[haptics and hypertext]

"Reading is a multi-sensory activity, entailing perceptual, cognitive and motor interactions with whatever is being read."

Anne Mangen at the National Centre for Reading Education and Research, University of Stavanger published a paper in October on haptics and immersion in hypertexts such as M.D. Coverley's Califia (2000), C. Guyer and M. Joyce's Lasting Image (2000) and there is reference to afternoon.

Mangen's article is interesting in it's approach, taking a phenomenological one. She explains: "If we take the main purpose and motivation for our reading to be that of becoming immersed in a fictional world, then the text will have to provide the necessary setting for such a phenomenological sense of presence – by way of whatever modality telling the story."

Though people do seem to equate turning the pages of print books with clicking a mouse Mangen notes that these two activities are quite different: there is an "ontological" difference.

"The feeling of literally being in touch with the text is lost when your actions – clicking with the mouse, pointing on touch screens or scrolling with keys or on touch pads – take place at a distance from the digital text, which is, somehow, somewhere inside the computer, the e-book or the mobile phone."

Mangen goes on to explain that the demand to click/interact in certain hypertext stories actually undoes any possible sense of immersion (a la Marie-Laure Ryan).

"The links in a hypertext fiction present themselves as an experiential potential, a latently accessible actualisation of something currently unavailable, which becomes readily accessible with the click of a mouse. The sensory–motor affordances of the computer make it very easy to rekindle our attention, getting access to something beyond our present experience. As such, text or icons that yield (i.e., hot spots) afford haptic interaction with the computer. We experience these as links to be clicked on, and such
affordance is necessarily incompatible with phenomenological immersion."

Though I agree with a large part of what Mangen and others argue, I do wonder whether there is a different kind of reader, perhaps emerging in line with this turned-on, 21st century, tech world, a reader who actually becomes more immersed the more physical the demand of reading becomes? I know reading some narratives like Donna Leishman's Red Riding Hood (mentioned in this blog before) which requires a greater degree of haptics (compared with afternoon et al), I found myself more "in" the story, actually moving my own way around. Perhaps gamer-readers won't find this cross-modal situation distracting, though Mangen notes that as a "psychobiological rule" we tend to allow motor senses to overpower cognitive ones.


Read the full article here (if you have access):
Hypertext fiction reading: haptics and immersion, by Anne Mangen in the Journal of Research in Reading, Volume 31, Issue 4 (p 404-419).

See also this article that is freely available: Storybooks On Paper Better For Children Than Reading Fiction On Computer Screen, According to Expert in ScienceDaily (Dec. 22, 2008).

[collective indigenous memory and digital archiving]

Gail Maurice says "Every step I take is with my ancestors; my memory in my bones..."

With this quote echoing in my head I'm wondering how this kind of cultural valuing of memory appears in a world where technology can ensure a kind of *archiving* of memory. Is taking a step with ancestors the same or even possible if new generations have access to digital memories? How does the passing on of stories, ideas, warnings, histories change if elders can include recourse to multimodal or hyperlinked creations?

This musing led me to "Designing digital knowledge management tools with Aboriginal Australians" by Helen Verran, Michael Christie, Bryce Anbins-King, Trevor van Weeren and Wulumdhuna Yunupingu. The article can be found in Digital Creativity, 2007, Vol. 18, No. 3, pp. 129–142.

In the article, the authors explain that "A significant number of indigenous and non-indigenous people respond with horror to the idea of using digital technologies to do collective memory in indigenous communities." This "horror" seems to stem from a belief that computers are anathema to a collective memory that is created together, in person, alongside nature/land. "Computers are actually more harm than good." There is a worry (understandably) that technology (or at least the way it is used) can help inculcate notions that indigenous knowledge is a commodity.

Verran et al call on feminist discourse to help negotiate the role of technology; there is an emphasis on the always-already provisional and partial view of knowledge (via mechanical means or otherwise): "Located accountability is built on what Haraway (1991, p.191) terms “partial, locatable critical knowledges”. As she makes clear, the fact that our knowing is relative to and limited by our locations does not in any sense relieve us of responsibility for it. On the contrary, it is precisely the fact that our vision of the world is a vision from somewhere, that it is inextricably based in an embodied and therefore partial perspective, which makes us personally responsible for it. The only possible route to objectivity on this view is through collective knowledge of the specific locations of our respective visions." (Suchman 2002, p. 96)

The article goes on to flesh out some ways of combining technology with the need to archive cultural memories. There are some interesting projects which, I think, can be quite appealing to students - especially aboriginal. Take for instance the TAMI database: "a fluid file management and database system which carries no Western assumptions about knowledge, and which maximises the possibility for the user to creatively relate and annotate assemblages of resources for their own purposes." This means that there are no hiearchies built into the system, no author, then subject etc... but rather: "The only a priori ontological distinction at work in the database is the distinction between texts, audios, movies and images. Apart from that there are no pre-existing categories (as there are in other database where metadata are sequestered into fields such as ‘author, ‘title’, ‘subject’). This provides a certain ontological flatness so indigenous knowledge traditions are not pre-empted by Western assumptions." Image cited in journal article. A project in a classroom might include students using google pages or delicious (though the latter might seem more "western" with the emphasis on text) to craft their own database of memories or experiences - perhaps focused on an emotion, story or single memory and from their build a multimodal archive. Also, rather than searching TAMI with a text string, as we do in google and delicious, users can scan thumbnails of each resource. Sounds a bit like some visual search engines. What the authors note at the end of the article is the ever-necessary importance of "digitally-canny outsiders" who know how to use the technology and are culturally sensitive.

See a map of UK memories here: http://www.nationsmemorybank.com/memorymap/


The image at the top of this post is of Cliff Island, Institute for Northern Studies fonds, University of Saskatchewan Archives, Institute for Northern Studies (INS) fonds – F2100. Binder 10. II. Slides – 4501 to 5000. Database ID: 20263.

[employment: podcast developer at UCL]

I haven't seen one of these positions at a university before. Pretty forward thinking of UCL even if it is only a year long pilot project. But, there is the implication, should the project go well, UCL will require a permanent podcast developer.

Podcast Service Developer

UCL Information Services Division

1 year post (ref 54260)

UCL has embarked on a project to assess the feasibility of setting up a service to record, store and then make lectures available for viewing or download. This is known as the Podcast Project.

The project will involve the re-encoding and publication of existing media into various publication environments, and the creation of portable and fixed capture stations that are integrated into the Podcast Producer environment. The project is for one year in the first instance.

We are looking for an IT professional to join the Applications Development team in ISD who develop and support e-learning and multimedia web-based applications. A key aspect of the role will be building work flows for Podcast Producer and Episode. The successful candidate will be able to communicate fluently and present technical information to both technical and non-technical audiences. This post could suit a new graduate with enthusiasm.

Salary will be on UCL salary scale 7 in the range of £31,620 to £38,250 per annum (inclusive of London Allowance).

Applications should be received no later than 5pm on close date.

Interviews are likely to be held on Tuesday, 9th December 2008.

To apply for the post, please download an application form and job description from ( http://www.ucl.ac.uk/is/vacancies. )

If you cannot obtain these from the web, you can email is-jobs@ucl.ac.uk quoting the relevant reference number (above), or write to Information Systems, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT. Do NOT send a CV. For further queries, phone 020-7679-7357. No agencies.

Closing date for this post is 26 November 2008

[writing and publishing panel session]

Chaired by Kate Pullinger, speakers include Sara Lloyd, Michael Bhaskar and Chris Meade.


Chris Meade: "How new media writers do, could and will make their way in the world"

• How to earn money? No business model.
  
• Andy Campbell says: "The ratio of research/theory documents to actual quality work in the field is embarassing."
• consulting, teaching, writing
• "Presentation skills can be really useful" - Tim Wright
• need to be amplified individuals (i think this is from andrea saveri)
• there are all kinds of webby businesses that new media writers could get into - blogging, args, projects, e-learning
  
• think of project i mentioned this morning by the hon brothers, 21 steps geo taagging project and others. dan hon says "there's still a stigma attached to writing for the online world"
• how to collaborate - showcases, clusters, events, making the case together, spindlers are doing it for themselves
• Christine Wilks has uplifting quote: "you may find your source/s of income are around the edges of your main area of creative interest. It's an experimental field, so be flexible and inventive, and be prepared to learn, learn, learn - never stop learning."

Sara Lloyd

• talks about the manifesto she wrote on publishing in the 21st century
• publishers won't be needed in the future unless they get their act together
• did this to stir lethargic publishers, start a debate
• lesson in new media publishing, the journal that officially published the manifesto, allowed sara to publish it independently on her site
• means there's a value to sharing content

Michael on how Pan MacMillan's the digitalist blog interacts with the world

• the digitalist blog began as an internal newsletter
• place to try ideas
• converse with readers
• access knowledge of the readers by following links, this is engaging in conversation and enabling a level of transparency
• "we're not just giving the pan macmillan line on things....using it to sell more books...actually we're trying to make an argument...not a standard bs corporate blog"

[reader 2.0]

Here is some info from my presentation on how I see readers who engage with born digital works.

Links to the web works I mentioned in my presentation:

http://twitter.com/manyvoices
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lynetter/2099009488/in/set-72057594139269787/
http://www.viddler.com/explore/hughgarry/videos/12/97.564/
http://emersoninbeijing.com
http://www.wetellstories.co.uk
http://thewhalehunt.org
http://transition.turbulence.org/Works/dynamo/index.html

Screen shots and the presentation to follow.

[creative writing & new media masters campus week seminars]

Following yesterday's slog, the students get a bit of a break today when they can sit back and listen to a few presentations including one by me on reading multimodal narratives, a panel on african digital literature and Peter Howard on digital poetry.

From the programme:

10.00-11.00 Meet your Reader Dr Jess Laccetti presents a reader�s eye view of new media writing.

11.00-11.30 Break

11.30-12.30 African Writing and New Media
Chair: Professor Sue Thomas
IOCT PhD student and novelist Anietie Isong introduces his research into African Writers and the Internet, and Nur Yaryare of the Somali Afro European Media Project presents his plan for a new media African heritage project in Leicester.

12.30-13.30 Lunch break

13.30-15.00 Writing and Publishing New Media
Chair: Kate Pullinger
Sara Lloyd and Michael Bhaskar, digital editors at Pan Macmillan, discuss Sara�s Book Publisher�s Manifesto for the 21st century, and Chris Meade, former CWNM student and Director of if:book London, presents Digital Livings, a report commissioned by CWNM to assess the potential of new media as a career path for writers.
Preparatory Reading for this session:
Book Publisher’s Manifesto for the 21st century by Sara Lloyd
Digital Livings by Chris Meade

15.00-15.30 Break

15.30-16.30 E-Poetry
This year CWNM offers an E-Poetry workshop for the first time. Tutor Peter Howard presents an introduction to E-Poetry including a selection of his own work.

Read more at the ioct blog.

[long live the experimental novel]

Long live the experimental novel with what Suzi Feay declares in her report in Sunday's Independent. Strangely that's also when a rather one-sided view on digital literature appeared. Feay's report on "Who'll be the bestsellers of tomorrow?" makes some interesting predictions including more books on the subject of our failing environment and, wait for it...digital narratives. One example Feay turns to is Chris Meade's In Search of Lost Tim, a magical musical graphical digital fiction "which uses fictitious blogs (hosted at www.insearchoflosttim.net) and YouTube videos to tell the story of a blogger who is contacted by a boy who claims he lives in the 1960s and is communicating via his "Futurizer"). Young Tim is trying to contact his future self, the political activist and secret agent Lord Tim. It's a jeux d'esprit, but also, just possibly, the future of fiction."

nb: note the allusion to Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu or...In Search of Lost Time

A Synopsis: "On holiday Jennifer begins writing a personal blog to help her through a recent bereavement. Then she receives mysterious messages from a boy who claims to be communicating through time via his 'Futurizer'. Young Tim has lost contact with his future self, with whom he has been fighting crime across the centuries.

In their 21st Century comic book world, Lord Tim and his glamorous Sidekick are under attack from the evil Mister B.
Should Young Tim save his elder self by tackling Bailey the school bully, or his suspicious neighbour, Barry?
What are 'Futurolusions'? Why is Jennifer caught up in all this? And is Young Tim in peril as he emerges into the dangerous, grown up world?

Starring a glove puppet, cartoon characters and a blogger, featuring words, ukuleles, video, photos and drawings, this is a multimedia novella about what the future means to a group of people living in the past, the present and the pretend."

