Customized Education

ASU grad Stephen Dubner, coauthor of Freakonomics with Steven Levitt, is now doing a regular Freakonomics podcast for the New York Times (see the Freakonomics blog here). The latest freakonomics radio broadcast is a fascinating look at how we can customize education through an algorithm similar to how Pandora picks our music. This episode centers on “the thrill of customization” — that is, how technology can enable each of us to get access to what we want, whether it’s music, or education. The focus of the podcast is a very creative New York City Department of Education pilot program called School of One. The School of One is an experiment that is currently only being used in an after school setting, but it brings us to the edge of a very exciting time in education. It moves technology to the center of decision making about what works best for a given student, and then partners technology with excellent teaching to optimize the best teaching and learning modalities for each kid. Can this algorithm really work for millions of school age students? Does Pandora work for you?

You can go here to listen to this great podcast.

You can learn more about School of One here.

Individual Project - A Virtual Book Club for Kids and Teens

This individual project for web 2.0 is something I would love to pursue in more depth over the summer. I admit that I have not given it the time or attention to detail that it deserves. My basic idea is this: create a virtual spot for kids and teens to share ideas about books with friends and peers. This site would include a variety of tools already in place on the web, but not coordinated, not necessarily easy to find, and certainly not as user friendly and intuitive as kids need them. Some of the key activities I hoped to integrate were crowdsourcing in the form of sharing knowledge about books, audio and video development in the form of book trailers with sites like animoto and prezi. I would like the site to be a social networking hub in the form of things like messaging, chatting, creating groups, sharing favorites, reviewing, and ranking. I also wanted to incorporate blogging and microblogging, creating mash-ups, the use of tagging and sharing bookmarks, and geotagging, and use existing web-based applications that kids will enjoy, and most importantly foster collaboration.
Now, if I knew how to make all that work, I would not be in this class. I have learned a lot, but have a lot more to learn. So, I created a simple mock up of a site, made my own logos, and linked to sites that do some of the things I would like this site to accomplish. I introduce to you Literati.org. Stay tuned for more updates.

Geotagging with nature....the evolution of GIS

Geotagging of images and media involves assigning geographical identification metadata to the image. Geotagging is a form of geospatial metadata consisting of latitude and longitude coordinates, and sometimes more complex data like altitude, etc. This very specific metadata can help users find images taken near a given location by entering latitude and longitude coordinates into a geotagging-enabled image search engine. The great power of geotagging is enabling information services which can be used to find location-based news, websites, blog or rss feeds, tweets, or countless other resources. Geotagging gives users the location of the content of an image, or other media, and conversely on some sites and web applications can show media relevant to a given location.
Geotagging evolved from the world of geographic information systems, a complex geospatial database tool developed in the early 1960’s. The Laboratory for Computer Graphics and Spatial Analysis at the Harvard Graduate School of Design was the real genesis of GIS, it is where the scientific world geospatial sciences, and the artistic world of design merged around the idea of geographic data representation. Some of the preeminent architects and planners of the world including Ian McHarg set forth the basic concepts that were to develop later in geographic information systems.
The great breakthrough of GIS data was the representation of real objects such as roads, land use, elevation with digital data. The ability to tie geospatial coordinates to real world objects allowed for the extensive development of geospatial metadata. Later, with the opening of the global positioning system (GPS), the access to geospatial data grew exponentially. This satellite-based navigation system is made up of a network of 24 satellites placed into orbit by the U.S. Department of Defense. GPS was originally intended for military applications, but in the 1980s, the government made the system available for civilian use. GPS works in any weather conditions, anywhere in the world, 24 hours a day, and it is extremely accurate through the use of satellite triangulation. Originally the system required a complex unit, often accompanied with a large antenna system for accurate use. Today, gps receivers exist in every cell phone, and almost any mobile electronic device.
Of course, one of the great advantages of all of this metadata is the ability to link the quickly growing world library of online digital images. The work that Blaise Aguera y Arcas is doing with seadragon at Microsoft is astounding. The visual clarity is phenomenal, and the grace of the movement in the interface is also remarkable. When Google purchased Keyhole in 2004 they made amazing strides in the field of geodata analysis. The emergence of Google Earth, and the associated tools, including streetview, have changed the way we deal with spatial information. Now, with the alliance of microsoft and yahoo, Bing mapping and flickr are offering amazing capabilities, and most importantly ease of use to the end user.
When I was an undergrad, my favorite professor liked to call geography “the science of the obvious”. It is in effect, everything that surrounds us. Combine that simple idea with the capability to manage immense amounts of data and metadata about everything that surrounds us, and the ability to capture spatial coordinates from satellites, and digital images of amazing clarity and quality, and you arrive at the brave world of geotagging, marching right in to the future of the obvious.

