I’ve been speaking on this topic lately. Here’s the version of the talk I gave at Cengage’s Technology Forums and will present at the Orlando Conference next month.
My First Windows Mobile App
I wrote a Bentley App that runs on Windows Mobile using Visual Studio 2010 in Visual Basic. After installing the Windows Phone Developer tools, I was good to go. Took a bit of time to learn a bit about page navigation, but I was able to get started. I took advantage of some of the code sample starters online.
The app showcases information about Bentley University, but is designed in such a way that by changing the college name, colors, logo, web site URL, etc., in various XML files, and then rebuilding, it becomes an app for any school.
Philip DesAutels presented this app at the Microsoft CIO Summit in Redmond, Washington. It was designed as a template that will serve as a model for other educational institutions.
The app is available in the Windows Marketplace, and the code in VB and C# is up on Codeplex.
Randy Guthrie, an Academic Developer Evangelist from Microsoft, wrote a review on his blog.
Internet of Things
In class today, we were talking about “an internet of things” and how many different devices are now connected to the Internet. One student showed a screen shot from LaundryView.com, which monitors the washing machines and dryers at in the dorms at Bentley.
ISECON 2010
John Miko and I received a distinguished paper award at ISECON for our paper, “Taking it to the Top: A Lesson in Search Engine Optimization.”
This paper , presented on Halloween eve in Nashville, focused on the technology concepts students learned while completing the SEO Contest exercise in CS 299. The abstract follows.
Teaching in Timisoara
On my last day in Timisoara, I taught Diana Andone’s Multimedia class at UPT. These students are English speakers and will be working on a collaborative project with my honors IT 101 students, to evaluate multimedia or collaborative software applications and produce a short demo describing the application, and its potential business uses.
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First on the List
I presented a paper at CELDA entitled “First on the List: SEO Contests as Authentic Learning.”
The paper was co-authored by Prof. John Miko of St. Francis University. The abstract follows:
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) describes a set of techniques applied to a Web site over time so it achieves a desirable position with a search engine’s rankings. SEO is an important strategy for organizations and individuals in order to promote their brands online. This paper describes an online learning activity that mimics a popular real-world event known as an SEO Contest. SEO Contest participants make use of a variety of techniques in order to compete for the top position in a search engine’s results when searching for a specified word or phrase. Results from this study show that teachers can leverage an SEO Contest as an authentic learning environment to effectively develop college students’ competence in implementing SEO techniques.
Slides after the jump.
At the Conference
I gave my keynote yesterday morning, then spent the afternoon attending other sessions. In anticipation of my keynote, I was interviewed by Romanian Television about the future of the web, limits of social networking, and changes in how people use the web.In anticipation of my keynote, I was interviewed by Romanian Television about the future of the web, limits of social networking, and changes in how people use the web. The University celebrated its 90th anniversary this year, so they invited the conference participants to a banquet in the evening in honor of the occasion. The evening was filled with elegant food, and Romanian music and dance.
IADIS/ICWI
Here's where I am!
I arrived yesterday in Timisoara, Romania for the IADIS Internet/World Wide Web Conference. I was supposed to be one of two keynote speakers, but my co-keynote, Molly Holschslag (@mollydotcom) went through an ordeal with customs and wasn’t able to make it, so I start the conference this morning.
Prof. Diana Andone from the University of Timisoara Politechnica met me at the airport yesterday. She and I had collaborated on a few papers last year, so it was nice to have a conversation in person and in the same time zone!
Web 2.0 Based E-Learning
I have a chapter in Web 2.0-Based E-Learning published by IGI Global Publications, edited by Mark Lee and Catherine McLoughlin of Charles Sturt University.
Web 2.0-Based E-Learning: Applying Social Informatics for Tertiary Teaching provides a useful and valuable reference to the latest advances in the area of educational technology and e-learning. This innovative book offers an excellent resource for any practitioner, researcher, or academician with an interest in the use of the Web for providing meaningful learning experiences.
My chapter is entitled “Teaching and Learning Information Technology through the Lens of Web 2.0”. The abstract after the jump, or read it here.
SALT 2010: Social Media Future Trends
Michael Jernigan of Microsoft and I were asked to fill in at the SALT conference this morning to give presentation on Social Media. After Michael spoke about policies at Microsoft about sharing corporate information on social networks, I spoke about current trends and future possibilities in social media.
Shawn Rosler gives a summary on his blog.