gives the best explanation:

.

Here’s a short version of what you will find on the web about how to podcast:

i) Plan first what you’d like to cover in your podcast.
ii) Record any audio files (most popular applications appear to be Garageband and Audacity).
iii) Edit the audio file, adding or deleting elements (but being careful of copyright).
iv) Save the audio file into mp3 format.
v) To host your podcast you can either upload your audio file to a site that supports podcasting or create an RSS file that will allow people to subscribe to your podcasts and upload the audio file and the RSS file to your own site. (Don’t know what RSS is? Don’t worry, more on this in the next post.)
vi) Decide what supporting material and evaluation/comment process you might provide.

On my next post I will be explaining my trials and tribulations of what I discovered when I chose to walk down the RSS path myself (I may need to wear a wig for awhile until all the hair I tore out in frustration has grown back….).

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Today I spent an unmentionable amount of hours trying to yet again organise the mass of links/resources/info I have collected, been referred to or recommended. I am slowly getting closer, at least my categories in delicious are starting to make more sense to me – I must have renamed, re-organised the tags a multiple of times now, but I think I am starting to get a system I can get a handle on. Unfortunately there is still a huge mass of resources I haven’t yet had time to tag.

Information navigation skills are essential for our students, but so are information management skills! There are just so many resources and great sites available to us now, I barely have time to tag and organize them all – much less actually explore them. And there are so many great resources I’d love to have a decent look at. So my new system in delicious is that tags that are sorted and I can refer to when needed are differentiated from those that I still have to spend some time exploring (the ones to be explored yet have an * at the end of the tag).

The tag bundles in delicious are great for me as I can group my tags in related bunches: http://delicious.com/pruesalter

I have also put a selection of tools on a page on this blog: http://psalter.edublogs.org/tools/
Although I haven’t explored them all in detail, at least I am getting to know what is out there. Any other suggestions or comments on existing tools on this page are gratefully received!

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A school in Sydney has trialed a new form of assessment task where students are able to take in laptops with Internet access, mobile phones, MP3 players for use during the exam.

Read the story here: http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2008/s2341549.htm

 The theory behind this decision was that this would allow the school to assess skills that were relevant to the modern world. Rather than just sticking to 19^th century style pen and paper no-info-allowed-in-exams to test how good your memory is, this style of assessment aims to test students’ ability to find information, assess its reliability and cite it correctly.

This makes perfect sense. I remember a wonderful story about Henry Ford I once read. During the war, a Chicago newspaper published editorials calling Henry Ford (among other things) an ‘ignorant pacifist’. Ford objected and brought a suit for libel. The paper’s attorneys placed Ford on the stand to prove he was ignorant and fired off a rapid series of questions at him including things like ‘Who was Benedict Arnold?’, ‘How many soldiers did the British send over to America to put down the rebellion of 1776?’. Eventually Ford tired of this and basically replied (not exact sorry as from memory): ‘Look, if I really wanted to answer any of these foolish questions, I have a row of electric push-buttons on my desk and by pushing the right button I can summon to my aid men who can answer any question I might have. Why should I clutter up my mind with general knowledge when I have men around me who can supply any answer I need?’

And our ‘electric push buttons’ have come a long long way since Ford’s time.

Our assessment system in Australia needs a radical overhaul. Although the NSW Year 12 HSC exams do test more than just memory skills (you do have to be able to apply the information) there is still a large component of memorization necessary. So you may be a fabulous essay writer, but if you don’t have the content packed away in your head, if you haven’t memorized the dates and the quotes, then unfortunately your wonderful essay writing skills are all for naught.

The other issue teachers face is that the syllabus is packed to the rafters with content. It would be lovely to be able to go off on a tangent and explore more relevant skills but the reality is that in the senior years teachers have a duty of care to prepare students for what is essentially a set of university entrance examinations. It is a challenge to just complete the course in most subjects, much less do anything extra.

Something else that concerns me is that the university entrance mark is composed of 50% exam mark and 50% school based assessment. My understanding for this change (when I did the HSC it was 100% based on the final exam) is that it allows students who do not perform well in exams to showcase their abilities in other forms of assessment. It was also supposed to take the pressure off the one big final exam (although my observation is that all it has done is take the pressure that students used to feel at the end of Year 12 and spread it over the entire year so they are just as stressed as they were before but now it lasts all year long - but that is a topic for another day). There are guidelines in place to try and make sure that these assessments do not just become a series of additional exams - I would question how effective these guidelines really are. When we are so focused on the final exams it is difficult to make decisions (on what to teach, how to teach and how to assess) that are not influenced by the knowledge that students must sit these exams.

So hats off to PLC for being brave enough to take a risk and try something new. If the decision makers are not going to recognize the need for updating and innovation, then it is up to the grassroots to lead the way for change.

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My current views of Learning:

 I believe that true learning stems from curiosity. We want to find out something or know more about something.  That is why children have such an open mind to learning new things – they are curious about the world! Learning does not necessarily just mean acquiring knowledge – although it does include this – learning can be a new skill, a new attitude or opinion or a deeper understanding of someone else’s outlook. To me, deep meaningful learning has occurred when you make new neural connections that allow you to do or know or think something you did not know or could not do or think before.

The factor that I think is most important is motivation – wanting to learn something is the most powerful driver of success in learning. Other factors that come into play are your own personal experiences, attitudes and ability levels. While I believe anyone can learn anything, there are limitations probably based more on belief that anything else.

My current views of Technology-Mediated Learning: