Moodle Webinars On Demand, Wikis in the Classroom Coming Up

Thank you to the fabulous educators who came out the past two Mondays. We had some great conversations and excellent ideas shared on how teachers can use Moodle in their classrooms. To access the recordings for Show me the Moodle and Introduction to Moodle on demand, visit the NMSU Webinars site. Don't forget the collection of resources for each event, where you can see the chat log and access other cool stuff.

Hope you can join the superbly talented presenter and model RETAzen, Bethany Bovard, for

Webinar Event: Wikis in the Classroom I

Date: Monday, October 6, 2008

Time: 6:00-7:00 pm MST

Description:
Wikis are extremely useful tools for doing everything from helping you easily create web sites to providing your students with an engaging collaborative workspace. Yet, choosing the right wiki from among all those available can be quite challenging and time-consuming. In this webinar, you will explore a few different wikis and learn how to choose a wiki that's appropriate to your class needs.

TO ATTEND:
Please use the following link to attend the webinar:
http://nmsu.na3.acrobat.com/wikis1fa08

Plan to join us 15-20 minutes prior to the start time to configure your computer. To participate, speakers are required. A simple computer microphone and/or a headset is ideal for interaction. A webcam is optional.

If you have never used Adobe Acrobat Connect Professional, please test your connection at: Adobe Acrobat Pro Support Center
https://admin.acrobat.com/common/help/en/support/meeting_test.htm

For complete information on this and all of our webinars visit us at:
http://webinars.nmsu.edu or contact us at webinars@nmsu.edu or call 575.646.6143.

Have a cup of coffee, invite a colleague and raise your eQ (eLearning
Quotient) with us!

Interested in Moodle? Show me the Moodle Webinar Monday

There's no need to scream ...

See how easy it can be to create interactive learning environment using Moodle and hear what teachers are doing with it.

Please join me Monday for...

Webinar Event: Show Me the Moodle

Date & Time: Monday, Sept. 29,2008 6:00-7:00 pm MST

Presenter: Holly Rae Bemis-Schurtz

Description:
Find out how teachers use Moodle in their classrooms and see how easy it is to create an online classroom environment. Participants will discuss ideas for integrating Moodle in the classroom and other learning situations.

To attend:
Please use the following link to attend the webinar:
http://nmsu.na3.acrobat.com/moodle2fa08. Plan to join us 15-20 minutes prior to the start time to configure your computer. To participate speakers are required. A simple computer microphone and/or headset is ideal for interaction. A webcam is optional. If you have never used Adobe Acrobat Connect Professional, please test your connection at:
Adobe Acrobat Pro Support Center
https://admin.acrobat.com/common/help/en/support/meeting_test.htm

For complete information on this and all of our webinars visit us at: http://webinars.nmsu.edu. If you have questions or need tech assistance, please contact Cissy Lujan-Pincomb or Miley Grandjean at webinars@nmsu.edu

Have a cup of coffee, invite a colleague and raise your eQ (eLearning Quotient) with us!

RETA Webinar Team

Intro to Moodle Webinar this Monday

What is Moodle and why would you want to use it? Who is using it in New Mexico? What does a a school district need to run Moodle?


Please join me for a revamped version of my Introduction to Moodle webinar. I'll be sharing the basics, as described below, and promoting the resources at our super cool OTL wiki (http://reta-otl.pbwiki.com) where you can learn about Moodle 'til your mouse is content.

RETA would like to invite you to our NEXT professional development
webinar in our eLearning with Emerging Technology Series.

Webinar Event: Introduction to Moodle

Presenter: Holly Rae Bemis-Schurtz

Date & Time: Monday, Sept. 22,2008 6:00-7:00 pm MST

Description:

Moodle is an open source course management system used by educators around the world. Created by Martin Dougiamas to support social constructivism,Moodle provides flexibility and autonomy for districts and teachers while supporting a wide variety of interactive social learning tools. In this session you will learn more about what Moodle can do and find out what infrastructure is needed for districts, schools, and teachers need to access this powerful toolset. To attend: Please use the
following link to attend the webinar:
http://nmsu.na3.acrobat.com/moodle1fa08.

Plan to join us 15-20 minutes prior to the start time to configure your computer. To participate speakers are required. A simple computer microphone and/or headset is ideal for interaction. A webcam is optional. If you have never used Adobe Acrobat Connect Professional, please test your connection at: Adobe Acrobat Pro Support Center http://www.adobe.com/support/connect.

For complete information on this and all of our webinars visit us at:
http://webinars.nmsu.edu. If you have questions or need tech assistance,please contact Cissy Lujan-Pincomb or Miley Grandjean at webinars@nmsu.edu or call 575.646.6143

Have a cup of coffee, invite a colleague and raise your eQ (eLearning Quotient) with us!

RETA Webinar Team

RETA (Regional Educational Technology Assistance)
College of Extended Learning
New Mexico State University
http://reta.nmsu.edu

See you then!

