Sorry that it has been more than a month since my last post. I have been working on many journal articles and book chapters as well as a couple of new course syllabi.
P540 Syllabus on Learning Theories: I have a new syllabus for my P540 course on Learning Theories and Instructional Design.
YouTube Addendum to P540 Syllabus: I also have an addendum to that syllabus which has a list of YouTube and other online videos which parallel each week of the semester. Feel free to use this list. If you do, please let me know how you use it and what happened when you did. Also note that I wrote an article on the use of YouTube in instruction for the AERA conference in New York last March which is available online. I will try to publish it later this year. Let me know what you think of it.
Webstreamed Lectures for Learning Theories: And I have some new Webstreamed lectures on behavioral, cognitive, constructivist, and social constructivist theory posted which I did on Friday September 5, 2008. I plan to do 4 more such video lectures this coming Friday. And when I do, I promise to wear a different shirt and tie for each one. Smile!
Wikibook for Learning Theories: This class will continue to work on a wikibook I started last year on "The Practice of Learning Theories" or the POLT. You are welcome to expand any chapter in it or add new ones.
R685 Syllabus on the Web 2.0: I use many Web 2.0 activities in that class. However, a better place to learn about the Web 2.0 is my R685 course on "The Web 2.0 and Participatory E-Learning." Every article in that course is found freely available online. The syllabus is now 30 pages so that is a lot of articles! There are also links to open access journals and a couple of open access e-books.
Wikibook for the Web 2.0: This class will continue to work on a Wikibook on "The Web 2.0 and Emerging Learning Technologies" or the WELT which I started last year with colleagues from universities in Malaysia, Taiwan, China, and the USA. You (or your students) are welcome to extend or edit it. Please let me know how you like it and what you did.
Enjoy these resources.
Saturday, 6 September 2008
Thursday, 31 July 2008
Time for Twenty-Four Terrific Tenure Tips for New Faculty Members: Ideas For Fostering Freedom
My department hired two new faculty members who have now both arrived on campus. Both are great! They sat down with me on Monday and asked my advice on getting tenure here. Since we did not finish the conversation, I created a list of ideas. It is below. Perhaps it will help you as well. Not all of it will apply.
You might skip them all since I was originally denied tenure and had to fight for it. I may not be the best role model. Once tenured, however, my productivity took off. This happened, in part, since I no longer had to sit through the endless and quite boring teacher education reform committees which never interested me (I was an corporate controller and CPA--interested in nontraditional learning, open, and flexible learning; anything but traditional learning and traditional schools and traditional teacher education). I found myself in distance education.
Give me anything that is not eyeball to eyeball or ear-pan to ear-pan and I am happy as a clam. With my research on distance learning taking off since tenure back in 1997, I now have 210 publications and have give over 850 talks. I think I had maybe 20 publications and 100 talks prior to 1997--you do the math since then. Same person I was when I was denied tenure. Same skin. Same smile. Same concern for students and heavy involvement in student mentoring.
The difference has been freedom. Freedom to explore. Freedom to say no to ideas and people that do not fit mine. Freedom to help people who need it. Freedom to suggest things to others to help they succeed when they do not see something that I think is quite obvious. Freedom to create unique partnerships and collaborations. Freedom to send to a journal you are not sure about. Freedom to write a book or an e-book. Etc. But why do we contort our bodies for a decade to get through graduate school and then get tenure for such freedom? If personal freedom to learn, live, and grow is that goal, do not delay! Go for it right now!
Anyway, once tenured, you reassume control over your life which perhaps you did not have for 4 years in graduate school and the six years of the tenure process. Do people realize how much of their lives they are giving up? That is a bloody decade and for many people it is two decades. How can one get out of this cycle of paying homage to everyone else? If you use some of the ideas below, I think you will be assuming more control and personal self-directedness over your life.
Many of these points below relate to time. Life is time. Time is life. Why do we go through routines that the media, our colleagues, our students, our family, and our friends expect of us? We should try to take control over our time. It is our own personal time. Once you do that, you enter a state of flow and your productivity will skyrocket. There is a ton of time for you to do whatever you want. Trust me.
Two dozen things to do on path to tenure and give you more control over your time amd personal freedom:
1. Teach in Bulk: I mean, if you can, teach back-to-back courses or one day a week courses. Free up days to write, rewrite, and reflect. Or perhaps teach some courses online and some face-to-face. I once taught 2 sections of undergrad educational psychology courses on Tuesdays and Thursdays back-to-back. I also once taught a graduate course at 4-6:45 pm on Wednesdays and another from 7-10 pm that same day. My two course load was all completed on Wednesdays, thereby giving me 5 days per week to write (1 day was spent prepping my 2 courses). I work every day if you cannot tell.
2. Avoid Summer Teaching or Teach Summer Intensive Courses: Do not teach all summer and avoid any summer teaching if you can. Save summer for writing and some vacationing. Three week summer classes are the best. Or even 1 week or no weeks. If you teach all summer your first six years as a new professor, your odds for getting tenure are significantly reduced. Simply put, look around you; chances are that your competition is not.
3. Get Vita Line Items: Say yes to many things that are low time that add to vita. Short time, high payoff items are best, especially those involving fun.
4. Avoid Big Things: Say no to most things that are long in nature and only add 1-2 lines to your vita. Unless you are principle investigator or it is your main interest area. If you are in charge, then sure.
5. Service Protection: Get protection from chair from too many service committees. Find out what are the norms and expectations and ask your chair if how many you need to be on. If you are on 2 or 3 service committees and that is the expectation, you can say that your chair told you to say no to anymore. This limits feelings of guilt.
6. Doctoral Committee Commitments: Once you are on the average number of dissertations, post a note on your door number of doctoral committees you are on and that you are not taking anymore. That way, if a student sends you an email to request you to be on a doctoral committee, you can say, well, if you read my door, you can see that I an not taking anymore. It is not you saying no, but the note on your door. This also limits guilt and you are telling the truth--you are not taking anymore (or at least not this day).
7. Schedule Student Meetings Back-to-Back: Have student meetings back to back. If you have 1 meeting, make others wrapped around it. Sometimes I double book appointments so as to speed everything up (not that often--perhaps 1-2 times a year when things get crazy). When another student is waiting, the one in my office gets to the point faster. (Actually, as bad as this sounds, I am the one who likes to dilly dally and socialize, so this keeps me on task too.)
8. Teach at Off Peak Times: I like to teach late at night at 4 or 7 pm or on early mornings or weekends. I love teaching Saturday mornings. You get access to all equipment and resources in the building and it is quiet and informal. It is also a chance to do whatever you want to do. The building is yours! It is like that built the place just for you and your class. It is quite uplifting. Makes your soul come alive! You also avoid disruptions and meetings that were not previously planned for.
9. Publication Goal Chart: Have a goal chart and reflect on progress. Have specific things to do on that chart and mark them off as you accomplish them. This is the most important point of my list of 24 items. Have goals and project into the future. And revise and monitor them as needed! You should have at a minimum the kernel of 4 or 5 articles on this goal chart. It should like at least a 2 year plan or looking out 24 months. I would actually recommend thinking 3-5 years into the future.
10. Goal Chart Mentoring: Discuss physical goal chart with a mentor. This will help keep you on task. It will also give you someone to share your successes and rejections with. Mentors are very important in getting to tenure and in life.
11. Clear Schedule in Bulk: Clear days or weeks from schedule to write and only write. And then write and write and write. Smile.
12. Writing Tips: Read the writing tips in my blog. I have 4 such blog posts.
a. Ten Quick Writing Tips: http://travelinedman.blogspot.com/2008/01/10-quick-writing-tips-in-academic-world.html
b. 20-30 Writing Tips: http://travelinedman.blogspot.com/2007/01/quick-20-academic-writing-tips.html
c. 3 P's of Professorship: http://travelinedman.blogspot.com/2007/08/3-ps-of-publishing-professorship-keep.html
d. 3 P's of Professional Writing: http://travelinedman.blogspot.com/2007/08/3-ps-of-professional-writers-purpose.html
13. Avoid Raising Hand or Volunteering to Chair a Committee: Do not volunteer to be a chair on a committee ever. When asked, just say when you signed up for this committee, it was with the agreement that you would not chair it. Do not go looking for more work that is not recognized prior to tenure.
14. Department Service: At the department level, work on service committees that matter—search committees, new student entrance committees, etc. These types of committees provide the people who you will work with in the future. Hence, they are extremely important ones to your own success. Travel or awards committees can also be fun and worthwhile without killing you.
