The Village Green

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Open source - started in 1994 with the GNU project. Free software foundation. Course management software like Moodle. Programming repositories include sourceforge, eduforge.

Schools have limited budgets and my have to choose between buying computers or software, so if the software is free, you have budget to purchase hardware.

Two choices, desktop applications, or web-based apps. Frequently these replace common apps like Word or Pages. NeoOffice includes a database. All resources listed are cross-platform, Mac, Windows, Linux.

Helping students become better producers of information. Present better.

World Grocery, what a family eats for a week.

ZOHO writer has mathematical characters.

Glide is a flash based web-OS or desktop.

Google has a pedometer that calculates steps and calories mashed up with maps.

MIT open courseware. Free secondary education.

Redzee visual search results http://www.redzee.com

Our network was down for this presentation, the backchannel for this session wasn’t available.

http://trying2figureitallout.wikispaces.com/TIE+Never+Buy+Software+Again

We started with a ‘coffee talk’ with different subjects, such as “you can copy up to 10% of a book” or “you can copy one chapter of a book”.

Presentation outline:
*Landscape
*Fundamentals
*Exemptions
*Synthesis & Application

—————

Landscape
Copyright as censorship. Early English Law. Designed to protect the rights of the printing press owners. Also allowed for vetting process on the part of the ruling class. Statute of Anne (1710) Right to copy is limited to 14 years after which the work is placed in the public domain. Constitutional Statement on Copyright - Article 1, Section 8. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Clause

With changes in technology, copyright has increased the scope, subject matter, and duration.
Text (1800)
Work (1900)
Tools (2000)

—————–

Fundamentals
Duration is complex and covered by multiple laws. Started with 14 years with one 14 year extension. This was double to 28+28, then changed to Life of author +50 years (1976), then changed to life+70 (1998).

Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)
*Update copyright law for the digital environment
*Deals with Digital Rights Management (DRM) technologies

Copyright belongs to the creator unless the creator gives it away. Exceptions include material created as part of employment, commissioned works, and any terms of publishing.
Rights include: reproduction, distribution, preparation of derivative works, public performance, public display.

Aspects of Copyright
*Expression, not idea
*Original and fixed

Public Domain
Belongs to everyone and no one
Anyone can exercise rights of copyright holder
Also includes:
-facts
-Works of US Government
-State Governments vary

—————-

Exemptions
Teaching exemptions - TEACH Act
Fair Use
Library circulation
Library archives

TEACH Act 2002 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TEACH_Act
*Allows public performance and display of copyright works in digital form
*Specific list of accepted uses = limited scope
*Requirement PRIOR to use
Face to face
-non-profit teaching institution
-legal copy
-teaching objective linked to the presentation
Digital Transmission
-legal copy
-accredited
-mediated instructional activities
-dramatic literary works - limited
-enrolled students only
Additionally institutions must have:
-copyright policies
-copyright best practices for teachers and students
-inform students of copyrighted materials
Technology protection measures: prevents retention of work accessible after the class, unauthorized further dissemination - may not manipulate existing encryption (like watermarks, passwords, etc.)

Fair Use
Purpose - Amount - Nature - Effect on market
Fair Use checklist http://www.copyright.iupui.edu/checklist.htm
Fair Use is a legal way to infringe on copyright

Guidelines
Alternatives to Fair Use
Broadly used as policy by school districts
10%, etc.
Not law - rests on congressional intent - does not protect from litigation or liability
Face-to-face teaching exemption - teacher or instructor is present - only students - connection to course content - using legitimate content
Audience is considered, as is context, access, and attribution

RISK activity using examples in small discussion groups

Copyright and Fair Use are indicators of risk, but as educators we have an obligation to present the moral and ethical issues involved with our students and in our professional behavior.

________________

Bibliographical Center for Research http://www.bcr.org/

Heather Clark’s bio http://www.bcr.org/training/schedule/profile.php?contactid=1

Bud started with a list of a dozen online presences that represent his online life. Point 1 - location is irrelevant when living online. They represent his digital footprint. Google is one place to find your digital footprint.

Is presence synchronous or asynchronous? What components are critical to define presence?

Tools of presence include:
USTREAM.tv, seesmic, twitter, meebo, skype, facebook, jaiku, plurk, friendfeed, Pownce, etc.

Presence can be overwhelming, especially if there is an element of celebrity.

Twitter: a micro-blogging tool. A tool of presence. In 140 characters or less, tell people your story. Twitter can be connected to your cell phone. He set up a tweet to see who on the twitterverse has something to say. Twitter can be used to send and collect links. Twitter is a venue for serendipity. Bud shared some of the people he follows on Twitter. There is a level of immediacy and connection to the people where they are. Groups, companies, and other communities can also have tweets and an online presence. Even the Mars Phoenix probe has a Twitter account.

Part of digital literacy is to know that when you put anything on the Internet you give up control of that information.

