The Power of Crowd and Place: A Conversation with Jeff Kirchick from SCVNGR Jeff Kirchick is the Universities and Schools Specialist for SCVNGR, a gaming platform about doing challenges at places. I first met Jeff at the CASE Social Media Conference in San Francisco where he was organizing a “trek” for the conference. It was the most fun I’d had participating in extra-curricular activities at a conference. What is SCVNGR? SCVNGR is a mobile game about going places, doing challenges, earning points, and unlocking rewards. SCVNGR exists in two major ways: as a casual game, and as a themed experience. You could also take part in a SCVNGR trek – some type of themed experience that guides you to a set of places where you have to complete specific challenges as part of the game. What makes SCVNGR different from other geo-location applications like Foursquare or Facebook Places? That being said, SCVNGR’s core unit is the challenge, not the check-in. How do you see SCVNGR impacting businesses? What are some of the cool things a business can do with SCVNGR?
Homework Hits the Small Screen at Purdue U. - Wired Campus More and more students carry cellphones or laptops with video cameras built in, and many instructors are asking students to use them to turn in video homework assignments for courses covering highly visual material. New software developed at Purdue University seeks to make such experimental assignments easier to manage. The system, called DoubleTake, lets students and professors shoot, share, and critique videos using a smartphone or a computer. “There’s no way possible to do a written assignment in American sign language,” says Kyle D. It’s also being used in a criminal forensics course, where students capture themselves processing evidence as they would in a crime lab and then assess the performances as though they were defense attorneys. Users upload raw video to the program, which connects with DiaGrid, a cluster of computers housed at Purdue. Mr. The program also provides a key measure of security compared with commercial programs. Return to Top
Green Ideas, Environmental Education and Activities for Secondary School Students How to Adopt a Social Media Lifestyle While most small business owners are starting to realize that social media is a necessary part of any marketing strategy, as a social media coach, the question I get most often is how to add social media to a day that is already way too full. For those of us working as solopreneurs or small business owners, it may, at times, feel like we are working virtually around the clock so when are we really supposed to tweet, post or blog? I’ll admit creating a social media plan that will stick is like starting an exercise program. You just have to take that leap and do it. You need to look at it, not as a series of social media tasks that need to be done during the day, but more of a lifestyle change that you need to incorporate into your entire way of thinking. 5 tips to make the social media lifestyle change Coffee and Twitter: For most of us, a morning cup of coffee is sacred. Connect: Authored by: Ali Goldfield See complete profile
5 Ways Higher Education Is Leveraging Mobile Tech Jeff Kirchick is Director of Universities at SCVNGR, the popular mobile game about going places, doing challenges and earning points. He presents regularly about the future of mobile and location-based services in education. You can follow Jeff on Twitter @JeffreyKirchick or e-mail him at jeff@scvngr.com. Mobile technology is on the minds of higher education professionals more than ever before. At the recent HighEdWeb conference in Austin, the itinerary included several ways schools can use social media, blogs and mobile technologies to better captivate its student body. And last week, hundreds of orientation professionals gathered in New Orleans for the National Orientation Directors Association annual conference, where they discussed how to engage with prospective students in modern and relevant ways — including mobile — to welcome the next freshman class. It’s no mystery why: The latest numbers show 40% of teens plan on buying an iPhone within the next three months. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Why the iPad Won't Transform Education -- Yet Apple's announcement on Thursday that it would be introducing a new iPad textbook experience and iBooks authoring tool presents huge opportunities for technology in classrooms. The company is selling textbooks from McGraw-Hill, Pearson and Houghton Mifflin at a price comparable to print versions, and it's presented an unprecedented opportunity for teachers to compile their own materials. But Apple has a long way to go — and logistical hurdles to clear in tens of thousands of schools — before it dominates K-12 classrooms the way it has done the music industry. Instructional Technology Resource Teacher Jenny Grabiec recently purchased iPads for two of the ESL classrooms in her 160-school district using federal funds allocated for students with limited English proficiency. In order to download new apps, she needed to get the Apple volume purchase program approved as a vendor by the budget group. "Because nobody in our district had done it before, it took a long time," Grabiec says.
