Quick link: Edublogger Bill Ferriter's posts about technology and education

I just discovered edublogger Bill Ferriter's blog, "The Tempered Radical" today. He is a fellow North Carolinian who is part of the Teacher Leaders Network. He teaches 6th grade science at a middle school.


Here are a couple of his posts:


Lessons Learned on Cell Phones in School
How Limited Technology Budgets Failed My Students

Display Week 2011 Recap: (Society for Information Display -SID)

SOCIETY FOR INFORMATION DISPLAY: DISPLAY WEEK 2011


49th International Symposium, Seminar, and Exhibition was held at the L.A. Convention Center in Los Angeles, California during the week of May 15-20, 2011.  Display Week  is one of a number of conferences of the Society for Information Display (SID), a group of professionals in all of the technical and business disciplines that relate to display research, design, manufacturing, applications, marketing, and sales.  


I'm sad to say, I was not able to attend the conference.  


In case you missed Display Week, or if you are curious to learn more about it, take a few moments to look over the conference website, and if it interests you, plan to attend the 50th next year.   I hope to be there!


2011 Keynote Speakers:
Phil “Captain 3D” McNally, Stereoscopic Supervisor, DreamWorks Animation
“How My 3D Hobby Became My 3D Career”


Yasuhiro Koike, Professor at Keio University and Director of the Keio Photonics Research Institute
“Overwhelmingly Realistic Face-to-Face Communications: Photonic Polymer Technology”


Shuji Nakamura, Professor in the Materials Department at the University of Santa Barbara
“Nitride-Based LEDs and Laser Diodes: Current Status, Bright Prospects!”


Douglas Trumbull, Trumbull Ventures LLC
Note: Douglas Trumbull's multimedia website is awesome.  It provides a visually pleasing overview of many of his special effects work, and more. 


There were a variety of courses and tutorials throughout the Display Week 2011, including one presented by Geoff Walker, of NextWindow: Fundamentals of Touch Technologies and Applications


For more information, take a look at the Display Week 2011 program (pdf).


Information from the Display Week website:
"Display Week, the Society for Information Display’s Symposium, Seminar, and Exhibition, is the essential yearly meeting for everyone involved in the technology, business, and application of cutting-edge displays. It is also the top North American exhibit venue for display industry products and services."


"Each year, engineers, manufacturers, researchers, and numerous others involved in the electronic-information-display industry gather at Display Week for access to a huge range of display-related technologies and applications. These include high-definition flat-panel displays, OLEDs, flexible displays, plastic electronics, large-area projection systems, and much more. This is the place to learn about the state of the art of image processing, systems software and display processor hardware, human factors and applied vision, and exciting new application areas such as 3-D and electronic cinema, touch and interactivity, solid-state lighting, and green technologies...As the must-see event for the worldwide electronic-information-display industry, Display Week is host to hundreds of exhibitors and thousands of attendees each year."


RELATED
News about Display Week 2011
News about the Society for Information Display






More about CHI 2011 and related interactive technology topics coming soon!

CHI 2011, Bill Buxton, and the Buxton Collection: Explore 35 years of interactive devices, online!

Bill Buxton is a researcher at Microsoft who focuses on Human-Computer Interaction and is known for his work in user experience design and natural user interfaces such as multi-touch surfaces.   His talk at the recent CHI 2011 conference, held in Vancouver, Canada, was an overview of the Buxton Collection, an on-line historical archive of interactive input devices spanning over the past 35 years.  


It was interesting to note that at the time of the presentation, the Vancouver Conference Center, where the conference was taking place, was having serious problems with the network/internet connections, and as a consequence, Buxton was not able to demonstrate the on-line version of his collection as planned.  

Not to worry.  The physical version of the Buxton's archive was on display during the conference, along with Buxton, who was happy to tell the story behind every device and gadget in the archive, with much enthusiasm. The slideshow below provides a glimpse of the Bill Buxton archive displayed at CHI 2011:

My Buxton Collection Slideshow, CHI 2011, Vancouver, Canada

Buxton's archive of gadgets comes with a rich history, accumulated over the years. Much of this history, until now, has resided in Buxton's head.   Holding and touching the items in the archive while listening to Buxton's passionate stories about each one, was unlike anything I had ever experienced.  His archive is a labor of love, and the interactive, on-line version of the Buxton Collection is his way of sharing his knowledge with the world.