15. School/College Level Service: At the college or school level, sign up for committees that usually have modest time requirements like student appeals or ethics committee, invited speaker or lectures and seminars committee (limited meetings and you meet cool and important people), and outstanding dissertation or awards committee. Committee on teaching are also worth the time investments. Avoid faculty council committees (political and a sure waste of time and effort--keep in mind that this is my opinion; many faculty love this one)> Also avoid promotion and tenure committees (political) and budget committees (boring! I know, I am an accountant. Higher education accountants, however, take boring to the extreme).
16. University Service: One word--avoid. Unless you like the topic a lot and it is great exposure for you, just say no. Of course, you might sign up for one to get to meet faculty from other departments and units or to work with your favorite friends. Just do not go overboard. If a form comes and you can sign not to be included in the annual voting for a particular faculty committee, then sign away. Why have your enemies vote you on silly committees that waste your time?
17. Grants of Other People: Do not get on another person’s grant (unless small role with high payoff; need to get your role specified in writing—-never just an oral agreement, though I an a hypocrite here…smile). This is one area that I have always seen problems. Weigh summer money and release time from grants of other people against commitments and time away from personal publishing.
18. Writing Environment or Setting: Find a place to write that you like. This is a no brainer and everyone will tell you this.
19. Signage for Visitors: If bothered too much, place a sign on your door about your availability. I have an open door policy at my office so I work for home a lot where I can get much done. Other people prefer their work offices. If you do, try to close the door at times. At home, I have a wondrous view of the woods and a creek at the bottom. Deer walking behind when I work on my deck. I can write a ton. Find your setting (see pt #19 above).
20. Get Help and Thank Help: You cannot do everything by yourself. Get people to give feedback on papers and thank them in acknowledgements. Have a couple of friends who are good editors will go a long way in your success. I just found 2 people here in Bloomington who are currently helping me with a book. Find those people, but be sure to pay them and thank them as well as help them out when they need it.
21. Journal Selection Process: Look for journals to publish in. Target your papers. Think or plan ahead. If you are in educational technology, see my technology journal list at: http://www.trainingshare.com/resources/distance_ed_journals_and_online_learning_books.htm
22. Conference Jumping: Do not go from conference to conference. Try to publish your papers prior to going (after accepted) or right after the conference. If you go from conference to conference, you will never get many things published. I am speaking from experience. Friends need you at conferences, but each conference equates to 2-3 weeks—one week to get ready, one week to be there, and a week to recover. Keep this 3 week rule in mind every time you consider a conference. It is more like 3 weeks of time for an assistant professor. For tenured professors like me, it is more like 1 week since I no longer have to write papers for each conference and can come and go as needed. That being said, I still do conference papers. I do not want to sound like a slug.
23. Annual Publishing Goals or Quotas: Publish on average 3 good articles per year. That is the goal. If you get 2 much of the time and 3 the rest, be happy. My personal quotas are much higher but you need to set yours somewhere and simply get started.
24. Research Strands: Create 2-4 strands of your research. Do not just have 1 strand to your research as some might advise you to do. One strand may never be accepted for publication and so then what do you do? Diversify somewhat.
These are just 24 of my ideas. I could give you 24 more if needed. Get ideas for 4-5 people and synthesize across them. Ok, remember this is about YOUR time. Below is a joke about the time commitments prior to tenure.
Ten Simple Steps to Tenure (this is meant as a joke--smile):
Step #1: Avoid department meetings;
Step #2: Avoid school or college meetings;
Step #3: Avoid university functions and meetings;
Step #4: Avoid mandated meetings;
Step #5: Avoid book publishers, book buyers (though sometimes getting cash for books is nice), and avoid anyone stopping by just to chat.
Step #6: Avoid retreats and other such silliness;
Step #7: Avoid committee meetings;
Step #8: Avoid students;
Step #9: Avoid life;
Step #10: Review other 9 steps each week.
Much of this I say in jest. Still, it is just a way to remind yourself that your time matters and is costly.
What about friends and family? Never forget them. They are the most important. Meet them during conferences or take with you. My kids have been with me to conferences and presentations in Finland, Australia, and Hawaii. That was fun! In addition, my friends meet me at almost all of my conferences. That is also great!
So now you have two dozen ideas to help you get tenure (should you want it). If all else fails, here is a job posting list I recently created (smile this is meant as a joke):
http://www.trainingshare.com/resources/Job-search-Educational-Technology-and-Instructional-Technology.htm
Good luck.
You might skip them all since I was originally denied tenure and had to fight for it. I may not be the best role model. Once tenured, however, my productivity took off. This happened, in part, since I no longer had to sit through the endless and quite boring teacher education reform committees which never interested me (I was an corporate controller and CPA--interested in nontraditional learning, open, and flexible learning; anything but traditional learning and traditional schools and traditional teacher education). I found myself in distance education.
Give me anything that is not eyeball to eyeball or ear-pan to ear-pan and I am happy as a clam. With my research on distance learning taking off since tenure back in 1997, I now have 210 publications and have give over 850 talks. I think I had maybe 20 publications and 100 talks prior to 1997--you do the math since then. Same person I was when I was denied tenure. Same skin. Same smile. Same concern for students and heavy involvement in student mentoring.
The difference has been freedom. Freedom to explore. Freedom to say no to ideas and people that do not fit mine. Freedom to help people who need it. Freedom to suggest things to others to help they succeed when they do not see something that I think is quite obvious. Freedom to create unique partnerships and collaborations. Freedom to send to a journal you are not sure about. Freedom to write a book or an e-book. Etc. But why do we contort our bodies for a decade to get through graduate school and then get tenure for such freedom? If personal freedom to learn, live, and grow is that goal, do not delay! Go for it right now!
Anyway, once tenured, you reassume control over your life which perhaps you did not have for 4 years in graduate school and the six years of the tenure process. Do people realize how much of their lives they are giving up? That is a bloody decade and for many people it is two decades. How can one get out of this cycle of paying homage to everyone else? If you use some of the ideas below, I think you will be assuming more control and personal self-directedness over your life.
Many of these points below relate to time. Life is time. Time is life. Why do we go through routines that the media, our colleagues, our students, our family, and our friends expect of us? We should try to take control over our time. It is our own personal time. Once you do that, you enter a state of flow and your productivity will skyrocket. There is a ton of time for you to do whatever you want. Trust me.
Two dozen things to do on path to tenure and give you more control over your time amd personal freedom:
1. Teach in Bulk: I mean, if you can, teach back-to-back courses or one day a week courses. Free up days to write, rewrite, and reflect. Or perhaps teach some courses online and some face-to-face. I once taught 2 sections of undergrad educational psychology courses on Tuesdays and Thursdays back-to-back. I also once taught a graduate course at 4-6:45 pm on Wednesdays and another from 7-10 pm that same day. My two course load was all completed on Wednesdays, thereby giving me 5 days per week to write (1 day was spent prepping my 2 courses). I work every day if you cannot tell.
2. Avoid Summer Teaching or Teach Summer Intensive Courses: Do not teach all summer and avoid any summer teaching if you can. Save summer for writing and some vacationing. Three week summer classes are the best. Or even 1 week or no weeks. If you teach all summer your first six years as a new professor, your odds for getting tenure are significantly reduced. Simply put, look around you; chances are that your competition is not.
3. Get Vita Line Items: Say yes to many things that are low time that add to vita. Short time, high payoff items are best, especially those involving fun.
4. Avoid Big Things: Say no to most things that are long in nature and only add 1-2 lines to your vita. Unless you are principle investigator or it is your main interest area. If you are in charge, then sure.
5. Service Protection: Get protection from chair from too many service committees. Find out what are the norms and expectations and ask your chair if how many you need to be on. If you are on 2 or 3 service committees and that is the expectation, you can say that your chair told you to say no to anymore. This limits feelings of guilt.
6. Doctoral Committee Commitments: Once you are on the average number of dissertations, post a note on your door number of doctoral committees you are on and that you are not taking anymore. That way, if a student sends you an email to request you to be on a doctoral committee, you can say, well, if you read my door, you can see that I an not taking anymore. It is not you saying no, but the note on your door. This also limits guilt and you are telling the truth--you are not taking anymore (or at least not this day).
7. Schedule Student Meetings Back-to-Back: Have student meetings back to back. If you have 1 meeting, make others wrapped around it. Sometimes I double book appointments so as to speed everything up (not that often--perhaps 1-2 times a year when things get crazy). When another student is waiting, the one in my office gets to the point faster. (Actually, as bad as this sounds, I am the one who likes to dilly dally and socialize, so this keeps me on task too.)
8. Teach at Off Peak Times: I like to teach late at night at 4 or 7 pm or on early mornings or weekends. I love teaching Saturday mornings. You get access to all equipment and resources in the building and it is quiet and informal. It is also a chance to do whatever you want to do. The building is yours! It is like that built the place just for you and your class. It is quite uplifting. Makes your soul come alive! You also avoid disruptions and meetings that were not previously planned for.