[sonic and digital literacies]

As I think about the kinds of things I'd like my pilot group to read while enjoying various brain scans (this is an experiement in the works) I find myself trying to make sure I'm not too text-centric. I'm working in the online environment (mostly) and that means there is often recourse to images, sounds, video, text (which in my experience is often quite visual too) and of course there's some kind of haptics. But I find I almost forget about sound...sounds odd saying that because as I write I am listening to myself, how can I *forget* about sound? Is it more likely that I'm so immersed in sound that I just navigate through its presence (as is the case for certain students according to Michelle Comstock and Mary E. Hocks) Cornstock and Hocks ask how might educators engage this kind of sonic sensitivity in their own writing (composition) classrooms. It seems that this might be similar to what Ximena Alarcon is doing with her research into sonic environments and memory. Ximena did her ph.d at DMU (in Music Technology and Innovation.) and now she is working on a Leverhulme Trust - Early Career Fellowship 2007 - 2009. For her ph.d Ximena created an ethnography based artwork. "Twenty-four volunteers participated in the project, sharing their (deep) feelings, spontaneity, curiosity, interest, and passion for discovering how sound is important in their life. Sounds included in this project have been selected by them, after a process of travelling, recording, listening and remembering."

Ximena's current project stretches the sonic environment to Paris and Mexico, this time comparing these results with the London one's which formed the base of the ph.d.

There are blogs devoted to Ximena's field work in Paris and Mexico and on the Mexican blog there's an interesting comment from one of the volunteers. She has just listened to sounds from the London Underground while navigating Ximena's "ethnographic artwork." She notes the sound of the bells (doors opening and closing I presume) and notes that hearing the sound means she visualises the tube" in action" (my translation):

"Lo que llama en particular mi atención son las campanas en la parte del corredor, la combinanción de imágenes y los sonidos hacen realmente imaginarte un mundo en moviemiento"

I wonder if this synesthetic response is something that might be made visible with brain scanning research and is it something we (as educators) can work into our teaching? I suppose this aligns with Ong's thinking that sound "emanate[s] from a source here and now discernibly active, with the result that involvement with sound is involvement with the present, with here-and-now existence and activity" (qtd in Michelle Comstock and Mary E. Hocks)

I'll look forward to reading what parisienne/parisien commuters think.

[ TIR-W Volume 9 no. 2 Instruments and Playable Text ]

From the guest editor Stuart Moulthrop:

"Our work is animated by the desire to evoke from simple rules a plausibly infinite set of expressions. We come at this problem from various perspectives, techniques, and points of the aesthetic compass, and we arrive at happily different results, but a certain resemblance remains.

For Judy Malloy, who was a master composer when I was still learning canon and fugue, the key to invention lies in the artful crossing of pattern and chance, of musical and cybernetic form, in her "Concerto for Narrative Data."

John Cayley, who would be our Che or Tristan Tzara if this were an actual movement, gives us a newly re-engineered version of "riverIsland," an exploration of poetry-as-simulation that continues to define the possibilities of its form.

Next come some younger though no less accomplished talents, beginning with Shawn Rider, a writer, digital designer, and meta-gamer who is represented here with two pieces, "PiTp," a work laid open deliberately to digital intervention, and "So Random," a story that tells itself each time, specially, just for you.

Elizabeth Knipe, another relatively new player, offers "activeReader," an interactive media piece that brings its own interpretation of reader engagement and emergent, open form.

Nick Montfort, equally at ease with aesthetic programming and the long-form palindrome, offers what we might call a minimum instrument, "The Purpling," a maze of recirculating expression built from humble Web pages.

Last in train is my own "Under Language," a sort of talkative poem with consequences, far less credible in its claim to infinity than most of its companions, but still a kind of game, for those who will play."

Read the new issue here.

[nature and textile art]

A little while ago I participated in a round-table discussion at the ICA where 2 of the 3 artists were textile artists...or at least they created art with textiles. I'm thinking here specifically of Rachel Beth Egenhoefer and Nicola Naismith. Both artists create some really interesting objects and installations with wool etc... That must be why I'm going to be checking out the THE HYPERBOLIC CROCHET CORAL REEF at the Hayward Gallery in London curated by Margaret and Christine Wertheim from the Institute for Figuring.

"During Summer 2008 - in this International Year of the Reef - the Crochet Coral Reef will be showing in London at the Hayward Gallery. The exhibition will include an expanded version of the Bleached Reef, a new configuration of the Ladies Silurian Reef, the beautifully archaic Branched Anemone Garden, and the ever-growing Toxic Reef. On show for the first time will be the wondrously surreal Chicago Cambrian Reef (curated by IFF contributor Aviva Alter), plus a new formation of the Beaded Reef by master beaders Rebecca Peapples and Sue Von Ohlsen. The exhibition will also debut several new plastic installations: The Exploding Plastic Inevitable Reef (with hot-pink sand by Kathleen Greco), and the Bottle Tree Grove (featuring works by Christine
Wertheim, Evelyn Hardin and Nadia Severns). Hanging elements in the show will include the all-plastic-bag Rubbish Vortex by Australian contributor Helle Jorgensen, a flotilla of jellyfish by Irish crafter Inga Hamilton, and Dr Axt's psychedelic coral-cloud "Reefer Madness."