Couchsurfing - "doveryai, no proveryai"

My experience with couchsurfing goes back to my days as an ultimate frisbee player, well before the couchsurfing site existed. The ultimate community is a very informal group, sharing an interest in a sport played for fun and friendship rather than money and fame. Tournaments happen all around the country and teams travel great distances to play, often couchsurfing in the homes of host team players. I have slept on couches in Charleston, Savannah, Charlotte, Blacksburg, Washington, Philadelphia, Chicago, and more. I have had more than 10 players from other towns sleeping all over my house, including on my screened porch. Some of my best friends are people I have met through ultimate tournaments and couchsurfing. In the old days, the game depended a close knit community and trust.
Couch surfing has occurred informally, in more than just ultimate, for thousands of years, but the modern internet version started in 2003. The site started when the founder had a plane ticket to Reykjavik, Iceland and could not afford a hotel. So, he stayed on a friend of a friend's couch and found it was fun. Today there are 1.8 million couchsurfers in almost 71,000 cities worldwide. According to the site, there have been 4,649,018 positive experiences, which is about 99.8% of all member experiences.
Over 80% of these are under 35 years old, about half of couchsurfers living in Europe. Most of weekmonth, the service is free, but donations are encouraged to support the work of the site.
Some call couchsurfing a movement toward a kinder and more connected planet. It seems most couchsurfers are looking for new connections, and to add new social experiences. Most reviews talk about extraordinary kindnesses of strangers on their couches, but some the occasional poor guest. Mostly you read about amazing people participating in the lives of the homes they are staying in, how they immediately involved themselves into their families- helping with dinner and washing the dishes afterwards.
As all this relates to our class, research about social networks consistently shows that people with larger social networks are healthier, happier, and live longer. Of course, those who attend church regularly also fair well in these areas, and this is likely due to the social connections and fellowship that follows worship services. Nonetheless, this is a very real social network, and a way to build real long term relationships with strangers.
One of the most important aspects of couchsurfing is the trusting of a stranger. Obviously this trust must always be based on information. There is an old Russian proverb "doveryai, no proveryai" that translates as "trust, but verify." The couchsurfing site is based on reputation and verification. New couchsurfers must earn verification, and be “vouched” for by other couchsurfers.
Overall, couchsurfing is a great social experiment, a test of community building and trust. Now that I have kids, I am a little more prone to seek verification, but I hope to formally participate in couchsurfing again soon.

Web 2.0 gap analysis

My original objectives needed more specificity about building my knowledge base and understanding of web 2.0 concepts.  At this point in my academic career, I need to recognize that much of the learning comes from pursuing what I have been exposed to and see in a class like web 2.0 and Social Media.  I certainly have learned a tremendous amount about communicating through social media, but how do I implement that in my classroom?  How can I best inspire reading and writing using these tools? Is it through the use of wiki's and blogs? Can I begin to incorporate handheld technology, what would that look like with my students? What about podcasting, or digital storytellling? It is up to me to actualize these goals based on what I have seen here.
DI mentioned a previous comment about "academic rigor".  The class was challenging, and certainly had a lot of useful material and activities.  The assigned readings, the TED lectures, the youtube videos, all had their own intellectually stimulating quality.  Were they directly aligned and linked with established pedagogical research? Would that have made them more useful?  Probably not for me, I enjoyed the more conversational approach which encouraged peer learning and a lot of sharing. We were asked to join and participate in a number of social media sites that dealt directly with implementation of web 2.0 tools and concepts in education. At a workshop recently I was asked to align certain web 2.0 tools with pedagogical theory, this was interesting and eye opening. It felt a bit forced, and in this class I was able to explore and learn, later I can think about how theses tools work in terms of educational theory.
I would have liked to address implementation more directly in class, but cannot define how that would have happened. Just as I know my teaching style must adjust in this quickly evolving web based environment, my learning style and expectations must be adjusted as well.

The last mile...making it real

Tonight I had the pleasure of attending the Asheville "Town Meeting" about our effort to win the Google fiber initiative. My goal was two-fold. First, selfishly I hoped to actually meet many of the people involved in the initiative face to face for the first time, as I have been part of the google group, facebook group, followed the twitter feed, and more. Second, I am so excited about the process, regardless of whether we get it, this is an amazing participatory drive in our community, and yes I would love to get 1 gigabit fiber in Asheville. About 300 hundred people gathered at the civic center banquet room to discuss how Asheville positions ourselves to get Google here. So, our mayor, a great lady named Terry Bellamy, kicks off the meeting and says "Google needs us", they need our creativity, and our initiative, to show this fiber roll out could work. Well, she thinks big, what can I say. I have to agree that our little hamlet is full of creative types, and not short on initiative, mainly due to the people attracted here by the natural beauty, arts scene, and maybe our 13 micro breweries. There is a local t-shirt that reads "If you are too weird for Asheville, you are too weird", gotta think Google would like that one.
We hear from a panel of local experts, including Hunter Goosman of ERC Broadband. Hunter discusses the "last mile principle". The "last mile" or "last kilometre" is the final leg of delivering connectivity from a communications provider to a customer. The last mile is the most cost prohibitive, sometimes costing more than hundreds of miles of fiber run point to point, due to labor and logistics.
Anyway, my first goal was a great success. I met Jose Ibarra of Applied Solutions Group, or H0zae, as he goes on twitter. H0zae is the key driving force behind the Google Avl initiative. I also meet Gary of gsocialmedia.com, possibly the most prolific tweeter on the planet, certainly in the AVL. I talked to many old friends, and got to finally meet some of the social media gurus of my community. I will be meeting with Jose soon to discuss an education strategy for Google AVL.
I thought the last mile was appropriate for this "tie the worlds" part of web 2.0. Getting together online with these guys is so easy, but actually meeting, and beginning to work together on an exciting project is less so, but once done, it really starts to bring it all home.
I will be blogging more about Google AVL soon......

