Something to think about

May 08, 2008 — Thursday

Open Source Software in Education

Educause Quarterly has an new article on the use of open source software in teaching and learning by Shaheen E. Lakhan and Kavita Jhunjhunwala. The article first looks at the history of open source before moving on to the role of open source in learning. The authors also look at some of the different learning management tools out there (including Sakai) before talking about the direction all this might be headed: Web 2.0.

Why does this matter? Because it suggests a change towards student-centered learning:

The traditional learning structure—where students take a backseat while content is developed by instructors and then structured and delivered as courses—has undergone a radical change with the adoption of Web 2.0 technologies. Students have become an important component in the development and distribution of learning content.

For more, go read the rest: “Open Source Software in Education.”

In the meantime, what do you think? As digital learning evolves will it move towards more student-centered learning? The answer seems fairly clearly yes to me, since that’s a move in teaching in general, and Web 2.0 technologies certainly help facilitate that.

— michael | 01:24 PM | Comments (0)

April 22, 2008 — Tuesday

Climate Change: Earth Day

Today is Earth Day, and there are numerous blog posts and news items that are worth reading about.

Among all these things, to honor Earth Day, I just wanted to point out these great set of images by Stuart Franklin on the Times website: “In the Time of Trees” which is a short set of photos of trees.

Also, as part of Earth Day: some semi-randomly chosen facts to consider:

80% - percent decrease in U.S. global warming pollution required by 2050 to prevent the worst consequences of global warming.

It takes 5,000 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of meat (so 1 pound of meat uses the equivalent water of taking a 5-7 minute shower every day for a year)

Americans throw away enough aluminum to rebuild our entire commercial fleet of airplanes every 3 months

— michael | 02:44 PM | Comments (0)

April 07, 2008 — Monday

World Health Day

Today is World Health Day, which celebrates the creation of the World Health Organization, which, incidentally, was created 60 years ago today. This years theme is “protecting health from climate change.” Regarding this years theme, the WHO explains:

In 2008, World Health Day focuses on the need to protect health from the adverse effects of climate change. WHO selected this theme in recognition that climate change is posing ever growing threats to global public health security.

For more, you can read about the key messages, download a podcast about World Health Day from WHO, read new release: Climate change will erode foundations of health, and read the issue paper (pdf) which explains:

The changing climate will inevitably affect the basic requirements for maintaining health: clean air and water, sufficient food and adequate shelter. Each year, about 800 000 people die from causes attributable to urban air pollution, 1.8 million from diarrhoea largely resulting from lack of access to clean water supply and sanitation, and from poor hygiene, 3.5 million from malnutrition and approximately 60 000 in natural disasters. A warmer and more variable climate threatens to lead to higher levels of some air pollutants, increase transmission of diseases through unclean water and through contaminated food, to compromise agricultural production in some of the least developed countries, and to increase the hazards of extreme weather.

Not to mention, you can watch a video about World Health Day from the Director-General, Dr Margaret Chan (windows media).

To learn more, go check out: World Health Day: protecting health from climate change.

— michael | 06:52 PM

March 27, 2008 — Thursday

Climate Change: A solution framework for the climate challenge

What sort of impact do each of us make on the environment? How much does the personal decisions about what we do, buy, and eat impact the world? If you’re curious about these things, you’ll want to check out the slides/notes of Saul Griffith who gave a talk on how to engineer solutions for climate change at the O’Reilly Emerging Technology Conference . What was covered? Griffith explains it’s two stories:

The first is the impersonal story told in very big numbers about climate change, global energy consumption, and fossil fuels.
The second is the personal story about how every decision you make in your life impacts everyone you share the planet with, and just how big the scale of the energy challenge is.

So the goal is to understand the role each of us play in changing the environment, or in Griffith’s words:

In laying out the logic of this document we hope to give you the tools to rebuild this story as it relates to you. If you disagree with any specific assumption or piece of information, you have the approach outlined here to return to. If you believe global warming isn’t happening at all, this logic is still valid for you. You will merely conclude that nothing needs to be done immediately, and you will walk away with a greater understanding of your own energy consumption, ways to save money, and ways to increase the security of energy supplies as fossil fuel supplies slowly dwindle.

To find out more, go look through the notes and slides (which are quite extensive and well done): The Game Plan: A solution framework for the climate challenge. You can also download the slides and notes (pdf), just the slides (pdf), or just the notes (pdf), or view them online (although it’s a little small online).