9. Publication Goal Chart: Have a goal chart and reflect on progress. Have specific things to do on that chart and mark them off as you accomplish them. This is the most important point of my list of 24 items. Have goals and project into the future. And revise and monitor them as needed! You should have at a minimum the kernel of 4 or 5 articles on this goal chart. It should like at least a 2 year plan or looking out 24 months. I would actually recommend thinking 3-5 years into the future.
10. Goal Chart Mentoring: Discuss physical goal chart with a mentor. This will help keep you on task. It will also give you someone to share your successes and rejections with. Mentors are very important in getting to tenure and in life.
11. Clear Schedule in Bulk: Clear days or weeks from schedule to write and only write. And then write and write and write. Smile.
12. Writing Tips: Read the writing tips in my blog. I have 4 such blog posts.
a. Ten Quick Writing Tips: http://travelinedman.blogspot.com/2008/01/10-quick-writing-tips-in-academic-world.html
b. 20-30 Writing Tips: http://travelinedman.blogspot.com/2007/01/quick-20-academic-writing-tips.html
c. 3 P's of Professorship: http://travelinedman.blogspot.com/2007/08/3-ps-of-publishing-professorship-keep.html
d. 3 P's of Professional Writing: http://travelinedman.blogspot.com/2007/08/3-ps-of-professional-writers-purpose.html
13. Avoid Raising Hand or Volunteering to Chair a Committee: Do not volunteer to be a chair on a committee ever. When asked, just say when you signed up for this committee, it was with the agreement that you would not chair it. Do not go looking for more work that is not recognized prior to tenure.
14. Department Service: At the department level, work on service committees that matter—search committees, new student entrance committees, etc. These types of committees provide the people who you will work with in the future. Hence, they are extremely important ones to your own success. Travel or awards committees can also be fun and worthwhile without killing you.
15. School/College Level Service: At the college or school level, sign up for committees that usually have modest time requirements like student appeals or ethics committee, invited speaker or lectures and seminars committee (limited meetings and you meet cool and important people), and outstanding dissertation or awards committee. Committee on teaching are also worth the time investments. Avoid faculty council committees (political and a sure waste of time and effort--keep in mind that this is my opinion; many faculty love this one)> Also avoid promotion and tenure committees (political) and budget committees (boring! I know, I am an accountant. Higher education accountants, however, take boring to the extreme).
16. University Service: One word--avoid. Unless you like the topic a lot and it is great exposure for you, just say no. Of course, you might sign up for one to get to meet faculty from other departments and units or to work with your favorite friends. Just do not go overboard. If a form comes and you can sign not to be included in the annual voting for a particular faculty committee, then sign away. Why have your enemies vote you on silly committees that waste your time?
17. Grants of Other People: Do not get on another person’s grant (unless small role with high payoff; need to get your role specified in writing—-never just an oral agreement, though I an a hypocrite here…smile). This is one area that I have always seen problems. Weigh summer money and release time from grants of other people against commitments and time away from personal publishing.
18. Writing Environment or Setting: Find a place to write that you like. This is a no brainer and everyone will tell you this.
19. Signage for Visitors: If bothered too much, place a sign on your door about your availability. I have an open door policy at my office so I work for home a lot where I can get much done. Other people prefer their work offices. If you do, try to close the door at times. At home, I have a wondrous view of the woods and a creek at the bottom. Deer walking behind when I work on my deck. I can write a ton. Find your setting (see pt #19 above).
20. Get Help and Thank Help: You cannot do everything by yourself. Get people to give feedback on papers and thank them in acknowledgements. Have a couple of friends who are good editors will go a long way in your success. I just found 2 people here in Bloomington who are currently helping me with a book. Find those people, but be sure to pay them and thank them as well as help them out when they need it.
21. Journal Selection Process: Look for journals to publish in. Target your papers. Think or plan ahead. If you are in educational technology, see my technology journal list at: http://www.trainingshare.com/resources/distance_ed_journals_and_online_learning_books.htm
22. Conference Jumping: Do not go from conference to conference. Try to publish your papers prior to going (after accepted) or right after the conference. If you go from conference to conference, you will never get many things published. I am speaking from experience. Friends need you at conferences, but each conference equates to 2-3 weeks—one week to get ready, one week to be there, and a week to recover. Keep this 3 week rule in mind every time you consider a conference. It is more like 3 weeks of time for an assistant professor. For tenured professors like me, it is more like 1 week since I no longer have to write papers for each conference and can come and go as needed. That being said, I still do conference papers. I do not want to sound like a slug.
23. Annual Publishing Goals or Quotas: Publish on average 3 good articles per year. That is the goal. If you get 2 much of the time and 3 the rest, be happy. My personal quotas are much higher but you need to set yours somewhere and simply get started.
24. Research Strands: Create 2-4 strands of your research. Do not just have 1 strand to your research as some might advise you to do. One strand may never be accepted for publication and so then what do you do? Diversify somewhat.
These are just 24 of my ideas. I could give you 24 more if needed. Get ideas for 4-5 people and synthesize across them. Ok, remember this is about YOUR time. Below is a joke about the time commitments prior to tenure.
Ten Simple Steps to Tenure (this is meant as a joke--smile):
Step #1: Avoid department meetings;
Step #2: Avoid school or college meetings;
Step #3: Avoid university functions and meetings;
Step #4: Avoid mandated meetings;
Step #5: Avoid book publishers, book buyers (though sometimes getting cash for books is nice), and avoid anyone stopping by just to chat.
Step #6: Avoid retreats and other such silliness;
Step #7: Avoid committee meetings;
Step #8: Avoid students;
Step #9: Avoid life;
Step #10: Review other 9 steps each week.
Much of this I say in jest. Still, it is just a way to remind yourself that your time matters and is costly.
What about friends and family? Never forget them. They are the most important. Meet them during conferences or take with you. My kids have been with me to conferences and presentations in Finland, Australia, and Hawaii. That was fun! In addition, my friends meet me at almost all of my conferences. That is also great!
So now you have two dozen ideas to help you get tenure (should you want it). If all else fails, here is a job posting list I recently created (smile this is meant as a joke):
http://www.trainingshare.com/resources/Job-search-Educational-Technology-and-Instructional-Technology.htm
Good luck.
Monday, 28 July 2008
Ice Story Interview with Cassandra Brooks
In my book that extends Friedman’s “The World is Flat,” I discuss many interesting learning situations and adventures. People are learning when in ships, trains, planes, taxis, and simulators. One of the more interesting adventures was the “Ice Stories” of scientists who are conducting research in Antarctic waters. These stories were sponsored by the Exploratorium in San Francisco and ran from January to March 2008, for instance. Scientists were at McMurdo Station near the South Pole as well as ones in the South Shetland Islands and other remote southern locations. This project, which was partially funded by the National Science Foundation, was called “Ice Stories: Dispatches from Polar Scientists.” In the Ice Stories project, students can read about experiments related to Antarctica’s sheet ice dynamics, climate change, penguin breeding behaviors, and the responses of the polar marine ecosystem to the effects of global warming. (Note: for more information, see the links at the end of this post.)
Among the people I found in these Ice Stories was Cassandra Brooks. I wrote her an email about two months after her return from her second trip to Antarctica. It was June 2008 when we chatted. She was just about to submit her master’s thesis at the Marine Science program at Moss Landing Marine Laboratories (MLML) in California and go through commencement. Cassandra’s work focuses on the life history and population of Antarctic toothfish (which we know as the very expensive, Chilean Sea Bass). In 2006, she was able to study krill and Antarctic finfish, including her beloved toothfish. This time she returned again as part of a zooplankton survey focusing on the krill. In a February 23, 2008 blog post, she notes that “I stepped out on deck this morning to find the sea fog had finally lifted, revealing an immense ocean of ice: the world of Antarctica.”
Cassandra definitely likes to write! To give you the sense of one her posts, in her final one, titled “One Gorgeous Day,” on Saturday, April 5, 2008, Cassandra goes on to say:
“We finally finished our zooplankton survey and since we had two days to spare, we steamed down into the Gerlache Straight, off the Antarctic Peninsula for a fun day off. The Gerlache Straight is famous for its scenery, but when I awoke it was snowing and it continued to snow all day. At first we were all slightly disappointed; the snow blocked our view of the landscape. But as the day carried on, the gently falling snow covered the boat, cultivating a surreal landscape. The water was calm and covered in a thick layer of snow which began to clump, forming what’s known as ‘pancake ice.’ There were icebergs and bergy bits everywhere, all covered in a fresh layer of white.”