In addition to the IFF reefs, the exhibition will also debut the amazing new UK Reef, currently being constructed by crafters across the UK (with contributions from Ireland, and even Australia - hey its a former colony)."

On the 13th of June there's going to be an all-day symposium with the crochet reef creators Margaret and Christine Wertheim; mathematician Dr Daina Taimina, inventor of hyperbolic crochet; radical UK crafters, environmentalists, and coral reef biologists. How neat is that?

Now I just need to learn how to knit or crochet...right Edith?!

Thanks to Sue for the head's up.

[recherche en littératies multiples - multiple literacies]

I recently received an invitation from Diana Masny at the University of Ottawa/Littératies Multiples to attend this amazing conference on multiple literacies. Colin Lankshear will be presenting his research on digital literacy (woo hoo!) from a sociocultural perspective. Check out the blog, Everyday Literacies that Colin writes with Michele Knobel.

[learning on screen - 2.1]

Rachel Isba, University of Manchester Medical School, "Fact and Fiction: The Use of Television Drama in Medical Education"


The gist: use House (the tv show) to help teach med. students about being a *good* doctor
(yay! she gave us an overview of her presentation)

• What is medical education
• drama as a teaching tool
• house study
• summary and questions

med. education - specifically the undergrad. degree, it's mainly a 1st degree and completed over 5 years, graduation and then students can start as a junior doctor


[bit of a break for tech problems, loss of sound... again I have to guffaw as in a room full of people who use *digital* tools for film/video/sound and teaching...no one seems to find the volume switch]

why use visual media to teach med students - varying exposure to rare or unusual cases, development of "alternative" formats, learning should be fun (I'm thinking of the international virtual medical school)

retention levels - proven that students retain only 5% from lecturing and 10% from reading but discussion group are 50% and practise by doing is 75% retention. In the middle is audio visual and demonstration at 20% and 30% respectively. Enter medical dramas.

*It's been shown that adults remember more if in a heightened state of emotion (interesting).*




Research Questions:
Can students learn from an episode of House and
How much do students retain?

Rachel says she believes House to be the most *factually* correct medical drama.

Benefits
can be done in students' own time
perceived as fun
exposure to unusual or rare cases

Risks
poor role models
acceptability (medicine shouldn't be fun when you're learning it)
misinformation (you can't actually shock a flatline, it won't work)




Drama is a valuable educational tool but more research needs to be done.

Question: Are the graphics useful?
Answer: in House they're not far off and sometimes the close-ups of cells are quite helpful and accurate

Question: Do you use House on it's own or do you embed it into your lessons?
Answer: both ways are possible

---

Dr. Chris Willmott, University of Leicester, "Sharing the Vision: Exploiting Web 2.0 technologies in promoting the use of multimedia in bioethics education"
http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif
Central thesis - web 2.0 technologies are useful for sharing and using information

Stem Cell Research: educational south park video (Kenny Dies)

Advantages of using blog service:
don't need to know any HTML (but gosh it's soooo much better if you do!)
range of off the self style sheets
built-in facilities to search (by tags, categories and reader-selected keywords)
built in site stats and tracking (but this is easy to add using google analytics or sitemeter etc...)
high visibility in google searchers
it's free

check out the bioethics bytes blog (with a delicious feed!)



conscious decision to have all different kinds of posts with video, documentary etc...and posts which engage with "academic literature" (like this post here on transgenics)


but how to get useful online videos?
bbc iplayer - short life span
streamed news footage - in perpetuity but platform dependent
Newsfilm Online (live from May 2008?)
youtube, google video - provenance of material, is it ok to recommend it if you didn't post it (given that "ethics" is in the blog title), is it ok to embed it if you didn't post it (yes if the source code is provided)
bespoke videos - student work

conclusions: TRILT is an excellent database and web 2.0 technologies are idea for teaching bioethics

---

"User Generated content - Triple L Project," Dr. Jan T. Goldschmeding

TRIPLE L - about live events, learning objects and learning environments

content - captured lectures


(arg battery dying and the are no plugs anywhere...)