Just take a look at the impact of the way we eat, and further, the impact of changing the way we eat:

Go check out the rest: The Game Plan: A solution framework for the climate challenge.

via BoingBoing

— michael | 09:41 AM

Women’s History Month - Amelia Bloomer Project

In light of Women’s History Month, I wanted to point out the Amelia Bloomer Project which seeks to honor feminist women writers. Specifically,

This year’s list includes books challenging the young women of today to take a new look at what it means to be feminist, showcasing who fought for our rights. These books bring to light the stories of women who break boundaries, from civil war doctors and journalists covering WWII to graffiti artists and girls demanding to be accepted for who they are. The 32 books on the 2008 Amelia Bloomer Project list encourage and inspire girls to be smart, brave, and proud.

The list of books includes fiction and non-fiction for beginning readers, middle readers, and young adults. They also have previous year lists. You might want to check out the list: Amelia Bloomer Project.

— michael | 08:32 AM

March 25, 2008 — Tuesday

Changing Faith in America

What do American’s believe? A recent Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life survey held some interesting results according to the Chronicle of Higher Ed writer Alan Wolfe. Wolfe reports, “Consider This: Pew in the Pews: A survey on American belief overturns some scholars’ theories,” that American faith is quite a bit more fluid than previously thought. The report indicates that 44% of the 35,000 interviewed have switched faiths at least once in their lives. Further, only 51.1% of Americans as Protestant and one in three Roman Catholics leave the church. Also interesting, almost 2 out of ever 5 (37%) Americans are married to someone who has a different faith. Other interesting facts include there are more Buddhists (0.7%) than Muslims (0.6%) and that a full 16.1% of the population is unaffiliated being atheist, agnostic, or expressing no particular belief. Obviously, these numbers are just the tip of the iceberg both in terms of the data as well as the potential implications of the data.

For more, you can read the entire article, “Consider This: Pew in the Pews: A survey on American belief overturns some scholars’ theories,” read the Summary of Key Findings of the Pew report, or download and read/review the entire report: U.S.Religious Landscape Survey (pdf).

— michael | 02:18 PM

March 24, 2008 — Monday

Women’s History Month - Library of Congress

As noted earlier, March is Women’s History Month, and in addition to the US Census Bureau’s Women’s History Month information, there are numerous other resources out there.

One of these is the Library of Congress’s Women’s History Month site, which provides access to a wide range of topics.

This includes links to Library of Congress collections that focus on women including, among many other resources, The Hannah Arendt Papers, Margaret Mead: Human Nature and the Power of Culture, The Zora Neale Hurston Plays, and Women of Protest: Photographs from the Records of the National Woman’s Party, 1875–1938.

There are also links to Library of Congress image collections that focus on women. This includes Dorothea Lange’s “Migrant Mother” Photographs in the Farm Security Administration Collection: An Overview, Rosie Pictures: Select Images Relating to American Women Workers During World War II, and Photographs of Women During the Civil War: Selected Images.

There is even a growing Library of Congress selection of audio/video that focuses on women (most require RealPlayer).

— michael | 06:45 PM

Future of Books: Do you own your ebook?

Gizmodo is reporting on the changing nature of book ownership. In particular, the way that ebook purchases are less a process of buying a book and rather one of leasing a book. In the post, “Amazon Kindle and Sony Reader Locked Up: Why Your Books Are No Longer Yours,” Gizmodo looks at the work of

Four students at Columbia Law School’s Science and Technology Law Review looked at the particular issue of reselling and copying e-books downloaded to Amazon’s Kindle or the Sony Reader, and came up with answers to a fundamental question: Are you buying a crippled license to intellectual property when you download, or are you buying an honest-to-God book?

In the past, once you bought a book, you could take that physical book and loan it to a friend to read, you could sell it to someone else, you could leave it on the shelf and read it whenever you want. However, with ebooks, the process is different, and you can only read the book yourself, unless you sell you Sony Reader or you Amazon Kindle.

What’s more, there is also almost certainly going to be issues about moving your library with you if you want to upgrade your reader after a few years.

