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Comic Books for Education

Thu, 05/15/2008 - 08:27 — Brett Bixler

I just read an interesting Edutopia article about comic books in education. I've been curious about this for years - a prof. at PSU into Manga gave a talk pre 2K that sparked my interest.

More recently I puchased Comic Life Deluxe for the Mac - a comic book layout program in essence. Using it, you can develop your own comics. You still have to create your own artwork, but all else (frames, text bubbles, etc.) is just a click away.

Second Life and other virtual environments are one way to obtain your artwork. Fantastic scenes abound, and characters, outfits, poses, etc. are cheap and easy. The Global Kids Project did just this to great effect.

Sound great, but what's missing here? Web 2 integrated into the process. Imagine a program that combined Comic Book Deluxe with a Google Doc-like interface. Students could come together in a participatory creative endeavour, using a medium that speaks to them to build great things. How cool would it be to work with others across the world to create an artistic story that teaches?

I'm keeping my fingers crossed here!

NMC Symposium on Mashups - Call for Proposals

Tue, 02/05/2008 - 15:57 — Brett Bixler
NMC Symposium on Mashups
April 1 - 3, 2008
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The NMC Symposium on Mashups, "Call for Proposals" officially opens today!  The deadline to submit your proposal is Monday, February 18.


This Symposium is the eleventh in the NMC's Series of Online Symposia and will take place April 1-3, 2008 in both 3D and flat web environments. The theme of this symposium draws from the 2008 Horizon Report and will focus on the topics of scholarly uses of mashups.
 

Symposium Format and Topics

The symposium will be conducted either in the virtual world of Second Life as well as the LearningTimes web environment. Sessions will be conducted live and will incorporate a variety of visuals and rich media, and are generally about 45 minutes in length, with about one-third to one-half that time devoted to dialog with participants using Second Life voice chat or the LearningTimes chat space.

Proposals are encouraged on the topic in any of the following areas, but this list is not exhaustive and selections are not limited to these categories:

  • Tools and methods for creating educational mashups
  • Projects which demonstrate creative use of data mashups
  • New approaches to data visualizations based on mashups
  • Strategies for encouraging development of mashups
  • Applications of data mashups

Proposals may be submitted online at http://www.nmc.org/2008-spring-symposium/call
 
Please note:  All presenters will be required to do a technical run-through of their session with conference staff in advance of the Symposium. If your proposal is accepted, you will receive further information with the acceptance notice.

NMC 2007 Closing Session - New Media Means New Choices

Sat, 06/09/2007 - 15:38 — Brett Bixler

Kristina Woolsey

Executive Director of the New Media Thinking Project

Opening Slide - An egg with an antenna stick up out of it. A man climbing out of a book.

We are just emerging from the book. Our ideas are now spread before hatching, if we do so, but it's hard to do so. Doers don't take the time to share.

New media means new choices. Papers, etc. are old school. Now we have so many new ways to share and learn. Most new ways come from pop culture, not universities. This will continue, perhaps not as fast as recently.

We want people to know all these choices for learning and be able to use them.

http://flood.firetree.net - A tool to show when you will be flooded out from seal level rising.

http://mapsofwar.com - Visual timeline of great wars.

Tools like this just come to us via email, etc. Learning opportunities abound!

The Big Seven

Youth

New media sparks youth - brings their ideas alive. They can explain things in ways never seen before. Imagination + tools = Understanding at an earlier age.

Youth are also producers of media, not just consumers. Active vs. passive. Technology is not an add-on - it's integral to learning.

New Media Competencies

  • Media awareness
  • Technical Savvy
  • Design Savvy
  • Intentionality - Making choices
  • S0und judgment for use

Digital citizens - we need to enculture digital natives into a community, can't just expect them to do it on their own.

BB thought - New medias may not just be augmenting our intellect, it may be allowing us to realize our true intellectual potential, each and every one of us. Maybe new media is that silent 1-on-1 teacher that we know is the best way for individuals to learn.

Visual Abstraction

How we develop deep structures is key. We may not be doing this well. We need to be able to "look" at something in multiple ways. For example, to know a town layout, we need overhead views as well as eye-level views. And different people/jobs need different views.

New Media

BB thought - Not the tool, it's how it's used.

Hypercard was a landmark. It brought user content, multiple senses, interactivity all together.

The web does all this + social interactions. Content is no longer the key element - it shares the stage with senses, interactivity, and community.

Conversation

Using new media to spark intellectual debate.

Casual Multimedia

It's fun to make these things. Remixes. The ratio of content to technical issues is changing. Used to be 1:1. You had to work through the technical issues. Now that's changed. Better on the content side, lesser on the technical side. Maybe 2:1 o 3:1. Typical cycle with many technologies. Starts out complicated and specialized, then we engineer it to make it easier to use.

BB thought - Why can't we do this with social issues? How can technology in the hands of the "rest of us" help?

NMC

New media can help change the way people think and learn. NMC is a change agent.

The Future

It's what we decide to make it. Individuals have a larger voice than ever before.

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