This is a talk Malcolm Gladwell gave in Feb 2004.
Watch this, but replace any words of food to learning.
The take away from this 17minutes video: There is no platonic plate for learning.
Tuesday, 24 July 2007
What we can learn from spaghetti sauce
Boundary Characteristics of Game, Simulation, Drama & Role play Learning - Draft 2
comments welcome.
Boundary Characteristics of Game, Simulation, Drama & Role-play Learning Environments
by Albert Ip, Fablusi P/L
Elizabeth Rosser, UNSW Foundation Studies
Elyssebeth Leigh, Faculty of Education, UTS
Abstract
Introduction
Since computers first entered the educational arena the concept of 'games for learning' become increasingly attractive to educators seeking to create engaging 'interactive' learning environments. The element of 'Play' as a conductor for learning is not new. Johan Huizinga1 in his 1938 book 'Homo Ludens', suggested 'Play' as being 'primary to and a necessary (though not sufficient) condition of the generation of culture' and, as such, is a core learning mode for cultural transmission for all sentient beings. Education theorists (Dewey2, and *** etc) have also long since recognised the value of play, including it, via forms such as 'games', in environments for learning that seek to escape from static modes of 'education'. Building on more than forty years of work in the use of games for learning, current researchers are demonstrating that everyone can learn something from games (see for example James Paul Gee2, Elyssebeth Leigh, etc.). Numerous articles have demonstrated ways to select, research, build, sell, deploy, and evaluate the right type of educational simulation for the right situation (see for example Dick Duke*, Clark Aldrich3, Jan Klabbers 3 and various issues of Simulation & Gaming*). While there is a continuing (often silently) passive resistance to the use of simulations and games for learning in formal environments this has not prevented such learning oriented institutions as the military and medical bodies from making extensive use of them for skill development, knowledge acquisiton and more recently exploration of affective learning goals. As John C. Beck and Mitchell Wade4 argue those who encounter learning via games glean valuable knowledge from their pastime and are well positioned to use that knowledge to transform their workplace. [er: I'm still hankering for the use of an all-encompassing term to cover the genre of games, simulation, role-play and drama - without the intro lacks cohesion. In our discussions Albert proposed that 'game' could capture this as the others may be seen as games by another name. Any thoughts?]
Ip [2006] while arguing against the [educational] potential of off-the-shelf (COTS) commercial games because of their close nature [er: close or closed Albert?], has identified two pedagogically important components of any game: the underlying simulator and the game goals. In the context of computer games, the in-game simulator is the mechanism through which responses to the actions taken by the players are generated.[er: what about multi-player computer games - responses are generated by both the simulator and other players] In role-play simulation and many other games (e.g. chess, football)[er: here we have again the assumption that role-play is a sub-set of the broad category of game - do we agree that it is?], however, the responses to players' actions are provided by other players. Yet another category of games depends on the real world to provide the feedback, such as the feedback provided by .... in a game of golf.
Within a game, simulation, or role play, a set of artificial rules constrain the permissable behaviours of the players in-game AND provide an objective for players to achieve. That is, the game defines the criteria for determining game outcomes. In particular, the game goals motivate players to use specific strategies and tactics in order to win a game. This GAME GOAL makes a game environment engaging and powerful.
When using a simulator, implicit role is assumed.[er: is implicit role assumed or role implicitly assumed?] For instance, a trainee using a flight simulator typically assumes the role of a pilot. Simulations, with appropriately designed game goals, have served a key role in training military personnel, pilots etc. The trainee pilot suspends their belief that this is a simulator and acts as if s/he is flying a real plane. Simulators thus provide critical learning opportunities for the trainee pilot to handle practice and demonstrate the skills necessary to fly a plane, including managing emergency conditions. This environment reduces risks associated with learning through on the job training, such as the risk of crashing operational aircraft.
Drama, 'process drama' in particular, likewise, requires the players to temporarily supend reality and immerse themselves into the set to play out the roles as specified by the script. O'Toole has demonstrated that such experiences can be very effective in coping with and reducing bullying in schools [O'Toole et el, 2005].
Text-based role-play simulations, such as the Middle East Political Science role play simulations [Vincent & Shepherd, 1994], are basically imagined reality. Players assume the role of politicians and respond to scenarios set 3 weeks into the real-time future. Such imagined reality can be as vivid as any real physical encounter, as evidenced by student descriptions of their experiences. In an end-of-course evaluation of "the Scarlet Letter" role play simulation run at Caldwell Community College, North Carolina, USA in 2005 one student stated:"I felt as though I was living in Boston [...], walking the streets with the Wilsons, the Hathornes, and Mistress Hibbins". Another student wrote in the same course: "I wasn't just reading the story, I was the story and I could change the plot however I wanted to".
There are several common elements connecting all of the above learning strategies of games, simulations, role play and drama. In this paper, we focus on two:
The learners (players) are required to
- dis-regard reality temporarily thereby entering a state in which disbelief is suspended for the duration of the play state
- act within and respond to a set of rules arbitrarily set up to define and maintain the game environment.
Many teachers/facilitators have recognised the existence of an "environment" [er:what are you trying to signify with the term environment? it seems obvious that there is an environment] while using these techniques. Frequently, and correctly, teachers and facilitators put great emphasis on the rituals in entering and existing such an environment. For simplicity, in the following we shall refer to this game, simulation, drama & role play environment simply as "game environment". This choice of terminology does not imply that we play more attention to game than the other three strategies.[er: I would like to see this stated at the outset of the paper]
This paper provides a theoretical analysis of the boundary characteristics of the game environment based on the teaching/learning experience of the authors. We hope this paper can initiate a more detailed study of the use of such environments.
Different types of game space
Game environments may be constructed in any of the following types of spaces or combination of these spaces:
Physical space
This is where our carbon-based life form lives. This is kind of fundamental. Without an existence in Physical Reality, we cannot have existence in the other realities discussed below. Many games, such as football, tennis, golf, paint-ball military games are played in a physical environment.
A classroom, laboratory, lecture theatre and observatory are examples of physical spaces used for teaching and learning. Students in such physical spaces typically behave consistently with imposed physical reality required by socially constructed norms. For example, in a lecture theatre most participants will assume the role of listener and sit quietly while one or two participants take on the role of information source in delivering a lecture.
It should be noted that a physical space ceases to be a game environment when the rules of the game are removed. For a example, a football field is just a field. Indeed, it is often the case that different activities may be conducted on the physical space as the football game is played. The football field only becomes a football game field when the people on the field agree to be bound by the rules of the football code and act accordingly.
Virtual space
This is the 3-dimensional world (space) computer generates. In a typical immersive mode, participants put on head-mount gear, wear some form of sensor-enabled clothing and walk in a VirtuSphere. Alternately, in the "token-immersive" mode, the player can control an avatar in the virtual space. In both cases, the interactions with the environment, including all game artifacts, are generated and controlled by a computer. Many computer games, including first person shooter games, and Second Life belong to the latter in this group.
Some high-fidelity environments (immersive mode) are used for military training. Flight simulator belongs to the immersive mode too. Second Life has increasingly been hyped as a potentially powerful space for teaching and learning.
Augmented space
From Wikipedia, Augmented reality [snip] deals with the combination of real world and computer generated data. At present, most AR research is concerned with the use of live video imagery which is digitally processed and "augmented" by the addition of computer generated graphics. Advanced research includes the use of motion tracking data, fiducial marker recognition using machine vision, and the construction of controlled environments containing any number of sensors and actuators. Again, there are two sub groups here. Physical Reality augmented with virtual artifacts, such as Hear&There5 or Magic Eye6. Virtual Reality augmented with virtual artifacts such as Berlin in 3D for Google Earth or Las Vegas 3D Buildings. Historical events link to Google Earth, such as World War Two Google Earth "Famous WW2 Battlefields Today", part 1 and 2. Last, but not the least, Google street view where physical space's photos are used to augment virtual space. Some uses of augmented reality in teaching and learning are:
- Arts Center of Christchurch New Zealand (http://www.newhorizons.org/strategies/technology/billinghurst.htm)
- MagicBook where it is a book just like any other, complete with a story written on pages that could be read without the help of AR technology. However, the pages also contained virtual animated figures, which once viewed with a heads-up display would act out the story in 3D space above the pages. (http://www.newhorizons.org/strategies/technology/shelton.htm)
- "Augmented Reality" simulations by MIT (http://education.mit.edu/ar/)
- Handheld Augmented Reality Project (http://isites.harvard.edu/icb/icb.do?keyword=harp)
- others such as http://www.ims.tuwien.ac.at/media/documents/publications/Imagina-AR_EducationPaper.pdf,
Imagined space
The imagined space has long been recognised as a powerful environment for learning. In this space, the visualisation of the environment, its artifacts and characters an occurs solely in our brain with hints supplied from stimulus, for example, text. When there are gaps in the description, our brain will attempt to fill in the missing parts. For example, when reading a novel the imagination of the reader acts on the author's description to construct the novel space in which the story is played out. Consider the vividness of the scenery and characters we imagine when reading such novels as Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
Game Environment and Game Space
Many games exist in the physical space. The advent of the computer leads to the development of computer games. Chess is a .... Boundary Characteristics of Game Environments
The game boundary defines the separation between the game environment and the real world environment.That is, it binds the game rules and action to the game space. The following properties do not absolutely have to be apparent in every game environment. Rather, we are only trying to highlight boundary characteristics that may have pedagogical implications. The properties can fall within a range (most likely to be a continuum) with different games may fitting into different point of the continuum. The characteristics of the boundaries between the real world and the game world can be understood as variables along a continuum. The degree to which each is apparant in particular types of games and in specific game environments impacts on the quality and outcomes of player experiences. Thus, these boundary characteristics need to be considered when designing and implementing games for learning. The same game may be implemented in quite different ways due to the manner in which these boundaries are established and maintained. Permeability
The permeability of the boundary refers to the extent to which the boundary permits factors and influences from the real world to enter the game world. If the boundary is impermeable it would be resistant to external influences flowing into the game space. In contrast, a boundary with high permeability suggest a vulnerability to external influence. Permeability is a dual-edged sword as this property allows contamination of the game, but also facilitates the transfer of knowledge, skills and attitudes developed within the game environment to contexts in the 'real' world.
Information and Experience: Football players spent a lot of time training in a non-game environment in order to improve their performance during game. Likewise, experience and information gathered within the game environment can be used outside of the game environment. This is the basis of our assumption that game environment can be used as pedagogical environment to help students learn. In other words, the game environment boundary is permeable to information and knowledge.
Power: The game environment does not exist in isolation. In the context of formal education and learning the game environment is mostly situated within an "institutional space". In some instances institutional representatives will interfere with the in-character game environment thereby acting to allow the real world to permeate the game world. In such a situation, there is a risk of contamination by power from the external environment which may have tremendous impact on outcomes within the game environment.
Permeability to external power is apparent whenever interactions and task performance of players within the game are subject to formal assessment. Players are inclined in such situations to be conscious that their play is subject to scrutiny by a power figure external to the game action and of the assessment value of particular strategies. The course of action players might pursue is thus influenced by the permeability of the game boundary to the inherent power exerted by the assessor.
Fuzziness
Where the boundary starts and where it ends is sometimes very difficult to distinguish. For example in a game of chess, if the players can hear the commentary of the game, the outcome will definitely be influenced. It has been reported many times that when fans cheer a player in a competition this impacts on the performance of the competitor. Are the commentators or the fans in-game or out-of-game? If the game rules of a chess match allows on-lookers to make suggestions to the players, how would that change the game? Is this the same game as a chess game where any suggestions/comments are strictly blocked? An example of this in the case of online role play simulation is the fuzziness between the 'real' world dispute over the development of the pulp and paper industry in South America and the 'game' world dispute in the BIG Paper b-SimParticipants report difficulty in separating the real world events and characters from those of the game world.
Preliminary indicators suggest that this may similarly be an issue within the emerging Second Life environment
Weight
Even in situations where the boundary is well-defined it is not necessarily the same thickness. At some points in the game the boundary may be thinner or thicker. That is, the degree to which the game environment is understood as distinct from the 'real' world environment is variable. Typically, during the briefing stage of a game, the boundary is quite thin. As the game space is defined and the rules established the boundary may thicken. However, it is our contention that the weight of the boundary is subjective rather than objective such that one player may experience a significant buffer between the real and game worlds whereas a compatriot at the same point in the game may experience a much thinner boundary.
Flexibility
Flexibility refers to the capacity of the game boundary to respond to internal and external pressure. For example, the ability of the game environment to accommodate changes to the game rules while action is in play. The more flexible the boundary, the easier it will be to introduce 'on the fly' modifications to the game environment, perhaps to reflect changes within the parallel 'real' world outside the game. For instance, as the scenario for the Middle East Politics simulation (Vincent and Shepherd, op cit) is set only 3 weeks into the future, it is possible that 'real' world parameters governing the scenario may change rendering the game environment less relevant. For example, the death of a key character in the role play or the outbreak of war. A flexible boundary will allow the game environment to be changed, either explicitly or implicitly to reflect 'real' world changes. In contrast, an inflexible boundary quarantines the game environment so that it remains untouched by such external pressures. Boundaries can be seen to be flexible in different ways and the following is an attempt to unpack these differences.
Plasticity: We have borrowed the concept of plasticity from neuroscience to denote a boundary that is able to undergo organisational change as a result of experience. Adaptive plasticity means that the boundary is able to change in response to new information and dynamics either within or outside the game environment resulting in changes that may be translated to later iterations of the game.
Elasticity: While elasticity is a component of flexibility, it relates specifically to the ability of the game environment to accommodate changes in the number of players at the start of the game. The more elastic the boundary is the more it can stretch or shrink to match the number of players enrolled to participate. In a broader context this is often referred to as scalability.
Fluidity: Fluidity refers to the ability of the game to accommodate changing numbers of players once play has commenced. Can the game continue with integrity if a player is introduced into the game, or withdrawn from the game whilst play is in action?
Use of Props
Most games require some form of artifact to facilitate action. Obviously a game of football cannot occur in any recognisable form without a football. That is, the ball is an essential prop for a game of football. There are games which require no additional pops such as the familiar children game of hide-and-seek. Chess is an interesting case. Some players are able to play chess without any help of chess pieces. The entire game is imagined. Tokenisation
Football is a contact sport where injuries to players are common. In a game of chess, the action of the players are manifested by movement of chess pieces which may be captured (or killed). However, such capture or killing does not incur physical harm to the players. Tokenisation refers to how the players' actions are manifested in the game world, whether it is manifested physically by the players' presence or via a token such as an avatar.Pedagogical Implications
Learning through games, simulator, drama and role playing is way of learning which depends very much on the learner. As James Paul Gee puts it,there are two ways to play a game [of Grand Theft Auto III ], you can play proactively and strategically or just become a good button-masher. If you want to be strategic¡Xboth in terms of the decisions you make and the ways you solve problems¡XGrand Theft Auto III is subtle and amazing. I found the gang fights distasteful, so I just didn¡¦t trigger them. I went out of my way to see how little damage I could do while still earning my living through crime. Such choices make the game partly mine and not just the designer¡¦s. Games allow you to accept a given assumption (I have to earn a living through crime) and then see how you personally would think, feel, and act.
In situation such as this, we obviously do not want the violent criminal behaviour to be learnt and transferred to real life. We don't want to train highly effective criminals, do we? We would like to manipulate the game so that the transfer of knowledge, skill and experience (Permeability) are those of desirable ones. Playing becomes an excuse for debriefing. For this type of game, the debriefing helps to correct the short-coming of permeability of the game environment.
For flight simulator, the skill to land a plane in emergency situation is the learning outcome. We would seek to ensure that the transfer of knowledge and skill is directly from the game environment and real life. The type of debrief is obviously different from those using Grand Theft Auto.
It is important to remember that the game environment is embedded within a larger institutional space (game, simulation, drama and/role playing as prescribed as part of a course), the institution representative (teacher/facilitator) has immerse power over the students. This power can permeate into the game environment easily. When a teacher/facilitator gives in-game suggestions, they can be easily interpreted as instruction to take a certain approach, denying the player the freedom to make choices. This can also seriously minimise the ownership of the game/role by the players. The same, may be to a lesser degree, be said about the powerful/friendship relationship among the players in the real world. In order to avoid real-world relationship interfere with the game, we may insist that all players are played anonymously.
Game environments with great flexibility assist administrators in allocating students to the game environment when the student enrolment may change from term to term. A flexible game environment would allow the teacher/facilitator to modify the storyline, game rules or other parameters so that when sudden unforeseen situation arises (such as a critical player is not able to continue due to illness), the game play can continue without impacting the learning outcome.
In online role play, one way of designing game environment to increase flexibility is to allow each role to be played by a team. If a member of a team is unable to continue, the work can be taken up by the rest of the team. Team size also allows more elasticity.
James Paul Gee talks about "an actual biological effect. When you operate a game character, you are manipulating something at a distance (a virtual distance, in this case), much like operating a robot at a distance, but in a much more fine-grained way. This makes humans feel that their bodies and minds have actually been expanded into or entered that distant space. "[http://pc.gamezone.com/news/07_03_03_06_17PM.htm] Tokenisation is a degree of protection from physical harm to the players by the game environment.
Conclusion
This paper presents a potential theoretical framework to understand and inform education designs for learning environments.The use of game, simulator, drama and role playing implicitly implies the existence of an environment. Learners enter and exist the environment by triggering suspension of disbelief and start observing the artificial rules imposed by the game environment. However, the environment boundary is not clear cut. Different design can result in environments displaying various properties as described in this paper. Understanding the properties can lead to better adoption and adaptation of the design, administrating the learning and evaluating the effectiveness of the learning outcome.
Reference:
1Huizinga, Johan. Homo Ludens. Beacon Press (June 1, 1971). ISBN-10: 0807046817
See for example Begona Gros, (July 2003) The Impact of digital games in education, http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue8_7/xyzgros/index.html
2 James Paul Gee (2003), What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy
3 Clark Aldrich (2005), Learning by Doing: A Comprehensive Guide to Simulations, Computer Games, and Pedagogy in e-Learning and Other Educational Experiences
4 John C. Beck, Mitchell Wade (2004),Got Game: How the Gamer Generation Is Reshaping Business Forever (Hardcover)
5 "Hear&There" (http://smg.media.mit.edu/projects/HearAndThere/) allows people to virtually drop sounds at any location in the real world. Once one of these "SoundSpots" has been created, an individual using the Hear&There system will be able to hear it. We envision these sounds being recordings of personal thoughts or anecdotes, and music or other sounds that are associated with a given area.
6 "Magic Eye" (http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/mue/www/magiceye.html) lets the user see the real world around him and augment the user's view of the real world by overlaying or composing three-dimensional virtual objects with their real world counterparts. Ideally, it would seem to the user that the virtual and real objects coexisted.
O'Toole, J; Burton, B and Plunkett, A, 2005, Cooling Conflict Pearson Longman, Australia
Monday, 23 July 2007
Work Together: 60+ Collaborative Tools for Groups
As the title, it lists over 60 collaboration tools including online, sharable documents, spreadsheet, mind maps, desktop sharing.
Friday, 20 July 2007
Laws of Software Development
by Joey deVilla
For all those who teach computer science.
laws, axioms and rules pertaining to mainstream software development and put them in a nice, easy-to-read table.
Included gems like:
For every scientific (or engineering) action, there is an equal and opposite social reaction. - Augustine’s Second Law of Socioscience
When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong. - Clarke’s First Law
The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible. - Clarke’s Second Law
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. - Clarke’s Third Law
You cannot reduce the complexity of a given task beyond a certain point. Once you’ve reached that point, you can only shift the burden around. - You cannot reduce the complexity of a given task beyond a certain point. Once you’ve reached that point, you can only shift the burden around.
and many more....
Thursday, 19 July 2007
清明上河圖
My brother forwarded this to me. I am sharing with you all. Enjoy.
[Please be patient. The image is about 1.3M. If the image does not open to 300px high, please let the image load and refresh. Otherwise, you will only see a small top of the beautiful image.]
