SSCEL 2006 Review
Cliff October 2nd, 2006
I presented at the Southeastern Scholarship Conference on E-Learning this past weekend. This is a regional conference to talk about the distance education, educational technology, and similar themes:
The drive up was quite entertaining, listening to NPR, watching the sunset, and laughing at the irony of billboards. Then January and I went out for some food and were quite entertained at her new blow-up bed.
- It was then up early to present Friday morning. Lorraine Schmertzing, Richard Schmertzing and I presented “Enhance Teaching and Learning with Free Internet Tools,” where we discussed freeware tools that can be used in educational settings, and how students in teacher education programs responded to these tools. We had a small but responsive crowd, and Laura Wood was kind enough to moderate our unruly bunch. During my demonstration of meebo for instant messaging, my Mom popped in to ask how my trip was going.
- The next presentation was “Podcasting and Podcatching” by Dr. Andy Brovey from here at VSU. He explained the basics of podcasting, the Education Podcast Network, and gave a demonstration of podcasting using GarageBand (those crazy mac people!). Last, he showed us his work with Macademics. Entertaining and enlightening.
- The KeyNote Lunch. What a brilliant idea! Dr. Joel L Hartman (Vice Provost for Information Technologies and Resources, University of Central Florida in Orlando) presented “What Do Our Net Generations Students Expect From Us?” Hartman discussed a lot of the expectations Millennials have from the educational system, and as the slides progressed, I noticed that a lot of the behaviors applied to me. I also noticed the distressed head-shaking that many of the older faculty members were doing as each point was explained. Of course, being the loudmouth that I am, when it came to question and comment time, I pointed out that I am a NetGenner, as well as a faculty member, and that the two are often beneficial when paired together, especially since we’re teaching this generation. I also pointed out that I often have more differences in perspective with my peer faculty members than I do with students. Even if students do appear lazy/technology focused/uppity/whatever, I can tell the difference between generational culture and individual stupidity. Alas, that’s a whole other post…
- Harold Powers’ presentation, “Georgia VIEW: Selected Online Programs Overview & Vista 4 Features Preview” was a short history of the University System of Georgia’s use of WebCT and other online course management software, and a preview look at the new Blackboard Learning Systems’ Vista 4.1 (the replacement to our current WebCT Vista). I’ll be honest, it’s impossible for me to offer a favorable review until I’ve gotten into the nitty-gritty of it and seen how it works. There are a whole pile of problems in the current Vista which make it difficult to use–my number one being file management. Until I get my hands on the new one, I can’t cast a vote either way. However, Vista 4.1 appears to have some nifty new tools, such as blogging and journaling, with the ability to have students do double-blind peer reviews (This of course begs the question of having to teach the students how to do proper reviews, but I remain hopeful…).
- I was pleased to see some librarians getting some presentation time–Robin Grant and Felicia Haywood of Macon State College presented, “Scholarly Research: Only a Link Away.” I got some excellent ideas in this presentation for our library’s subject guides, as theirs seemed simplified and…well…helpful in comparison to our own.
- “Can I “Make” my Students Learn?” by Janet Orr was quite cool. She discussed her informal research into the effectiveness of using online quizzes to teach macroeconomics. She found that the addition of graded quizzes increased test scores 1-9%, but that student effort increase 39-112%. As an economist, she states, this is bad since the effort doesn’t match the reward. Following her presentation (pictures here, and video clips here and here) was a lively discussion about ways that she can improve her research and her classes–she appreciated the constructive criticism, and everyone was impressed with her research.
- Barry Monk and Blanche Presley presented “Why Pay When you Can Get It For Free? Freeware on the Web.” They showed off some free tools such as Open Office, CamStudio, and NVU. It was a fun walk-through of a lot of the freeware and open source stuff out there–many of the audience members were finding out about stuff for the first time.
Friday evening was a relaxing evening with January. We talked a lot about friends over Japanese food (with some warm sake to help!). Then we went back to her apartment to watch TV until she passed out. But watching her TV recorder (it’s not Tivo, but some knockoff) I realized that not having TV means that I miss out on a lot of the cool TV technologies–oh well, you can’t have it all!
Just in case I forget to mention it elsewhere, Macon State has a beautiful campus and beautiful buildings. I can see why folks at Macon State would be happy to work at a smaller university.
- After I got some Burger King coffee in my system, I went to Jane Zahner’s presentation, “Billboard Wild Adventures: Managing and Caputring Online Discussion Groups.” She’s an engaging presenter, and discussed with the audience different techniques for creating and managing discussions in WebCT (and other online forums). I will definitely keep my notes from this talk handy for the next time I teach an online class. A short video clip is here.
- The last presentation I went to was “The Case for Online Technology in the Music Curriculum,” by PK Ebert. She emphasized that learning is multisensory, and presented different ways in which music could be enhanced with distance learning and online tools (such as online rehearsals, etc.). She also demonstrated different tools that could be found online for free, and we had a demonstration of high-end karaoke!
I took some good notes that will serve me in the future, got some good swag, and met some interesting people. All in all, a good conference and an uneventful drive home.