[literacy in transliteracy]

"maintaining heterogenous contradiction is essential"


(Julia Kristeva, Revolution in Poetic Language, 189).

While catching up on some reading and sifting through my google reader, my thoughts keep turning to Monday's transliteracy workshop. Again the notion of literacy appeared (initially) to cause some discomfort or at least problematisation. What *exactly* is literacy? Did we mean it in a linguistic book-sense? Should we be employing another term? Although it seemed there was general agreement that literacy points to modes of comprehension that extend beyond letters to mean *codes* in a broader sense, I frequently am asked why we don't just say visual literacy or multi-media literacy etc... For me, transliteracy is very much about a plurality - it isn't *just* visual or oral or linguistic and it isn't just about being media savvy. I think a large part of being transliterate is the ability to carry multiple literacies between media. For me, aspects of the web seem to exemplify this. I'm thinking of Twitter and sending updates via a mobile (txt literacy perhaps) to the web (web literacy) and then someone being notified of those updates on their mobiles, via rss aggregators, IM or just be following along on the web. Amidst these kinds of information exchanges there are also literacies required to navigate across literacy borders, to *read* images and sounds. I'm also thinking of web fictions (Dene Grigar's Fallow Field, Donna Leishman's Red Riding Hood, Marjorie Luesebrink's Fibonacci's Daughter etc...) which require readers to be literate in sounds, images, text and interaction and often this literacy requires readers to amalgamate these literacies into the same instant of reading/understanding/interacting/performing. Maybe using the word literacy in transliteracy might also be thought of (in my view) as a Kristevian move; (like Judith Butler and Luce Irigaray too suggest); one can challenge traditions (literary and otherwise) from within. So, using the term literacy can suggest a critique of (monomodal?) foundations. A sort of productive mimesis, repetition with a difference?

Iterability is "the logic that ties repetition to alterity"

(Derrida, "Signature, Event, Context," 180).

[transliteracy workshop today]

Today is the day!

Following on from last year's transliteracy unconference we're holding a transliteracy workshop. Last year the vote was to have a day where we could put into practise our ideas of transliteracy in order to *make* transliterate objects.

We have piles of string, coloured papers, digital cameras, computers, scanners, robot lego, old answering machines, playstation and more.

As a reminder, the definition of transliteracy (so far) that we're using is:

"The ability to read, write and interact across a range of platforms, tools and media from signing and orality through handwriting, print, TV, radio and film, to digital social networks."

The aim of making transliterate objects will help us understand *why* something is transliterate as right now we seem to have an innate idea of what transliteracy is but how to we begin to describe it in words, images, sounds etc...?

more on the PART blog.

[shmapp london]

The shmapp london guide asked to use one of my portabello road market pics that I have on flickr in their most recent (4th edition) travel guide:

About Schmap
Schmap is a leading publisher of digital travel guides for 200 destinations throughout the United States, Europe, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The innovative technology behind Schmap Guides also lets end users publish their own ‘schmaps’ (to share trip itineraries, local reviews and more), and powers a popular range of Schmap Widgets, displaying maps with content and event schedules for travel, sports, concert tours and more on a fast-growing network of websites and blogs. Founded in 2004, Schmap is privately owned and based in Carrboro, North Carolina

Schmap Guides

Schmap’s series of digital travel guides integrates dynamic maps with useful background reading, suggested tours, photos from the traveling public and reviews by local correspondents (for sights and attractions, hotels, restaurants, bars, parks, theaters, galleries, museums and more) to profile 200 destinations throughout the United States, Europe, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

Schmap Guides can be browsed online, or downloaded for offline trip planning and when traveling with a laptop.

There's even a funky and customisable widget.

[happy birthday to me!]

cue drumroll...

a selection of bithday cards...some even arriving via snail mail!

The inside of this card is hilarious..."with 12 years experience"! Ha! Thanks Keith!

Update - 9:50am and look what's been delivered:

Update - 10:37, look what's just arrived:

Update - 12:00, more pressies:

[still ill....]

but slightly (ever so slightly) back in the land of living and came across (i know...behind the times) this neat pedagocial vid from Jim Brown over at Blogging Pedagogy:




I can't wait to try something like this (when I'm better!) with my students.

[guiding readers: new book]

A forthcoming book from the International Reading Association that includes aspects of digital literacy.

Guiding Readers Through Text: Strategy Guides for New Times (second edition)
Karen D. Wood, Diane Lapp, James Flood, and D. Bruce Taylor.

