Twitter in Education

I’ve been using Twitter for quite a few months now and after an initial period of scepticism, reluctance and cynicism, I am now a fully-fledged Twitter convert.

How I use Twitter

Gone are the days of Twittering about ‘eating beans on toast’ or what you’re having for breakfast. Gone too are the days of stalking Stephen Fry and other such celebrity nonsense (in my opinion).

Twitter posts are now a ‘Thought Stream’ – cataloguing and promoting ideas, news and information; sharing links, help and advice.

I use Twitter mainly for work purposes – i.e. Within the e-learning community as a Learning Technologist.

Since joining, my personal network has grown enormously and I am now following and being followed by people throughout the country and around the world – all within the e-learning community.

My knowledge and awareness of new ideas, software, developments and conferences has been opened up. I am discovering new things everyday. Blackboard 9, virtual worlds, cloud computing, teaching tools, mobile learning, new technologies – just a few of the things I have been made more aware of recently.

Here’s some good links to get you all on-board:

Presentation: Twitter in Education

What is this Twitter thing and why should I care?

50 ideas on Using Twitter for Education

Twitter and the new wave of Digital Natives

The Guardian reports on proposals to introduce the study of Twitter, Wikis and blogs into the Primary curriculum. It says:

The proposals would require:

Children to leave primary school familiar with blogging, podcasts, Wikipedia and Twitter as sources of information and forms of communication. They must gain “fluency” in handwriting and keyboard skills, and learn how to use a spellchecker alongside how to spell.

I think this is a great idea, especially as tools such as Twitter are becoming more mainstream and finding their uses in e-education. I still believe touch typing skills are pretty much essential (faster, more productive) although this recent report suggests touch screen technologies will become the norm. But I suppose this is just making the mouse and keyboard redundant.

I just hope that new technologies with in elearning are supported throughout education, not just Primary (ie. FE colleges, HE Universities etc).

Have joined Twitter

After considering the pros and cons of jumping on the Twitter bandwagon, I decided to climb aboard…

http://twitter.com/jonnycrook

I’m enjoying the ride so far.

Virtual World Wobble

Google’s brief foray into virtual worlds has come to a swift end. Google’s ‘Lively’—its answer to Second Life—has been shut down. Launched in July 2008, it offered virtual world characters, three-dimentional graphics and virtual rooms for people to socialise.

It’s quite possible Google thought there was no future in virtual worlds, certainly after the increasingly ridiculous Second Life stories being reported in the press.

Even a Reuter’s reporter has left Second Life, after concluding that there wasn’t really anything of value to report after being ’sent there’.

However, as one door closes, another one opens. Muxlim has just been launched - a Sims-style virtual world aimed at the Muslim community, with the hope of members socialising and sharing common interests.

Cloud computing Vs Personal storage

Cloud computing seems to be the buzzword du jour in the world of technology. Cloud computing is a new concept of computing that uses third party software and storage space provided by companies such as Google or Microsoft, to handle work that would normally be done on your desktop computer.

There’s certainly an interest here at the College to try and utilize this technology and the advantages are numerous: No maintenance, free storage, no software installation, no access restrictions. But while we continue to explore the options of Google Docs and MS Skydrive, there is also a backlash against using this new technology.

This Guardian article has GNU founder Richard Stallman giving his opinion on cloud computing, “It’s stupidity. It’s worse than stupidity: it’s a marketing hype campaign.“

It also has Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle saying, “The interesting thing about cloud computing is that we’ve redefined cloud computing to include everything that we already do,” he said. “The computer industry is the only industry that is more fashion-driven than women’s fashion. Maybe I’m an idiot, but I have no idea what anyone is talking about. What is it? It’s complete gibberish. It’s insane. When is this idiocy going to stop?”

Is cloud computing just a fashionable fad in computing or will it revolutionise the way we use computers?

My main concern is the security of data put in the hands of third party companies, but with an incredible amount of data already out there on personal PCs (emails, bank details) and the increasing gaffs of data security breaches from personal hardware, maybe the ’safe hands’ of Google would be a better idea?

Phasing out IE6

Scott Mallinson reports on the phasing out of Internet Explorer 6 by some mainstream web companies but warns that it might exclude users who are yet to update to a modern browser.

Shamefully, I only upgraded my work machine to IE7 a few weeks ago – although to be honest, I’m not a browser geek. I’ve only ever dabbled with Firefox and Safari.

Online Collaborative Meetings blog

I’m maintaining a blog for a work project tracking our research and developments into online collaborative meeting tools.

Read about the project here:

http://ehwlcdtproject1.blogspot.com/

Matt (Multiple Account Twitter Tweeting)

‘Matt‘ is a useful Twitter tool created by the innovative Bath based web development company Carsonified. Matt (Multiple Account Twitter Tweeting) allows you to post to multiple Twitter accounts without logging into each one everytime. Useful if you are Twittering to a work account and a personal one.

Read my friend Scott Mallinson’s excellent write up of the whole project.

Durham College Student Vodcasts

I quite like the Vodcasts featured on New College Durham’s website.  The fun, magazine style format works really well. The presentation and camera work is pretty impressive too.

It’s good to have something made by the students for the students available to download easily.

BBC iPlayer for iPod

It’s great news to hear that the BBC has launched a version of it’s excellent iPlayer for the iPhone/Touch. I regularly use the iPlayer to catch up on tv shows I’ve missed or to check out what goes on on the digital channels (can’t get digital in my flat).

You can stream programs for 6 days after they have been broadcast or choose to download the program and view and keep it for 30 days (although at 600Mb to download, it seems a bit arduous).

I’m all the more tempted to get an ipod Touch now.