She ended this post with the following:
“We all have a responsibility to manage Antarctica for the international good, to do our best to learn as much as possible about this polar environment. That includes how humans are affecting it via climate change, which will affect everyone. We have a responsibility to protect its resources and ecosystem, to make the best choices about how we fish Antarctic waters and how we manage Antarctic resources, and to educate each other, as I have tried to do through these dispatches. I thank you for sharing the adventure with me.”
She is right. We must find ways to protect Antarctica and the entire world. For my book, I had many questions for Cassandra. My list of questions and her answers are below.
Here are my questions and Cassandra’s answers:
1. (Bonk.) How did you get picked for this?
1. (Cassandra.) I started graduate school in the fall of 2004 with an interest in marine science with an interest in fisheries and doing a thesis that I thought would make a positive and applicable contribution not only to the science world, but also to management and conservation. My boss was working on a bigger age and growth toothfish project and needed help, so I began working full time on it and later took on a thesis studying one of the two species of toothfish, the Antarctic toothfish. My project focused on age validation of this species. Accurate age and growth information is critical in estimates of maturity, longevity, recruitment, and mortality all of which go into stock assessment models used in setting management quotas and setting catch limits. The problem is that most age and growth studies are incredibly subjective. We age most fish by counting growth zones in their bony parts (i.e. otoliths -fish ear bones-, scales, vertebrate, etc.) in the same way you would count rings in a tree to assess how old they get. But often these growth zones are not distinct or we don't know that the bony parts form only one growth zone per year or if they form one every three years. So we have to test the accuracy by age validation. I did this through lead-radium dating. In this method we actually measure the ratio of the isotopes lead and radium in the fish otolith as an independent chronometer which we can then compare to the ages we obtained through counting growth zones. Then we know if our ages are accurate!
Now, all of my Antarctic toothfish otoliths were obtained from fisheries observers (workers who collect data and biological samples) on commercial fishing vessels in the Ross Sea, Antarctica (the side opposite New Zealand). At the same time I was aging the otoliths, I was also doing a spatial analysis and trying to really understand the glacial dynamics and oceanography of Antarctica. I felt I could not do this project and never actually see Antarctica and a toothfish, which led me to pursue ways of getting down there. A researcher at my lab by the name of Valerie Loeb was one of the head scientists for AMLR (Antarctic Marine Living Resources) and at the same time I was looking for ways down south she was looking for a research technician and asked me to join here. So I went to Antarctica (the region off the Antarctic Peninsula, South Shetland Islands to be exact) with AMLR in January of 2006 and had an incredible time. That year we did a zooplankton survey (focusing on krill) followed by a fish survey where I finally got to see my toothfish!
During my first season with AMLR I wrote long emails to my friends and family about my experience in Antarctica. I loved sharing the adventure and people seemed to get a lot out of it. I believe so strongly in communicating science and in making people more aware of the world out there. I knew being in Antarctica was a unique experience and I also knew many people simply didn't know a lot about the environment down there, so I wanted to teach them. I returned to Antarctica with AMLR this year (2008) and wanted to write for a bigger audience and so I hooked up with the Exploratorium.
The way I got hooked up with the Exploratorium is another story though. You could say that science writing (for the public) has always been my dream job and I began looking into the science communication program at UCSC awhile ago. I had applied to the program just as I was getting ready to go to Antarctica and had voiced to the director of the program my desires to write from down south. One of the alumni of the UCSC program runs the Exploratorium "ice stories" program and so he put us in touch and I began to write for them (that was a REALLY long answer!).
2. (Bonk.) Did you blog from your ship or camp? What kind of connection to the Internet did you have?
2. (Cassandra.) I blogged from my research vessel. We didn't actually have an internet connection, which made things a bit harder. We had satellite email which I was really limited on in terms of how much I could send out, especially pictures. And we only had the connection twice a day.
3. (Bonk.) Do you know the person who replied to you (Naicy) and how old she is? (Naicy had replied to Cassandra March 10th blog posting about what drew her down to Antarctica and invited Cassandra to visit her in the Philippines.)
3. (Cassandra.) I don't know Naicy or how old she is.
4. (Bonk.) How often did K-12 kids reply to your posts? How might such activities be used in education?
4. (Cassandra.) I can't say for sure how often K-12 kids replied to the posts, but there were definitely a few who did who did say their age, but most didn't. I do know that a couple of my friends and colleagues did use the posts in their classrooms as an interactive way to teach their kids about Antarctica. Especially because of the pictures, and many scientists use other multimedia tools like audio and video, I think it’s a great interactive learning tool. Moreover, students can follow the scientists along in their trip and look forward to new posts, meanwhile they are learning about this incredible and extreme environment.
5. (Bonk.) What was the overall experience like?
5. (Cassandra.) I am assuming you are asking about the blogging experience? It was a lot of work, especially because I was working 12 hour shifts on the research side of things, but incredibly rewarding and a great way for me to gain experience in science communication (which the career I am now moving towards). Being in Antarctica is such an amazing experience and something I feel incredibly fortunate to have had. I loved being able to share this with others and to hopefully educate and inspire them about this beautiful place. I cannot stress how important I think it is to educate the public, especially in today's world when all our human actions are having such a growing impact on the world, including Antarctica. I think many people can't imagine that, that they are affecting a land that they have never seen. I wanted to show them that place, through my eyes, pictures and words, in hopes that I am doing something for the ultimate long-term greater good of Antarctica and the southern ocean resources (which is ultimately why I do the science as well).
6. (Bonk.) How long were you there?
6. (Cassandra.) This year I was only there from mid-February to mid-March. In 2006, I was there for January, February and March. And also to clarify, that while my thesis is on toothfish, which led me to going down there, the cruise I was on this year was focused on krill, not toothfish. But it’s all connected of course!
Some Web links:
Exploratorium: http://www.exploratorium.edu/
Ice Stories: http://icestories.exploratorium.edu/dispatches/index.php
Ice Stories (Cassandra Brooks’ weblog): http://icestories.exploratorium.edu/dispatches/?author=6
See Article:
eSchool News. “See Science in Action at the South Pole through These Live (and Archived) Webcasts,” eSchool News (January 2, 2008), http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/site-of-the-week/site/index.cfm?i=51354;_hbguid=a9d5d040-8d6d-4eb6-89c7-75e426c9da15
I hope you enjoyed this Ice Story moment. There is a story about Cassandra in the book I am just about done with as well as dozens of other similar stories.
Among the people I found in these Ice Stories was Cassandra Brooks. I wrote her an email about two months after her return from her second trip to Antarctica. It was June 2008 when we chatted. She was just about to submit her master’s thesis at the Marine Science program at Moss Landing Marine Laboratories (MLML) in California and go through commencement. Cassandra’s work focuses on the life history and population of Antarctic toothfish (which we know as the very expensive, Chilean Sea Bass). In 2006, she was able to study krill and Antarctic finfish, including her beloved toothfish. This time she returned again as part of a zooplankton survey focusing on the krill. In a February 23, 2008 blog post, she notes that “I stepped out on deck this morning to find the sea fog had finally lifted, revealing an immense ocean of ice: the world of Antarctica.”
Cassandra definitely likes to write! To give you the sense of one her posts, in her final one, titled “One Gorgeous Day,” on Saturday, April 5, 2008, Cassandra goes on to say:
“We finally finished our zooplankton survey and since we had two days to spare, we steamed down into the Gerlache Straight, off the Antarctic Peninsula for a fun day off. The Gerlache Straight is famous for its scenery, but when I awoke it was snowing and it continued to snow all day. At first we were all slightly disappointed; the snow blocked our view of the landscape. But as the day carried on, the gently falling snow covered the boat, cultivating a surreal landscape. The water was calm and covered in a thick layer of snow which began to clump, forming what’s known as ‘pancake ice.’ There were icebergs and bergy bits everywhere, all covered in a fresh layer of white.”
She ended this post with the following:
“We all have a responsibility to manage Antarctica for the international good, to do our best to learn as much as possible about this polar environment. That includes how humans are affecting it via climate change, which will affect everyone. We have a responsibility to protect its resources and ecosystem, to make the best choices about how we fish Antarctic waters and how we manage Antarctic resources, and to educate each other, as I have tried to do through these dispatches. I thank you for sharing the adventure with me.”
She is right. We must find ways to protect Antarctica and the entire world. For my book, I had many questions for Cassandra. My list of questions and her answers are below.
Here are my questions and Cassandra’s answers:
1. (Bonk.) How did you get picked for this?
