one more h5p template – Accordions

Alrighty. If you liked the Glossary/Terminology h5p template, and you thought the Tab h5p template was ok, I’ve got a new one for you. My goal here was to set up an “Accordion” – style interaction, mimicking similar types of expand and collapse tools all the cool kids are using today. As I mention in the template, h5p does have a content-type for this, but you can’t customize it (well, not without getting into the code).

So, the new template looks like this:

Go have a look – https://kylemackie.h5p.com/content/1290941857695765899 – download a copy for yourself and make something cool. Let me know what you come up with.

another h5p template – Tabs!

Thanks for the positive responses from my previous post. Sharing another template today. This one’s simpler, and probably easier to work with. This one is designed to have a Tab menu, so that you create a familiar and cohesive interface for the “sub pages”.

Have a look – https://kylemackie.h5p.com/content/1290941692419743699 – download a copy for yourself and let me know what you come up with. Check out the last Tab, for a short/fun/informative quiz.

 

h5p template – terminology / glossary.

I’m excited to share the first of hopefully a few h5p templates for you to reuse, remix, and redistribute. I put this together for a current project, and I’ve removed any specific content or references from this downloadable version.

You can access the template, and download a copy at: https://kylemackie.h5p.com/content/1290940443231778479

Let me know if this is helpful. I’m super excited about the potential of h5p. I’d love to hear about your use, so reach out if you want to chat more.

The (Personal) (Business) Impact of Open

Over the next couple days, I’ll be participating in the 12th Annual Open Education Conference #OpenEd15: The Impact of Open. It’s a conference I’ve always wanted to attend, but for various reasons haven’t been able to make it happen. This year, we’ll make it work.

For folks at home, tune in to the live stream keynotes, and a rich twitter stream. Expect to hear some of the most forward-thinking learning professionals discussing how open open educational resources (OER) can dramatically improve the quality of education. At the risk of telling you what you should do, don’t miss it.

Since starting my consulting business 2 years ago, I’ve had the good fortune to work on a number of open educational projects. I’ve just “run the numbers”, as some of them say. Here’s where my income comes from:

There’s good work be done. Links to some of these projects below. Let me know if you’d like access to any of the source files, or if you have any questions.

• Carleton University Certificate in Blended and Online Teaching
• College Educator Development Program (Western Ontario Region)
• Brock University Guide to Teaching and Learning Online
• Ryerson University Open Learning
  • Journalism Skills
  • Interdisciplinary Program Evaluation 
• Niagara College Student Toolkit
  • How to Write a Literature Review
  • How to Write an Executive Summary
  • How to Conduct a Research Interview
  • How to Build a Portfolio Website

“Investment” is the new “Engagement”

I hear the word “engagement” daily, at least.

• “I want to introduce new technologies into my classroom to promote student engagement”
• “If we want this project to be successful, we’ll need to make sure the engagement of the staff”
• “We’re looking for an approach that really encourages engagement”

cc: flickr.com/photos/iloveakira

The goal of having engaged learners, an engaged staff, an engaged team working on a project is an great one, and once met, there hopefully be success and happiness. I’d suggest, however, that there’s great value in moving the goalposts a bit, and considering the difference between engagement and investment. I think the difference is more than semantics, and more than just a tweak. I think that if the goal is “engagement”, the project will hopefully be successful, but if the goal is “investment”, the project surely will be.

A proposed continuum (and the spacing is deliberate):

awareness – interest —- engagement ———- investment

Thoughts?

My take on “IBM and Desire2Learn Take On Education Data Challenge”

It’s all over Twitter today:

IBM and Desire2Learn Take On Education Data Challenge http://t.co/46LbmRhK #edtech

— THE Journal (@THE_Journal) May 7, 2012

This is an interesting step in data management and analysis and predictive analytics in education. I think what this brings to the front is that analytics is very much a business application, and that applying it to learning changes the education game, considerably. I’m not saying that it’s all bad. In fact, I think there can be a lot of good in it. With any discourse around this, I feel compelled to throw in a couple “let’s be cautious” and “consider the implications” type comments. I’m excited by predictive analytics. They’re neat, and I love all the pretty graphs. Should IBM and D2L be making conclusions and interventions based on the mass of data available? What are the implications and potential pitfalls of having edu-business-borgs making conclusions and giving advice? Consider what can’t and shouldn’t be counted. Let’s be sure to question the robots when they make decisions based on logic like this:

Gladys, Take a memo, and please clean up my dirty mouth

cc: flickr.com/photos/70251312@N00

“Writing obscures language; it is not a guise for language but a disguise.”
– (Saussure, Course in General Linguistics)

In September, I started to experiment with voice recognition software. The results were interesting, humourous, and inaccurate. I wrote a post about it on the blog I set up for my graduate research. At the time, I was experimenting to see what it means to capture the analytics of performance (or here, speech) to be replicated later. This experiment resonated with some of the work I’ve done in the past couple years with accessibility, speech recognition and voice commands.