"Strategy guides support students during reading, helping them attend to significant information, process and think about content, and engage in meaningful discussions throughout the reading experience. Reflecting what is considered “text” in today’s multimedia world, these guides take students beyond traditional textbooks and into multiple sources of information, bridging print and digital literacies. The book’s question sets, statements, engaging activities, and experiences will build and deepen students’ understanding of topics across all subject areas.

In each chapter, the authors provide procedural descriptions and examples of each guide, as well as “Tips for Diverse Learners.” An appendix of reproducible strategy guides is also included."

Check out the Table of Contents:

About the Authors

Foreword

Preface

Part I: Using Strategy Guides in K–12 Classrooms

Chapter 1
Introduction: From Study Guides of the Past to Strategy Guides of the Present and Future

Chapter 2
Getting Started With Strategy Guides

Part II: Collaborative Guides

Chapter 3
Collaborative Listening–Viewing Guide

Chapter 4
Interactive Reading Guide

Chapter 5
Reciprocal Teaching Discussion Guide

Part III: Thinking Guides

Chapter 6
Critical Profiler Guide

Chapter 7
Inquiry Guide

Chapter 8
Learning-From-Text Guide

Chapter 9
Multiple-Source Research Guide

Chapter 10
Point-of-View Guide

Part IV: Statement Guides

Chapter 11
Anticipation Guide

Chapter 12
Extended Anticipation Guide

Chapter 13
Reaction Review Guide

Part V: Manipulative Guides

Chapter 14
Foldable Guide

Chapter 15
Origami Guide

Part VI: Text Structure Guides

Chapter 16
Analogical Strategy Guide

Chapter 17
Concept Guide

Chapter 18
Pattern Guide

Part VII: Process-of-Reading Guides

Chapter 19
Glossing

Chapter 20
Process Guide

Chapter 21
Reading Road Map

Chapter 22
Textbook Activity Guide

Part VIII: Transferring to Independent Learning

Chapter 23
Student-Developed Guide

Appendix
Reproducibles

Index

Interested? Buy the book here.

[multimodal pedagogy]

An interesting project at the Intermedia Research Centre, University of Oslo:

"Gidder is a research design project that is part of the interdisciplinary 'Digital Design' initiative at UiO. In this project, wiki and mobile phone technologies are combined to support high school students interpreting works of contemporary art across two settings, classroom and museum.
Groups in Digital Dialogue is a study of high school students interpreting modern and contemporary works of art. The knowledge domain is art history, a curriculum subject in which students are expected to not only master terminology and knowledge about artists and works -- but also to critically inquire and engage in meaning making processes. Museums are particularly interested in teenagers as a visitor group, and ICT-supported communication represents a means of achieving this goal, as youths are generally competent and familiar with many forms of digital technology. High school students are thus chosen for the study because they tend to make an effort to understand contemporary art, but also because they are a target audience for both contemporary art museums and developers of new mobile technologies. A combination of wiki and mobile phone technologies will be used across two settings, classroom and museum."

[inanimate alice education portal]

For the past few months I've been quietly beavering away on a sample resource pack with lessons, handouts, and links to sources to be used alongside the teaching of Inanimate Alice. I finished it a little while ago and have sent it out to a group of willing educators who are going to give I.A. a test-run (some educators have already used Alice!) in the class room/lecture room/educational environment. The aim of this project is to develop an educational portal alongside the main Inanimate Alice site. Hopefully this will mark an important step in bringing web-based multimodal texts into learning environments. I realise there are new media courses being taught out there (I'm involved with one at DMU) but it would be so handy to have some resources available online so teachers/parents/students/readers can help themselves to ready-made ideas. Plus Inanimate Alice seems to be a perfect building block in the multimodal landscape as the development of Alice and the story probably parallels the experience we've had (well, at least some of us) with new media (we get better with it as time goes on).

I'm hoping to add some case-studies and student comments to the site too, so that we get a feel for what's *really* happening when students access and participate with these kinds of works. I'm also wondering how the reader/author dynamic will shift and develop with the new tool called iStories coming out soon. (Peter Brantley has blogged about iStories here.) With students able to easily make their own multimodal stories I wonder how their perception of what they *read* will change.

Of course, any lesson ideas that you have are welcome.

I can't wait to get some feedback from the educators participating at this early stage. If you'd like to get involved send me an e-mail.