[ED-TECH] TED Talks

Ed-Tech list members,

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Go to http://www.ted.com/tedtalks/ and look at the wonderful talks that are available to be watched on-line or downloaded.

MORE DETAILS

In the past two days I have been told about TED Talks by three independent sources. I suppose that means either it is my duty to spend some time on this and pass it on to you or else everyone else knows about it except me. So, if you don't know about TED Talks, here are some brief details.

TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It is a conference and series of talks. The conference costs $6,000 to attend, I believe. The 2007 conference was March 7-9. The 2008 conference is already sold out, since only 1,000 people are allowed to attend. A number of the talks are available on-line. You might find many of them stimulating. You might find some of them useful as part of your student's learning experiences. The range of experts is wide, so there is material on almost every topic.

Go to http://www.ted.com/tedtalks/ to access the on-line talks. A new talk is made available each week. You can watch on-line or download the video or audio to use off-line. I encourage you to at least go to the http://www.ted.com/tedtalks/ page and see what is there. I hope that you will find it useful both in your personal development and your design of learning activities for your students.

Bill Vilberg

Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement

305-284-3944

[ED-TECH] Best Educational E-Practices [BEEP]

Ed-Tech members,

BEEP is a great source for information on e-learning, distributed by St. Petersburg College. Lost of links; lots of examples; lots of ideas. You might want to spend an hour or so during Spring break to take a look and see whether this information is relevant to you and your activities. Here is a link to their issue on "Teaching Critical Thinking Skills and Other Tips for E-Faculty":

http://www.spcollege.edu/eagle/research/beep/beep52.htm

You can use the links on the left of that page to get to all back issues, and issues organized by topics. To be notified when a new issue is released or updated, send an e-mail request to lechnerj@spcollege.edu and ask to join BEEPers@spcollege.edu.

Have a re-creational spring break! (Come back renewed and, in some way, new!)

Bill Vilberg

Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement

305-284-3944

[ED-TECH] Meeting Times & E-mail Spam

Ed-Tech list members,

Two things are going to happen in the next week. First, Daylight Savings Time goes into effect on March 11, three weeks earlier than normal. Because many of us use computerized calendaring systems, appointments on those systems may be off by an hour, either early or late, depending on when the appointment was made, and which systems have been properly patched. Luckily March 12 is Spring Break at UM, so that week shouldn't be too much trouble for most people, but the following two weeks may have problems.

Be sure to (1) keep your system(s) updated with all the latest patches, (2) follow the suggestions of your system and e-mail administrators, and (3) check things out before going to meetings during the three weeks starting March 11, and then the week that starts in October and ends in November in the fall. You might want to note the starting time of meetings in the subject line in your calendar, so you will know if it got moved somehow.

On March 12 UM is scheduled to implement a wonderful new Spam identification system. All e-mail addressed to x@miami.edu or x@umiami.edu will be processed by this system. Mail to x@sba.miami.edu and x@as.miami.edu and other such specialized addresses will not be affected in any way. This system will, by default, change the title of the e-mail to include the word [SPAM]. Nothing will be blocked. But through an easy to use web page, you can have the system hold mail that it thinks is Spam, and send you a daily notice of what it held that day for you. You can release it item by item if you want. It has a number of additional features. More information will be available before it is turned on.

I just wanted to share these two items from the System Administrator's meeting today. Have a great weekend.

Bill Vilberg

Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement

305-284-3944

[ED-TECH] Web 2.0 and Barcamp

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org:University of Miami;School of Communication
adr:;;5100 Brunsn Drive;Coral Gables;FL;33146;USA
email;internet:grinfeder@miami.edu
title:Assistant Professor
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Hi,
Just to remind you that we have two great Internet related events today
at the University of Miami School of Communication. Nick Dominguez will
be talking about designing for Web 2.0 at 3:35 and then we are hosting
Barcamp at 6:00. All are welcome to attend, there is more information
about these events below. Please forward this email to any interested
parties.