Then this happened:

Apple’s new iPad (generation 3), has a Dictation option. The features page, suggests that:

Write an email. Send a text. Search the web. Or create a note. And do it all with only your voice. Instead of typing, tap the microphone icon on the keyboard. Then say what you want to say while your iPad listens. When you’re done, tap anywhere on the screen and, just like that, your spoken words become written words. Dictation also works with third-party apps, so you can do things like update your Facebook status or share a thought on your Twitter feed.

Interesting stuff. Now, before you jump on board, read this post and consider what information you might be sending and storing on Apple’s servers.

I’ve been experimenting with this dictation feature for the past couple weeks. On Monday, I lost a fight with the dandelions in my backyard. As a result, I’ve thrown my back out and I have difficulty sitting for an extended period of time. So, I’ve been using the dictation feature to answer emails, send out tweets, and I’m using it right now to compose this post. It seems to work pretty well.

I was showing it off to my kids this morning as replying to an email from a friend of mine. I asked my five years old son if he wanted to try it out. So, I suggested he say, “Looking forward to seeing you.” Somehow things got a bit garbled…and the result?

“Fucking sea plank.”

I’m not entirely sure what that means, but it resulted in me having to change my shirt when coffee came out my nose.

My take on Desire2Learn’s Learning Suite 10: Elegant and Extensible

cc: flickr.com/photos/wwworks

or, “Get out of my way and let me do stuff!”

I was honoured to be asked to speak at Desire2Learn’s Product Announcement yesterday. The event focused on the launch of Learning Suite 10. You can read all about it on their site.

I’ve had the distinct pleasure of working with Desire2Learn for over 12 years. I’ve seen the staff grow from a team of 5 coding in someone’s basement apartment over 400 people who make up the company today. It’s quite remarkable. I’ve also had the pleasure of seeing D2L’s software mature over the past 12 years to the world-class product it is today. Learning Suite 10 marks an important step in their evolution.

One of the things that sets D2L apart is their engagement with their clients, and that they actively seek out and listen to feedback from the community of users. D2L knows that I love to get sneak peeks at new tools, and I have a bit of a reputation for speaking my mind. So, at Guelph we’ve had guest access to Learning Suite 10 Early Access for about a month, to kick the tires.

This release, in a word is ELEGANT.

The layout is crisp, the navigation is slick, and the tools themselves fade into the background, which is awesome. It lets users focus on what’s important…teaching and learning. In some ways the best tools are the ones you don’t notice you’re using. It’s important for software developers to know when to get out of the way and let users focus on what they need/want to do. We shouldn’t have to discover the proper combination of clicks and to figure out how the tool was created in order to use it properly. First impressions of D2L’s Learning Suite 10 are that was built with this type of usability in mind.

It’s an elegant design. And what it creates is a solid foundation to work with and build on. I was happy to see in this release continued development on D2L’s Web services. These APIs will allow institutions like ours to build, integrate, and extend their teaching and learning tools and services.

I’m excited to start working with Learning Suite 10. I’m anxious to see how instructors and students start to shape this platform, and I’m looking forward to continuing to work with D2L on this and future developments.

Congratulations, John & Kenneth, Jeremy, the Brian’s, Heather…and all the rest. Great work. Keep it up!

This boy has a new (‘nother) blog

Howdy.

To kick-off my journey back into academe as a student, I’ve created a new site. I’ll use it to document and share research and activities related to my Masters of Arts program. It’s partially a blog, partially a journal, partially whatever you want it to be.

So far, so good. Have a visit, if you’re interested. Follow along, if you’d like.

kylemackiemasters.wordpress.com

This site will still continue to see some action.

Change is Good.

cc: flickr.com/photos/smemon

Great times of change here.

On the work front:

• new department: Centre for Open Learning and Educational Support
• new job title: Manager, Teaching and Learning Technologies
• new (expanded) team
• renos to the office

On the learning front:

• back to school for all of us it seems, in some way, shape or form

On the blog front:

• new theme…like it?

Stay tuned for a wild ride.