DIT e-Learning Summer School Presentation #elss13

Below is my presentation at last week's Summer School in DIT. It is strange watching oneself after a talk like this. I was happy with how it went, and very much enjoyed presenting and chatting to people afterwards. It's an hour long, so you probably won't watch it all, but do watch out for the 1970 Brazilian football team and a description of installing a satellite dish at the beginning.

 

North Kerry #100corners

On my first day of summer holidays I revisited North Kerry a year after riding through that part of the Kingdom in very heavy rain. I was touring Kerry as part of my 100 Corners of Ireland trip and had completed some fantastic tours around the Dingle Peninsula, the Ring of Kerry, and the Sheep's Head Peninsula - all in good weather. But when I reached Fenit near Tralee, the heavens opened and I got soaked. In particular I remember looking up at the statue of St Brendan at the end of Fenit Harbour pier, and feeling pretty miserable with myself. The following is a description of this experience from my first draft of my book about my trip, which I have since deleted:

It's interesting how the anatomy of getting wet on a motorcycle works. It starts at the neck, where the water runs down from my helmet. I wear an open face helmet, but despite having a pull-down visor I was still getting a lot of rain being splashed on my face, and my visor was fogging up on the inside all the time. I constantly have to wipe both the inside and outside of the visor to see the road ahead. Inside my over-suit my shirt absorbs the water running down my face and neck, and makes my shoulders and upper body very wet. My leather gloves slowly absorb water and when they are saturated the water starts to flow inside my sleeves and up my arms despite the elastic grips at my wrists. Water slowly moves up my sleeves to meet the stream coming down from my shoulders. But the wettest part of my body was my middle and I did not understand how this could happen in a neck to ankle one piece suit. Later I was to discover that there were two small holes in the crotch of my suit, which despite their small size, seemed to be big enough to admit the Lakes of Killarney into a most uncomfortable area. This wetness spread upwards to meet the water moving down from my neck and shoulders, and downwards towards my knees. Water slowly moved down my legs to my knees, but at least my feet were still dry. I was like a sponge riding through North Kerry soaking up all the water from the road. This sucked, and I reached a low for the first time on this trip. Since I could not get any wetter, I rather foolishly and stubbornly decided to keep going. I slowed my speed down to 40 kph and even slower in places. I would pass many wonderful locations and interesting sites without stopping. I even skipped lunch. This wasn’t touring, instead I was saying to myself “I’m a motorcyclist, get me out of here!”

 

Below are some photos from a better day this year:

 

At Fenit with St Brendan, no rain today!

The view from Fenit Pier towards Mt Brandon on the Dingle Peninsula.

Inside the ruins of Ardfert Cathedral.

Tea, pie, and a history lesson from Ron Elston at the Glandore Gate bookshop and tea room in Ardfert.

At the Roger Casement memorial near Banna Beach.

I always took the coast road!

I bet Bill Clinton would rather be driving a Harley! (in Ballybunion).

At the wonderful Carrigafoyle Castle near Tarbert.



At the Tarbert-Killimer ferry.

Willkommen in der Deutschen #anglo

I'd like to welcome the almost 20,000 Germans who have viewed this blog over the past few days. Since Wednesday, the normal number of daily views of around 400-500 has shot up. Wednesday is also the day the Anglo Irish Bank tapes scandal broke, so I'm sure it is not a coincidence in that suddenly Germans found my blog interesting? The graph shows the sudden peak, but Google Analytics does not yet show what individual posts the Germans are viewing.

 

Below are the top ten page views by country, Germany almost never features in this list, and normally the US and Ireland are at the top. I do not blog about the feckin' banks, but I have mentioned former Taoiseach Brian Cowan in a few posts when remembering our school days in Roscrea - the first of these posts was Who's that beside Eugene O'Loughlin?

No matter - whatever you are reading, all Germans are welcome here!

 

(Blog post title translated from "Welcome to the Germans" using Google Translate)

How tough is it to spell things right?

I noticed in my email that the ad that runs across the top of the email list had a typo - clearly the advertiser does not know how to spell "receive". It's a common spelling mistake to write it as "recieve". I was taught in school the rule "i before e except after c" - while not universally true, it does help in remembering how to spell this word. Surely something as important as an advertisement would be worth checking for spelling? One quick way to turn off potential buyers is to get something simple like spelling wrong. My own attitude is - if you can't get this right, what else is wrong with your product or service?

Presenting at the DIT e-Learning Summer School #elss13 @YouTube #analytics

Today I had the pleasure of speaking to people attending the annual Summer School on e-Learning at DIT Aungier St. The topic for my talk was "Learning analytics and YouTube: What to watch and who to follow", and I shared my own experiences and learning analytics from my YouTube Channel. 

Getting ready.
Photo by @IClaudiad.

I discussed YouTube EDU and what I use my channel for. I also covered the motivation for using YouTube and how Google are making inroads into the managed on-line course space to challenge the likes of Coursera and Edx. I encouraged the audience to investigate some of the fantastic content (I used Prof Michael Sandel's super "Justice" course as an example).

