REC:all webinar

Yesterday I watched a web seminar on REC:all - 'Building a community of practice about lecture capture in EU universities'. I had previously not heard of the initiative, but from listening to the speakers and reading more into it, it seemed very interesting.

The speakers were Yacine Abboud from the University of Lorraine, Clive Young from University Collage London, Mathy Vanbuel from KHLIM, Silvia Moes from VU University of Amsterdam and was headed by Sally Reynolds, managing director of ATiT.

REC:all is a project that seeks to develop and better integrate digital lecture capturing technologies into higher education for the purpose of off-campus learning. As well looking at lecture recording and delivery, they are interested in implementing new technologies into remote learning environments, such as study trips and excursions.

One example of this was from Silvia Moes who provided a case study where students on a trip to Rome were told to form groups, each collecting evidence from around the city and depositing it on an open source mapping software. The map could be accessed by the other students who could learn from the data collected from the group.

Particular emphasis in the webinar was put on 'Flipping', a way of providing prerecorded audio or video lectures before a timetabled session so that more time can be spent in the session for the type practical, hands-on instruction that cant be effectively communicated with just a video. Pamala Kachka from Pearson eCollage gives a nice overview of Flipping here.

Another initiative that was mentioned was transLectures, which has been running since November 2011 and whose objective is to develop solutions that translate video lectures into many languages to reach wider audiences.  

W.I.R.E.

W.I.R.E. or 'Web for Interdisciplinary Research and Enterprise' is a think tank based in Zurich that sees itself as 'a platform between science and practice'. Their research is interested in global developments which positively effect individuals, communities and industry. This includes looking into interdisciplinary methods that empower people, enhance our lives and help provide for a better future. Their site says:

W.I.R.E. sees itself as a laboratory for the development of new concepts for the creation and dissemination of knowledge. The foundations for this are to be found in the breaking down of traditional boundaries between academic disciplines, the abandonment of hierarchical concepts and the integration of content and form.

I like them.

Cargo-Bot - Programming game for iPad

I should probably stop surfing the net today, but I keep finding cool things. This is Cargo-Bot, a game that encourages the player to think like a programmer should. The player is given a stack of blocks, a grabber arm and a image of how the blocks should be stacked. 

The player then needs to drag and drop a series of commands that when executed, controls the arm so it stacks the blocks to match the image given. This is a perfect representation of Papert's constructionist ideas of learning theory.

I want to get this but I dont have an iPad :(

On a separate but just as interesting note, this is the first ever app to be made entirely on an iPad. Done with an app called Codea.

Floating Orb Interface

I'm a sucker for interfaces like these.

Found at www.fastcodesign.com

A programming book for bed-time stories

Imagine reading lines of code to a child every night while in bed? That would certainly send them to sleep, I dont think it would teach them much about programming.

Luckily, a real book has the same goal (teaching programming, not making kids fall asleep), but with a different approach. Lauren Ipsum is a story book aimed at young kids that embeds logical programming scenarios into children's stories. The stories seem cute, and the pictures look awesome. I've just bought one.

The book uses metaphors within a fairytale story to convey concepts that would be encountered in a programming environment, and is actually written by one of Facebook's engineers responsible for maintaining the programs which runs on their servers. He wife does the illustrations.

With each copy bought, the creators will donate a copy to a library or school.

Meeting 24/5

Who was there:
Myself
Tom Page

Topics covered:

• Google's plans to back Raspberry Pi
• Videos - How did they go?
• Methodology for choosing prototyping systems
• What does the BA require? what is the purpose of the prototype? - we need focus
• Comparison of Brunel's and Lboro's curriculums

Google Backing Raspberry Pi

Google has plans to fund teachers to work in schools around the UK along with resources such as Arduino and Raspberry Pi. East Midlands named as an area that will receive support.

• Which schools around this area are going to get the support?
• How can we find out? Talk to Nigel Zanker
• A good idea to speak to the schools, contact the teachers, find out how they are teaching
• Collaboration?

Videos with Peter Simcoe

In the last few days, Peter and myself have been conducting video interviews with 3rd year undergraduate students in the last stages of their FYDP. This was primarily for videos to go on the IDATER conference website to describe the kind of work students do at Loughborough and to get some insite into how they used electrical prototyping in them. I took the opportunity to get some information about experiences students were having with electrical prototyping.  The following questions were asked:

1. Tell us your name and briefly describe your project. 
2. What stage are you at in terms of product development? 
3. What do you hope to achieve with the prototype when its finished? What will you be using it for? 
4. What aspects of the project involve electronic prototyping? 
5. What proportion of it has been spent on that? 
6. What kind of systems and software are you using to make your electronics? 
7. What has been the biggest challenge during prototyping so far? 
8. What sacrifices have you had to make in order to get the prototype working? 
9. When you first thought about / considered / approached the task of prototyping the electronics, how did you feel about it? Were you keen? Was it daunting? 
10. In comparison, how do you feel about it now? 
11. If you could have anything to make this process easier, what would it be? 
12. Prior to university, how much experience have you had with electronic prototyping?