Boundary Characteristics of Game, Simulation, Drama & Role play Learning - Early draft
Comments welcome. See draft 2 here 24th July, 2007
Boundary Characteristics of Game, Simulation, Drama & Role play Learning Environments
Abstract
Introduction
Game as a structured or semi-structured activity is becoming more and more attractive to educators as a learning environment1. James Paul Gee2 shows us that everyone can learn something from games. Clark Aldrich3 talked about how to select, research, build, sell, deploy, and measure the right type of educational simulation for the right situation. John C. Beck, Mitchell Wade4 argues that gamers glean valuable knowledge from their pastime and that they’re poised to use that knowledge to transform the workplace. Sceptics (refs) have argued against the value of games in education.Ip [2006] while arguing against the potential of off-the-shelf (COTS) commercial games because of their close nature, has identified two pedagogically important components of any game: the underlying simulator and the game goals. In the common sense of computer games, the in-game simulator is the mechanism which generates responses to the actions taken by the players. In role play simulation and many other games (e.g. chess, football), however, the responses to players' actions are provided by other players. Yet other type of games, such as golf, depend on the real world to provide the feedback.
Within a game or a role play simulation, there is a set of artificial rules to constrain the allowed behaviour of the players in-game AND provides an objective for the players to achieve (i.e. the game defines the criteria on how a player/team may be considered winning a game). In particular, the game goals motivate the players to take specific strategies and tactics in order to win a game. This is the GAME GOAL which makes a game environment engaging and powerful.
When using a simulator, implicit role is assumed. For instance, a trainee using a flight simulator typically assumes the role of a pilot. Simulations, with appropriately designed game goals have served a key role in training military personnel, pilots etc. The trainee pilot suspenses his/her belief that this is a simulator and acts as if s/he is flying a real plane. Simulators, thus, provide critical training/learning opportunities for the trainee pilot to handle flying a plane at emergency conditions without risking his/her life and reducing the cost of crashing real planes.
Drama, "Process Drama" in particular, likewise, requires the players to temporarily supense reality and immerse into the set and play out the roles as specified by the script. As an example, O'Toole has demonstrated that such experiences are very effective in coping and reducing bullying in schools [O'Toole et el, 2005].
Text-based role play simulation, e.g. Middle East Political Science role play simulations [Vincent ???] are basically imagined reality. Players assume the role of politicians and respond to scenarios 3 weeks ahead of real time. Such imagined reality can be as vivid as any real physical encounter as these students described in an end-of-course evaluation of "the Scarlet Letter" role play simulation ran at Caldwell Community College, North Carolina, USA in 2005:
I felt as though I was living in Boston [...], walking the streets with the Wilsons, the Hathornes, and Mistress Hibbins.
and another student wrote in the same course:
I wasn't just reading the story, I was the story and I could change the plot however I wanted to.
All the above strategies, using games, simulator, role play and drama have several common elements. In this paper, we focus on two:
The students (players) are required to
- dis-regard reality temporarily (enter the state of "suspension of disbelief"), and
- act and respond to a set of rules arbitrarily set up in the environment.
Many teachers/facilitators have recognised the existence of an "environment" while using these techniques. Frequently, and correctly, teachers and facilitators put great emphasis on the rituals in entering and existing such an environment. For simplicity, in the following we shall refer to this game, simulation, drama & role play environment simply as "game environment". This choice of terminology does not imply that we play more attention to game than the other three strategies.
This paper provides a theoretical analysis of the environment based on the anecdotal evidences gathered by the authors. We hope this paper can initiate a detailed studies in the use of such environments.
Different types of Realities
Game environment exists in any of the following types of spaces:Physical space
This is where our carbon-based life form lives. This is kind of fundamental. Without an existence in Physical Reality, we cannot have existence in the rest of the realities describe below.
Classrooms, laboratory, lecture theatre, observatory are examples of physical space which are used for teaching and learning. Students in such physical space typically behalf consistent to imposed physical reality. For example in a lecture room, most participants will assume the role of listener and sit quietly while one or two participants take on the role of information source in delivering a lecture. Many games, such as football, tennis, golf, paint-ball military games are played in a physical environment.
It should be noted that a physical space ceases to be a game environment when the rules of the game are removed. For a example, a football field is just a field. People have different activities on the same field. The football field becomes a game field (for a football match) when the people in the football fields agree to be bound by the rules of the football and act accordingly.
Virtual space
This is the 3-dimensional world (space) computer generates. In an immersive mode, participation puts on a head-mount gear, wears some sensor-enabled clothing and walks in a VirtuSphere. Alternately, in the "token-immersive" mode, the player can control an avatar in the virtual space. In both cases, the interactions with the environment, including all game artifacts, are generated and controlled by a computer. Many computer games, including first person shooter games, and Second Life belong to the latter in this group.
Some high-fidelity environments (immersive mode) are used for military training. Flight simulator belongs to the immersive mode too. Second Life has increasingly been hyped as a potentially powerful space for teaching and learning.
Augmented space
From Wikipedia, Augmented reality [snip] deals with the combination of real world and computer generated data. At present, most AR research is concerned with the use of live video imagery which is digitally processed and "augmented" by the addition of computer generated graphics. Advanced research includes the use of motion tracking data, fiducial marker recognition using machine vision, and the construction of controlled environments containing any number of sensors and actuators. Again, there are two sub groups here. Physical Reality augmented with virtual artifacts, such as Hear&There5 or Magic Eye6. Virtual Reality augmented with virtual artifacts such as Berlin in 3D for Google Earth or Las Vegas 3D Buildings. Historical events link to Google Earth, such as World War Two Google Earth "Famous WW2 Battlefields Today", part 1 and 2. Last, but not the least, Google street view where physical space's photos are used to augment virtual space. Some uses of augmented reality in teaching and learning are:
- Arts Center of Christchurch New Zealand (http://www.newhorizons.org/strategies/technology/billinghurst.htm)
- MagicBook where it is a book just like any other, complete with a story written on pages that could be read without the help of AR technology. However, the pages also contained virtual animated figures, which once viewed with a heads-up display would act out the story in 3D space above the pages. (http://www.newhorizons.org/strategies/technology/shelton.htm)
- "Augmented Reality" simulations by MIT (http://education.mit.edu/ar/)
- Handheld Augmented Reality Project (http://isites.harvard.edu/icb/icb.do?keyword=harp)
- others such as http://www.ims.tuwien.ac.at/media/documents/publications/Imagina-AR_EducationPaper.pdf,
Imagined space
This is the scenery and/or the vivid characters we found when reading novels such as The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, written by Mr. Mark Twain. The visualisation of space and characters occurs solely in our brain with hints supplied from the text. When there is missing gaps in the description, our brain will fill in the missing parts. This is long been a powerful environment for learning.
Boundary Characteristics of Game Environment
The following properties do not absolutely have to be there in every game environment. We are only trying to point out the characteristics that may have pedagogical implications. The properties are a range (most likely to be a continuum) and different game may fit into different point of the continuum.Permeability
Information and Experience: Football players spent a lot of time training in a non-game environment in order to improve their performance during game. Likewise, experience and information gathered within the game environment can be used outside of the game environment. This is the basis of our assumption that game environment can be used as pedagogical environment to help students learn. In other words, the game environment boundary is permeable to information and knowledge.Power: Game environment does not exist in isolation. For education and learning, it is mostly situated within an "institutional space". Sometimes, institutional representative will interfere with the in-character game environment. In such a situation, the power inherent from the external environment has tremendous impact on the outcomes in the game environment.