1. (Cassandra.) I started graduate school in the fall of 2004 with an interest in marine science with an interest in fisheries and doing a thesis that I thought would make a positive and applicable contribution not only to the science world, but also to management and conservation. My boss was working on a bigger age and growth toothfish project and needed help, so I began working full time on it and later took on a thesis studying one of the two species of toothfish, the Antarctic toothfish. My project focused on age validation of this species. Accurate age and growth information is critical in estimates of maturity, longevity, recruitment, and mortality all of which go into stock assessment models used in setting management quotas and setting catch limits. The problem is that most age and growth studies are incredibly subjective. We age most fish by counting growth zones in their bony parts (i.e. otoliths -fish ear bones-, scales, vertebrate, etc.) in the same way you would count rings in a tree to assess how old they get. But often these growth zones are not distinct or we don't know that the bony parts form only one growth zone per year or if they form one every three years. So we have to test the accuracy by age validation. I did this through lead-radium dating. In this method we actually measure the ratio of the isotopes lead and radium in the fish otolith as an independent chronometer which we can then compare to the ages we obtained through counting growth zones. Then we know if our ages are accurate!
Now, all of my Antarctic toothfish otoliths were obtained from fisheries observers (workers who collect data and biological samples) on commercial fishing vessels in the Ross Sea, Antarctica (the side opposite New Zealand). At the same time I was aging the otoliths, I was also doing a spatial analysis and trying to really understand the glacial dynamics and oceanography of Antarctica. I felt I could not do this project and never actually see Antarctica and a toothfish, which led me to pursue ways of getting down there. A researcher at my lab by the name of Valerie Loeb was one of the head scientists for AMLR (Antarctic Marine Living Resources) and at the same time I was looking for ways down south she was looking for a research technician and asked me to join here. So I went to Antarctica (the region off the Antarctic Peninsula, South Shetland Islands to be exact) with AMLR in January of 2006 and had an incredible time. That year we did a zooplankton survey (focusing on krill) followed by a fish survey where I finally got to see my toothfish!
During my first season with AMLR I wrote long emails to my friends and family about my experience in Antarctica. I loved sharing the adventure and people seemed to get a lot out of it. I believe so strongly in communicating science and in making people more aware of the world out there. I knew being in Antarctica was a unique experience and I also knew many people simply didn't know a lot about the environment down there, so I wanted to teach them. I returned to Antarctica with AMLR this year (2008) and wanted to write for a bigger audience and so I hooked up with the Exploratorium.
The way I got hooked up with the Exploratorium is another story though. You could say that science writing (for the public) has always been my dream job and I began looking into the science communication program at UCSC awhile ago. I had applied to the program just as I was getting ready to go to Antarctica and had voiced to the director of the program my desires to write from down south. One of the alumni of the UCSC program runs the Exploratorium "ice stories" program and so he put us in touch and I began to write for them (that was a REALLY long answer!).
2. (Bonk.) Did you blog from your ship or camp? What kind of connection to the Internet did you have?
2. (Cassandra.) I blogged from my research vessel. We didn't actually have an internet connection, which made things a bit harder. We had satellite email which I was really limited on in terms of how much I could send out, especially pictures. And we only had the connection twice a day.
3. (Bonk.) Do you know the person who replied to you (Naicy) and how old she is? (Naicy had replied to Cassandra March 10th blog posting about what drew her down to Antarctica and invited Cassandra to visit her in the Philippines.)
3. (Cassandra.) I don't know Naicy or how old she is.
4. (Bonk.) How often did K-12 kids reply to your posts? How might such activities be used in education?
4. (Cassandra.) I can't say for sure how often K-12 kids replied to the posts, but there were definitely a few who did who did say their age, but most didn't. I do know that a couple of my friends and colleagues did use the posts in their classrooms as an interactive way to teach their kids about Antarctica. Especially because of the pictures, and many scientists use other multimedia tools like audio and video, I think it’s a great interactive learning tool. Moreover, students can follow the scientists along in their trip and look forward to new posts, meanwhile they are learning about this incredible and extreme environment.
5. (Bonk.) What was the overall experience like?
5. (Cassandra.) I am assuming you are asking about the blogging experience? It was a lot of work, especially because I was working 12 hour shifts on the research side of things, but incredibly rewarding and a great way for me to gain experience in science communication (which the career I am now moving towards). Being in Antarctica is such an amazing experience and something I feel incredibly fortunate to have had. I loved being able to share this with others and to hopefully educate and inspire them about this beautiful place. I cannot stress how important I think it is to educate the public, especially in today's world when all our human actions are having such a growing impact on the world, including Antarctica. I think many people can't imagine that, that they are affecting a land that they have never seen. I wanted to show them that place, through my eyes, pictures and words, in hopes that I am doing something for the ultimate long-term greater good of Antarctica and the southern ocean resources (which is ultimately why I do the science as well).
6. (Bonk.) How long were you there?
6. (Cassandra.) This year I was only there from mid-February to mid-March. In 2006, I was there for January, February and March. And also to clarify, that while my thesis is on toothfish, which led me to going down there, the cruise I was on this year was focused on krill, not toothfish. But it’s all connected of course!
Some Web links:
Exploratorium: http://www.exploratorium.edu/
Ice Stories: http://icestories.exploratorium.edu/dispatches/index.php
Ice Stories (Cassandra Brooks’ weblog): http://icestories.exploratorium.edu/dispatches/?author=6
See Article:
eSchool News. “See Science in Action at the South Pole through These Live (and Archived) Webcasts,” eSchool News (January 2, 2008), http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/site-of-the-week/site/index.cfm?i=51354;_hbguid=a9d5d040-8d6d-4eb6-89c7-75e426c9da15
I hope you enjoyed this Ice Story moment. There is a story about Cassandra in the book I am just about done with as well as dozens of other similar stories.
Saturday, 26 July 2008
Now I need some book publishing advice!
Ok, I have written an educational extension of Thomas Friedman's "The World is Flat." I have spend the past year in near seclusion to do it (e.g., no TV, no international travel, and no beer (ouch)) and I have run everyday for the past 13 months. My feet are very sore but getting better with extra pads. It is a long book. This has been the most difficult project of my life. Still, I got to meet dozens of people from around the planet whom I would not otherwise have met. I cover ten key technology trends in the book (e.g., e-books, online learning, wireless and mobile learning, virtual worlds and gaming, open and free software, etc.). This is my title: "The World is Open: Now WE-ALL-LEARN with Web Technology."
I am now about to send the manuscript off for review. I have contacted a couple of publishers who are interested in reading it. I would like to know if anyone has any publisher friends, agents, or contacts whom they might recommend to me. I am particularly looking for a publisher who is innovative, willing to work with me on alternative ways of publishing (e.g., YouTube promos, Kindle, blogs, e-books, PDF of document, etc.).
I have had 11 reviews of the book from colleagues and friends (biased I know) and they have all come back great. I am not able to share anymore at this time; however, if you want to know more, just send me an email (cjbonk@indiana.edu). Thanks so much.
Once published, I hope to blog 1,000 words of the book per day until it is up as an e-book. Thoughts?
I am now about to send the manuscript off for review. I have contacted a couple of publishers who are interested in reading it. I would like to know if anyone has any publisher friends, agents, or contacts whom they might recommend to me. I am particularly looking for a publisher who is innovative, willing to work with me on alternative ways of publishing (e.g., YouTube promos, Kindle, blogs, e-books, PDF of document, etc.).
I have had 11 reviews of the book from colleagues and friends (biased I know) and they have all come back great. I am not able to share anymore at this time; however, if you want to know more, just send me an email (cjbonk@indiana.edu). Thanks so much.
Once published, I hope to blog 1,000 words of the book per day until it is up as an e-book. Thoughts?
Sunday, 20 July 2008
The SCoPE of R2D2!
Hey all, the SCoPE people will have a discussion of my R2D2 book from Monday July 21 to Sunday August 3rd, 2008. You can link to SCoPE here:
Here is the link to the seminar discussions area.
Here is a direct link to the forum.
Dr. Ke Zhang, my co-author, and I look forward to chatting with you about R2D2. May the force be with you!
SCoPE is an "open, online community for people like you!"
By the way, I will be traveling to Denver and Boulder this week from July 21-24. Information on my talks can be found in at my news page.
Finally, my talks for this coming week as well as this past Friday at the University of Houston can be found in my archived talks. I spoke on my R2D2 book as well as my next one, TEC-VARIETY for online motivationand retention and my "The World is Open" book.
Here is the link to the seminar discussions area.
Here is a direct link to the forum.
Dr. Ke Zhang, my co-author, and I look forward to chatting with you about R2D2. May the force be with you!
SCoPE is an "open, online community for people like you!"
By the way, I will be traveling to Denver and Boulder this week from July 21-24. Information on my talks can be found in at my news page.
Finally, my talks for this coming week as well as this past Friday at the University of Houston can be found in my archived talks. I spoke on my R2D2 book as well as my next one, TEC-VARIETY for online motivationand retention and my "The World is Open" book.
Saturday, 5 July 2008
R2D2 book is out!!!!!!!! May the force be with those who use it!
