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I have not had time to check out Flowgram, but the concept sounds interesting:

A flowgram combines the advantages of slide presentations and screencasts with an interactive user experience that fully exploits the fact that almost all the information we might ever need is already on the web.

Using the zero download Flowgram Maker, creators can assemble and annotate web pages, photographs, videos etc on any topic, and add a voice narrative which provides context, emotion and consistency. This uniquely personalized package can be shared as an embeddable widget, email or as a link to either a private group or with the world. Flowgram recipients can interact with any of its pages by, for example, clicking on links, and playing and pausing videos.

Will explore this in a future post.

Hat tip to Jane's E-Learning Pick of the Day.

I'm in LT 15 attending Elizabeth Koh's introduction to wikis (and Wiki.nus) for the CS1105 wiki project. Going to live-blog the lecture. Here goes!

  • Wikis in Plain English video
     (no one's in the LT has watched it before!)
  • New way of collaboration - co-authorship
  • Editable website enabling many users to co-create a website
  • Examples
    • the famous one: Wikipedia
    • University of Leeds examples (get the links)
  • Pros
    • quick
    • flexible
    • facilitate process and form the outcome
    • convenient
  • Cons
    • info overload
    • plagiarism if citations not given
    • the fear of editing
    • wikis tend not to be too aesthetically pleasing
  • Wiki.nus
    • Logging in
    • Updates shown on the right
    • Spaces - a wiki, in Confluence context
    • Global vs Personal Spaces

    ...continue reading →

Potential Research Project Topics

Xinyu, a student taking ES2007S Professional Communication, ruminates about potential research topics. She is aware of the inaugural eLearning Week at the Communications & New Media Programme earlier this year. So, her proposed question is:

Do students in Science Faculty at NUS support the introduction of an eLearning week to its curriculum?

The objective of my study is to determine if a majority of students in the Science Faculty support introduction of eLearning week. My aim will also be to present a report on the responses of the students in Science Faculty at NUS towards introduction of the eLearning week, to curriculum administrators in NUS science course.

My colleagues and I at the Centre for Instructional Technology would love to know the answer to that question! And if it is a 'yes', it will be both exciting and daunting for us. We started small with CNM, so ramping up eLearning Week for an entire faculty would be a challenge. Nevertheless, it is a challenge that we look forward to, if it comes to pass.

I would imagine that a full-scale eLearning Week would necessitate very simple tools. An issue we grappled with in terms of the technology being used is that in a real life situation, a forced eLearning situation might come very suddenly. With no time to prepare, we have to fall back on what we are familiar with. Faculty staff will not have time to learn new techniques/tools (some of which have a significant learning curve). The same goes with students. For example, virtual classroom solutions which we tried on a small scale may not ramp up well.

From my understanding eLearning Week in other institutions involves mostly uploaded lecture slides, with or without accompanying narration, in place of physical lectures. Tutorials are replaced with discussion forums or text chat.

I seem to be getting ahead of myself. Xinyu, if you read this and you decide on this research topic, do let us know your findings. =)

Touched base with Anand Ramchand and Elizabeth Koh from the School of Computing this afternoon to discuss their plans for the CS1105 Computing and Society wiki.

On Wednesday, Elizabeth will talk to the students and lay out the parameters for a wiki-based assignment. Students will form groups and collaborate using the wiki.

One of the things that came out of our discussion was that the students should be using the wiki not just to dump their final submissions there. Elizabeth will stress that they will be looking out for collaborative input, particularly in the form of comments. This can only happen if the students put up early versions of their work in the wiki.

So, while the end product should be relatively polished, the comments will show how they students arrived at their submission.

In a way, it is similar to that saying about the journey, not the destination, being important.

Not to say that the destination isn't important in this case... the final submission will account for the majority of the students marks!

On a related note, I want to highlight a blog post by Dr Eric Thompson, an Associate Professor at the Department of Sociology. He has been using a Wetpaint wiki for SC2218 Anthropology and the Human Condition. He discusses the issue of grading collaborative projects and how he grades the wiki-based assignment.

Must remember to check if the Most Active Contributors in Confluence takes into account the amount of edits made, rather than just the number of edits (however minor).

I found this video via John Larkin. It shows how simple and effective design can sometimes be ruined by attempts to throw everything and the kitchen sink into the mix.

Have we been guilty of this?