Fuzziness
Where the boundary starts and where it ends is sometimes very difficult to distinguish. For example in a game of chess, if the players can heard the commentary of the game, the outcome will definitely be influenced. When fans are cheering on a player in a competition, it has been reported many times that it has impact on the performance of the athletes. Are the commentators or the fans in-game or out-of-game? If the game rules of a chess match allows on-lookers to make suggestions to the players, how would that change the game? Is this the same game as a chess game where any suggestions/comments are strictly blocked?Flexibility
Flexibility refers to the ability/desirability of the game environment to introduce "game rule" changes while a game is on-going.
Elasticity
Elasticity refers to the ability of the game environment to accommodate different numbers of players at the start of the game.Fluidity
Fluidity refers to the ability of the game environment to accommodate changing number of participants (Players) during play.
Use of Pops
Obviously a game of football cannot occur in any form of resemblance without a football. Football is an essential pop for a game of football. There are games which require no additional pops such as the familiar children game of hide-and-seek. Chess is an interesting case. Some players are able to play chess without any help of chess piece. The entire game is imagined. Tokenisation
Football is a contact sport where injuries to players are common. In a game of chess, the action of the players are manifested by movement of chess pieces which may be captured (or killed). However, such capture or killing does not incur physical harm to the players. Tokenisation refers to how the players' actions are manifested in the game world, whether it is manifested physically by the players' presence or via a token such as an avatar.Pedagogical Implications
Learning through games, simulator, drama and role playing is way of learning which depends very much on the learner. As James Paul Gee puts it,there are two ways to play a game [of Grand Theft Auto III ], you can play proactively and strategically or just become a good button-masher. If you want to be strategic—both in terms of the decisions you make and the ways you solve problems—Grand Theft Auto III is subtle and amazing. I found the gang fights distasteful, so I just didn’t trigger them. I went out of my way to see how little damage I could do while still earning my living through crime. Such choices make the game partly mine and not just the designer’s. Games allow you to accept a given assumption (I have to earn a living through crime) and then see how you personally would think, feel, and act.
In situation such as this, we obviously do not want the violent criminal behaviour to be learnt and transferred to real life. We don't want to train highly effective criminals, do we? We would like to manipulate the game so that the transfer of knowledge, skill and experience (Permeability) are those of desirable ones. Playing becomes an excuse for debriefing. For this type of game, the debriefing helps to correct the short-coming of pearmeability of the game environment.
For flight simulator, the skill to land a plane in emergency situation is the learning outcome. We would seek to ensure that the transfer of knowledge and skill is directly from the game environment and real life. The type of debrief is obviously different from those using Grand Theft Auto.
Game environment with great elasticity and fluidity assist administrators in allocating students to the game environment when the student enrollment may change from term to term. A flexible game environment would allow the teacher/facilitator to modify the storyline, game rules or other parameters so that when sudden unforeseen situation arises (such as a critical player is not able to continue due to illness), the game play can continue without impacting the learning outcome.
James Paul Gee talks about "an actual biological effect. When you operate a game character, you are manipulating something at a distance (a virtual distance, in this case), much like operating a robot at a distance, but in a much more fine-grained way. This makes humans feel that their bodies and minds have actually been expanded into or entered that distant space. "[http://pc.gamezone.com/news/07_03_03_06_17PM.htm] Tokenisation is a degree of protection from physical harm to the players by the game environment.
Conclusion
This paper presents a potential theoretical framework to understand and inform education designs for learning environments.The use of game, simulator, drama and role playing implicitly implies the existence of an environment. Learners enter and exist the environment by triggering suspension of disbelief and start observing the artificial rules imposed by the game environment. However, the environment boundary is not clear cut. Different design can result in environments displaying various properties as described in this paper. Understanding the properties can lead to better adoption and adaptation of the design, administrating the learning and evaluating the effectiveness of the learning outcome.
Reference:
1 See for example Begona Gros, (July 2003) The Impact of digital games in education, http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue8_7/xyzgros/index.html
2 James Paul Gee (2003), What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy
3 Clark Aldrich (2005), Learning by Doing: A Comprehensive Guide to Simulations, Computer Games, and Pedagogy in e-Learning and Other Educational Experiences
4 John C. Beck, Mitchell Wade (2004),Got Game: How the Gamer Generation Is Reshaping Business Forever (Hardcover)
5 "Hear&There" (http://smg.media.mit.edu/projects/HearAndThere/) allows people to virtually drop sounds at any location in the real world. Once one of these "SoundSpots" has been created, an individual using the Hear&There system will be able to hear it. We envision these sounds being recordings of personal thoughts or anecdotes, and music or other sounds that are associated with a given area.
6 "Magic Eye" (http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/mue/www/magiceye.html) lets the user see the real world around him and augment the user's view of the real world by overlaying or composing three-dimensional virtual objects with their real world counterparts. Ideally, it would seem to the user that the virtual and real objects coexisted.
O'Toole, J; Burton, B and Plunkett, A, 2005, Cooling Conflict Pearson Longman, Australia
Learning Chinese R/W way - Lesson 13
In the last lesson, we learned how to associate the first set of the Chinese components and the keys which covered the Chinese philosophy of Yin/Yang and the Five elements. In this lesson, we skip the keys H to N because they associate with the shape of the Chinese characters which has to be covered in more details later. We will study the keys which associate with the human body part.
The first one is the key O which associates with the Chinese character 人 which means human or people. 人 is a pictograph with the central line denoting the trunk of the body and the two slant sides denoting the legs. The head is absorbed in the trunk in simplification of the writing. Peter uses the Italian word Omo which means man. I tend to use Ourself which is also people 人. Anyway. Now O is associated with Ourself who are people 人. By pressing the O key in Changjie, you get 人 displayed on the screen.
The next one is P which associates with the Chinese character 心, which means the heart. 心 is also a pictograph with the lower curve denoting the ventricles and auricles and the three strokes denoting the valves of the heart. Peter uses Pump to associate the function of the heart 心 with the key P. By pressing the P key in Changjie, you get 心 displayed on the screen.
The following one is Q which associates with the Chinese character 手, which means hand. 手 is also a pictograph with the fingers and the hand. Peter uses the word Quintet(te) which is an ensemble with five elements. In fact Quint is the Latin root for Five. So associating the hand with Five fingers with the Latine root Quint is very natural, isn't it? By pressing Q in Changjie, you get 手 displayed on the screen.
The final key is R which associate with the Chinese character 口, which means mouth. 口 is also a pictograph. This is quite obvious. Peter uses the word Round to associate R with 口. In fact, in Changjie, whenever a Chinese character with a rectangular shape enclosing other components inside the rectangle, the component 口 can be used. Thus by pressing R in Changjie you get 口 displayed on the screen.