Yippie! My R2D2 book came out July 2nd. Just in time for the firework displays!
Bonk, C. J., & Zhang, K. (2008). Empowering Online Learning: 100+ Activities for Reading, Reflecting, Displaying, and Doing. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Here is a picture of the cover...
This book goes through the Read, Reflect, Display, and Do model for online teaching and learning that Dr. Ke Zhang from Wayne State University and I designed. There are 25 activities in the book for each phase. Some might see it as a learning style approach, but Ke and I view it as a problem solving model. A wheel. One goes through it in any order to learn. Some might prefer diferent parts of the wheel.
The R2D2 book has 10 chapters totaling 303 total pages. Naturally, there is an introductory chapter and an ending recap chapter. To help the serious reader as well as casual browser, there are also summary tables at the start (i.e., see Chapter 1) and end (see Chapter 10) of all 100+ activities. Ke and I decided to have one chapter introduce new learning technology and then the following chapter have activities with it. The activities chapters are loaded, however, with many juicy pieces of information about new technologies and learning tools. There is an intro to each phase of R2D2 that you will find in Chapters 2, 4, 6, and 8. We cover topics like blogging, podcasting, wikibooks, simulations, virtual tours, digital repositories, online concept mapping, etc. The four chapters with the 25 activities are Chapters 3, 5, 7, and 9. For each online idea or activity, we give the following:
1. Description and Purpose of Activity.
2. Skills and Objectives (the activity addresses).
3. Advice and Ideas.
4. Variations and Extensions.
5. Key Instructional Considerations (List includes a Risk Index (Low to High), Time Index (Low to High), Cost Index (Low to High), Learner-centered Index (Low to High), and the Duration of the Activity.
In effect, we have templates for 100 online learning activities for any age group from K-12 to higher education to government, military, and corporate training. All of 100 of them can be used in higher education and most of the rest can be used in any setting. Sometimes it may require creativity on the part of the instructional designer, teacher, or trainer, but they can work nearly anywhere with access to technology and the Internet. And with 100 variations and extensions, there are at least 200 activities or ideas in the book, not just the 100 promised. So it is a good deal. Smile.
Some "Read" activities: Online Poetry Readings, Online Language Lessons, Online Scavenger Hunts, Audio Dramas, WebQuests, E-Book and Wikibook Reports and Critiques, Text Messanging Course Reminders and Activities, and Online Synchronous Testing.
Some "Reflect" activities: Podcast Tours, Posting Model Answers, Collaborative and Team Blogs, Electronic Portfolios, Social Networking Linkages, Field and Lab Reflections, Reuse Chat Transscripts, and Self-Check Quizzes and Exams.
Some "Display" activities: Interactive News and Documentaries, Broadcast Events, Online Visualization Tools, of Google Maps, Anchored Instruction and Online Video, Virtual Tours, Online Timeline Explorations and Safaris, and Design Reviews and Commentaries.
Some "Do" activities: Web-Based Survey Research, Action Research, Online Tutoring and Mentoring, Learner Podcast Activities, Events, and Shows, Real-Time Cases, Wikibook Projects, and Online Role Play of Personalities.
You can order it on Amazon for $40.
You cam find the R2D2 model and a 20 percent off order form off my homepage at: http://mypage.iu.edu/~cjbonk/
***A PDF of an order form with a 20 percent discount from Wiley/Jossey-Bass os also available.
The visual of the R2D2 as well as the book cover and more information about the book can be found at PublicationShare.com.
I have also gotten permission from Jossey Bass to post all the Web links mentioned in the book by chapter. I also posted all the references that ended up in the R2D2 book; many include Web links to the actual article or report. Check them out. This is all free for you and me!!!!!!!! You can find lots of resources at TrainingShare.com.
Ke Zhang and I hope you enjoy the book. Send us any feedback, suggestions, comments, and so on that have. We look forward to hearing from you! By the way, six chapters that Ke and I wrote that were more general or theoretical in nature, including one's on learning styles, training and support of instructors to teach online, Generation X and Y students, and instructional design comparisons to the R2D2 model, were not included in the book. Comments and inquiries for such chapters or about anything related to the book, can be sent to me at: cjbonk@indiana.edu or to Dr. Ke Zhang at prof.zhang@gmail.com.
Later this summer, I will be working on another 100 idea book related to online motivation and retention using my TEC-VARIETY model. Each letter stands for a motivational principle (Tone, Engagement, Curiosity, Variety, etc.). This book will have ten motivational principles and 10 activities for each principle as well as variations and extensions related to each one. In effectm, it will be another 100+ activities book for online learning. First, I must finish revising my big book about the more open learning world we are in. That project is killing my brain right now! Back to revising.
Oh ya, here is a picture of Ke and I showing off our R2D2 talents:
May the force be with you always!!!!!!!
Bonk, C. J., & Zhang, K. (2008). Empowering Online Learning: 100+ Activities for Reading, Reflecting, Displaying, and Doing. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Here is a picture of the cover...
This book goes through the Read, Reflect, Display, and Do model for online teaching and learning that Dr. Ke Zhang from Wayne State University and I designed. There are 25 activities in the book for each phase. Some might see it as a learning style approach, but Ke and I view it as a problem solving model. A wheel. One goes through it in any order to learn. Some might prefer diferent parts of the wheel.
The R2D2 book has 10 chapters totaling 303 total pages. Naturally, there is an introductory chapter and an ending recap chapter. To help the serious reader as well as casual browser, there are also summary tables at the start (i.e., see Chapter 1) and end (see Chapter 10) of all 100+ activities. Ke and I decided to have one chapter introduce new learning technology and then the following chapter have activities with it. The activities chapters are loaded, however, with many juicy pieces of information about new technologies and learning tools. There is an intro to each phase of R2D2 that you will find in Chapters 2, 4, 6, and 8. We cover topics like blogging, podcasting, wikibooks, simulations, virtual tours, digital repositories, online concept mapping, etc. The four chapters with the 25 activities are Chapters 3, 5, 7, and 9. For each online idea or activity, we give the following:
1. Description and Purpose of Activity.
2. Skills and Objectives (the activity addresses).
3. Advice and Ideas.
4. Variations and Extensions.
5. Key Instructional Considerations (List includes a Risk Index (Low to High), Time Index (Low to High), Cost Index (Low to High), Learner-centered Index (Low to High), and the Duration of the Activity.
In effect, we have templates for 100 online learning activities for any age group from K-12 to higher education to government, military, and corporate training. All of 100 of them can be used in higher education and most of the rest can be used in any setting. Sometimes it may require creativity on the part of the instructional designer, teacher, or trainer, but they can work nearly anywhere with access to technology and the Internet. And with 100 variations and extensions, there are at least 200 activities or ideas in the book, not just the 100 promised. So it is a good deal. Smile.
Some "Read" activities: Online Poetry Readings, Online Language Lessons, Online Scavenger Hunts, Audio Dramas, WebQuests, E-Book and Wikibook Reports and Critiques, Text Messanging Course Reminders and Activities, and Online Synchronous Testing.
Some "Reflect" activities: Podcast Tours, Posting Model Answers, Collaborative and Team Blogs, Electronic Portfolios, Social Networking Linkages, Field and Lab Reflections, Reuse Chat Transscripts, and Self-Check Quizzes and Exams.
Some "Display" activities: Interactive News and Documentaries, Broadcast Events, Online Visualization Tools, of Google Maps, Anchored Instruction and Online Video, Virtual Tours, Online Timeline Explorations and Safaris, and Design Reviews and Commentaries.
Some "Do" activities: Web-Based Survey Research, Action Research, Online Tutoring and Mentoring, Learner Podcast Activities, Events, and Shows, Real-Time Cases, Wikibook Projects, and Online Role Play of Personalities.
You can order it on Amazon for $40.
You cam find the R2D2 model and a 20 percent off order form off my homepage at: http://mypage.iu.edu/~cjbonk/
***A PDF of an order form with a 20 percent discount from Wiley/Jossey-Bass os also available.
The visual of the R2D2 as well as the book cover and more information about the book can be found at PublicationShare.com.
I have also gotten permission from Jossey Bass to post all the Web links mentioned in the book by chapter. I also posted all the references that ended up in the R2D2 book; many include Web links to the actual article or report. Check them out. This is all free for you and me!!!!!!!! You can find lots of resources at TrainingShare.com.
Ke Zhang and I hope you enjoy the book. Send us any feedback, suggestions, comments, and so on that have. We look forward to hearing from you! By the way, six chapters that Ke and I wrote that were more general or theoretical in nature, including one's on learning styles, training and support of instructors to teach online, Generation X and Y students, and instructional design comparisons to the R2D2 model, were not included in the book. Comments and inquiries for such chapters or about anything related to the book, can be sent to me at: cjbonk@indiana.edu or to Dr. Ke Zhang at prof.zhang@gmail.com.
