How can iPods help you learn and study better?
December 7, 2009
Well, for one, you have to be open and accustomed to consuming content on a portable device. Sometimes this can be challenging because of the small screen and limited options for input. Secondly (and most importantly), you have to have a mobile device - if you’re a member of the University of Richmond faculty, the Center for Teaching, Learning and Technology can provide you with an iPod Classic or an iPod Touch to be used in your courses. You can complete the proposal form to request iPod’s here.
Feel free to a look at the OEDb’s 100 ways to use iPod’s for learning. I found #’s 6, 24, 51, 63, 72 to be quite intriguing. Let us know which ones you like!
Learning 2008 in Review
May 9, 2008
Photo Credit - Sharyn Morrow
Learning 2008 is now officially over. Despite some minor adversity, a great time was had by all. There were lots of exciting conversations and really impressive presentations.
In case you missed something, or just want to revisit something you really liked, here are links to relevant notes, slides and resources for all the presentations I could find. If you have additional material, please leave a comment and link and I’ll add it to the mix.
Thanks to everyone who attended!
Keynote
Networked Academic Conversations and the Liberal Arts - Ruben R. Puentedura, Ph.D.
- Link to Ruben’s keynote slides - PDF
- Link to an audio file of the keynote speech - 64.3 MB MP3
- Link to Ruben’s blog
See other people’s thoughts on this presentation.
- Anna C. has a great summary of the keynote up at her blog.
- Tom W. has some notes as well but they’re more erratic.
Session One
Reflection in Digital Storytelling - Kenneth Warren and Terry Dolson
Tools to Simplify Research - Andy Morton and Laura Horne
See other people’s thoughts on this presentation.
Session Two
A Blogging Bestiary - Tom Woodward, Dr. Patricia Stohr-Hunt, Dr. Darell Walden
See other people’s thoughts on this presentation.
Introducing the Digital Scholarship Lab - Andrew Torget
Session Three
Copywrong: Web 2.0, and Collaborative Multimedia Resources - Allison Czapracki
See other people’s thoughts on this presentation.
WordPress Blogs- More Than Meets The Eye
February 26, 2008
It’s easy to think of blogs as simple online journals. That’s often the way they’re portrayed in the media. The facts, however, are quite different.
Disregard the word “blog” (which sounds silly anyway).
What this server based software allows you to do is:
- quickly and easily publish websites and updates from any computer with an Internet connection
- embed all sorts of files in your site- everything from Word docs to YouTube videos
- make all this contact sortable and searchable by your audience
- build community and allow an online conversation to occur that is controlled by you
If you’d like to see some of the ways the UR community is using Wordpress check out some of the links below.
- Dr. Darrell Walden - Accounting
- Dr. David Kitchen - Paleontology
- Dr. Patricia Stohr-Hunt - Education
If you want to view some tutorials or ask questions regarding UR’s Wordpress blogs we have a support site at http://blog.richmond.edu/wordpress
Google Earth
February 21, 2008
Google Earth is an easy and effective way to make all sorts of interactive visual content. This powerful and easy to use program is useful for far more than just simple maps.
While the science and geographical uses are fairly self evident Google Earth has advantages in other areas as well. It’s been used to add historical and geographic context to literary works. There’s actually a site devoted to using Google Earth to enrich the reading experience located at Google Lit Trips.
There are huge numbers of Google Earth files available. It’s a great way to pull in recent content. You can search for Google Earth files by adding the following element to your search filetype:kmz. If you were looking for Google Earth files on natural disasters, your search would look something like this.
Google Earth is also being used in some really interesting ways in science. There’s an amazing file that tracks the evolutionary tree and geographic spread of avian flu. There’s a video here explaining the file and you can download the actual Google Earth file here.
Google Earth has amazing depth and breadth. When that’s combined with ease of use and a visually engaging interface you have a very powerful learning tool.