The Gizmodo article, “Amazon Kindle and Sony Reader Locked Up: Why Your Books Are No Longer Yours” reproduces the legal summary, so if you’re curious about what your rights are to those books you’ve bought (or are thinking of buying), you might want to check it out. What are your thoughts? No big deal to lease a book versus owning it? Should we be able to buy a book, and then resell it (i.e. sell it once to one person and remove the local copy)? It certainly raises questions about the line between physical property and intellectual property and what it means to actually own something.

via Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing who is less than happy:

Books that you own can be loaned, re-sold and given away, and the ongoing health of the book trade and reading itself relies on this—how many of your favorite writers did you discover at a used bookstore, or when a friend passed you a copy of a book?
It’s funny that in the name of protecting “intellectual property,” big media companies are willing to do such violence to the idea of real property—arguing that since everything we own, from our t-shirts to our cars to our ebooks, embody someone’s copyright, patent and trademark, that we’re basically just tenant farmers, living on the land of our gracious masters who’ve seen fit to give us a lease on our homes.

— michael | 11:37 AM

March 13, 2008 — Thursday

Technology and Today’s Students

What is the driving forces of students today? Mark Edmundson, professor of English at the University of Virginia, thinks he knows, and he explains what those forces are in his article, “Dwelling in Possibilities: Our students’ spectacular hunger for life makes them radically vulnerable” in the Chronicle of Higher Education. After telling us about meeting with one of his students, Edmundson explains

For his student generation is a singular one, at least in my experience of 30 or so years teaching: Its members have a spectacular hunger for life and more life. They want to study, travel, make friends, make more friends, read everything (superfast), take in all the movies, listen to every hot band, keep up with everyone they’ve ever known. And there’s something else, too, that distinguishes them: They live to multiply possibilities. They’re enemies of closure. For as much as they want to do and actually manage to do, they always strive to keep their options open, never to shut possibilities down before they have to.

Edmundson goes on to argue that the availability of technology and the fear of death resulting from 9/11 are two factors that lead students to go, go go... As a result, Edmundson is making it a policy to not allow laptops in his classroom: “starting this year, no more laptops in my classroom. You can leave them at home. You can check ’em at the door.”

To find out in more detail what Edmundson thinks and why he’s banning laptops from his classroom, go read the whole thing: “Dwelling in Possibilities: Our students’ spectacular hunger for life makes them radically vulnerable.”

What do you think? Is this a good idea? Should laptops be in the classroom? Are students trying to do too much? Are they scattered and multitasking themselves into getting nothing done? Is surfing on the web different from doodling in the margins? Let us know what you think in the comments.

— michael | 02:17 PM | Comments (1)

March 11, 2008 — Tuesday

All the air & water on Earth compared to Earth

We often hear about how 70% of the Earth’s surface is water, and while this is certainly a legitimate way of measuring the water on the earth, what about comparing the volume of the Earth to the volume of water on the Earth? What about the same thing with air? Well, Dan Phiffer has posted an image (found online) that shows just this.

Phiffer explains:

Left: All the water in the world (1.4087 billion cubic kilometres of it) including sea water, ice, lakes, rivers, ground water, clouds, etc. Right: All the air in the atmosphere (5140 trillion tonnes of it) gathered into a ball at sea-level density. Shown on the same scale as the Earth.

If you want to find out the math that suggests this is an accurate picture: go read the whole thing.

— michael | 05:17 PM

March 10, 2008 — Monday

Watched by the Web

As more and more of your time is spent online, it’s important to realize that you aren’t just gathering content from the web, the web might be gathering information on you. Specifically, according to the New York Times article, “To Aim Ads, Web Is Keeping Closer Eye on You:”

...large Web companies are learning more about people than ever from what they search for and do on the Internet, gathering clues about the tastes and preferences of a typical user several hundred times a month.

Additionally:

“When you start to get into the details, it’s scarier than you might suspect,” said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a privacy rights group. “We’re recording preferences, hopes, worries and fears.”

It’s important to realize that increasingly, whatever you do online, is being recorded by someone, whether that’s your ISP or whatever service you’re logged into. That is, if you’re logged into Google and do a Google search, Google will remember that. The same is potentially true for any other service you’re logged into.

Another example is Yahoo:

Yahoo came out with the most data collection points in a month on its own sites—about 110 billion collections, or 811 for the average user. In addition, Yahoo has about 1,700 other opportunities to collect data about the average person on partner sites like eBay, where Yahoo sells the ads.

For more, you can go read the article: “To Aim Ads, Web Is Keeping Closer Eye on You.”

