Virtual Canuck

This afternoon I recorded a 10 minute demonstration of the Me2u system which is an instance of elgg.net set of social software tools. These tools are being piloted tested at Athabasca University.
The demonstration is available as an Elluminate recording here . Clicking on this link will start the installation of the java based client tool for Elluminate and should begin playing the video, with assorted audio and application sharing features.

I created this video as some people experience disorientation when first exposed to ELGG systems. I hope the demo is useful for potential users of Me2U.athabascau.ca (must be associated with Athabasca University) and for those using other ELGG systems.

I apologize in advance for the poor production values, but the cost was right – free and relatively easy to produce.

Terry

The PLE panel session at Alt-C was a big hit.

Graham Attwood podcast his contribution and I liked his sense that PLEs are not an application, but the indiviudalized set of tools he uses to manage and contribute to his part of the Net. I did a brief comparison of the coordinated and controlable option of an LMS (or VLE as they say ‘over the pond’) as below. An educator seems to have the option of using a VLE, individual Social software applications or systems that combine serveral social apps such as ELGG. My point was the complexity and challenge of adoption for educators (and computer services support staff) trying to move from the familiar VLE world to the scary world of PLE’s.

David Tosh (of ELGG fame) began his 8 minute talk by confessing that he didn’t know what a PLE was!

Next Josie Fraser orchestrated a great activity in which we broke into small groups and armed with flipcharts and felt pens tried to create a graphical image of our vision of a PLE. We also showed Scott Wilson’s now famous Future PLE diagram which may have inspired some of the groups.

Our group came up with a diagram related to Scott’s but with more generic capacities or affordances of PLE’s as opposed to particiular products. I’ve tried to recreate it from my rough notes below:

The inside consists of various creation, communication and collaboration tools, as well as specialized tools relevant to individual users and various aides to reflection, problem solving etc. These tools link, via ubiquitous connectivity, agents and appropriate protocols to content, expertise, mentors, and of course since we were mostly employed educators we included “assessment and credentialing”.

Thanks to those attending the workshop, the other presenters and of course the team that created the diagram above.