Search technology is of interest to anyone on the net these days, but it has a special kind of interest for those of us concerned with accessing and managing resources for learning. And, for those of us instructional technologists involved in work related to school media centers (or libraries in general), facilitating search is one of the most conspicuous pieces of our day-to-day mission.
I do not claim overwhelming credentials that qualify me to discuss this topic, but over the years I have observed approaches to search, search tools, and alternatives to search emerging and evolving. Today I want to briefly highlight several recent search contenders and then focus on an item launched last week, that is much in the news at the moment, that is intimately related to search but claims to be no search engine at all.
The first four items I want to mention are recent offerings that aim to offer a meaningful alternative to Google. They are:
Cuil ( www.cuil.com )
Viewzi (www.viewzi.com )
Kosmix (www.kosmix.com )
Leapfish (www.leapfish.com )
(And there are probably other worthy items I have failed to include.)
Cuil claims to search three times more web pages than Google (and 10X more than Microsoft). Among other features and claims, all of these package results into user-friendly categories, offer alternative options of how to view results, and generate links to related topics. To one degree or another, these search tools are attempting to generate sort of a "your complete guide to this topic" in a single web page. In addition, Leapfish has added real-time search-as-you-type, or click-free search, which is pretty amazing to see in a web-based search engine.
You can generally find multiple demos and reviews of these tools on YouTube. As an example, here is a video demo of Cuil, which is probably the one that attracts me the most so far:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMHI3XSg75s
Now enter Wolfram Alpha, the engine that does something other than search
( www.wolframalpha.com ). Wolfram Alpha is a computational engine that specializes not in finding existing web pages but in mining numerical data, especially math and science data, and computing/compiling answers to queries. The "10+ trillion pieces of data, 50,000+ types of algorithms and models, and linguistic capabilities for 1000+ domains" has all been vetted by humans, so the quality of results is expected to be at a reliability level far exceeding what search engines do.
Thus any information that can be expressed quantitatively should be fair game to request.
The problem with Wolfram Alpha, so far, is that people are having very limited success in getting it to do something useful for them. There seem to be two main causes of this problem: one is that users tend to enter queries that are more appropriate for search engines, rather than making the adjustment to the idea of requesting quantifiable information; the other is that Wolfram Alpha is still developing its data resources and there are certainly many gaps that remain in the categories of data that have been indexed.
I think we can expect great things from this new tool, while we can also expect to often see the following result in the meantime:
"Wolfram|Alpha isn't sure what to do with your input."
There is a very helpful CNet video comparing Wolfram Alpha to Google here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3emFpcOfek
There is also a two-part introductory video by Stephen Wolfram, who is the force behind the project:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=riQ5tpHc_b8
Finally, just my little disclaimer that while information is power, information is not learning. I hope someone finds this discussion of new tools helpful; but there will always be the accompanying question "how do I use this to support meaningful learning?". I'll cop out here for the moment and save that for another day.
Best to everyone!
Greg
Friday, May 22, 2009
Friday, April 24, 2009
The Studio: 10 Years and Counting
Yes, it's been 10 years since we began the instructional technology design studio at the University of Georgia. Ten is a nice round number and is cause enough to stop, reflect, and hopefully celebrate. If this were a marriage, the traditional gifts would be tin and aluminum (kinda weird actually; of course, my wife and I just celebrated our 31st wedding anniversary, and I think the traditional gift is "linoleum.")
Most people know that the studio concept was born on the drive to Sapelo Island in March 1997 for the instructional technology faculty's annual retreat. Over that weekend, Michael Orey, Jim King, and I roughed out a structure and organization for the studio. Of course, a ton of work took place between then and the actual start of the studio in the fall semester of 1998. The studio approach was a radical departure for graduate education in instructional technology at the time, and remains one of the most innovative approaches to graduate education in the field. Over the past 10 years, we've since been a model for many other graduate programs around the world, even though relatively few have adopted a similar studio model. We have been held up as an example of a group who actually practices what they believe (and teach). In hindsight, I think it was a very gutsy move and I am very proud of my role in the studio's birth and life so far (I think we are at least at the adolescent stage).