An expanding universe?

A Private Universe is a video documentary of Harvard grads, alumni, and faculty being largely unable to detail what causes the seasons of the year or the phases of the moon. Their views were sometimes based on the correct fundamental idea, but were an incorrect understanding of the facts. Why had they never solidified their understanding of these basic principles of astronomy and geography? Had they carried these incorrect concepts since grade school, or somewhere along the line unlearned what they previously understood. I was left asking of the Harvard grads, did they used to know, had they never learned, or had they learned these principles incorrectly.
In his speech at TEDxNYED on Saturday, George Siemens, author of Knowing Knowledge which is a study of how the context and characteristics of knowledge have changed, argued that what we see in A Private Universe is an issue of "conceptual failure". Siemens argues that "the inability on the part of individuals to share and shape their understanding of a subject through discourse with others causes erroneous or errant concepts that could be eliminated through social interaction."

Siemens contends "the scientific method offers a response to faulty connections, offering a long history of creating a transparent structure whereby connections are validated and evaluated." Traditionally, educators have lead students to meaningful and useful information via the curriculum (scientific method), and helped them build understanding through socialization (the classroom).

Web 2.0 and New Media change the equation. Rather than the educator creating a linear series of lessons within a tightly structured curriculum, learners build knowledge and understanding as part of what Siemens calls "peer participative pedagogical practice". Students make sense of content via social and technological connections. The educator still has an instructive role, but now the responsibility moves directly to the learner in terms of how they interact with the information and their peers.

Siemens argues that social media rebuild a sort of lost "small group" socialization that existed prior to modern production and transportation networks. Prior to mass movement via mechanized transportation networks, and mass production of goods and food, core knowledge was validated in a small group within a family, a village, a farming community, a church, where people discussed these matters, and provided peer instruction. In a mechanized world these validation tools break down, and things like the cause of the seasons lose relevance and importance.

In a new world of social media, sites like Delcious, Facebook, Ning, and products like blogs, podcasts, and now Twitter represent an increased exchange of information and a possible reconstruction of social systems. The new media tools allow socialization that sort of recreates traditional small groups and communities. These technologies offer a link to our social, networked, small-group past. Siemens thinks these tools represent a recreation of "a past centered on the social sharing of information and making sense of the world together."

The promise of this idea in the abstract is limitless. Our ability to network, recreate shared sense of community, not based on geography, but on ideas and values, is exciting and potentially powerful. The visualization tools are well beyond the power of television because they are not unidirectional, the viewer can now react, and interact in a way traditional video lacked. The capability to share text, audio, and images, holds incredible potential. Thus the sharing of ideas and knowledge and information could grow in an almost limitless manner.

Yes, but were these small networks of our agrarian past always accurate in the information they shared and validated? Didn't isolation lead to bigotry and racism? Didn't some of us hold on to outdated, unscientific ideas for hundreds of years based on religious tradition and fear? I am shocked when I hear my 10 and 11 year old students tell me that President Obama is going to take away their guns. How do they know, their parents read it on the internet. In how many blogs could I go to read that global warming is a myth? Can misinformation be spread just as fast or faster using new media? Can wrong ideas become ingrained by a sense of shared community in a new media environment. Instead of a private universe, could it just turn in to a shrinking universe?

In a modern new media world, does it really matter if you know what causes the seasons? As long as you know they are coming and can adjust, isn't that all that matters. Does it matter if you accept an idea that is incorrect without questioning the validity of the idea?

This is a fundamental challenge to those of us who want to see new media tools reach their great educational potential. To overcome the pitfalls of small ideas, and fulfill the potential of new media tools with a great cacophony of big shared ideas. To make a social media landscape that inspires a great pursuit of knowledge and information, that leads the way to true reconnection of community around the shared goal of the common good.

Map image from Wikicommons:
Planisphaerium Coeleste, by G. C. Eimmart (first published in 1705, copy probably by Matthäus Seutter, c. 1730); 56.5 x 49 cm
Date Augsburg, c. 1730
Source http://www.jpmaps.co.uk/map/id.32893
Author
Georg Christoph Eimmart (1638(1638)–1705(1705)

Map is part of the public domain