Later this summer, I will be working on another 100 idea book related to online motivation and retention using my TEC-VARIETY model. Each letter stands for a motivational principle (Tone, Engagement, Curiosity, Variety, etc.). This book will have ten motivational principles and 10 activities for each principle as well as variations and extensions related to each one. In effectm, it will be another 100+ activities book for online learning. First, I must finish revising my big book about the more open learning world we are in. That project is killing my brain right now! Back to revising.
Oh ya, here is a picture of Ke and I showing off our R2D2 talents:
May the force be with you always!!!!!!!
Saturday, 10 May 2008
A Personal Interview with Julie Young, President and CEO of the Florida Virtual School (FLVS)
I have not been posting to my blog lately. Sorry. Google took my TravelinEdMan blog offline for a week since they had perceived it to be a spam blog. I have cleared that up thankfully. I found out just as I was about to post a blog reflection related to attending a talk by Barack Obama on the night of April 30th, 2008. He was here for our presidential primary and he was electric! I will post that later on as I have something else to post tonight.
During the past few weeks, I have been working on my book that extends Thomas Friedman’s “The World is Flat” book to education. I have a draft nearly completed and it is approaching 220,000 words. Yikes. I have been interviewing many educational leaders for it. Among them is Julie Young, President and CEO of the Florida Virtual School (FLVS). Her comments were so thoughtful that I asked her permission to place them in my blog.
As background for you, the FLVS is among the largest online K-12 schools in the U.S. and perhaps the world. With state appropriations of over $50 million (Jacobson, 2007), during the 2006-2007 fiscal year, the FLVS had over 52,000 students from grade 6 to 12 enrolled in more than 87,000 half-credit courses (see Florida Virtual School, 2008). These enrollments were expected to exceed 100,000 during the 2007-2008 school year.
Here are my questions and Julie’s answers:
1. (Bonk.) How do you make learning engaging?
a. (Young.) First and foremost, we rely on the teacher to engage the student. While technology will increasingly allow us to customize the courseware itself to each individual student, we believe a proactive teacher who intentionally reaches out to students on a regular basis goes a long way in the battle for engagement.
That said, we’re moving ahead on the curriculum design side as well. Some past developments that have worked well with students are simple things like chunking the content and adding things like pace charts to give students simple tools to make their way through a course. The more ownership we can foster within students in their learning process, the more likely we will see engagement. We’ve also analyzed our courses to see where students are less engaged or where they might be stumbling over certain lessons. As we continually refresh and update our courseware, we look at that data in order to know where we need fresh interactive tools or lesson re-designs to keep engagement levels high.
2. (Bonk.) Why do students from so many states use the FLVS?
a. (Young.) Because we were so supported in Florida, we were able to develop and grow quickly. By the time other states began to recognize the need for an online learning option and began doing the research to see what was involved in launching a program, they realized that it just made more sense to come to a program like ours and purchase services.
We have been selling courseware, training, consultative services, and classroom seats outside of Florida since 2002. Those revenue dollars come back into development to keep courses at the highest quality level possible. We feel pretty good about being able to take the expertise we’ve been able to foster here and use it to provide a sort of a clearinghouse for quality online courseware and instructional design so that we can share that research and design with educators nationwide. Ultimately, more students will benefit as we partner nationwide.
3. (Bonk.) Are there any states doing what the FLVS did? Or using it as a model?
a. (Young.) Yes, there are a number of states who have modeled their program after FLVS. In fact, some of those states have also purchased courseware and services from us. The Southern Regional Education Board, in fact, has encouraged all of the states within its purview to follow the FLVS model, not just from an instructional design stance, but also from a policy and fiscal support standpoint. Florida has worked hard to remove legislative barriers to online learning, and SREB encourages other states to take note and follow suit.
Some states have adopted many FLVS policies in terms of the daily school operations, but their model may be completely different. For instance, leaders in Wisconsin took the stance that online learning should be a grass roots initiative versus state-led. The Appleton district took the initiative to launch a program, and after much research, they chose FLVS as their curriculum provider. That choice has resulted in a long-term partnership which has included myriad consultations and training. They have taken the principles that made FLVS a success and have found ways to apply those principles to their unique circumstances. Today, the Wisconsin eSchool is a large consortium of numerous districts that share resources and serve students through much of the state. We are proud to be their provider and partner in the journey.
4. (Bonk.) What happens next for FLVS?
a. (Young.) We are moving forward with developments in curriculum and in our instructional methods. On the instructional side, we have adopted what we are calling a “Symphony of Skills,” which is a mélange of best practices from several sources, including the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, Phil Schlecty’s “Working on the Work” concepts, and Quantum learning. We are training our staff in all of these pedagogical theories and looking for ways to infuse our instructional approach with them. On the curriculum side, we are partnering with the Academic Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Co-Lab in Wisconsin to push ahead to next-generation content development. We are thrilled to be working with the recognized creators and developers of Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM), which forms the basis for object-oriented learning.
5. (Bonk.) Do you have an interesting story or 2 where you impacted learning of someone in a way that you did not plan?
a. (Young.) Earlier in our development, we didn’t realize the secondary skills that students would gain from working in the online learning environment. We’ve seen students develop in their ability to speak clearly with an adult because they actually talk one-on-one with instructors fairly regularly. (They can’t hide as easily as they can in a classroom.)
b. (Young.) We’ve also seen students grown in their ability to organize themselves, take initiative, and take ownership of their learning—simply because of the nature of our environment. Likewise, students have developed in their ability to read and write, again because the online environment requires them to do so more often than the classroom.
Finally, we’ve seen students grow in technical skills. They often come into this environment with a mistaken belief that they know all about the technologies we use, but they don’t. What they do have, however, is a fearless willingness to try. They dive into the content, and the fact that they are learning to use tools like a web-conferencing, VOIP, or a simple PPT at the same time they are learning content may be seamless to them.
One other thing that comes to mind in terms of unexpected outcomes is the life management and coping skills that so many students have gained through our health and life management courses. We get so many questions about how it is possible to teach personal fitness online, but what the naysayers don’t see are the almost daily letters we receive from students and parents about how life changing the course was. We’ve had students write to say they lost 10, 20, 40 pounds, and many have said that other family members lost weight as well because they actually did the workouts together! These are the same students who likely would have gotten nothing out of a school gym class.
We’ve had students from the life management courses write that they’ve improved their ability to communicate with their families as a result of the course. One student who had been running with a rough crowd wrote that he realized he had made poor choices that had adversely affected him and his family, and the course taught him how to turn things around for himself. He actually said that he believed the course and the teacher saved his life. It doesn’t get much better than that.
6. (Bonk.) Friedman says the world is flatter now. I think it is open. Do you see the world opening up?
a. (Young.) The world is definitely opening up in terms of access to information and to people. The possibilities, as Friedman so eloquently portrayed in his book, for information exchange, collaboration, and teamwork are almost mind-boggling, as are the ramifications for our personal, educational, and work lives. I think this new world of open access provides for students some exciting and unprecedented opportunities for learning. It also presents new dangers.
Part of my passion as an educator is to help other educators understand how vital it is that we be willing to pioneer within this new “open” world on behalf of our children. If you think of pioneering days of old in this country, no one would have dreamed of sending children out to forge a trail to the West ahead of their parents. Yet, so many parents and educators today are willing to throw up their hands and say that they just aren’t good at technology or they are just too old to change their way of teaching. That’s the equivalent of sending our kids into a wilderness with no map or compass. We have to be willing to provide the maps and the compass so that when they get out into this new open world of instant access, they will have guideposts, warning signs, and even a moral compass to keep them on a productive path.
7. (Bonk.) Are you familiar with the MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) initiative? How might free or open educational resources (OER) be used or promoted by FLVS?
a. (Young.) Yes, we are familiar with the move to open courseware, as noted by MIT and others. It is certainly a trend, and it is something we have discussed and will continue to discuss at FLVS. There are challenges, such as finding ways to share content without compromising state or national standards requirements, but we will continue to explore options that will allow us to do more sharing in the future.
Thanks for listening or reading this interview. As I indicated, Julie is quite thoughtful; small wonder the growth of the FLVS. As always, your comments are appreciated. You can read more about the FLVS in my upcoming book.