The studio experience has proven to be the core experience for our masters students. M.Ed. students tend to report during their portfolio meetings that they were uncomfortable with the studio approach at the beginning, but came to understand and enjoy the studio experience by the end. Even for those students who did not resonate entirely with the studio approach, I find much satisfaction in knowing they at least experienced a different kind of "school" from what they experienced for their first 16 years of education (kindergarten doesn't count).
We had some notable events over the past year recognizing the studio at UGA. We had several sessions at the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) conference in Orlando in November, 2008 recognizing our efforts over the past decade. Most notably we were featured in AECT's Design & Development Showcase. The studio was also part of a session organized by Elizabeth Boling of Indiana University at the American Educational Research Association (AERA) conference in April, 2009 in San Diego in which many of the nation's leading programs described how they prepare instructional designers.
It is somewhat fitting that I write this entry the day after the spring 2009 studio showcase was held. This, it turns out, was the final showcase to be held in Athens. This is because the Instructional Design & Development area is moving its curriculum (which includes the studio) to the new UGA Gwinnett campus. So, we are entering into a new era, one full of promise and opportunity, but also some anxiety and apprehension. We certainly look forward to connecting with more students, schools, companies, and organizations in the Atlanta area.
It's been an honor working with and getting to know all of the students who passed through one or more of the studio courses over the past 10 years. I know you are out there and it would be great to hear from you. I've been humbled and inspired by all of the outstanding design projects over the years. However, I think it fitting to end this posting by recognizing those individuals who were part of the first studio back in 1998 and who completed the first cycle of studio courses: Sara Bradbury, Shannon Crupi, Sebastian Fiedler, Michael Gardner, Beaumie Kim, Vivian Liu, Bryan McLucas, Susan Paul, Jerry Slezak, Marcia Walker-Guy, Bethany White, and Hong Wu.
Here's to the next 10 years!
Most people know that the studio concept was born on the drive to Sapelo Island in March 1997 for the instructional technology faculty's annual retreat. Over that weekend, Michael Orey, Jim King, and I roughed out a structure and organization for the studio. Of course, a ton of work took place between then and the actual start of the studio in the fall semester of 1998. The studio approach was a radical departure for graduate education in instructional technology at the time, and remains one of the most innovative approaches to graduate education in the field. Over the past 10 years, we've since been a model for many other graduate programs around the world, even though relatively few have adopted a similar studio model. We have been held up as an example of a group who actually practices what they believe (and teach). In hindsight, I think it was a very gutsy move and I am very proud of my role in the studio's birth and life so far (I think we are at least at the adolescent stage).
The studio experience has proven to be the core experience for our masters students. M.Ed. students tend to report during their portfolio meetings that they were uncomfortable with the studio approach at the beginning, but came to understand and enjoy the studio experience by the end. Even for those students who did not resonate entirely with the studio approach, I find much satisfaction in knowing they at least experienced a different kind of "school" from what they experienced for their first 16 years of education (kindergarten doesn't count).
We had some notable events over the past year recognizing the studio at UGA. We had several sessions at the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) conference in Orlando in November, 2008 recognizing our efforts over the past decade. Most notably we were featured in AECT's Design & Development Showcase. The studio was also part of a session organized by Elizabeth Boling of Indiana University at the American Educational Research Association (AERA) conference in April, 2009 in San Diego in which many of the nation's leading programs described how they prepare instructional designers.
It is somewhat fitting that I write this entry the day after the spring 2009 studio showcase was held. This, it turns out, was the final showcase to be held in Athens. This is because the Instructional Design & Development area is moving its curriculum (which includes the studio) to the new UGA Gwinnett campus. So, we are entering into a new era, one full of promise and opportunity, but also some anxiety and apprehension. We certainly look forward to connecting with more students, schools, companies, and organizations in the Atlanta area.