Just a thought on Moodle v. Drupal

Drupal, you're a rock star...but your reporting features just don't hold a candle.
v.
It's just data, but then again, it's the Data!

We should probably research some way of adapting Drupal to give us the data we need. Any ideas?

ICOT in the NECC

Caught up in the net of NECC even though I'm nowhere near. Not that there's anything wrong with that (but we can all only run away from home so often ;-) )...a variety of my Google Reader feeds and Summize alerts (trackable through GReader) keep me in the loop on the news and notes at NECC 2008.

Amazing what you can observe when a whole bunch of people at the same session tweet at the same time...not to put to fine a point on it, and not to name names but when 'this session is boring' gets tweeted with a topic name all in the same span of time you kind of get the picture...crazy.

Haven't even glanced at the NECC Google Trends but I think we can safely assume there has been a spike as of late.

So the moment that prompted this post was actually the locating of ICOT (ISTE's Classroom Observation Tool). We need more open and/or free assessment resources like this one.

Catch the fire...

http://summize.com/search?q=necc
http://www.google.com/trends?q=necc%2C+moodle
http://twist.flaptor.com/trends?gram=necc&table=0

Scribd

I have seen Scribd, but never paid attention. Hmmm, docs, ok. Was playing with FlashPaper and Kerry did some research on .pdf to Flash and came up with this...

Now I get it! It's like the Slideshare of pdfs, docs, etc. Woah, the cooliemust embed codes of existing or your own content...

Check it out. First time I posted this I posted a Moodle resource that was on the site. It was later removed...so I found this!

Handbook on Synchronous e-Learning - Upload a Document to Scribd

Read this document on Scribd: Handbook on Synchronous e-Learning

Gizmodo's headline: "Future-y"

XO 2.0

Read Matt's post here.

Streaming News, Emotion, Thoughts & Conversations

There's something happening which I can't describe because I don't really have the words or the schema to say it at this point.

I imagine it as this great nebulous cybernet of memes - I might venture to guess that RSS is the main technology which has allowed for us to have these amazing streams of information.

When my colleague Phillip shared the Maramushi Newsmap http://www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/newsmap.cfm

It reminded me of these stream of conversation/consciousness/emotion sites

http://www.wefeelfine.org/ (draws from blogs in general)

http://twistori.com/ (draws from twitter)

Finding twistori led me to Summize ..I do especially like the searches for popular terms like "is down" or "listening to" or one of the coolest "#haiku"

http://summize.com/

So what exactly is happening here? ;-) I could see some cool mashup of all of the above which is designed to meet the learning needs of students...and society in general.

The magic of the 'Turn Editing On' button will be revealed...

... at this week's RETA Webinar.

Below are the event details and instructions for participating:

Event: Introduction to Moodle II
Presented by: Holly Rae Bemis-Schurtz

Description: Now that you know what Moodle is, you’ll want to see it in action. In this demonstration, you will see how a basic Moodle course shell can be designed into a learning module. This will give you an overview of the Moodle design process. Participants will discuss ideas for integrating Moodle in the classroom and other learning situations.
When: Tuesday 13 May 2008, 04:30 PM - 05:30 PM MST


TO JOIN THE WEBINAR
Our webinars are one hour and will begin promptly at 4:30pm MT (5:30 CST; 6:30 EST; 3:30 PST).

If you have previously registered for this event or you are having problems registering for the event, please use the following url as it will take you directly to the webinar session: http://nmsu.acrobat.com/r32422589/

Join the webinar 20-30 minutes prior to the start time to configure your computer. To participate speakers are required; a simple computer microphone and/or headset is ideal for complete interaction. A webcam is optional. If you have never used Acrobat Connect Professional, please test your connection at: http://admin.adobe.acrobat.com/common/help/en/support/meeting_test.htm

TECH ASSISTANCE
If you have questions or need assistance, please contact us at webinars@nmsu.edu or call us at 575.646.6143.

FOR MORE INFORMATION
Please visit us at http://webinars.nmsu.edu

Have a cup of coffee, invite a colleague and raise your eQ (eLearning Quotient) with us.

Thank you,
The RETA Webinar Team

Pitfalls of mobile blogging

Phx Airport Terminal D Starbucks
Funny how you forget to mention things. Slide pictures from the Sloodle pres by Jeremy Kemp.. Supercool!

Somehow in the mobile blogging excitement & frenzy, grammer & structure get a little crazy.

Enjoying the symposium

First I must tell you the salad for lunch was like a dream (so great you must see a picture)..as a matter of fact all of the foods has been great.

It has all been great. Carefree has been amazing, ,presentations are fabulous, Sloan C is just a first class organization.

It's nice to talk to people who have used Second Life in their teaching. Certainly, I've never been with so many Moodlers... I've learned so much.

Que Cooliemust.