As a summary, here are the associations again:
O for Omo or Ourself which means 人, people.
P for Pump which is 心, heart.
Q for Qunitette which is 手, hand.
R for round which is 口, mouth.
Now is the time to learn more combinations using what we have learned.
One O is people 人.
OAA, 人日日 is 倡, to propose or to lead.
OB, 人月 is 內, which is the word for inside. Please note here 月 has been extended to include the forms which are bounded by three sides in a rectangular shape without the two strokes inside.
OBO, 人月人 is 肉, which means meat. It can be regarded as a pictograph with a piece of meat hanging. the line at the top is the string to hang the meat.
OD, 人木 is 休, which means rest.
OF, 人火 is 伙, which means a gang of people
OG, 人土 is 仕, which is a respectful name for a learned person.
OGG, 人土土 is 佳, which means good.
OGD, 人土木 is 集 , which means gather.
OGR, 人土口 is 售, which means sell. Please note the upper part of the two characters. That is how Chinese hcaracters are formed. They use the same part 佳 as the top part and use other components below to form different characters with different meanings.
OOG, 人人土 is 坐, which means sit, with two people sitting on the ground.
OP, 人心 is 化, which means change. Please note that the character 心 has a variant shape simplified with only the ventricles and auricles. This shape will be used often.
OPD, 人心木 is 他, which means he. In older Chinese writing, people did not differentiate the male and female, but now this character is used mainly for male he. the female she is 她, put here as a reference.
OPP, 人心心 is 仳, which means separate or divorce.
OPPA, 人心心日 is 偕, which means a person together.
OPR, 人心口 is 佝, which means rickets.
OQ, 人手 is 年, which means year, a word you learned before.
OQO, 人手人 is 伕, which means porter or chauffeur
ORD, 人口木 is 保, which means guarantee. Please note that many of these word has the same left component which denotes human being or related to human being.
P, 心, which means heart.
PA, 心日 is 旨, Depending on the other characters forming different phases to mean different things, it can mean aim, purpose, Emperor’s desire.
PA, 心日 is 旬, means ten days. 上旬, 中旬 and下旬 are used to refer to the first, second and last ten days of the month. When it comes to mention about age, 旬 also means ten years. Please also note that 旬 and 旨 share the same code. There are many Chinese characters with the same Chnagjie code. That makes blind-touch typing a bit difficult.
POG, 心人土 is 惟, means only. It combines with other characters to mean different things, but always has the meaning of only. Say 惟一means the only one. Please note the variation of heart which is 心 originally is now the left side with a vertical stroke and two dots on both sides. This is called the vertical heart in Chinese characters.
POGF, 心人土火 is 憔, has the meaning of weary or worried. Note also the variant of the heart on the left side.
PP, 心心 is 比, means compete with two people competing. Note here the second variant of the heart 心.
PR, 心口 is 句, means sentence.
QC, 手金 is 扒, means climb. Note that the hand 手 has changed to a variant similar to this one才 but with the tick going from bottom left to top right. This is called the hand component which is always on the left hand side. In Chinese characters, you can see a lot of the characters are grouped according to the left side component. One example is the vertical heart in the previous paragraph. Other examples are the mouth component in the next paragraph.
QFQ, 手火手 is 拌, means mix
QGR, 手土口 is 拮, means puncture
QO, 手人 is 夫, means husband. This is the second variant with two vertical lines and a slant side. The lower slant side is a variant of the component 人. Only the right stroke is used. These two components form the character 夫.
QOA, 手人日 is 替, means replace. Two husbands are replaced in a daily basis.
QPA, 手心日 is 指, means finger.
QR, 手口 is 扣, means knot or button.
QRB, 手口月 is 捐, means donate.
R, 口
RAA, 口日日 is 唱, means sing. It has a mouth and uses the sound of the character 昌 which you learned in the previous lesson (12).
RC, 口金 is 只, means a piece when used as a particle, or only when used as an adverb. Note that only the upper two strokes of the character 金 is used. This is a simple variant using the upper part.
RC, 口金 is 叭, imitates the sound Ba. When used with 喇叭, it means loudspeaker or trumpet. Note that this is a character sharing the same Changjie code with 只. The 八is now put on the right side instead of below the mouth.
RD, 口木 is 呆, means stupid
RG, 口土 is 吐, means to spit. Note that we have learned some words with 土 on the right side. Can you still remember some of them?
RGG, 口土土 is 哇, also imitates the crying sound of a baby Wa.
ROB, 口人月 is 吶, means slow in speech when used in repetition 吶吶, or loud shouts in support吶喊.
ROD, 口人木 is 咻, to hush a baby.
ROG, 口人土 is 唯, A yes man saying yes, yes. 唯唯諾諾.
RP, 口心 is 叱, shout or yell.
RRR, 口口口 is 品, with many combinations to mean different things. It can mean product 產品, 作品. It can also mean taste 品嚐. It can refer to quality品質.
RRRD, 口口口木 is 噪, means noise or noisy.
As you can see, when you learn more Changjie components, you will be able to display more Chinese characters on the screen. This is a long lesson. Hope you will spend a bit more time on learning and memorizing the components and their variations.
Tell a story in 5 frames
From the description of this flickr group:
Tell a Story in 5 Frames has two important parts. The first part is creating and telling a story through visual means with only a title to help guide the interpretation. The second part is the response of the group to the visual story. The group response can take many forms such as, a poetic or prose rendering of the visualization, a critique on the structure of the story, comments on the photograph, or other constructive forms of response. Telling and enjoying stories should create entertainment for the group as well as offer insight into the universal elements that help create a story for an international audience. The more people who respond , as either story tellers or respondents, the greater the reward for all.
Here are two random interesting post reproduced for your viewing pleasure.
Penguin Parade
Fisher's way of life
Three principles for learning
by Shawn Callahan
Shawn wrote:
One [of] the speakers, David Hornsby, said there were three principles you should keep in mind when helping children to learn.
* Move from the heart to the head
* Move from the meaningful to the abstract
* Move from the known to the unknown
Great principles for any learning initiative at any age.
With this brief note, I don't really understand the three principles mentioned so I followed through to David Hornsby's website and found a resource page which seems to contain a number of interesting articles.
The first article, Whole Teaching, Whole Schools, Whole Teachers by John P Miller wrote:
To establish the rhythm, flow, and vitality that energize the classroom, whole teaching incorporates three instructional approaches:
* Transmission teaching involves the student receiving and accumulating knowledge and skills—for example, by reading a textbook or listening to a teacher's explanation. Transmission teaching is appropriate when we begin to learn a particular skill. For example, when we learn to drive a car, we study the basic rules of driving by reading the driving handbook in preparation for a written test.
* Transactional teaching involves the student in solving a cognitive problem or pursuing some form of inquiry—usually based on a set of procedures, which may be rooted in a particular discipline, such as physics or history.