-Kim

3:35pm - 4:25pm: Room 2055 - COMWEEK CLOSE UP
*The aesthetics of web 2.0 - An examination of design and usability
among web 2.0 sites and applications - with Nick Dominguez*
Nick is an interactive graphic designer and illustrator living in South
Florida. In 1998 he graduated from the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale
with a degree in Visual Communication. For over 7 years he has designed
for various startups and companies in the South Florida area. More
information at http://www.nickdominguez.com/

------------------------------------------------------------------------

6:00pm - 9:30pm: Common Ground Courtyard
*Barcamp Miami*
Think BarCamp is a meeting among geeks? Think again!
BarCamp is your opportunity to present your company, your startup or
your idea of the next big thing. Everyone is welcome to present and all
presentations are scheduled upon arrival.

The first BarCamp "unconference" was organized in California in August
2005.Since then, BarCamps have been held across the globe, culminating
last year in the first anniversary Barcamp Earth, held the same day in
multiple locations worldwide. Barcamp is a great place to meet people
and learn about your online community in your home town.

This year, South Florida will finally get its first BarCamp Miami on
February 21st, 2007

"BarCamp Miami was designed for people in South Florida to share and
learn in an open environment." - Kim Grinfeder, Professor, University of
Miami

BarCamp Miami is an intense event with discussions, demos and
interaction from an ad hoc gathering of entrepreneurs, technology
developers, journalists, bloggers, designers, web enthusiasts, students
and anyone else who's interested in learning about new projects
underway. It's a way to "get everyone together and see what happens".
Prepare in advance, but come early to get a slot on the schedule wall.

"You don?t have to present anything but I do encourage people to just
come and listen and share ideas." - Alex de Carvalho, Community Guy,
Scrapblog.com

More information at http://barcamp.org/Barcamp-Miami

--
__________________________
Kim Grinfeder
Assistant Professor
Visual Communication Program
School of Communication
University of Miami

305-284-6253
http://com.miami.edu
__________________________

[ED-TECH] New student e-mail at UM - UMail

Ed-Tech list members,

The opinions listed below are my own. Since you have contact with our students, and provide them with guidance, I wanted to share this new e-mail solution with you so that you can share it with your students, if you wish.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:

UM has a new and improved e-mail service for students: UMail. I strongly urge you to let your students know about this and even to encourage them to switch to it, at least for all UM mail. Using UMail should greatly reduce the number of problems that students encounter receiving our messages on Hotmail, Yahoo, Gmail, and AOL. Send students to http://www.miami.edu/umail for the signup link, tutorials, answers to their questions, and more. (RSMAS and Med School students are not included - all other students are, I believe.)

EXTENDED DETAILS:

Many students at UM use an external e-mail service such as Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail, or AOL. Some of them have trouble receiving e-mail from UM, either from Blackboard or other systems. In the past students could get an e-mail account on the UMSIS system. That is still available, but now the can get an account on the UM exchange system, the same system used by faculty in some schools and employees in all the business units on campus. It is the system that I use.

The student accounts will have 1 GB of storage space. They can have all the junk mail filtering and virus filtering that is on my account, and I can tell I don't see 2 junk mail messages a day, and only once in four years did an infected e-mail make it through. They can access their e-mail from the web. If they use Internet Explorer the web access will have an incredibly powerful interface, almost exactly like the Outlook application on a PC. Using Firefox will bring up an interface that is not quite as feature rich, but it can be used to access their accounts, as well. They will also be able to access their e-mail from devices such as the Blackberry Pearl, Blackjack, or many other cell phones with e-mail capabilities.

I hope you will share this information with your students. Any student having trouble receiving your e-mail should seriously consider switching to the UMail service. Others will probably find it a good solution, at least for all their UM e-mail.

TECHNICAL ISSUE:

The only "gotcha" that I can see is that when a student creates the UMail account their Preferred E-mail Address is automatically changed to their UMail account, and can only be changed to some other account if/when they delete the UMail account. So students cannot "try" the UMail account while continuing to have their e-mail sent to Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, or whatever system they use. When they get a UMail account, all mail sent to their @umiami.edu address will begin going to their UMail account. I see this as an advantage, since they don't even have to go to MyUM to make the change -- it is done automatically. But they should be aware that this is going to happen.

Bill Vilberg

Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement

305-284-3944