Marginalia

Open source discussion annotation for Moodle! Beautimus - we're watching a live demo as we speak...

Http://www.geof.net/code/annotation/

Sloan C International Symposium: Emerging Technology Applications for Online Learning

I am so fortunate to be able to be here in Carefree, Arizona as part of the NMSU contingent. It is absolutely beautiful - what a great idea to bring the best of the virtual and real world (hikes in the desert with experts, complete sessions in Second LIfe, and a vast assortment of other hybrid sessions involving Moodle, Elluminate and even more).

Our keynote presenter is the director of eLearning at Adobe ! How cool since we use a lot of Adobe in eLearning (in particular Adobe Connect). Her presentationis Wayfinding in the Learning Metaverse.

Questions posed...
What are learning stakeholders doing with all of this stuff?
Does real learning take place in a mobile environment?
What happens...in the Metaverse?
When the physical world and the virtual world together definethe real world?
We need to pay attention to the mixing of learning, play and recruitment (as in the Army Game).
Staggaring statistic: percent of growth rate for online enrollment (9.7%) exceeds then overall higher education student population growth rate... (1.5%). Can we get an OMG people?
How do we move from fascination to sustainable innovation? Ellen Wagner introduces us to the notion of 'wayfinding'- the way you get around when you have no map, no plan to follow.
How to wayfind:
1) prepare yourself for the quest
2) chart your course so you don't get lost
--research
--reference models
--effective practices
--community
3) keep an eye on where you're going
4) leaven the extra baggage behind
5) 'be excellent to eachother'

Must add great announcment - Flash and Flash Video will be open through the Open Screen Project!!!

Opening @ Opera House

Miss Information

For my own misunderstandings of the concept 'Object Oriented' I must apologize. I have, in attempts to explain Moodle's acronym, misrepresented the concept.

In my recent explorations of Ruby on Rails and Yahoo Pipes, I actually learned what Object Oriented means. I also learned some other cool things which were new to me like the difference between scripted and compiled programs. Anyway, the true meaning of an object oriented language is reflected here.

Which totally also makes sense, because I did know that this is how Moodle works...I just got confused with the end-user WYSIWYG experience. I learned also, of course, about some of the cool features of these programs and managed to pull together at least one decent pipe with the help of a tutorial.

And so I now attempt to clarify my role of 'Missinformation Provider' to 'Miss Information Provider.' Surely I'm not the first person to blog about their own mass distribution of misinformation.... LOL. This is officially my attempt at transparency and openness regarding my own misstatement in the true marketing 2.0 spirit. I promise to do more homework next time and make sure I keep you in the loop when I do realize my errors.

Introduction to Moodle - On Demand!

Catch the aforementioned RETA Webinar at your convenience here.

Catch the Moodle Fever

You are invited...
Introduction to Moodle - RETA Webinar
Presented by Holly Rae Bemis-Schurtz

Moodle is an open source course management system used by educators around the world. Created by Martin Dougiamas to support social constructivism, Moodle provides flexibility and autonomy for districts and teachers while supporting a wide variety of interactive social learning tools. In this introductory session you will learn more about what Moodle can do and find out how it can be implemented. You will even be able to hear from some teachers who have used it in both distance and blended education and see examples from their courses.

When: TODAY
Tuesday 29 April 2008, 04:30 PM - 05:30 PM MST


TO JOIN THE WEBINAR
Our webinars are one hour and will begin promptly at 4:30pm MT (5:30 CST;
6:30 EST; 3:30 PST).

If you have not registered for this event, please go to the following link
to register at least 24 hours prior to the event:
http://nmsu.acrobat.com/intromoodle1/event/registration.html

If you have previously registered for this event, attend by going to the
following link and enter the email address and password you used to
register: http://nmsu.acrobat.com/intromoodle1/event/login.html

Join the webinar 20-30 minutes prior to the start time to configure your
computer. To participate speakers are required; a simple computer microphone and/or headset is ideal for complete interaction. A webcam is
optional. If you have never used Acrobat Connect Professional, please test
your connection at:

http://admin.adobe.acrobat.com/common/help/en/support/meeting_test.htm

TECH ASSISTANCE
If you have questions or need assistance, please contact webinars@nmsu.edu or call us at 575.646.6143.


FOR MORE INFORMATION
Please visit us at http://webinars.nmsu.edu

Have a cup of coffee, invite a colleague and raise your eQ (eLearning
Quotient) with us.


Thank you,
The RETA Webinar Team

LunchOMatic

Pack another cool tool in your lunch tomorrow with the RETA Webinar on ScreencastOMatic Tuesday at 12 noon MST.

Worth the risk

The last time I posted a Slideshare to this blog, it broke my template and all of my loverly little widgets went to the bottom of the page.

In my search on learning ecosystems, I came across this presentation. I felt I could give the template issue another shot, because I think the content has lots of implications for myself and the fine folks I work with.

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