Showing posts with label university. Show all posts
Showing posts with label university. Show all posts

Saturday, February 28, 2015

My e Learning Talk at Wawasan Open University WOU

  • WOUs Summary of My Talk
  • e-Learning Talk (Slideshare)
  • eBook - 69 Learning Adventures in 6 Galaxies


WHY WOU?

I was invited to spend two days at Wawasan Open University (WOU) to meet some of the key people there and share ideas about e-learning and so on. It was a thrill to interact with everyone from the Vice Chancellor to the driver. After spending two days exploring WOU, its slogan The peoples University is increasingly making sense ...about WOU

Besides having fun interacting and sharing ideas with the people of WOU, I am still amazed with WOUs unique campus buildings, which truly demonstrates the fusion of old and modern construction. The picture above should give you a good indication of what I mean.

In short, I enjoyed the learning adventure, and learned some valuable lessons on the way (hopefully vice verse) :)



E-LEARNING TALK
In addition, I gave a 90 minute full-steam e-learning talk exploring some of the e-learning 2.0 (or web 2.0 technologies) tools, and discussed how they could be used to infuse a more social, collaborative and dynamic online learning environment. Yes, we even explored connectivism, and how we can use a network of diverse technologies to facilitate online learning.

Why, bla, bla, bla, ... Here are the slides (on SlideShare):

E-Learning Talk
View more presentations from zaid.



REFLECTION
This time around, I slimmed down the participants slide-intake from 100+ to 73, and was able to cover what I wanted to share (I am still learning!). We managed to even watch 4 short videos during the 90 minute e-learning roller coaster (which ended up with the 5-Minute University video!). I am sure many were overwhelmed, but at least they got some idea what e-learning 2.0 is all about (before we have to deal with e-Learning 3.0! Dont we love such buzz words!).



Besides talking about e-learning 2.0, I promoted again my eBook and blog. If you look at the stats above, you will notice that Malaysia is not the top country visitor to my blog (sadly enough!), and can only muster a fifth place. However, we should be proud that we are higher positioned than Singapore at least (this time around!).

On a positive note, people from 185 countries, or 5,786 cities around the world have discovered ZaidLearn one way or the other (over the last 12 months). This just shows how interconnected the world is today. Amazing!

Yes, believe it or not, I have even connected with a remarkable guy from Gaza Strip (Palestine), who is exploring learning 2.0 with 12-15 year old kids. He is even planning to write a book about e-learning 2.0 in Arabic. Couldnt CNN or BCC cover such positive stories, besides the depressing ones. Again, amazing!

Oops, I need to pack, I am going on holiday to ... :)

Friday, February 27, 2015

Lecturefox Free University Lectures!

  • Lecturefox
  • Lecturefox Blog - Latest updates in the free lecture world!

WHAT?
Lecturefox is a free service. You can find high-quality lectures from universities all over the world. They collect lectures from official universities, and they have a special interest in lectures from the faculties computer science, mathematics and physics. In the category faculty-mix you can find miscellaneous lectures from other departments like electrical engineering, chemistry, biology, psychology, economics, history and philosophy.

MASTERMINDS?
Andreas and Ellen Petersen (from Germany) are the founders of lecturefox.com.

Google you should consider supporting or buying this project before Yahoo or MSN does! WHY?

User statistics - Jan-Sep 2007 (Source):

I suppose with a bit more creative and aggressive marketing, promotion and awareness, these figures could easily reach to 50-100 million page loads per year. It sounds a lot, but after exploring YouTubes viewing figures (e.g. Evolution of Dance alone = +59 MILLION views), why not!

JUICE?
After scanning through the growing juicy Lecturefox collection (+400 and growing!), here are a few lectures to stimulate our minds (to use Lecturefox):

  • The Future of the Web (Tim Berners-Lee) (Oxford)
  • Einsteins General Relativity (Caltech)
  • Global Climate Change (Caltech)
  • Game Design (Utrecht)
  • Introduction to Artificial Intelligence (UC Berkeley)
  • Quantum Theory (Richard Feynman) (Auckland)
  • Technology, The Brain, and The Future (Harvard)
  • Natures Greatest Puzzles (Stanford)

REFLECTION!
I simply love the interface design, white breathing space, simplicity and ease-of-use/search/find (video, audio or notes) at Lecturefox. Yeah, the Fox used to be known as a brutal thief in the old world causing chaos on the farm, killing the sheep, and messing up our dustbins, but in the new world order it is the Robin Hood of knowledge sharing. Way to go LectureFox!

Though, there is still room for improvement, especially in the users ability to navigate through the lecture collections (e.g. one cannot jump pages or select the number of resources to view at one time). But, those things are only minor fixes and can be easily added (if wanted), and they do not take away Lecturefoxs Google like simplicity and speed (to find stuff).

Yes, next time I want to find a particular lecture I will begin my journey on Lecturefox :)