* Transformational teaching connects the student and the curriculum more deeply—for example, through such strategies as cooperative learning, drama, and role playing.
Another links to UNICEF's 7th report card which provides a comprehensive assessment of the lives and well-being of children and adolescents in the economically advanced nations.
Explore at your own pleasure!
Tuesday, 17 July 2007
Towards a New Process for Learning What is Important
By Dave Polland
Dave's opinion of the current formal education system of affluent nations on its ability to achieve these purposes is
Enabling us to realize our full capability -- D
Enabling us to acquire modern survival skills, including how to make a living -- F
I totally agree.I also agree that there is no work for those deliberately cowed and dumbed down by the education system.
Here are the attributes that Dave suspect the new learning process would have:
* It would be a self-managed process, both at the individual and at the community level. We would trust people to do what they want, to learn. Esteva found that in Mexican 'radically de-schooled' communities, young people quickly grew bored of mindless activity and began to pursue the natural inclination to learn. When I was in my last year of high school, we were exempted from classes if we attained certain test grades, and by the end of that year we had learned to learn from each other and from the real world, away from classrooms and teachers, so well that our 'de-schooled' group won almost all the scholarships.
* It would be based on apprenticeship (which literally means 'grasping', 'understanding'), learning by observation of those acknowledged by the learner as having exceptional capability, and on practice (literally, 'becoming better').
* It would be playful, joyful, fun.
* Skills like literacy and numeracy would be learned in the context of apprenticeship and practice, not as separate 'subjects'.
* The entrepreneurs and artisans from whom we learn would not be paid, but would know that they would eventually be rewarded for what they showed others, what Esteva calls receiving a 'cooperación'.
* The role of those who care about learning would be creating tools that make learning easier and more powerful.
* The activities of selected mentors would be primarily listening, facilitation and, when requested, coaching.
* A key objective of the process would be achieving autonomy, freedom from dependence, self-sufficiency.
* Another objective would be cultural regeneration -- relearning local (connected to place) skills that have been forgotten.
* The process would be improvisational and evolutionary, not planned or designed.
* It would be based on growing hopefulness, not raising expectations or achieving goals.
* It would entail renouncing those technologies and other obstacles that impede true friendship, which is essential for collaboration and learning to make a living together.
Wikipedia - hypocritical?
I referred to Zeitgeist - The Movie in an earlier post. No doubt the movie is controversial, removing it from Wikipedia is not a wise move and violated the trust of the mass to the validity of Wikipedia.
Sunday, 15 July 2007
Zeitgeist - The Movie
I wanted to label this post as fun, but I just canNOT. If what is described in the movie is true, this is a REALLY serious situation. From the website:
That being said, it is my hope that people will not take what is said
in the film as the truth, but find out for themselves, for truth is not told, it is realized.
The movie is about 2 hours long. But you can watch them in parts.
Part 1: Why was Jesus born on 25th December by a virgin Mary and crucified, resurrected after 3 days?
Part 2: Why did the World Trade Centers collapse in a free fall when only the top floors were burning?
Part 3: Why did USA go into war on terror?
Saturday, 14 July 2007
The Radical Traditional Curriculum
by Tim Stahmer
The original BBC news is here and Tim's summary:
The essential point about the new curriculum is that it gives teachers much more flexibility about how to organise learning.
They do not have to be trammelled by subject labels. They do not have to plod methodically through programmes of study.
Instead, they can pursue learning through cross-curricular themes. They can adapt the pace and content of learning to the needs of individual pupils.
In short, the new curriculum is designed to permit something the government has espoused - without really defining - “personalised learning”.
As one curriculum expert put it, this whole vast exercise of revising the curriculum has really been about one thing - giving teachers permission to use their own professional judgement.
When standardised tests are still being used, there is no hope of any changes. Teachers will just do the things they always do - prepare the students to sit for the standardised tests!
I have not fully work out my version of the future curriculum, yet but the idea of "cross-curricular themes" as authentic learning tasks is in them.
The Inconvenience of Truth
By Mark Pesce
Mark talks about difference of how knowledge is guarded verse how knowledge is shared using Britainnica and Wikipedia as examples.
Thursday, 12 July 2007
Cartoons on US Army Torture
Unrelated to Learning.
A Chinese blogger has revealed two cartoons by Amnesty International to raise awareness of the US Army treatment to "Enemy Combatants". (Why I keep thinking "Some animals are more equal"?)
It’s not plagiarism, it’s an easy essay
by Leigh Blackall
Leigh was offered money to link to an essay writing service. Interested in what they do, Leigh conducted an email interview. The questions and answers are interesting and call for reflection in the role of essay writing as an assessment task.
Here are a few Questions and Answers I found very inspiring:
Does you your service subvert academia? - good bad, doesn’t matter, other…
To some extent, yes, but not without help of educational system itself. Since essays are used as an assessment tool, which is a wrong method for testing student knowledge, students are seeking the way out. This is not bad in itself, since, as previously stated, they receive an opportunity to devote themselves to the path chosen – whether Math, IT, or Dance, but this, perhaps, shapes a wrong worldview, as students have to deal with ethical dilemmas imposed by society, which should not have happened if academic institutions were to develop better assessment techniques and a more personalized, individual interests based educational program.
Do you have alternative visions for knowledge creation and sharing?
With the advent of online social networks, I think that one could definitely come up with an alternative to regular writing assignments. Why not let students communicate and develop their own interest based social networks where they could stand up for their views in academic related subjects that do interest them? For students majoring and/or interested in IT or Math – let them discuss in a written form questions that interest them – both professional knowledge and writing skills would develop. Math and IT students need writing for communicating own ideas in a written form in a professional manner, perhaps, using specialized IT/Math vocabulary. What would develop their writing skills better than an open discussion on an education related topic of own choice? Academic institutions perceive Internet as a threat instead of enjoying all the benefits and opportunities it offers for improvement of education.
I linked to another by Glenda Morgan on Tuesday with more focus on copyright.
I think the whole issue of IP, including the beginning of copying to original ideas, the notion of reference, R & D (repeat and duplicate) has to be re-examined in the light of the current technology.
The whole notion of "reference" is also political which I may address in a later post.
Wednesday, 11 July 2007
My Psychic Power - a test
Please read the following paragraph and then rate how it has correctly described you from a scale of 0 to 5. 0 means completely not applicable to you and 5 means it is an excellent description.
Note: The following text is generated at the server side for you.
You have a need for other people to like and admire you, and yet you tend to be critical of yourself. While you have some personality weaknesses you are generally able to compensate for them. You have considerable unused capacity that you have not turned to your advantage. Disciplined and self-controlled on the outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure on the inside. At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations. You also pride yourself as an independent thinker; and do not accept others' statements without satisfactory proof. But you have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others. At times you are extroverted, affable, and sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary, and reserved. Some of your aspirations tend to be rather unrealistic.
How did I rate?