And for tips on protecting your privacy online, check out these ideas from the Electronic Frontier Foundation:

— EFF’s Top 12 Ways to Protect Your Online Privacy

— EFF’s Privacy page

— Six Tips to Protect Your Search Privacy

Update (3/11/08): And following up on this conversation, the New York Times “Bits” Blog has a follow up on this topic: Where Every Ad Knows Your Name.

— michael | 03:26 PM

February 14, 2008 — Thursday

Biofuels: Helping or Worsening Climate Change?

One of the hopes for limiting the impact of climate change has been the goal of using biofuels, such as ethanol, instead of traditional using conventional fuels based on fossil fuels, such as petroleum. However, while these “green fuels” have long been seen as a means of releasing less carbon into the atmosphere, new studies released in Science suggest that this is potentially not the case. (Original Science article behind pay wall.)

There seems to be two main issues here. The first is the emissions released converting the plant material into fuel and transporting it. The second is the release of carbon from clearing the land for production.

This has caused quite a stir. According to Elisabeth Rosenthal in her New York Times article, “Biofuels Deemed a Greenhouse Threat there are serious issues with the land clearing process:

The clearance of grassland releases 93 times the amount of greenhouse gas that would be saved by the fuel made annually on that land, said Joseph Fargione, lead author of the second paper...

Rosenthal goes on to explain:

In the wake of the new studies, a group of 10 of the United States’s most eminent ecologists and environmental biologists today sent a letter to President Bush and the speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, urging a reform of biofuels policies. “We write to call your attention to recent research indicating that many anticipated biofuels will actually exacerbate global warming,” the letter said.

The issue is clearly complex, and there are ways that biofuels might still be valuable (see “Reasons for Hope” below), but it seems clear that some rethinking should be done regarding the feasibility of using biofuels as a straight replacement for fossil fuels.

For more:

“Biofuels Deemed a Greenhouse Threat by Elisabeth Rosenthal from the New York Times

— also from the New York Times: World View: Greg Winter and Libby Rosenthal discuss the downsides of biofuels. (mp3)

“Studies Say Clearing Land for Biofuels Will Aid Warming by Juliet Eilperin from the Wasington Post

“A really bad day for biofuels” by Michael O’Hare from the blog: The Reality-Based Community

Reasons for hope?

“The Path to Better Biofuels: An Interview with Alex Farrell on the Latest Land Use Studies” by Andrew Plemmons Pratt from Science Progress

— or you can listen to the interview with Alex Farrell (mp3)

“Trash-Based Biofuels: From Landfill to Full Tank of Gas” by David Biello from Scientific American

— michael | 09:19 AM

November 20, 2007 — Tuesday

Photo Tampering: Editing what we see

If you are interested in a brief history of photo tampering and editing, Hany Farid, Professor of Computer Science at Dartmouth has posted, Digital Tampering in the Media, Politics and Law. Farid looks at the history of photo editing starting back in the 1800s with an edited photo of Abraham Lincoln. He carries the process forward through the years covering politics and popular media until this past September 2007.

To find out some of the ways photos have been edited, go read the whole thing: Digital Tampering in the Media, Politics and Law. Maybe we can't believe everything we see.

— michael | 09:05 AM | Comments (1)

November 01, 2007 — Thursday

Crunch time?

The IGDA (International Game Developers Association) is reporting on "Why Crunch Mode Doesn't Work: 6 Lessons," by Evan Robinson.

Robinson explains in the executive summary that "When used long-term, Crunch Mode slows development and creates more bugs when compared with 40-hour weeks." The basic idea is that we get less productive if we continue to put in more than forty hours. So much so that "t approximately eight 60-hour weeks, the total work done is the same as what would have been done in eight 40-hour weeks."

To find out the details, you can go read the rest: Why Crunch Mode Doesn't Work: 6 Lessons.

— michael | 04:50 PM

October 16, 2007 — Tuesday

Language Extinction?

Do languages go extinct? Yes, once the last speaker passes away, the language goes extinct. And right now, there are hundreds of languages on the verge of going extinct. National Geographic looks into it with their article "Languages Racing to Extinction in 5 Global 'Hotspots'" by Stefan Lovgren. Lovgren explains that

From Alaska to Australia, hundreds of languages around the world are teetering on the brink of extinction—some being spoken only by a single person, according to a new study.
The research has revealed five hotspots where languages are vanishing most rapidly: eastern Siberia, northern Australia, central South America, Oklahoma, and the U.S. Pacific Northwest.