Bud is now taking a picture of someone in the room with his cell phone, and emailing it to his Flickr account. He then brought up his Flickr account to show us the picture. He then tagged the image so it can be connected to other images and tags.

The next portion of the session is an open time for people to try new things with presence tools. This will be followed up with a show and tell time.

I got the opportunity to help someone get a better idea of what Twitter is and how it works, how to follow people, tweet, block people and so forth. What I learned from that is that the tools are almost simple enough, but not quite there yet. I really think they need to be as simple as an old land-line phone instead of like a new smart phone, which is sometimes too smart for me.

http://12seconds.tv/ is sort of like twitter for video. Good example of tools that interact with other tools. That too is part of presence. Another characteristic of presence is that every tool you can find will be duplicated by someone else. It is a good idea to invest some time in understanding your options. “It is educational malpractice” if you use a tool in your room that you haven’t explored yourself.

http://cybercamp.edublogs.org/ Blog for a learning community for teachers with recorded video sessions.

http://mrssheftelsclass.wikispaces.com includes a site meter. Site usage statistics are very motivational to the students.

http://lablogsapbio.blogspot.com/ Posts with links to student videos of AP Biology work on YouTube.

http://budtheteacher.wikispaces.com/Twitter+Me+This+-+TIE+2008

TIE 2008 Keynote

Keynote: Dr Jason Ohler, University of Alaska
New kids, new media, new literacies.
Started with a description of his 2nd grade teacher, an educator who understood students learn in different ways, knocking on a different door. Also thanked his high school music teacher. Our kids today are banging on the door, begging to bring in their iPods, to let us work with movies, etc. It is our challenge as educators to open those other doors for our students. Played a 15 second ring tone of music he created. What seems outrageous today, assures it will be here tomorrow.

Screasels everywhere. Screens + easels. Computer, cell, TV, movie, security cameras, 2nd life, etc. Literacy means consuming and producing the media forms of the day, whatever they are. Therefore, kids need to be able to write whatever they read. Consider words on a page, and the collage of words that is a web page.

Why has literacy changed? Read-only to write-possible time shrinking. Pervasive, cheap, appliance, furniture tools. Free stages, venues, art, story environments. Web 2.0 - Web 3.0. Web 1.0 had very few producers, lots of consumers. In web 2.0, potential for an equalization of producers and consumers. Web 3.0, the semantic web: the tagged web. Makes it possible to treat all tagged information (meta-data) as a searchable data-base.

Digital storytelling is new media narrative. It is students writing original works, using their own art, using cheap or free accessible tools in 2 to 3 minute presentations. It is all about the story. Rule of 80/20. 80% of production is done in the first 20% of the time. The last 20% takes the remaining 80% of time to tweak. If you don’t have time, focus on the first 20% and leave the last 80% of the tweaking out.

Let the students teach each other how to use the technology. Create learning communities. Ride herd on quality and wisdom. Provide feedback based on practical aspects of telling the story, such as writing, planning, media fluency, literacy blending, research, and innotivit, critique. Turn in all of the work.

Assignment metaphor. Is it an essay or a poem? If it is an essay and you can’t understand the story, fix it. If it is more like a poem, expect to be challenged.

The meta-message of the Internet is that everyone gets the opportunity to tell their own story.

Tells a great story of an adult who needs to make a presentation, and he can’t get the projector to display what is on the screen until a little girl tells him the tech work-around and the presentation comes up. Illustrates the power of story: problem (tension) + solution (resolution) + transformation (growth). Transformation is characterized by realization. Use Bloom’s Taxonomy to evaluate the effectiveness of a story.

Story is diametrically opposed to NCLB.

Shared examples of student story telling. In one, students explain how to animate a ball rolling across the screen. In another, Fox learns to be a better person in a morality play. Many others.

Storyboarding as one 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of paper with an arc of transformation. Story should fit in about 2 to 3 minutes.

Story telling process:
Plan
write
speak, record
add reserve title page
add pics
add citations
add music
add transitions

Yes of course there are concerns. Technology allows us to do anything we want to do. The question now is who do we want to be? What story do we want to tell?

Go tell your story!

Live blog from Bud the Teacher and others for another view o the same keynote:
http://www.coveritlive.com/index2.php?option=com_altcaster&task=viewaltcast&altcast_code=d8b08dce95&

http://www.jasonohler.com/

I group calling itself “I Power” has posted a couple of videos puportedly uncovering a conspiracy on the part of ISPs and content producers to turn the Internet into another version of cable TV. On the face of it, the notion is preposterous. Content providers are mostly generating revenue by advertising. Only in rare circumstances are there successful models of the content itself generating income. If one company started charging, another could easily scoop up the ad revenue by offering their content for free. It is also ludicrous to think that in this day and age of citizens journalism, that people would continue contributing content for free if someone else was charging for that content on the other end. A quick check of any facts listed (no article by anyone named Pattyn in Time Magazine sort of makes it hard to claim he is one of their reporters) blows the whole thing up as delusional misinformation that only muddies the water. We need clear and concise information around the issue of Net Neutrality, not vague unsubstantiated rumors and conspiracy theories.

