Technology Tip: More Real Estate in Your Browser Window

As we go back in time to smaller and smaller computers, sometimes it seems as though the layers of controls at the top of browser windows take up too much room. We just added Littlefox (only works with Firefox) to one of our browsers. It slims down those controls and gives you more browser window to use. Works great.

Web 2+, Students, and Learning

This is one of the items in the AUGUST 2008 edition of Trends in Higher Education (PDF), a bi-annual publication of SCUP; the category is "Technology":

Observation

There is no question that a large percentage of students engage in what can be loosely called online social networking activities. Initial results of an EDUCAUSE survey found that 89 percent of students have a presence on Facebook (Bytes From Lev, June 10, 2008,
• A study of university admissions departments conducted by the Center for Marketing Research at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth found that 33 percent said they blogged for recruitment purposes and 29 percent had a presence in Facebook or MySpace (The San Diego Union Tribune, August 19, 2008).
• Sending emails is the least popular form of daily social communication, only 14 percent of 12-17 year-olds use emails, compared with 28 percent who send instant messages, 27 percent who use text messaging, and 21 percent who send messages via social networking sites (Pew Internet & American Life Project, December 19, 2007, “Teens and Social Media”).
• Half of the students in the EDUCAUSE survey used their preferred social networking site for communicating about course-related activities (Bytes From Lev, June 10, 2008).

Our Thoughts

Higher education needs to find ways to leverage learning within the boundaries of students’ engagement with social networking. Students are willing to use course management systems to keep up on grades and assignments, but they do their collaborative learning on Facebook (Campus Technology, May 28, 2008, ; Bytes From Lev, June 10, 2008).
• Multiplayer online games appear to have the capacity to encourage scientific thinking. A study of discussion posts on World of Warcraft found that 86 percent of them focused on sharing knowledge to solve problems and 58 percent used systematic and evaluative processes (eSchool News, August 19, 2008).
• A study of 16- to 18-year-old students who used social networking sites (77 percent) revealed that the respondents view technical skills as the top lesson they learn from using such sites. Following technical skills, students cited learning creativity, becoming open to diverse views, and communication skills as what they were taking away from their interactions (University of Minnesota News, June 24, 2008).
• The opportunity to help students understand the skills they are learning and practicing on social networking sites may be as important as using them directly for coursework or discussion (University of Minnesota News, June 24, 2008).

Frontline: Growing Up Online

PBS' Frontline's website for its program, 'Growing Up Online', includes many resources beyond the full program that was broadcast on television. But it also includes the full television program in streaming video format. Those of us who've lived through the last 15 years or so in higher education have been astonished by the changes. But the next ten years may be even more transformative in terms of the the expectations and capabilities of our future students.

Web 2.0 Is Redefining What and How and With Whom We Learn

A very lucid presentation of a shift in learning epistomolology. This is a must-read for those who want or need to peer into the next ten years of change in higher education:

At present, the response of most educators is to ignore or dismiss this epistemological clash. Many faculty force students to turn off electronic devices in classrooms; instead, students could be using search tools to bring in current information and events related to the class discussion. Some faculty ban the use of online sources and deride the validity of any perspective that does not come from a disciplinary scholar. Many see social networking sites as useless or dangerous and do not recognize the diagnostic value of folksonomies for understanding the language and conceptual frameworks that students bring to the classroom. This refusal to acknowledge the weaknesses of the Classical perspective and the strengths of Web 2.0 epistemologies is as ill-advised as completely abandoning Classical epistemology for Web 2.0 meaning-making.