Digital Dialogues

New Year - a time to celebrate?

I've had difficulty deciding how to wish all the LTUG members and readers of our blog a happy New Year in the context of such a horrific world catastrophe...

I hope all LTUG members and their families & friends are safe  - although with so many Australians still unaccounted for and masses of others from so many nations missing or dead, it seems inappropriate to be celebrating a New Year...

Perhaps instead of buying more champagne (or maybe we could cancel all those obscenely expensive fireworks that seem to dominate NYE) we could donate something to the charities that are screaming out for world support - I've listed them below:

CARE Australia: 1800 020 046 or http://www.careaustralia.org.au
Australian Red Cross: Call 1800 811 700, visit http://www.redcross.org.au or post a cheque to GPO Box 9949 in capital cities.
Oxfam: 1800 034 034 or http://www.oxfam.org.au
Medecins Sans Frontieres http://www.msf.org.au/
UNICEF: 1300 884 233, 1300 732 240 or http://www.unicef.org.au.
World Vision: 13 32 40 or http://www.worldvision.com.au.
Baptist World Aid Australia: Call 1300 789 991, by mail to Baptist World Aid Australia, Locked Bag 122, Frenchs Forest NSW 2086, or http://www.shareanopportunity.org.

I recall reading comments from a contemporary philospher (I can't remember which one though) saying that one of the attributes that distinguishes people from other species is hope and the ability to look forward into the future and plan for the continuation of our lives in the face of adversity - perhaps then our NY resolutions should be reflective of what disaster has struck the world and our region of it and hope for a future that is better planned to avert the likelihood of these events recurring...and providing our support for those trying to re-build their lives...

Be safe, happy and reflective!

ABB

December Overview

It's nearly Christmas and most people have their focus firmly on holidays, eating, social events, Xmas shopping, and spending time researching new technologies to incorporate into our practices in 2005 - don't we???

2005 looks like being a really interesting and exciting year from a learning technologies perspective - lots of new developments and improved access to enhanced software options....

Watch out for our series of workshops and webinars on blogs.

Join our webinar series that will interview the winners of the ALTR awards from the Learning Technologies 2004 conference - you can read more about these innovative practitioners on the LT2004 website: http://videolinq.tafe.net/learning2004/awards.html

Plus, we'll be exploring some emerging technologies and examining their uses in the educational context - like podcasting and m-learning!

If anyone has already starting using these or other innovative technolgies to enhance their practice, we'd love to hear from you - it's only through sharing our practices that we can start to develop sound pedagogical strategies!

That's all for now - have a safe & happy festive season!

PS. We have a new website!

We've managed to secure our own web address:

http://www.ltug.org

If you have us bookmarked (and why wouldn't you?), then please remember to update your Favourites!

More on Gen X-ers!

The information on 4 Generations in the Workplace has been one of the most regularly visited entries on the LTUG blog.

To further enhance our practice, here are some articles on Generation X that may be of interest:

Tips for Managing Gen-Xers:

http://www.workforce.com/archive/artcile/22/05/28.php

Short list of ways to interact with and motivate 20-somethings.

Learning: Generation does matter! by Lesley Darling
http://www.elementk.com/training_advice/htm/05-02-learninggen.asp

Boomers, Gen-Xer¹s, and Millenials: Understanding the New Students by Diana Oblinger http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/erm0342.pdf

TMR Research report on collaboration products

Here's a detailed research report on virtual classroom and collaboration systems from TMR (Training Media Review) - features a detailed WebEx product review too!

http://www.tmreview.com/researchreports/pdf/WebEx.pdf

Google it!

A new addition from Google:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar/about.html
If you haven't already discovered this part of Google, then explore it and direct your students there - besides, they Google everything already, don't they?!!!

Webinar software

An example from Webex on the use of the synchronous webinar software in an educational setting!

The Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University in Amsterdam is using WebEx for collaboration with students and lecturers  - creating a virtual classroom for remote students.

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/041201/sfw046_1.html

BlogTalk Downunder Call for Papers

We've received enourmous interest in the BlogTalk Downunder conference - thank-you so much to all those that have emailed me!

We're in the process of completing a website (& blog) specifically for the conference - in the meantime, we have prepared an official call for papers - just to give you something to think about over the Xmas break!

Here it is: Download blogtalk_downunder_call_for_papers.pdf

The Edublog Awards

Did you miss the EduBlog Awards voting? Sorry James, I did...too busy marking end of year assignments!

Don't know what the EduBlog Awards are about? Or perhaps you want to know who won??

Then visit James Farmers' blog - incorporated subversion

Wouldn't it be great to see some LTUGers nominated (and winning) in 2005 - perhaps in a category for new entrants to blogging in education??

Webinar Review

Blogging to Learn, Learning to Blog webinar 14 Dec

The first of a series of webinar presentations and workshops on the use of blogs in education went live to a synchronous audience across Australia and New Zealand yesterday.

Thanks to all those LTUG members who joined us and continue to support the group - I will be emailing the workshop participants a copy of the Powerpoint slides and links to the various resources discussed.

If you missed the event - don't panic! Due to popular demand, this introductory session will be running again in early 2005 - probably late January or early February.

A BIG thanks to Webex for sponsoring event - thanks Kevin!!