I'm all excited over these upcoming conferences. Trying hard to figure if my researches can be submitted to the conferences, since they are all under the realm of 'education' and mine is more of emerging technologies and knowledge management.
Still related, though... if I can twist the idea a bit here and there hehehe...! (Talk about gung ho! Huu huu...) Mind's boggling with ideas that flowing like water out of nowhere every day. So, see how... see if I could manage the time to write 'em out!
Check out these conferences. I will add more if I know more.
12-13 Aug 2009: http://ici9.oum.edu.my/
13-15 Oct 2009: http://www.ptpm.usm.my/seaair2009/
12-13 Nov 2009: http://www.ucsi.edu.my/inec/index.asp
Oh, you can send me some links to other conferences too! I appreciate that! Thanks!
Conferences... here I come!
- Sha on Teaching and Learning
18 Apr 2009
Friday, April 17, 2009
No more classroom.shahrinaz.com/moodle/
To all friends and colleagues who may be visiting or using the above mentioned link (http://www.classroom.shahrinaz.com/moodle/), please take note that it's no longer available.
I've just discontinued the webhosting service last few days, without really thinking twice. I forgot that Raj was experimenting on the moodles in that site.
Anyway, I will keep you updated if I set up another new webhosting service that can be used by all. Keep in touch!
Enthusiastic on research now, more than anything...,
- Sha on Teaching and Learning
18 Apr 2009
I've just discontinued the webhosting service last few days, without really thinking twice. I forgot that Raj was experimenting on the moodles in that site.
Anyway, I will keep you updated if I set up another new webhosting service that can be used by all. Keep in touch!
Enthusiastic on research now, more than anything...,
- Sha on Teaching and Learning
18 Apr 2009
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Final post on CENL2008
First of all, thanks for the name "Gung Ho" and "The Fast One". Hehehe... I only get that kind of names when I'm in UCSI University. I think I brought that culture from my previous company - something I learnt from my big boss then. (Somebody needs to explain to George, Peter and the rest the meaning of 'gung ho'. Hope I spelt it right.)
About the CENL2008 course
I'm so happy that I could accomplish every task given. Not all are perfect, but with the skills I have and the way I work, I could've done more. Nevertheless, the course has made me feel 'belong' to the education world. I could understand well on how students nowadays learn (by being a learner myself) and I could imagine how they would want us to teach/guide them. The concept of "being near but yet it's far" should be there (I mean, us being reachable to the learners even though we are far apart, via emails, IMs, SNCs, Twitter, etc.)
Personally...
Personally, being a person in the middle of technical-side and user-side (for the past 9 years) actually made me a little bit unsatisfied when I can't get myself to hack on the applications/technology that we've learnt in CENL2008. I guess it is my habit to crack/hack whatever in front of me, so that I could understand better how the whole thing works and what's the possibilities we could further achieve from it. (I guess that's where the "gung ho" part comes from. Sigh!)
That's why I took an extra effort to figure out how to install and set up my own moodle and wiki (programmatically) onto my personal web hosting server (shahrinaz.com). All were half-cooked, sorry. The excitement dwindles down after some time hacking through the brickwalls... huu huu...
I'm yet to try out the PHP scripting in Facebook Application to make some learning environment in it. It's still in blue draft in my head, no time to sit on it. Hehehe...
Final Paragraph now... I promise!
All in all... It's been a wonderful adventure, and it helps me kick-start on having ideas and ideas pouring into my head (I think I need an external portable harddisk for my head soon! Haha!!) on how to 'reach' the learners' expectations via technology around us today. I learn a lot from CENL2008, and I think from now on, I would know how to learn on my own using the same methods taught here. Thank you so much, George and Peter.
Knowlede we give others
will be replicated again and again
that it reach beyond the numbers we could've imagined;
Knowledge we share with others
will be appreciated continuously
that it would grow into bigger and bigger ideas;
Knowledge we taught otherswould make them grow
with more confidence in facing life ahead;
Knowledge itself is a wondrous journey,
not a destination.
The knowledge-sharing enthusiast,
- Sha @ Teaching and Learning
10 Dec 2008
About the CENL2008 course
I'm so happy that I could accomplish every task given. Not all are perfect, but with the skills I have and the way I work, I could've done more. Nevertheless, the course has made me feel 'belong' to the education world. I could understand well on how students nowadays learn (by being a learner myself) and I could imagine how they would want us to teach/guide them. The concept of "being near but yet it's far" should be there (I mean, us being reachable to the learners even though we are far apart, via emails, IMs, SNCs, Twitter, etc.)
Personally...