During his talk, Buxton pointed out that in computer science programs, students are not required to have much exposure to the "history of ideas" in the field.  Huge chunks of work are often ignored in the literature,  and in some cases, the wheel is unknowingly reinvented, and this is something that must be addressed within the CHI community, according to Buxton. 


I agree.

RELATED
Previous IMT posts about Bill Buxton
Bill Buxton's Presentation Video: "A Little Tale about Touch" (Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, 2010)
Two good articles by Bill Buxton: The Mad Dash Towards Touch Technology; The Long Nose of Innovation
Buxton Collection
Buxton Collection, PivotViewer
Back to the Past: Bill Buxton Shows Off 36 Years of Tech Devices
Microsoft News Center, 5/9/11
Microsoft's Bill Buxton exhibits gadget collection 35 years in the making
Donald Melanson, engadget, 5/9/11
Bill Buxton's Haptic Input References (pdf)
Bill Buxton's website
Multi-touch Systems that I Have Known and Loved (Bill Buxton)
CES 2010: NUI with Bill Buxton

On Engineering and Design: An Open Letter Microsoft Research Principal Scientist Bill Buxton calls for engineers and user experience designers to learn to appreciate one another

Bill Buxton, Bloomberg Businessweek, 4/29/09

humanaquarium at CHI 2011

I had the opportunity to attend the presentation session of humanaquarium: Exploring audience, participation, and interaction at CHI 2011, and also experience humanaquarium's compelling interactive performance along with a crowd of CHI 2011 attendees. It was one of my favorite events.



What I liked about humanaquarium is that it is a good example of how music, the arts, and technology are converging, on many levels.  It is encouraging to know that this sort of interdisciplinary, creative collaboration is evident at a number of university research centers. humanaquarium was developed with the support of Culture Lab, Newcastle University (UK),  the Advanced Man-Machine Interface Laboratory, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada, and the Alberta Foundation for the Arts.


According to the abstract for the CHI 2011 paper, "humanaquarium is a movable performance space designed to explore the dialogical relationship between artist and audience. Two musicians perform inside the cube-shaped box, collaborating with participants to co-create an aesthetic audio-visual experience. The front wall of the humanaquarium is a touch-sensitive FTIR window. MaxMSP is used to translate the locations of touches on the window into control data, manipulating the tracking of software synthesizers and audio effects generated in Ableton Live, and influencing a Jitter visualization projected upon the rear wall of the cube."

To learn more about humanaquarium and catch a glimpse of the performance, take a look at the following video clips.  The first video clip was produced by Nick Barber, who was covering the CHI 2011 conference for IDG News Services. (Nick is also the host and co-producer of World Tech Update.)  I produced the second video clip.

humaniquarium:  Robyn Taylor/Guy Schofield/John Shearer

RELATED
humanaquarium: exploring audience, participation, and interaction
CHI EA '11 Proceedings of the 2011 annual conference extended abstracts on Human  Factors in Computing Systems
CHI 2011 The User in Flux
humanaquarium YouTube channel
Humanaquarium blends art and tech, attracts crowds
Nick Barber, Computerworld, 5/13/11
Humanaquarium: Two musicians, one box
Nate Lanxon, Wired, 3/16/10

Johannes Schoening's CHI 2011 Highlights, Linkfest, and More!

Johannes Shoening has posted some great videos, pictures, and links about ACM-CHI 2011, a conference that recently took place in Vancouver, Canada.  Johannes is the author of the Perspectivevoxel blog, where he shares information about interactive and emerging technologies.


Weekly Linkfest (CHI 2011)


CHI 2011 Highlights in the Area of Interactive Tables and Surfaces




Take a look at a recent article about CHI 2011, by Terry Lavender,  in the on-line version of the Vancouver Observer:


CHI: Computer-Human Interaction shows stunning use of interface technology (5/14/11)

Note:  I have several post about CHI in the works.  Sorry for the delay, I got behind when Blogger was down.

