Thinking about thinking...

SEPTEMBER 3, 2014
Why Walking Helps Us Think
BY FERRIS JABR http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/walking-helps-us-think

I find it so incredible that researchers and journalists still talk about getting outside and exercising like it is an amazing and new discovery.

I have watched generations of Nordic skiers go through my life and they are the most thoughtful, intelligent and successful students. I believe this to be no coincidence, they not only spend hours/week outside, mostly in the wilderness, but they do so in motion. Always in motion.

In his book Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School, John Medina states, "The brain appears to be designed to solve problems related to surviving in an unstable, outdoor environment, and to do so in almost constant motion."

This would describe Nordic Ski training and racing to a key and I believe the athletes with which I have had the pleasure to work exemplify this perfectly.

We'll start with the 10-15 hours/week they spend training and then add the 5-10 hours of fundraising in addition to their school work. In an environment where time is at a premium these young student/athletes spend a large amount of disposable time training. With this training comes a necessity for more rest and recovery. All told they spend the equivalent of a part time job focused on training for skiing.

You might then ask how they are able to be successful in classes? Are they taking less demanding degrees? Are they barely passing courses?

The resounding answer is NO!

These amazing young people are in some of the most challenging/time consuming degrees offered on campus:Earth Systems Science, Chemical Engineering, Math, Economics, Art, Microbiology, Marketing, and Geology. In addition many of them have a concurrent major in Environment and Natural Resources.

And not only are they engaged in extremely difficult and time consuming scholarship they rock it in traditional assessments! It is tough to imagine how they find the time to to be such top notch students but they do and they do it day in and day out.

I often say that the ski team is producing a brand of super heroes who are not only in the top 1% of the fittest athletes in this nation but also some of the top academics and if you truly want to be amazing have a conversation with one of them some day. Their grasp of an amazing array of conversational topics will make your head spin.

So if our brains are truly meant to solve problems, outside, in constant motion Nordic Ski Team Athletes must be among the best problem solvers in the world!

Social Justice: 'The Meaning of Serena Williams'

Crazy Week, too much to do to actually read and think but here is one thing I actually read today.

Social Justice:

The Meaning of Serena Williams

On tennis and black excellence.

By CLAUDIA RANKINE AUG. 25, 2015

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/30/magazine/the-meaning-of-serena-williams.html?_r=0 

What an awesome article. It actually brought tears to my eyes. I remember when the Williams girls first hit the scene and Venus was touted as the good girl and Serena was just too 'cocky'. Even at my young, uneducated age I was troubled by that word, 'cocky'. I couldn't decide why but I love to watch Serena's passion and antics, she embodied the power of women to me. As a young, white athlete she was a goddess.

I finally heard an interview with Billy Jean King who basically said that women are not allowed to be 'cocky' that they had to be everything the malestream society expected of female athletes. She loved Serena's cockiness and wished more young women would own it and move on.

This article helped to frame the importance of Serena to both women and people of color. She embodies female, black excellence at it's best and I feel fortunate to have watched her soar!

Liberal Education Rocks, Digital Badges for Professional Development, MeisterTask and more!

I've decided to keep track of what I read on a daily basis and keep a general work journal to help me find stuff when I need!

Reading:

AAC&U advocates for 'liberal learning' even as higher ed transforms

• Liberal Education and America’s Promise

I think this is great! I totally believe that specific content knowledge is like trying to solve problems while stuck in a box. You aren't even aware that there are other potential solutions. Without having a broad base of knowledge you are continually hampered by a lack of knowledge, no matter how amazing you are in your field!

Pioneer of ed-tech innovation says he’s frustrated by disruptors’ narrative

I totally agree with Seimens on this one, Universities are doing a great job of adapting. I believe that lots of groups make their money by saying higher ed doesn't advance BUT at the same time how many companies are in business specifically to cater to this changing nature!

Best quote: “This is one of the most inaccurate pieces of @#%$ floating around in the ‘disrupt and transform’ learning crowd,” Mr. Siemens wrote. “Universities are exceptional at innovating and changing,” he argued. “Explore any campus today. It’s a new world on most campuses, never mind the online, competency, and related systems.”

Can Digital Badges Help Encourage Professors to Take Teaching Workshops?

I'm doing this for the Professional Development we do for UW. We have created an account on credly for University of Wyoming Teaching & Technology (TNT). I've started awarding badges to a couple of sessions and our Boot Camp on Wednesday will have a bunch.