Personally, being a person in the middle of technical-side and user-side (for the past 9 years) actually made me a little bit unsatisfied when I can't get myself to hack on the applications/technology that we've learnt in CENL2008. I guess it is my habit to crack/hack whatever in front of me, so that I could understand better how the whole thing works and what's the possibilities we could further achieve from it. (I guess that's where the "gung ho" part comes from. Sigh!)
That's why I took an extra effort to figure out how to install and set up my own moodle and wiki (programmatically) onto my personal web hosting server (shahrinaz.com). All were half-cooked, sorry. The excitement dwindles down after some time hacking through the brickwalls... huu huu...
I'm yet to try out the PHP scripting in Facebook Application to make some learning environment in it. It's still in blue draft in my head, no time to sit on it. Hehehe...
Final Paragraph now... I promise!
All in all... It's been a wonderful adventure, and it helps me kick-start on having ideas and ideas pouring into my head (I think I need an external portable harddisk for my head soon! Haha!!) on how to 'reach' the learners' expectations via technology around us today. I learn a lot from CENL2008, and I think from now on, I would know how to learn on my own using the same methods taught here. Thank you so much, George and Peter.
Knowlede we give others
will be replicated again and again
that it reach beyond the numbers we could've imagined;
Knowledge we share with others
will be appreciated continuously
that it would grow into bigger and bigger ideas;
Knowledge we taught otherswould make them grow
with more confidence in facing life ahead;
Knowledge itself is a wondrous journey,
not a destination.
The knowledge-sharing enthusiast,
- Sha @ Teaching and Learning
10 Dec 2008
Emerging trends - my review
"In this respect, the fundamental pattern oflearning and innovation using social tools – find -> remix-> share – seems ideally suited to the way most youngpeople like to discover and make sense of the worldaround them, which is reason enough for an optimisticview of their likely impact." - Lee Bryant, Becta 2007 http://partners.becta.org.uk/page_documents/research/emerging_technologies07_chapter1.pdf
I've been searching around the Net, and I found a list of interesting articles about emerging trends in the use of technology for learning, reported by Becta. (EDUCAUSE also wrote an article in this Becta's publication!)
Among the articles on emerging trends reported by Becta are:
- Emerging Trends in Social Software for Education
- Learning Networks in Practice
- The Challenge of New Digital Literacies and the 'Hidden Curriculum'
- How to Teach with Technology: Keeping Both Teachers and Students
- Comfortable in an Era of Exponential Change
- Games in Education
- Ubiquitous Computing
* You can download the PDFs of these articles and more at http://partners.becta.org.uk/index.php?section=rh&rid=13768.
My interest lies on the last two titles - "games" and "ubiquitous". It may be easier to think of a way to teach a younger students (i.e. primary school, high school) using games and ubiquitous - games as a way to teach the concept or relate to theory via metaphor; ubiquitous as a more practical way for their history and geography research papers (we have that in our high school here). But what about educating (or providing a condusive environment for learning to) the undergraduates?
I also came across new terminology that is worth a research. A lot more to read on these:
- augmented reality
- mapping mashups
- interactive tables
- interactive papers
- collective intelligence
- ... and many more...
So what will the future trend going to be? More virtualised, more metophoric in concept, more creative, more socialised, more collaboration of all 5 senses (or 6? Hehe...), more 3-dimensional... Probably that's what the new generation of learners would crave for, something that serves their 5 senses. It would make them remember more on what they've learnt.
(Hold on a minute, did I include sense of 'smell' in that 5? Ops! Sorry about that. Should be only 4 then...)
In other words, back to square one - IT infrastructure. If we have at least broadband and RFID, it will be a start to go virtual almost everywhere anytime. We can even implement the 'interactive table' WITHOUT the 'table', or without computers even. That's what I think the future would be. Probably I watched too much of futuristic movies (who doesn't?) and the ideas may be way ahead of our 'near future' capabilities, but hey... it's a start. Starting with 'wireless', retrieving and sending files from anywhere at anytime in any format, etc...
PS: I read a lot about students spending much time in "Second Life" (an online virtual reality game) and how they learn a lot from 'there'. I tried to download and install yesterday, so I will spend time trying that out, too! ... If I have some nick of time for it. Hhmm...
Whatever 'sense' I have left (including non-sense?), that's what I use to learn and teach,
- Sha at Teaching and Learning
10 Dec 2008
George's Visit to UCSI University on 09 Dec 2008
I missed George's forum on Connectivism yesterday, due to the exam proctoring duty I had that I could not get swapped with anyone at the last moment. Sigh!
