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Wed., Sept. 29, 2004
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IN THIS ISSUE
VIEWPOINT
NEWS & PRODUCT UPDATES
CASE STUDY
TECH NOTES
READER RESPONSE
Sponsors
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CMS and ePortfolio: At the Crossroads
By Stephen R. Acker
The Ohio State University
Course management systems offer powerful support for teaching, but
they truncate student learning at the end of every term. ePortfolios
offer a longitudinal learning environment in which a student can
organize and maintain learning connections, but they may lack the
orchestrated vision of an experienced educator. These alternate
structures for capturing, evaluating, and reflecting on student
work should intersect on the student’s desktop to deliver a
powerful multiplier effect to an institution’s eLearning environment.
The CMS has entered the elite ranks of critical infrastructure components,
joining e-mail and payroll as required systems to meet the demands
of a majority of higher education institutions. It is easy to
understand why; the CMS provides indisputable value to the teaching
function. A well-designed course site packages a syllabus, calendar,
access to grades, assignment drop boxes, and perhaps content and
class interaction opportunities all in one convenient place. A
faculty member who skillfully uses CMS gains in both efficiency
and effectiveness.
Read more
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Nobel Prize Winner and bepress Launch The Economists’ Voice
The Berkeley Electronic Press announced the launch of The Economists’
Voice, an electronic journal of economic analysis and opinion.
(bepress)
Read more
Blackboard Has Great Penetration in its Market
According to Business Week, more than half of U.S. colleges are using
Blackboard technologies, and it sees Blackboard’s future as a rosy one,
despite competition from the Sakai Project. (BusinessWeek Online)
Read more
Amazon.com Taking Aim at Google--“Search Engine with Memory”
Launched Tuesday, A9.com offers users “the ability to store and
edit bookmarks on a . . . central server computer, keep track of
each link clicked on previous visits to a Web page, and even make
personal ‘diary’ notes on those pages for viewing on subsequent
visits.” (New York Times)
Read more
Don’t Mess with Librarians
Here’s a sign from the resistance to the Patriot Act, spotted in a
public library: “Q. How can you tell when the FBI has been in your
library? A. You can’t.” (Wired News)
Read more
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“Unified Engineering” Marks Publication Milestone for OCW
By Jon Paul Potts, MIT
The MIT OpenCourseWare Initiative now lists more than 900 courses
on its Web site. One of MIT’s most venerable, “Course 16.01:
Unified Engineering,” showcases the active learning and integrated
curriculum goals that are the benchmarks of OCW. This signature MIT
Aero/Astro course is the largest ever published by the OpenCourseWare
initiative.
Mention this famous course from the MIT Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics
to any MIT Aero/Astro grad from the last 30 years, and you are certain to get
a knowing nod.
It is the bane of every MIT Aero/Astro student’s sophomore year--combining
the disciplines of Materials and Structures, Computers and
Programming, Fluid Mechanics, Thermodynamics, Propulsion, Signals
and Systems, and Systems and Labs, into one year-long course
designed to introduce the systemic nature of aerospace engineering…
And now it is the biggest course ever published--by far--on the MIT
OpenCourseWare (OCW) Web site. The Web site for Course 16.01-04:
Unified Engineering I, II, III, & IV marks a major publishing
milestone for MIT OCW, and is enabling the MIT Aero/Astro Department
to share its unique pedagogical approach.
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Don’t Look Now: Here’s A Computer Stalking the Tip of Your Nose
Want to move a mouse around without using your hands? Some software for that
tracks movements of your mouth or eyes but the latest takes an image of your
face and tracks 25 or so pixels by their brightness. Shades of Samantha! (NewScientist.com)
Read more
ePortfolio Workshop Hosted by George Mason U. October 15-16
The workshop is designed to provide an implementation plan and practical knowledge
of how to use the technology, gained from hands-on practice
with hierarchy and template use and development.
Read
more
From the Reader Response Forum
Are LMS Anti-Web?
Posted by: cameronloudon - Austrailia
Recently I have been following the blog
of Dr Peter Sefton who described MIT's
Anti-web Learning Management System, Caddie as anti-web. He returned to
this theme in a later entry called 'Links considered too difficult for online
education software' (http://ptsefton.com/blog/2004/08/06/implementingims).
What interests me most is that this observation could be applied to all the
major players in the LMS space. Why do we need an LMS to be a file system repository
for PDF and Word documents? Is that the best that can be offered to students?
Read more
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