By the way, I will be gone this week to Atlanta on Monday May 12th to meet up with Brian Ford from the UK to discuss my book and then to speak at UNC Charlotte on Tuesday (May 13. IU also speak this coming week at DePaul University in Chicago on Thursday and Friday (May 15-16). Let me know if you want to attend any of these talks. Last week I presented at Fresno Pacific University. PDF copies of my talks in Fresno can be found here: http://www.trainingshare.com/workshop.php#fpu2008
References:
Florida Virtual School: http://www.flvs.net/
Florida Virtual School (2008). FLVS fast facts. Florida Virtual School. Retrieved April 13, 2008, from http://www.flvs.net/educators/fact_sheet.php
Jacobson, Robert L. (2007, December 28). State-run virtual schools gather steam. eSchoolNews. Retrieved December 28, 2007, from www.eschoolnews.com/news/showStoryRSS.cfm?ArticleID=7328 (link no longer works); try this one for part of story: http://pryorcommitment.com/newsblog/?p=65
During the past few weeks, I have been working on my book that extends Thomas Friedman’s “The World is Flat” book to education. I have a draft nearly completed and it is approaching 220,000 words. Yikes. I have been interviewing many educational leaders for it. Among them is Julie Young, President and CEO of the Florida Virtual School (FLVS). Her comments were so thoughtful that I asked her permission to place them in my blog.
As background for you, the FLVS is among the largest online K-12 schools in the U.S. and perhaps the world. With state appropriations of over $50 million (Jacobson, 2007), during the 2006-2007 fiscal year, the FLVS had over 52,000 students from grade 6 to 12 enrolled in more than 87,000 half-credit courses (see Florida Virtual School, 2008). These enrollments were expected to exceed 100,000 during the 2007-2008 school year.
Here are my questions and Julie’s answers:
1. (Bonk.) How do you make learning engaging?
a. (Young.) First and foremost, we rely on the teacher to engage the student. While technology will increasingly allow us to customize the courseware itself to each individual student, we believe a proactive teacher who intentionally reaches out to students on a regular basis goes a long way in the battle for engagement.
That said, we’re moving ahead on the curriculum design side as well. Some past developments that have worked well with students are simple things like chunking the content and adding things like pace charts to give students simple tools to make their way through a course. The more ownership we can foster within students in their learning process, the more likely we will see engagement. We’ve also analyzed our courses to see where students are less engaged or where they might be stumbling over certain lessons. As we continually refresh and update our courseware, we look at that data in order to know where we need fresh interactive tools or lesson re-designs to keep engagement levels high.
2. (Bonk.) Why do students from so many states use the FLVS?
a. (Young.) Because we were so supported in Florida, we were able to develop and grow quickly. By the time other states began to recognize the need for an online learning option and began doing the research to see what was involved in launching a program, they realized that it just made more sense to come to a program like ours and purchase services.
We have been selling courseware, training, consultative services, and classroom seats outside of Florida since 2002. Those revenue dollars come back into development to keep courses at the highest quality level possible. We feel pretty good about being able to take the expertise we’ve been able to foster here and use it to provide a sort of a clearinghouse for quality online courseware and instructional design so that we can share that research and design with educators nationwide. Ultimately, more students will benefit as we partner nationwide.
3. (Bonk.) Are there any states doing what the FLVS did? Or using it as a model?
a. (Young.) Yes, there are a number of states who have modeled their program after FLVS. In fact, some of those states have also purchased courseware and services from us. The Southern Regional Education Board, in fact, has encouraged all of the states within its purview to follow the FLVS model, not just from an instructional design stance, but also from a policy and fiscal support standpoint. Florida has worked hard to remove legislative barriers to online learning, and SREB encourages other states to take note and follow suit.
Some states have adopted many FLVS policies in terms of the daily school operations, but their model may be completely different. For instance, leaders in Wisconsin took the stance that online learning should be a grass roots initiative versus state-led. The Appleton district took the initiative to launch a program, and after much research, they chose FLVS as their curriculum provider. That choice has resulted in a long-term partnership which has included myriad consultations and training. They have taken the principles that made FLVS a success and have found ways to apply those principles to their unique circumstances. Today, the Wisconsin eSchool is a large consortium of numerous districts that share resources and serve students through much of the state. We are proud to be their provider and partner in the journey.
4. (Bonk.) What happens next for FLVS?
a. (Young.) We are moving forward with developments in curriculum and in our instructional methods. On the instructional side, we have adopted what we are calling a “Symphony of Skills,” which is a mélange of best practices from several sources, including the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, Phil Schlecty’s “Working on the Work” concepts, and Quantum learning. We are training our staff in all of these pedagogical theories and looking for ways to infuse our instructional approach with them. On the curriculum side, we are partnering with the Academic Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Co-Lab in Wisconsin to push ahead to next-generation content development. We are thrilled to be working with the recognized creators and developers of Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM), which forms the basis for object-oriented learning.
5. (Bonk.) Do you have an interesting story or 2 where you impacted learning of someone in a way that you did not plan?
a. (Young.) Earlier in our development, we didn’t realize the secondary skills that students would gain from working in the online learning environment. We’ve seen students develop in their ability to speak clearly with an adult because they actually talk one-on-one with instructors fairly regularly. (They can’t hide as easily as they can in a classroom.)
b. (Young.) We’ve also seen students grown in their ability to organize themselves, take initiative, and take ownership of their learning—simply because of the nature of our environment. Likewise, students have developed in their ability to read and write, again because the online environment requires them to do so more often than the classroom.
Finally, we’ve seen students grow in technical skills. They often come into this environment with a mistaken belief that they know all about the technologies we use, but they don’t. What they do have, however, is a fearless willingness to try. They dive into the content, and the fact that they are learning to use tools like a web-conferencing, VOIP, or a simple PPT at the same time they are learning content may be seamless to them.
One other thing that comes to mind in terms of unexpected outcomes is the life management and coping skills that so many students have gained through our health and life management courses. We get so many questions about how it is possible to teach personal fitness online, but what the naysayers don’t see are the almost daily letters we receive from students and parents about how life changing the course was. We’ve had students write to say they lost 10, 20, 40 pounds, and many have said that other family members lost weight as well because they actually did the workouts together! These are the same students who likely would have gotten nothing out of a school gym class.
We’ve had students from the life management courses write that they’ve improved their ability to communicate with their families as a result of the course. One student who had been running with a rough crowd wrote that he realized he had made poor choices that had adversely affected him and his family, and the course taught him how to turn things around for himself. He actually said that he believed the course and the teacher saved his life. It doesn’t get much better than that.
6. (Bonk.) Friedman says the world is flatter now. I think it is open. Do you see the world opening up?
a. (Young.) The world is definitely opening up in terms of access to information and to people. The possibilities, as Friedman so eloquently portrayed in his book, for information exchange, collaboration, and teamwork are almost mind-boggling, as are the ramifications for our personal, educational, and work lives. I think this new world of open access provides for students some exciting and unprecedented opportunities for learning. It also presents new dangers.
Part of my passion as an educator is to help other educators understand how vital it is that we be willing to pioneer within this new “open” world on behalf of our children. If you think of pioneering days of old in this country, no one would have dreamed of sending children out to forge a trail to the West ahead of their parents. Yet, so many parents and educators today are willing to throw up their hands and say that they just aren’t good at technology or they are just too old to change their way of teaching. That’s the equivalent of sending our kids into a wilderness with no map or compass. We have to be willing to provide the maps and the compass so that when they get out into this new open world of instant access, they will have guideposts, warning signs, and even a moral compass to keep them on a productive path.
7. (Bonk.) Are you familiar with the MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) initiative? How might free or open educational resources (OER) be used or promoted by FLVS?
a. (Young.) Yes, we are familiar with the move to open courseware, as noted by MIT and others. It is certainly a trend, and it is something we have discussed and will continue to discuss at FLVS. There are challenges, such as finding ways to share content without compromising state or national standards requirements, but we will continue to explore options that will allow us to do more sharing in the future.
Thanks for listening or reading this interview. As I indicated, Julie is quite thoughtful; small wonder the growth of the FLVS. As always, your comments are appreciated. You can read more about the FLVS in my upcoming book.
By the way, I will be gone this week to Atlanta on Monday May 12th to meet up with Brian Ford from the UK to discuss my book and then to speak at UNC Charlotte on Tuesday (May 13. IU also speak this coming week at DePaul University in Chicago on Thursday and Friday (May 15-16). Let me know if you want to attend any of these talks. Last week I presented at Fresno Pacific University. PDF copies of my talks in Fresno can be found here: http://www.trainingshare.com/workshop.php#fpu2008
References:
Florida Virtual School: http://www.flvs.net/
Florida Virtual School (2008). FLVS fast facts. Florida Virtual School. Retrieved April 13, 2008, from http://www.flvs.net/educators/fact_sheet.php
Jacobson, Robert L. (2007, December 28). State-run virtual schools gather steam. eSchoolNews. Retrieved December 28, 2007, from www.eschoolnews.com/news/showStoryRSS.cfm?ArticleID=7328 (link no longer works); try this one for part of story: http://pryorcommitment.com/newsblog/?p=65
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