Anyway, I ran all the way from the next block to meet George for our little CENL2008 group gathering, after the exam. Took me some time to catch my breath before I could think clearly and respond to any of the things they were discussing. Haha!
Here are the photos captured during our little gathering. (Peter, wish you were here too! At least George got to hear my sweet voice finally hahaha!!)
Christine, thinking hard to understand what George is trying to say in response to her question. Or is she acting like she's digesting George's idea? Hehehe... Just joking, Christine! :-*
George's best pose... well, actually it's the best pic I could capture with my mobile phone. My hands were too shakey after the running... Phew!
The group photo of CENL2008 from UCSI University, with George Siemens... well, only half of us, I think. Dr Irene, in case you can't see, the "gung ho" one (a.k.a. Ms-Sha) is on the far left. I could hardly see the face with this notebook screen. I think better not let Jim take the photo, next time, eh? Huu huu...
Anyway, thanks all for the pics. You too, Jim!
Having fun between the hectic schedule,
- Sha @ Teaching and Learning
10 Dec 2008
Anyway, I ran all the way from the next block to meet George for our little CENL2008 group gathering, after the exam. Took me some time to catch my breath before I could think clearly and respond to any of the things they were discussing. Haha!
Here are the photos captured during our little gathering. (Peter, wish you were here too! At least George got to hear my sweet voice finally hahaha!!)
Christine, thinking hard to understand what George is trying to say in response to her question. Or is she acting like she's digesting George's idea? Hehehe... Just joking, Christine! :-*
George's best pose... well, actually it's the best pic I could capture with my mobile phone. My hands were too shakey after the running... Phew!The group photo of CENL2008 from UCSI University, with George Siemens... well, only half of us, I think. Dr Irene, in case you can't see, the "gung ho" one (a.k.a. Ms-Sha) is on the far left. I could hardly see the face with this notebook screen. I think better not let Jim take the photo, next time, eh? Huu huu...Anyway, thanks all for the pics. You too, Jim!
Having fun between the hectic schedule,
- Sha @ Teaching and Learning
10 Dec 2008
Thursday, December 4, 2008
What I learnt in NVivo Training Today!
This is the tag cloud result of the word frequency query, from the NVivo training today! Wow wee!! :-D
Excited for no reason over new technology learnt,
- Sha @ Teaching and Learning
05 Dec 2008
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Sha on PLE (Personal Learning Environment)
Collaboration of all kinds of learning - formal learning, informal learning, personal interest learning - something that we've been doing whether we realise it or not; because in our daily lives, we learn something new along the way. Especially in teaching, we learn how to deal with students who are from different batches and generations each semester. And as academicians, we can't run away from reading and updating ourselves with the news related to our studies, new theories and new ideas, innovations, etc., and that is also another set of 'personal learning' on our side.
Different styles of Learning... I learn new software/application by trying out. If Can't figure out how to use it on my own, I would refer to the tutorial or help file that comes along with the software/application. If I know what I want to do but not knowing how to do it and the help doesn't give much help, then I would search online, view the online tutorial, especially videos, because I learn best by observing how others do, and I get ideas on how to innovate from the method I observe once I've tried on my own.
As for learning 'theories' or dry subjects, reading is inevitable. But if I could listen (to audio) or view (videos) of presentations, lectures, etc., I learn better. Once I get the rough idea what the whole topic is about, my preference would be to discuss on the topic/subject and share ideas. Personally for me, only when I debate out I learn more, understand better and remember better. I prefer others clarify my understanding if the subject is still a blur to me.
Attwell (2006) "Learners are no longer necessarily locked in to a particular course in order to gain a qualification but are able to present their learning to prove they possess such competencies or are able to achieve those outcomes." I was so afraid of trying new things, or even inserting new skills/knowledge in my portfolio, without having certificates of the qualification after going through personal learning. Now, I know that all I need to do is "perform" or "present" (depending on the type of skill/knowledge) in order to be recognised, and to hear somebody greeted me saying, "Hi! Would you like to join our team as..." and I get the projects here and there. At least now, I'm more confident in what I know and what I've learnt, and more braver to commit and try out. Of course, I would learn more when I'm in the field, and that's the most valuable thing that I wouldn't miss.
One of the reason why I encourage students to have personal website is to prove a few things:
Imagine if our campus is 'ubiquitous' as such, probably upon entering the lecture hall, the students would be able to get the course brief details plus recommended readings/videos/audios for case studies to be discussed available to be downloaded on the spot... to name a few. One thing for sure, students won't have any excuse not able to find the classroom because the whole campus will be 'ubiquitous' including the location map and how to get to classrooms.