The people in the videos seem sincere, and I support efforts toward securing a reasonable assurance of Net Nuetrality, but I can’t help but wonder if the whole thing isn’t some marketting scheme like lonelygirl15 turned out to be. It also reminds me of claims we hear this time of year where a political candidate will air an attack ad about himself to garner sympathy toward a cause or campaign.

Some might say that this is an example of the failure of the Internet. Others love any conspiracy that can’t be disproved. In any case, it makes for an interesting discussion about verification of information, credibility of sources, and general critical thinking applied to the Internet experience. I’m just not buying it, whatever it is they end up trying to sell.

http://ipower.ning.com/netneutrality2

The BBC News is marking the 60th birthday of what some describe as the first modern computer. Modern in this case means it had memory into which you could load a program instead of rewiring the whole thing. I’ve always been fascinated with tech histroy, and up till now, I hadn’t heard of Baby, but Happy Birthday Baby, just the same.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7465115.stm

• Main Page - Brush Schools Wiki
  
  Curriculum wiki for the Brush School District RE-2(J) in Colorado
  (tags: curriculum wiki)

Here is an interesting mashup. It logs in to your del.icio.us account, examines your tags, and offers to reduce some of the clutter. It does a pretty good job of detecting and reducing plural tags, but it still has a way to go on intelligently offering to replace tags based on the name or description. If you have a large collection of tags in del.icio.us, this tool might be helpful to you in keeping your tags organized.

http://delicious.isnotworking.com/

Interesting point of view about using Google Earth. You might want to be more careful about where you click!

CNET has a collection of images from the fourth Microsoft-sponsored Next-Gen PC Design Competition. These are really cool and innovative. If these designs end up in production, sign me up for the YUNO, a coffee mug computer that keeps you up to date with news, weather, etc. Very practical. I’ve always thought that computing needs to be simpler and everywhere, much like the ubiquitous pen/pencil cups I have in every room of the house.

http://news.cnet.com/2300-1042_3-6241967-1.html

My district is evaluating instructional management systems (IMS) and it brings to mind two thoughts. First, I’m a firm believer that data is not information. Access to data is important, but teachers and administrators need to know what the data is, what it means, and how it should inform their instruction. Data itself is just numbers. So while I applaud the potential for an IMS, we need something to collect all of our data repositories so there can be some intelligible voice from the current volume of noise, I can’t help but think that the missing piece is change in teacher practice. I’m reading Schmoker’s “Results Now” (yes, it’s a book) and if you put in crayola curriculum, you’ll still get crayola results, even with an IMS.

Second, I’m struck by an ongoing conversation in one of my online classes around the issue of online grade books. Teachers seem pretty clear about seeing the benefits of parent (and student) access to assessments and the improvement in communication between the classroom and the home. At the same time, there is a reluctance on the part of some teachers to open up their assessment information. There is concern that it opens up criticism of the assessment practices of the professional educator, and the possibility that parents will complain if their students are not receiving the type of scores they expect their child to earn.

Both of these thoughts are connected. More data is a good thing for everyone involved in the education of our students, but more is still needed. We need to know what the data really is (attendance or standards for example,) how to interpret the data (how to read the details,) and what the data says about changing the learning environment. Data is not information, but it can be helpful in improving achievement. An IMS may be a helpful step, but it won’t by itself solve the problem of moving from a crayola curriculum to a learning environment characterized by rigor, relevance, and relationships.

I’ve tried setting up a Pageflakes page as an aggregator for all of the edu-bloggers for the two sections of the class I’m teaching, and I have to say I like it a lot better than other tools I’ve used. It was very easy to set up, and the page looks nice too!

http://www.pageflakes.com/mwoolums

Thanks to a tweet from Joyce Valenza, according to Pew Internet, and their survey, I belong to the Omnivore typology group. I’ve always said you should eat anything on your plate, except mushrooms.

Omnivores embrace all this connectivity, feeling confident in how they manage information and their many devices. This puts information technology at the center of how they express themselves, do their jobs, and connect to their friends.

In which group are you?

http://www.pewinternet.org/quiz/index.asp

Thanks to Bryan Alexander for pointing out Wordle. It takes a block of text, or your del.icio.us account, and makes a tag cloud of it. I think tag clouds are cool, and sometimes make it easier to understand complex collections of words, especially for us visual learners. Below is my Wordle tag cloud for my del.icio.us account. It runs as a Java applet, so make sure you are up to date and using the newest version.

Wordle

Infocult

I’m sure this news is great for someone, but frankly, the viewing habits of two year olds should all be about the same, as in not enough to measure. Give these kids blocks, walks outside, finger paints, trips to the museum, time talking to parents, listening to or reading books, just about anything but watching TV or YouTube.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9963543-7.html