Congratulations to this semester's graduates! (and what's next for the IDT@ESU network?)

[Aaron Sumner]

Hey everyone who presented on Friday, it was great to see what we've all been up to and to finally meet some of you (and to catch up with those of you I see more regularly). I was one of the presenters myself, which should mean I'm done with the program!

As far as I know this site will keep on going--I'm going to try to talk with Dr. Childress in the next few weeks to see what he thinks, but I'd like to see it continue being a resource for IDT students, alumni, and faculty. Any thoughts on this? Let me know what you think!

Aaron

[Dan Spurgin]

Congrats Aaron... way to get that MS done, babyeeee!

Anyone been using this site?

[Aaron Sumner]

It's kind of on-again, off-again. I need to talk to Dr. Childress still to see how he'd like to see it move forward.

[Dan Spurgin]

I'm doing a project that involves building social presence outside the classroom - not so much a social networking thing as much as "How does someone in New York who never comes to ESU feel like they are at ESU in a community of fellow learners?" --- lots of the research is at the class level so I want to look at what happens outside the classroom level (both formally in informally).

ANYWAY, I was wondering if I could use this site in my discussion on how we can and cannot expect social presence to happen spontaneously. Would you be okay with that? Thought talking about your site might be a bit more instructive/honest then going on about how we should start a Facebook group and blathering on theoretically about how everyone would instantly join and chat on it all the time.

Uhhh... did I just win the contest for longest post ever posted on this site? What do I win?

[Aaron Sumner]

Absolutely. If you find any literature on this topic will you let me know? I can also provide you my purely anecdotal "evidence" (more like conjecture) about what needs to happen for community to start happening.

[Dan Spurgin]

I'm allowing myself some anecdotal/conjectural "evidence" as this is a Masters project -not a PhD where I'm trying to create new knowledge. Also, if you write it, it's conjectural but if I write what you tell me, IT'S A QUALITATIVE STUDY BABY! ;p

[Aaron Sumner]

Ha ha! Are you already to IT899, or doing independent study?

Maybe we should meet up at the Underground sometime and you can hear me rant and rave a bit about this topic. In the name of knowledge, of course :-D

[Dan Spurgin]

Yuppers... I start IT899 Jan 14th (dum dum dum.....)

Would love to hear your rants on this topic --- because besides the fact that its fun to rant... I'm guessing your efforts speak directly to my project idea.

I kind of giggle about the elearning world right now.... there are literally millions of dead little projects all over the place (I've built my share to be certain) and yet if you read the literature - elearning is a wild success at every turn. I continually think of the Emperor without any clothes (does this make me some kind of sicko. ;P) And there is kind of a stigma that if your criticize you're somehow being unpatriotic towards your field (you are either FOR elearning or AGAINST US!)

See... I've got the rant in me tooooo!

p.s. How 'BOUT that 8-5 season!
-d

[Aaron Sumner]

Yeah, how bout them Hawks! And pretty much everyone (except Fields and the linebackers) are coming back next year--look out Big 12 North.

I'm with you on the sorry state of e-learning. Call me a cynic, but I don't think ANYthing in education technology is really innovative--you have to look at the consumer tech industry first. Did I tell you I'm going to South by Southwest Interactive this spring? It will be cool to see what's going on in more consumer-driven fields and then hopefully come back to KU and apply some of what I've learned.

btw are you planning on driving down to ESU for your presentation or doing it online? I would strongly recommend the former--there were many tech glitches for the online presenters this last go-around. The face-to-face is pretty informal, poster session-style and is over before you know it. It's also a good way to meet some more of the anonymous people from your classes.

[Dan Spurgin]

I definitely plan to go down and do in person (ASSUMING that I actually get my project done. ;P)

Amazing how much of elearn is tech driven vs. learner driven. Most is driven by the shape of and economy of technology, not the learner. For example, Blackboard has a much bigger effect on how ESU elearning is delivered vs. anyone sitting down and thinking about how learners learn (and then making sure learning is tailored to meet those needs).

Education has always worked like this I suppose. The reason we have 30 kids to a class in the face-to-face world is that our building classrooms hold 30 kids? ;P And the economy of learning is a very real thing and will always mold how the learning occurs.

Still... ;P

I don't know anything about S by SW (at least not tech wise). Sound very cool. Going alone or w/ some peers?

-d

[Aaron Sumner]

Apparently Ning cuts off threads at a certain point--weird.

I'm going to SXSW by myself but have friends down in Austin. It's a pretty cool-looking conference, the week before the music festival kicks off. Here's some info about the talks going on: http://sxsw.com/interactive/talks

Anyway, I don't know if you read TechTrends (ed tech practitioners' journal) but it's not just ESU--it's everywhere. People get wowed by something glitzy without really thinking about its educational merit. Lots of "could be" and not enough "how to," do you know what I mean?

[Dan Spurgin]

If it were JUST ESU I wouldn't be so vocal w/ my crits -- but the probs in elearning are obviously industry wide. As the next wave of elearn creators it's our job to fix these probs. But if we can't even admit these probs exist then how will we ever fix them? This is where I think we really need richer discussion in our program - too much focused debate on this weeks homework assignment for this semester's class --- not enough broad debate outside of class with my peers.

Wait! I've just describe my Master's project! ;P

By the way... this very discussion is EXACTLY what I envision ESU IDT needing more of. Hmmmm... does this debate fail to happen because of the medium? the people involved? both? neither?

[Aaron Sumner]

My short, PC answer is people, because they're too busy. I have a longer answer that makes people mad; I'll tell you that one in some other medium :-D