The videos have not been reviewed or transcribed yet, but one of the points I came away with was that a lot of the students (7 interviewed in total) mentioned that time was spent and wasted at the start of the project by not selecting the right components to do the job. This meant only later on they realised their mistake and switched to a new system or approach, either by their own realisation or by the guidance of a lecturer.

Prototyping Methodology

Possible solution: create a methodology to help with the process of choosing systems.

• A handout given at the start of FYDP (October)
• Consists of a guide / flowchart / grid that the student follows inorder to choose the best system for their project
• Outcome based upon desired complexity, control elements, inputs, outputs, wireless systems, etc
• Includes list of recommended suppliers / websites / books / guides / code libraries which are more likely to work together.
• If one of these are made over the summer, it could be used as a handout for next years FYDP students.

Possibility of crowd sourcing information? Take experiences from previous years, good sources students have used, systems that work well, components that are reliable / cheap. Would require vetting and selection system.

What does the BA require in terms of prototyping?

As stated in the previous meeting, the prototype represents and showcases many disciplines that the student has gained during their time on the course. Therefore, it cannot purely be made for user testing purposes as that would neglect other skills that need to been demonstrated. However, how far can we expect a student to go during the prototyping stage, and how much does this really influence the final mark?

Case in point:

Mark is making an mp3 player that reacts to movements of the user (tapping, nodding, etc) and changes the music to suit the perceived mood. He cannot create the computer system that calculates the type of song required as this would need a very complex system, instead he decides to create a system that mimiks the interface. It involves a screen, an Arduino, 3 buttons and an SD card reader. Originally he wanted the mp3s to be stored on the SD card and to be processed through the Arduino, but he struggled to make that work, so now he has taken an mp3 player apart and plans to use the buttons to turn on sounds with the mp3 player as well as navigate a menu on-screen. He has spent a long time trying to get it all working and thus far, has got the screen to display characters. Much time was wasted trying to get the mp3 player working within the Arduino, not yet sure if he has managed to include the bought-in player to the system.

Ben has made a Beehive that you can monitor the bees with a wireless camera. Along with the camera feed, the temperare of the hive is also displayed on a monitor. He looked into making this using Arduino and components bought off Sparkfun. But instead, he bought a wireless webcam off eBay, a thermometer with a digital readout and set it up so the web cam was pointed inside the hive with the readout in-shot. The image streamed to a computer screen.

Both these students are BA. One decided to take the long and hard route and has resulted in something not much more better than if he just put a cheap mp3 player in it. The other saved time, bought all the fully working components in and got nearly the same as he would have if he prototyped it.

What I am interested in is how much is Mark's work going to pay off? When it comes to marking, how much more will be given for the work done with the electronics? Is it going to be worth the time spent working on systems that never worked, and worth the time neglected on other parts? Especially since the areas neglected are more likely going to be considered more typical concerns for a BA student. 

I need to talk to various members of staff to get their views on how something as subjective as FYDP marking works. Talk to:

• Mark - BA FYDP coordinator
• Ian
• Karl
• John
• Richard
• Darren

Lectures who are ex-students, worth getting their opinion:

• Steve
• Rhoda

Get the FYDP marking scheme. However, this will not explain all the decisions because it does not take into account the subjectivity of each lecturer.

Lboro / Brunel curriculum comparisons

Brunel's courses being considered the course closest in setup to Loughborough's, to help visualise where each course overlaps it might be worth setting up a matrix to compare the areas which they cover.

Might be worth speaking to Nick Schneider, who seemed opinionated when it came to the differences between the two courses.

Technology Will Save Us - Interview

Ever since I got my Lumiphone Kit, I have been really interested in the work of Technology Will Save Us, a small group of guys who set up communal workshops usually in empty shop spaces, aimed at members of the public who want to learn more about electronics and making things themselves.

The above video is an interview with Daniel Hirshmann, one of the Cofounders of the company, where he talks about the reasons for setting up the project as well as how well its doing.

He starts by talking about how he wanted to start a company that did not only make a profit, but also gave back to society with more than just more products that will later end up in a landfill. Their goal was to create some kits that encourage people to learn more about technology, learn to be more creative technology and learn to produce it, not only consume it.

He says with the increased complexity of technology, along with the recession, there is a growing public interest in becoming more hands-on and learning new skills that save money and help people become more self dependent.

So now they set up workshops that help teach people how to put the kits together, as well as creating a fun, inclusive, communal atmosphere. Whats interesting is how he talks about the huge cross-section of people that come to the workshops; he mentions that not once have there been no women in a workshop session, yet there has been sessions with no men.

He talks about how their work can influence larger corporate companies by showing them that there are ways of producing while also giving back to the community and engaging with your customers. TWSU are selling a product that a customer buys, but also gets taught new skills and knowledge that they can take away to help improve their lives.

He then touches on open source communities online and the vast resources available to anyone who wants to take on something like electronic prototyping, but makes a good point by saying that many people struggle to pick that up when it is a list of steps or lessons online, but find it easier when it is booked out as a fixed time and place where the learning takes place. That is where the workshops come in.