tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-81355392024-03-07T13:22:14.204-07:00The Edu-BloggerRick West's (BYU) thoughts about how people learn, and how we can help them learn more and learn better. Included are ideas about Instructional Technology, ISD, educational psychology, and the like.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.comBlogger112125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1164209916695932972006-11-22T08:26:00.000-07:002006-11-22T08:38:36.760-07:00Connections versus relationshipsYesterday in class we discussed social network analysis and how it emphasizes the connections existing in a network (community). One of the critiques of the method that was raised was that connections may not mean the same as relationships. I have seen this in the community of youth that I have been observing. Sometimes we see that it appears the youth have relationships with each other --but Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1163865887670386322006-11-18T09:00:00.000-07:002006-11-18T09:04:47.690-07:00Contributing to the function of the LCIn my literature review on learning communities that I am doing for Dr. Reeves' course, I discuss several ways of conceptualizing what a learning community is, including a functional concept--or rather, that every member of the community is working towards the same function or end goal. One example might be a learning community organized at work or a classroom community, clearly organized for a Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1160617089390208492006-10-11T19:35:00.000-06:002006-10-11T19:38:09.400-06:00This is not the blog you're looking for!If you are at AECT and happened to read about our BlogTracks presentation, you might have noticed I have this blog listed.This is no longer the right blog for that presentation! My BlogTracks blog is http://rickwest.edublogs.org.In the words of the great blogger, Obi-wan Kenobi:This is not the blog you're looking for. You can go about your business. Move along! :-)Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1159392515245502012006-09-27T15:16:00.000-06:002006-09-27T15:28:35.260-06:00The importance of a model for newcomersAs I was reading on page 156 of Etienne Wenger's Communities of Practice book about negotiating pardigmatic trajectories, and how these can be reified milestones or actual people, it dawned on me that Wenger was talking, in layman's terms, about how people need a model for how to perform, achieve, and become. This is something I believe strongly, and I have written up some research about the Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1158680866316565262006-09-19T09:35:00.000-06:002006-09-19T09:47:46.330-06:00Graves' three parts of learning communityI haven't been posting here as much as I should for our class. OK, I haven't posted here at all yet! I'm going to have to come up with some method for reminding myself to do this because it's kind of out of my regular flow of homework, so I need to somehow remind myself to regularly stop and post on this blog and not get lost in simply analyzing the literature.OK, first to define my learning Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1158085282313701552006-09-12T12:14:00.000-06:002006-09-12T12:21:22.326-06:00This blog is being transformed!As I posted last time, my "official" blog where I do most of my thinking about educational research has been moved to http://rickwest.edublogs.org.I LOVE Edublogs. What a great community of educational bloggers!Speaking of community, I am now in a "Community as a Metaphor for Learning" course with Dr. Julie Moore and Christa .... For this class, we are each maintaining a blog connecting our Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1155317437018941822006-08-11T11:24:00.000-06:002006-08-11T11:30:37.030-06:00Movin' onWell, since the day I entered the blogosphere and set up shop at Blogger as my first home, I knew this day would come. I'm packing my thoughts, and having them moved over to my home at http://rickwest.edublogs.org. Why? For several reasons. One, I love Wordpress and how it seems to stay a little more innovative and contemporary. Second, I like the edublogs community, just a bunch of educators Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1145629428522948752006-04-21T08:21:00.001-06:002006-04-21T08:23:48.533-06:00Prepared to playSomebody would think of designing something like this, a widget that looks like a detailed spreadsheet or important document so you can bring it up at a touch of a button to cover up that you have been goofing off at work.Sheesh! What ever happened to honest pay for honest work?http://www.tuaw.com/2006/04/21/widget-watch-hard-at-work/Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1140748525118997922006-02-23T19:23:00.000-07:002006-02-23T19:35:25.156-07:00When (future) teachers cheatIt's not at all unusual anymore to see advertisements for companies who will write your English 101 paper for you for a fee. But I was surprised to come across a website today for a company that will actually write your dissertation for you. And for only $10 a page!I had several thoughts about this:• Thought 1: Can this really be possible? Do they collect the data themselves? Do the analysis? Or Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1140709043690198332006-02-23T08:35:00.000-07:002006-02-23T08:37:23.700-07:00Computer affordancesI filed this Fox Trot comic away under "affordances of a design". It gave me a good chuckle. It reminded me of a story I heard of someone thinking the CD-drive loader was a coffee cup holder! It just goes to remind us as designers that if your design affords a certain action, you can bet somebody will use it for that action!http://www.ucomics.com/foxtrot/2006/02/23/Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1140546044561711022006-02-21T11:16:00.000-07:002006-02-21T11:20:44.573-07:00What would save me timeI just thought of a little design adjustment that could really save me time every day. I use Gmail, and I love how you can view the first few words of your email without having to click on the email. So if my friend answers my email with a "OK." or a "Got it, thanks," then I don't have to open the email because I'll be able to read the message in the standard inbox view in Gmail.What would be Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1136852196927123982006-01-09T17:14:00.000-07:002006-01-09T17:16:36.936-07:00Christmas all over again! (Macworld Expo)Forget, the CES, every mac fan is more excited about Steve Jobs' keynote and revelation of what the new, killer Apple products are.Fun comic from Foxtrot today about the excitement surrounding a Jobnote!http://www.ucomics.com/foxtrot/2006/01/09/I'll be keeping a keen ear peeled tomorrow to catch all the news!Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1136660677884820622006-01-07T11:56:00.000-07:002006-01-07T12:04:37.886-07:00The end of Slashdot?More on the quick rise and fall of technologies. I love Slashdot for its ability to inform me of technology news faster than traditional news outlets. I then learned about Digg two days ago. Now some have proclaimed Digg to be Slashdot's demise! My response was, "already?"Steve Mallett, in an article getting "digged" quite a lot lately, gives some reasons why Digg is superior to Slashdot:"Hidden Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1136660196759509832006-01-07T11:40:00.000-07:002006-01-07T11:56:36.813-07:00DVDs are dead - anyone want to buy mine?Man! Everytime I start to get a good media collection going, the media of choice changes. I still have some of my favorite movies on VHS, and am grateful you can still find a VCR in some stores. DVD is a superior format, of course, so I've been happily buying new DVDs --- alot lately, as we don't have cable right now---and now feel pretty satisfied with our movie collection. Even more, my wife Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1133825583058059382005-12-05T16:07:00.000-07:002005-12-05T16:33:03.100-07:00But isn't open discussion the point of scholarship?Do you ever feel that we're regressing instead of progressing in the move for more open discussion of scholarly ideas? As if the obscenely long journal review process wasn't bad enough ...My former school, BYU, I guess is in the middle of some controversy because a physics professor is doing research claiming that the WTC towers fell because of controlled demolition and not from the planes. This Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1133374410848013832005-11-30T11:11:00.000-07:002005-11-30T11:13:30.866-07:00Fuel alternatives?More reports today about scientists' efforts to create fuel from chicken fat:http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051130/ap_on_sc/chicken_fat_fuelDon't they get it? They're barking up the wrong tree! What we need is an invention to convert HUMAN fat into fuel. Then we wouldn't have to rely on foreign fuel imports at all! :-)Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1132409605722542952005-11-19T07:06:00.000-07:002005-11-19T07:13:25.810-07:00So what is school really about? (football)It's so encouraging to know what really drives our systems of higher education! This morning I got up bright and early to try and get some extra work done at school, and once I arrived on campus realized it was GAMEDAY. (If you don't read this blog often, I should mention I'm a new student at the University of Georgia, where they take their football, seriously).So I did, miraculously, find some Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1132247252842912602005-11-17T10:03:00.000-07:002005-11-17T10:07:32.856-07:00Call for ideas: Systemic change and distance learningI'm co-authoring a very short blurb for TechTrends on the possible impact systemic change theories could have on distance learning, or vice versa. Any ideas out there about this? I'd love to hear them as we're in the thinking stage of this right now.Here are some thoughts I've had ...- The impact of alternative degree-granting DLinstitutions on change in higher education (and K-12for that matter)Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1131658273092753682005-11-10T14:27:00.000-07:002005-11-10T14:31:13.106-07:00Some things shouldn't be done! (Star Wars musical)Well, I haven't had the most productive day today, but it's comforting that whatever I've done will hopefully be more useful than this!"The MIT Musical Theatre Group will be staging a musical version of the Star Wars Trilogy (Eps. IV through VI). There will be tap-dancing stormtroopers, singing Ewoks, etc."Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1131546099435418162005-11-09T07:20:00.000-07:002005-11-09T07:21:39.446-07:00Video blogging is upon us!Here's a fun video blog leading the way-- a group of students in New Jersey.http://www.starw.org/acrc/Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1130952151372474722005-11-02T10:14:00.000-07:002005-11-02T10:22:31.390-07:00Google's hypocrisy?A friend of mine, Rich Culatta, just vented his frustrations over Google:A year ago I thought Google was the answer to all of the world’s problems, today I’m changing my mind. I have two major frustrations with Google. The first is that they do not release any of their products for Mac users. I would pay to have a copy of Picasa for Mac if they would just port it over. Perhaps they think that Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1129827472577030592005-10-20T10:49:00.000-06:002005-10-20T10:57:52.576-06:00Reflecting on impending doom! :-)One of the exciting :-) aspects of AECT this year is the impending arrival of Hurricane Wilma this weekend. Some say Saturday, some say Monday. Some say complete destruction of Florida, some say only light rain.Who do we believe?In my carpool, we're taking day by day. we're not leaving today, and whether we leave tomorrow may depend on tonight's nightly news. We definitely do not want to pull a Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1129826985636327862005-10-20T10:43:00.000-06:002005-10-20T10:49:45.643-06:00AECT conference in OrlandoI'm here in Orlando at the Association for Educational Communications Technology conference. For some reason (perhaps the fact that this is a conference on Ed technology?) I thought there would be wireless. In fact, wireless is spotty, so my blogging this week may be spotty.And then when I get home, I won't remember anything that was said, so I won't have anything to post about! Oye!In reality, Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1129133977683518132005-10-12T09:59:00.000-06:002005-10-12T10:19:37.793-06:00Wikipedia and credibility of sourcesJust writing the title to this post almost made me gag--it seems we have too much discussion in the blogosphere already about Wikipedia and whether it is or isn't a credible resource.But here's some more thought to add to the conversation.I found it interesting this past week or two that there's been a heated debate on the EdTech listserv about this issue. This listserv is mostly read by K-12 Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8135539.post-1128601357719465542005-10-06T06:18:00.000-06:002005-10-06T06:22:37.726-06:00NVue and other Mac softwareEveryone who know me, knows I love Mac. When we talk about my reasons why, they often counter with, "Yeah, but, you can't get very much software for a Mac."That may have been true once, but not anymore.Richard Miller on theBYU Mac User Group listserv I belong to recently posted three great sites for finding free Mac software:http://www.freemacware.com> http://www.coolosxapps.net/> http://Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419451812399834547noreply@blogger.com0