Dangers of social groupthink: A case study in Enterprise 2.0, Social CRM and Social Business For sure, there’s a lot of Goodness in social media—in our personal lives and business. But also a lot of issues to be worked out. That’s why two years ago I established a Social Business category on CustomerThink, and last year launched SocialBusinessOne, a community dedicated to the topic. One of the downsides of social media is that it can accelerate getting locked into a point of view. This is counter intuitive, because you might expect that social media would make it easier to get multiple points of view. It can, but it depends on the group dynamics and the willingness of each of us as individuals to consider alternate ideas. Image Credit: philipcarter These days it’s all too easy to find and join a group that supports a certain mindset. Groupthink means members of a group try to avoid conflict and reach consensus without critical analysis. This is fine if your group is cheering for a sports team or maybe a political party. Trends in social thinking Dr. Source: Social Radar
4 Ways Mobile Tech Is Improving Education The Global Innovation Series is supported by BMW i, a new concept dedicated to providing mobility solutions for the urban environment. It delivers more than purpose-built electric vehicles — it delivers smart mobility services. Visit bmw-i.com or follow @BMWi on Twitter. Communication centers, computers, laptops, mobile phones and tablets have all been spoken about at one point or another as technologies with promising applications for education. But mobile phones stand apart in an important way. The United Nation’s International Telecommunication Union estimated that there were 5.3 billion mobile phone subscriptions worldwide at the end of 2010 — and that a full 90% of the world population now has access to a mobile network. Students around the world are increasingly bringing their own mini-computers (or some connected device) to class. 1. Abilene Christian University (ACU) began equipping its students with iPods and iPhones in 2008 (now students can also choose an iPad). 2. 3. 4.
The Social Workplace — Where collaboration and community mean productivity. Mobile learning: a handbook for ... - Agnes Kukulska-Hulme, John Traxler How to Write a Social Media Policy Why is having a social media policy in place so critical? Because virtually 100% of companies are now involved in social media—whether they acknowledge it or not. Even without any formal plan to use social media, every organization with more than a handful of employees (and many under that benchmark) is present in social media because people are talking about them. If no one else is discussing a company, its employees almost certainly are. Half of all Americans are now members of at least one social network, and that figure rises to 67% for 25- to 34-year olds. Those employees may be accessing social networks away from work and using them primarily for sharing pictures of their kids or planning their weekend activities, but workplace topics are all but certain to come up from time to time; how many people do you know who never talk about their company outside of the workplace? Essential Topics for an Organizational Social Media Policy Introduction and Definitions Social Media Objectives
Killer Apps: Distance Learning Students Dial in to Higher Education on Smartphones and Other Devices | DegreesOnline.net Distance learning universities are using the latest technology to supplement their curricula. Newsfactor.com reports that more and more online institutions have opted to create mobile apps to enrich their online course offerings. These apps allow student to access course content, including online discussions, threads, assignments, and they can receive real-time alerts when grades are posted. Students can pursue their studies wherever and whenever they want. The universities leading the pack in the latest distance-learning technology are Western Governors University, Golden Gate University, and the University of Phoenix, which launched an app last month for the iPhone and iPod Touch that allows its 300,000 online students to access online discussions, threads, and assignments. These tools will become increasingly important as the Digital Age wears on. But critics state that such technology encourages a lack of focus.
How to Help Students Use Social Media Effectively Today more than ever, people are capable of publishing their thoughts to a vast audience. Comments, tweets, and status updates are ubiquitous and constant. However, are we really focusing on the quality of the message we are putting out there? Are we really providing useful information or are we just adding to the noise? Simply giving students a blogger ID and a twitter username is not enough. Unless they are working to develop the skills necessary to effectively convey their message to a receptive audience, then the value of the message is diluted. Keep Standards High If we are going to enable our students to find and share their voice with the world, we need to equip them with a powerful skill that is timeless: writing effectively. Educators must model effective writing and editing as well. More Is Not Always Better The second frustrating element of social media is the perpetual sharing of watered-down guides e.g., "500 Tips for Google" or "100 Ways to Use YouTube in the Classroom."