At the end of the day, it's about "availability" and "infrastructure" - back to square one. Without this 'environment' to support 'personal learning', it would be a long way to achieve our vision in lifelong learning.
Different styles of Learning... I learn new software/application by trying out. If Can't figure out how to use it on my own, I would refer to the tutorial or help file that comes along with the software/application. If I know what I want to do but not knowing how to do it and the help doesn't give much help, then I would search online, view the online tutorial, especially videos, because I learn best by observing how others do, and I get ideas on how to innovate from the method I observe once I've tried on my own.
As for learning 'theories' or dry subjects, reading is inevitable. But if I could listen (to audio) or view (videos) of presentations, lectures, etc., I learn better. Once I get the rough idea what the whole topic is about, my preference would be to discuss on the topic/subject and share ideas. Personally for me, only when I debate out I learn more, understand better and remember better. I prefer others clarify my understanding if the subject is still a blur to me.
Attwell (2006) "Learners are no longer necessarily locked in to a particular course in order to gain a qualification but are able to present their learning to prove they possess such competencies or are able to achieve those outcomes." I was so afraid of trying new things, or even inserting new skills/knowledge in my portfolio, without having certificates of the qualification after going through personal learning. Now, I know that all I need to do is "perform" or "present" (depending on the type of skill/knowledge) in order to be recognised, and to hear somebody greeted me saying, "Hi! Would you like to join our team as..." and I get the projects here and there. At least now, I'm more confident in what I know and what I've learnt, and more braver to commit and try out. Of course, I would learn more when I'm in the field, and that's the most valuable thing that I wouldn't miss.
One of the reason why I encourage students to have personal website is to prove a few things:
- It proves that they are computer literate and know a bit of technicality in publishing a website.
- Personal website should display their work and make it an online resume plus online portfolio, to show their future employer their worth and effort. Their work (e.g. for Computing) could be any application or animation they did for course assignments, they can tidy up the work according to comments made by lecturers and publish it online - preferably created in demo video on how the application works and how it looks like.
- Only with visual (even if it's only a blog on some research done) that people can understand and relate to, in order to be assured that this person has some 'value-added' criteria to consider.
... and I do that too - have my own website and e-portfolio.
Imagine if our campus is 'ubiquitous' as such, probably upon entering the lecture hall, the students would be able to get the course brief details plus recommended readings/videos/audios for case studies to be discussed available to be downloaded on the spot... to name a few. One thing for sure, students won't have any excuse not able to find the classroom because the whole campus will be 'ubiquitous' including the location map and how to get to classrooms.
At the end of the day, it's about "availability" and "infrastructure" - back to square one. Without this 'environment' to support 'personal learning', it would be a long way to achieve our vision in lifelong learning.
As I was going through the article by Attwell (2006), I had an idea regarding research on "examining the use of different social software applications for learning". Lately, I've been using 'Notes' in Facebook to broadcast my thoughts and information I get (via email, etc). I think we can make use of that as one of the tools for learning (provided all our students are in our Friends list, of course). Other features in Facebook inclusive Application (using PHP to add on for learning capability, etc.), and Group (which already include discussion board, latest news updates, links to recommended readings, etc.).
Oh, I have to list my PLE, is it? Quite a long list, though. But I'll minus the common ones like MS Office, email and all, ok?
- SNC - Facebook (more on PLE), Friendster (less on PLE)
- Blogger - multiple blogs with different topics
- Google 'suite' (i.e. mail, alert, calendar, iGoogle, etc.)
- Solidcasts/Podcast - audio files hosting
- Audacity - audio recording
- Meebo - all IM in one site
- Delicious - tagging
- Camtasia - screen capture video to create demos
- Webservers - upload HTML pages and websites
- Search engines - most of the time Google
- Online tutor guide on books - Pearson, Wiley (one of my students even did the online quiz on this site and I received the email of his marks!)
- Moyea - FLV downloader, to download Flash video files
- Adobe suite - photo editing and other design works
- Flash - preparing sample works for assignments on Multimedia course (I have to try out the tutorials/exercises before I teach/assign the students , right?)
- Moodle - I just installed on my personal website http://www.classroom.shahrinaz.com/moodle/, haven't properly set it up or test it yet
I probably have more, can't think anymore...
Reference:
Attwell (2006) Personal Learning Environments. The Wales-Wide Web website. Retrieved on 26 November 2008 from http://www.knownet.com/writing/weblogs/Graham_Attwell/entries/6521819364
Probably more.., and more..,
- Sha on Teaching and Learning
27 Nov 2008
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