Exploring Social Media Literacies in Teaching and Learning: Howard Rheingold's Keynote at CHI 2011

Howard Rheingold
"Independent thinker, online instigator, novice educator, expert learner, offline gardener." 
(Howard Rheingold's Twitter profile)

Credit- Joi

Howard Rheingold was the opening keynote speaker at the ACM-CHI 2011 conference on May 9th, in Vancouver, Canada.  In his delightful talk, Rheingold discussed his exploration of social media and social media literacies in teaching and learning, drawing upon his experience teaching university courses.  According to Rheingold, these literacies include mindful infotention; participation; collaboration, and critical consumption, or in his words, crap detection. 

In traditional classrooms, students are given a number of reading assignments, and then called upon to respond to the instructor's questions, demonstrating that they "did the reading".  From Rheingold's perspective, this is off-track, as cold-calling students isn't the way to foster "thinking, reflection, inquiry, and the ability to contribute to a broader conversation."


Rheingold suggests that it is a myth that "tech-savvy" digital natives know how to use technology for learning and connecting with others effectively, drawing from his recent experience teaching university students.  Rheingold believes that the goal of learning is not to get the right answer, but to learn strategies such as inquiry, exploration, and collaboration.  Learning is not limited to the classroom walls, but takes place (within a network of other co-learners, linked to one another, and also linked to the wealth of resources that are available on-line.  


In this way, a "culture of conversation" is built that extends well beyond the classroom, and takes place after the official class period has ended. Technology is not the solution-  it is a tool that when harnessed thoughtfully, can support co-learning activities in a variety and combination of ways.  This process, Rheingold stresses, can facilitate engaged learning, and amplify intelligence.


If you are interested in exploring the wisdom of Rheingold, take some time to soak in the videos below, as well as the links to resources provided at the end of this post.



21st century media literacies from JD Lasica on Vimeo.


Howard Rheingold at Reboot Britain

More About Howard Rheingold

As early as the mid-1990's, Howard was clear that the future of technology would be visual and multimedia, and that technology would improve access to a wealth of information as well as provide opportunities for increasing connections between people. Rheingold is known for his 2002 book, SmartMobs: The Next Social Revolution- Transforming Cultures and Communities in the Age of Instant Access. He has taught courses such as Digital Journalism at Stanford University and Virtual Community/Social Media at the University of California, Berkeley, and his approach to teaching breaks the traditional mold, given the comments from his former students.  

Since most people don't have the means to attend Stanford or Berkeley, Rheingold recently established Rheingold U, an on-line learning community offering courses that run about 5 weeks, through live sessions and the use of forums, blogs, wikis, mindmaps, and social bookmarks. 

To explore the Howard Rheingold's Story,  his Wikipedia page, his website, and Electric Minds Archives, a blast from the mid-1990's past. Also take a look at the following resources and links:

Virtual Community/Social Media Course Prezi
Virtual Community/Social Media Course Concept Map
Interactive Mindful Infotention Concept Map, which links to additional resources
Wiki:  Interactive presentation media - a good "how-to" resource

Howard Rheingold's gaming2learn Bookmarks


RELATED
Developing the Digital Learner (Intel)
Standards for Global Learning in the Digital Age - ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education)
A New Culture of Learning: Cultivating the Imagination for a World of Constant Change (Book authored by Douglas Thomas and John Seely Brown)

PREVIOUS CHI-2011 RELATED POSTS
Allison Druin's Workshop Keynote: "Mining the Imagination from Time Travel to Anti-Gravity"  CHI 2011, Vancouver,Canada (Child Computer Interaction: UI technologies and their impact on educational pedagogy)
Update from CHI 2011 - much more to come!
Press Pass for CHI 2011!  Today's Highlights from the ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

FYI:

If you are unfamiliar with the acronyms, ACM stands for the Association for Computing Machinery, and is known as the world's largest educational and scientific computing society, with over 108,000 members. Within the ACM are a number of special interest groups, known as SIGs.  SIG-CHI is an interdisciplinary group of practitioners, industry researchers,  students, and academicians who represent fields of design, engineering, management, and user experience. All members of SIG-CHI are interested in topics related to Computer-Human Interaction in some way.   Communities featured at the CHI-2011 conference are Child-Computer Interaction; Games and Entertainment; Health; and Sustainability.