National Geographic even has a map of endangered language hotspots.

One of the more shocking tidbits:

More than 500 languages may be spoken by fewer than ten people.

For more, go read: "Languages Racing to Extinction in 5 Global 'Hotspots'."

— michael | 05:07 PM

October 15, 2007 — Monday

Blog Action Day - the environment

Blog Action Day is dedicated to bringing together blogs to post on the same issue on the same day. Specifically, this year they are focusing on the environment:

On October 15th - Blog Action Day, bloggers around the web will unite to put a single important issue on everyone's mind.
In its inaugural year, Blog Action Day will be co-ordinating bloggers to tackle the issue of the environment.

They provide a link to environmental resources and environmental charities. And their blog has some great coverage of some of the over 5,000 post people have up on the subject.

— michael | 03:40 PM

October 05, 2007 — Friday

Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read

This past week has been Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read: September 29–October 6, 2007. What is Banned Books Week? The American Library Association (ALA) explains:

Banned Books Week (BBW) celebrates the freedom to choose or the freedom to express one’s opinion even if that opinion might be considered unorthodox or unpopular and stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of those unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints to all who wish to read them. After all, intellectual freedom can exist only where these two essential conditions are met.

Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read is supported by: American Booksellers Association, American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, American Library Association, American Society of Journalists and Authors, Association of American Publishers, National Association of College Stores, and endorsed by the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress.

Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read is even celebrated here @ your Libraries.

What were the 10 most challenged books of 2006?

"And Tango Makes Three" by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, for homosexuality, anti-family, and unsuited to age group;

"Gossip Girls" series by Cecily Von Ziegesar for homosexuality, sexual content, drugs, unsuited to age group, and offensive language;

"Alice" series by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor for sexual content and offensive language;

"The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things" by Carolyn Mackler for sexual content, anti-family, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;

"The Bluest Eye" by Toni Morrison for sexual content, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;

"Scary Stories" series by Alvin Schwartz for occult/Satanism, unsuited to age group, violence, and insensitivity;

"Athletic Shorts" by Chris Crutcher for homosexuality and offensive language.

"The Perks of Being a Wallflower" by Stephen Chbosky for homosexuality, sexually explicit, offensive language, and unsuited to age group

"Beloved" by Toni Morrison for offensive language, sexual content, and unsuited to age group;

"The Chocolate War" by Robert Cormier for sexual content, offensive language, and violence.

Check out the ALA's Banned Books Week site for more information including the list of the 100 most challenged books.

— michael | 03:06 PM

September 25, 2007 — Tuesday

The Effect of Rising Sea Levels

The San Francisco Examiner is reporting on the potential effects of global warming to sea levels to various parts of the US.

The article, Rising Seas Likely to Flood U.S. History by Seth Borenstein expains:

Global warming - through a combination of melting glaciers, disappearing ice sheets and warmer waters expanding - is expected to cause oceans to rise by one meter, or about 39 inches. It will happen regardless of any future actions to curb greenhouse gases, several leading scientists say. And it will reshape the nation.

To find the rest, or see the rest of the images, read the whole thing: Rising Seas Likely to Flood U.S. History.

— michael | 01:25 PM

August 16, 2007 — Thursday

Library of Congress Funds Gaming

Game Set Watch reports that The Library of Congress has issued a news release announcing the "Preserving Creative America Program."

Stanford University's Henry Lowood comments:

"This is an omnibus release covering all the projects funded in this impressive new program (over $2 million in all, a nice portion of which went to the games project). The games project is called "Preserving Virtual Worlds" and includes historical games (cf. our Digital Game Canon), electronic literature, and virtual worlds. It is the project listed under University of Illinois, as prime contractor. Stanford, Maryland, and Rochester are sub-contractors."

Read on at the official Library of Congress News Release.

— rory | 09:14 AM

August 07, 2007 — Tuesday

"Educational Tools for the Digital Age"

Check out Wired's weeklong news series "Education 2.0." Topics covered so far include the Student Gear Guide and File Sharing 101. The latter includes a nifty guide to downloading digital content through your campus connection, as well as the legal risks associated with pirated content.

— rory | 09:24 AM