0
1
2
3
4
5
How “Wintel thinking” reduces productivity
by Paul Murphy
try timing this:
(1) focus on some text on your screen
(2) move one hand to the mouse, select the text
(3) release the button, focus on a menu, move the mouse to that menu
(4) use the mouse to select something,
(5) refocus on your text, move your mouse hand back, click again.
Paul has essentially described a situation where novice users constantly depend on the screen to give feedback in order to perform some routine tasks and hence is reducing speed and productivity.
That also deeply influenced my choice of Chinese Input Method in the series "Learning Chinese Read/write way". ChangJei Method allows blind-typing meaning if you are proficient in ChangJei, you don't need to look at the screen as you type. You can keep on eye on the document, or whatever else you like. Other Chinese input method involves selecting characters of a list displayed on the screen. In order words, you have to look at the screen every character, but interrupting your thinking as well as transcribing.
Tuesday, 10 July 2007
The Instructional Design of Learning Objects
This week's article in Learning Solution eMagazineis on an old subject which seems never die. From the overview:
Designers face the task of coordinating a considerable effort when they undertake a project that involves object production. This is especially true when the project also requires re-use of existing materials and content. This week's article solves that problem, with a comprehensive ten-step process that you can put to work immediately!
Unfortunately, this is another re-"discovery". Everything said in the paper has been discussed before. Some issues the paper have not yet addressed (but have been discussed before) includes:
How many times must "learning object" died before it forever die?
Borrowing, creativity and the problem of copyright
by Glenda Morgan
I like Glenda's title. An alternate title to this post may be "What does your R & D stand for?"
Many would say "R & D" stand for "research and development". The fact is in school, we do a lot of "Repeat and Duplicate" from simple Physics experiments to reciting peoms from the great.
If learning is conversation, we are constantly remixing our understanding with feedback from people we meet and talk to. Which part is yours originally and which is a re-hatch of an idea you have forgotten where you have heard of?
In the article Glenda pointed to, Jonathan Lethem wrote
The idea that culture can be property—intellectual property—is used to justify everything from attempts to force the Girl Scouts to pay royalties for singing songs around campfires to the infringement suit brought by the estate of Margaret Mitchell against the publishers of Alice Randall's The Wind Done Gone. Corporations like Celera Genomics have filed for patents for human genes, while the Recording Industry Association of America has sued music downloaders for copyright infringement, reaching out-of-court settlements for thousands of dollars with defendants as young as twelve. ASCAP bleeds fees from shop owners who play background music in their stores; students and scholars are shamed from placing texts facedown on photocopy machines. At the same time, copyright is revered by most established writers and artists as a birthright and bulwark, the source of nurture for their infinitely fragile practices in a rapacious world. Plagiarism and piracy, after all, are the monsters we working artists are taught to dread, as they roam the woods surrounding our tiny preserves of regard and remuneration.
Further down the article:
The distinctive feature of modern American copyright law is its almost limitless bloating—its expansion in both scope and duration. With no registration requirement, every creative act in a tangible medium is now subject to copyright protection: your email to your child or your child's finger painting, both are automatically protected. The first Congress to grant copyright gave authors an initial term of fourteen years, which could be renewed for another fourteen if the author still lived. The current term is the life of the author plus seventy years. It's only a slight exaggeration to say that each time Mickey Mouse is about to fall into the public domain, the mouse's copyright term is extended.
Even as the law becomes more restrictive, technology is exposing those restrictions as bizarre and arbitrary. When old laws fixed on reproduction as the compensable (or actionable) unit, it wasn't because there was anything fundamentally invasive of an author's rights in the making of a copy. Rather it was because copies were once easy to find and count, so they made a useful benchmark for deciding when an owner's rights had been invaded. In the contemporary world, though, the act of “copying” is in no meaningful sense equivalent to an infringement—we make a copy every time we accept an emailed text, or send or forward one—and is impossible anymore to regulate or even describe.
I encourage you to read the article. It is refreshing....
Virtual Worlds, Real Leaders
via Accidental Pedagogy
This is an IBM Global Innovation Outlook program's report. The subtitle of the report is
Online games put the future of business leadership on display
Virtual worlds put leadership on display. The jump of between to show/identify and to train leadership in virtual worlds is a big jump. The report does not address that.
Monday, 9 July 2007
Computer Science Reconsidered: The Invocation Model of Process Expression
The title of the review of this book by ITwire reads:
Want to be a computer scientist? Forget maths
According to the review, the author (Karl M. Fant) argues that mathematics (algorithm in particular)
has been largely ineffective as a paradigm for computer science. because mathematicians, notably John Von Neumann and Alan Turing, were intimately involved with the early development of digital electronic computers in the 1940s they transplanted a mathematical model of computation, including the algorithm - commonly understood to be an exact prescription, defining a computational process, leading from various initial data to the desired result - into the fledgling science of computers.
[snip]
The primary questions of computer science are not of computational possibilities but of expressional possibilities. Computer science does not need a theory of computation; it needs a comprehensive theory of process expression.
Let me ask a question: Should training of engineers include some Physics?
My answer would be yes, but not to the degree as a student specialising to become a Physicist. Some fundamental understanding of the basic concepts that the profession will need is part of the education.
Basic algrothm such as sorting, searching, stacks, queues, boolean logics, ... are the basic building blocks of "expression" and exclusion of such fundamental concepts in preparing a computer science profession, to me, is counter-productive.
Steve Jobs' Greatest Presentation
BusinessWeek mined Apple's CEO presentation skill, something everyone should learn and know.
1. Build Tension
2. Stick to One Theme Per Slide
3. Add Pizzazz to Your Delivery
4. Practice
5. Be Honest and Show Enthusiasm
Sunday, 8 July 2007
Periodic Table of the Internet
I would modify the title to "Periodic Table of the Web".
The following is part of the screen capture of the page showing the whole table.
Wikipedia competition
Wikipedia competition, sort of. They are both jokes. One is a joke itself and the other is joke as in fun. You decide which is which.
A conservative encyclopedia you can trust. The truth shall set you free.
Uncyclopedia, the content-free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.
Abject-Oriented Programming
Right near the beginning, the author has given the definition of abject:
abject: utterly hopeless, miserable, humiliating, or wretched: abject poverty.
Unfortunately many of his readers did not get the humor.
For those teaching programming languages, it will be an interesting exercise to print a copy of that post, including the comments and ask students to identify those comments which missed the joke.
Dr Kin Ping Leung
Please welcome Kin to join me in writing for this blog.
We have known each from the days when we have to hand solder our little computers. Kin started in the dip-switches days and I started soon afterwards with a Sinclaire ZX80. (Anyone still remember this little gem.) We have been good friends mostly because we share very similar interest, albeit Kin is more towards hardware/electronics and I am more towards software and information architecture.
Kin has posted his first post to this blog, "Learning Chinese R/W way". It is a gem!
Please look forward to his later posts, I am sure they will be as interesting as his first.
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