It's been an honor working with and getting to know all of the students who passed through one or more of the studio courses over the past 10 years. I know you are out there and it would be great to hear from you. I've been humbled and inspired by all of the outstanding design projects over the years. However, I think it fitting to end this posting by recognizing those individuals who were part of the first studio back in 1998 and who completed the first cycle of studio courses: Sara Bradbury, Shannon Crupi, Sebastian Fiedler, Michael Gardner, Beaumie Kim, Vivian Liu, Bryan McLucas, Susan Paul, Jerry Slezak, Marcia Walker-Guy, Bethany White, and Hong Wu.
Here's to the next 10 years!
Monday, April 13, 2009
Global Perspectives in LDT
Ever since I worked at an international school in Caracas, Venezuela I have believed that immersion in another culture is an important experience for every human being on the planet. My old Spanish professors would talk about a fish not really knowing what "water" was until they ever found themselves out of water. We have very little understanding of our own culture until we leave it. Several years ago, I agreed to take a doctoral student from Brazil, Tel Amiel. Tel and I worked together to get a grant that would help students participate in an exchange between UGA and a university in Brazil. We wrapped this around the teacher education program, so LDT students did not directly participate in this project (except for Jo McClendon and Tel Amiel). So, after Tel graduated, we applied for another one of these FIPSE/CAPES grants and we were awarded another one. This time, our intent is to send our masters students to Brazil for two months in the summer (each student gets a $5000 package to participate in this exchange). We begin this exchange by receiving Brazilian students next spring and sending our students in the summer of 2010. We are hoping that we can help students form relationships during the spring exchange that will carry over to the summer exchange. All of these exchanges revolve around locally developed educational materials being redesigned for the "other" culture and in the "other" language. Of course, their students need to learn some English and our students will need to learn some Portuguese.
To get prepared for this exchange, I am testing this experience this summer in my EDIT 6600 class called, "Multicultural Perspectives on Technology." The course this summer will pair students from Veracruz, Mexico with UGA students and will focus on the redesign each others learning materials. We will meet this entire class online. We will make use of our audio online classroom (Wimba), our videoconferencing system, and any other technology tools we can think of to help develop relationships between UV students and UGA students. We will rely heavily on their English ability and a little on our Spanish abilities. I have ten of their students signed up and I hope I can match that number with at least 10 or our students.
So, if you are still here at UGA, please agree to participate in this class. If you have graduated, I would love to hear about how you have faced cultural issues in the educational materials you have designed and implemented. I would love to learn what you have already learned.
BTW, I have setup a wiki to manage what has been going on with us here at UGA as we grapple with learning, design, and technology as it relates to cultural dimensions. You are welcome to visit this wiki. It has some of our papers and it has some of the materials from various courses related to culture and education and technology.
http://projects.coe.uga.edu/mikeorey/
To get prepared for this exchange, I am testing this experience this summer in my EDIT 6600 class called, "Multicultural Perspectives on Technology." The course this summer will pair students from Veracruz, Mexico with UGA students and will focus on the redesign each others learning materials. We will meet this entire class online. We will make use of our audio online classroom (Wimba), our videoconferencing system, and any other technology tools we can think of to help develop relationships between UV students and UGA students. We will rely heavily on their English ability and a little on our Spanish abilities. I have ten of their students signed up and I hope I can match that number with at least 10 or our students.
So, if you are still here at UGA, please agree to participate in this class. If you have graduated, I would love to hear about how you have faced cultural issues in the educational materials you have designed and implemented. I would love to learn what you have already learned.
BTW, I have setup a wiki to manage what has been going on with us here at UGA as we grapple with learning, design, and technology as it relates to cultural dimensions. You are welcome to visit this wiki. It has some of our papers and it has some of the materials from various courses related to culture and education and technology.
http://projects.coe.uga.edu/mikeorey/
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Welcome to the Learning, Design, and Technology Blog
The purpose of this blog is to keep everyone who is interested in the Learning, Design, and Technology Program at the University of Georgia informed of what is going on here. Our goal is to post something that each of us here at UGA is working on or thinking about every month or so. Look for the first post soon!
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