Udacity’s Sebastian Thrun: How Nanodegrees can democratize tech education

I LOVE the idea of democratizing education but I have problems with this model. It still caters to the elite with no real help for those students who don't have the background to be successful at their own pace. It also assumes access to the equipment and network that are necessary. 

I do like the idea of micro credentials BUT I also think that true innovation comes from a liberal education so students can be exposed to not immediately useful information!

Cool Tools:

MeisterTask

Love this product! It's amazing for organizing groups and projects. Just started using it and LOVE IT!

Cool Sites:

#theafricathemedianevershowyou

https://twitter.com/search?f=images&vertical=default&q=%23theafricathemedianevershowsyou 

There's a reason they call #malawi the warm heart of Africa, right? #TheAfricaTheMediaNeverShowsYou pic.twitter.com/aea3spI0tg

— Jack McBrams (@mcbrams) August 10, 2015

Environmental:

My SolarMill - Super cool personal windmill/solar setup that is easy to install on your house and fairly inexpensive to buy! Makes me want to do my part to help lesson our dependance on fossil fuels!

What I learned today:

• WyoCourses/Canvas analytics will not let you see how many students viewed a page. Bummer....The only way to kinda do this is with modules and making them do one thing, say view the page, before they are able to submit an assignment.

Summer Boot Camp and Digital Buffet!

It's been about a month since our second summer Technology Boot Camp.

The first year it was heavily focused on technology but this summer the focus was equally pedagogy and course design along with technology. Our partnership with the Ellbogen Center for Teaching and Learning also caused a change of name to the John P. Ellbogen Blended Learning Summer Institute.

With the extra funding available from this partnership we were able to bring in a blended learning expert, Brad Garner, Indiana Wesleyan University.

Faculty applied for the opportunity to participate in March and were awarded $500 in professional development funds at the completion of the project. 30 faculty were accepted and spent four days learning how to "flip" their classroom.

One of the most valuable resources that was created during this event was the Digital Buffet of technologies and ideas. http://www.uwyo.edu/outreach/ocp/instructional-support/tie/digitalbuffet.html

If you are interested in the next iteration of the Technology Boot Camp watch this page for updates.

http://www.uwyo.edu/outreach/ocp/instructional-support/tie/boot%20camp/index.html

ED-MEDIA 2013

I just returned from a fantastic trip to the AACE ED-MEDIA Conference in Victoria, British Columbia. http://www.aace.org/conf/edmedia/

I've been to this conference a couple of times and I am always impressed with the great information that  can be gleaned from the representatives from all around the world. I have been to numerous 'International Conferences' but none of them have ever had the truly international group that this one manages to attract year after year!

I tweeted a lot more than my followers probably thought reasonable and also took some notes specific to the impending change of the LMS and the subsequent training that will accompany it. You can find all these randome notes at: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qLRQS0Xt2uhU66pTj1_TY0yvsXLLZGq8K47QJZ3_tqA/edit?usp=sharing

The focus of this conference is truly the use of technology to teach, in all arenas and all forms. Most of the presenters are either faculty or instructional designers or a combination and most of the papers and presentations are very useful. The full papers are published by AACE, including my own with co-author Rachel Watson:

Watson, R. & Boggs, C (June, 2013). Is There a Virtual Edge? An Investigation of the Use of Virtual Labs to Supplement Traditional Microbiology Labs. In-Press. Proceedings of ED-MEDIA, 2013, Victoria, Canada. (Refereed)

Next year's conference will be held in Finland and I'm hoping to be able to pool some of my other conference money and attend. If it is ever in your vicinity I would encourage attendance, you won't regret it!

WACTE Boot Camp

I just returned from a fantastic trip to Casper where Cody and I gave a mini Technology Boot Camp to high school teachers who are members of WACTE.

It was a great time. What an amazing group of people! Every time I work with K-12 teachers I am more inspired by their dedication and persistence in the face of continual criticism and regulation.

We started the session with a Poll Everywhere to find out what they most wanted to talk about from a fairly long technology list. We started with Poll Eaverywhere and video production and moved on through several topics. It was a fun day with great people!

You can see the resource list we developed for it at: http://bit.ly/WACTE2013

The return to the blog!

It has been awhile, almost 3 years, since my original attempt to be a blogger ended. After a conversation with a faculty member I have decided to make another attempt.

My stumbling block in the past is my hesitation that I have little to add to the multiple conversations around teaching and technology. Although I still feel that this is mostly true I also realize that due to the unique nature of my job I can spend more time sifting through the information than most people and certainly more than most faculty.

As an effort to support faculty I am willing to try my hand at blogging.

Wish my luck!