I then moved on to the analytics provided by Google for my channel. I spent a good bit of time showing the cycles that views go through over the lifetime of the channel and talked a bit about audience retention. I then concentrated on the last 365 days showing weekly cycles and where the best and worst times of the year are for the number of views. I also showed a map of the world and the number of views from different countries. We had some discussion on the gender breakdown by country, the traffic sources, and the types of device that viewers are watching my videos from. The next set of analytics was about the demographics, and my audience were interested to find out that the highest proportion of viewers were middle aged American men! I also covered engagement reports (likes, dislikes, shares, etc) and briefly mentioned comments and the email traffic that I get from the channel. The last part of my talk was about Earnings - people were fascinated that such a simple channel can earn some money. I'm sure that many will be motivated to go down the same path.

@topgold getting ready for #elss13

After coffee I attended a talk on Reflective Audio Journaling by Bernie Goldbach (@topgold) of Limerick IT. As always, Bernie was very informative and entertaining. He showed the power of using audio with a simple tool called Audioboo and how it can capture the voices of students for reflective learning. He also demonstrated how easy Audioboo is to use and also how it can help people who are visually impaired. This was shown to us by Nadine who is visually impaired and made her first Boo on her iPhone only minutes after downloading it from the App Store. Bernie also played some examples of how other people use podcasting for capturing all sorts of sounds - these ranged from birds singing to a bus driver capturing kids' voices.

Now it works, now it doesn't #version=3

I've started to get more emails from comments on my YouTube channel about my How To... Embed a YouTube video into a PowerPoint 2013 Presentation. Suddenly the embed code I describe using is no longer working. Here's an example of embed code (from my own video):

Previously, you had to delete the twos instances of "version=3" highlighted about.  Then this stopped working.  Then thanks to on-line forums, I discovered that changing the "3" to a "2" worked. Today this no longer works. I don't see any change in the embed code that might cause this not to work. Microsoft can only display what works, so that leaves Adobe and Shockwave as likely culprits. Why do they do this?

If anyone has a fix for this, please let me know.

Thank You to 5,000 @Youtube subscribers!!!

Over the weekend, my YouTube Channel, Learn with Dr Eugene O'Loughlin, passed the 5,000 subscriber mark. Every day, YouTube sends me emails letting me know that a new user has subscribed to the channel - today so far there have been 10 new subscriptions. Thanks SOOOOOO much to all subscribers!!!

Image Source: YouTube downloads.

The first subscription was on 28th September, 2009 - people from all over the world are tuning in. Once again I am humbled and delighted that so many people find my videos useful and want to learn more. I had hoped to be able to create some new videos over the supposedly quiet period after the exams at NCI, but a persistent cough and itchy throat that I've only now started to get over after three weeks put paid to that. 

YouTube currently seem to be making a lot of changes to their education services. Today I note new categories to YouTube EDU for Social Sciences, History, Humanities, Law, Education, Arts, and Medicine. Clearly YouTube are making a big play for the education space, especially the MOOCs domain. More and more people are now using YouTube as a platform of choice for running courses. Coursera and Edx watch out!

A new T-shirt, and a tribute to Pink Floyd

Last October I re-named this blog from the rather boring title of "Eugene's Blog" to the much cooler "Careful With That Axe, Eugene" after the song of the same title by Pink Floyd. Eight months later I love using this title - so far, Pink Floyd's lawyers have not been in contact with me! 

When I came across the really cool Redbubble website, I spotted that they had a CWTAE t-shirt by the artist  ssan, so I couldn't resist ordering it. While I feel a little egotistic doing this, I still like the t-shirt. I forced my daughter Vicki to take a photo of me with my trusty axe.

I haven't got the dreaded letter from customs yet to tell me I owe someone money for buying from America - it will be interesting to see what they charge for a t-shirt that cost $21. Redbubble don't like this either, and even  ask for a picture of the paid receipt to send to them. Not sure what they will do with it, but I might join in when I get the payment demand from Customs.

Master These 15 Simple Skills - via @DaveKerpen

Dave Kerpen offers advice to recent graduates to master 15 simple skills - I can't resist quoting French President Georges Clemenceau who is reputed to have said "Le bon Dieu n'avait que dix!" (The good Lord only had ten!) in response to US President Woodrow Wilson's 14-point plan in 1918. Kerpen's full article is on Linkedin here, and I've embedded his Slideshare presentation below.

Kerpen's "15 simple skills" are as follows:

1. Pursue your passions
2. Learn how to use the phone to talk
3. Value every minute
4. Be afraid, then take risks anyway
5. Take care of yourself
6. Work on your listening skills
7. Reinvent yourself
8. Read
9. Write
10. Avoid sensational TV news
11. Vote
12. Love. Hard
13. Form a personal board of advisors
14. Show your friendship first
15. Be honest and transparent.

I won't repeat here what Kerpen has written, all his points are worth reading and I feel are excellent advice for new graduates. Many are life skills, but all can be applied to developing a career. In 1983 when I graduated from Trinity with a BA degree I had no real idea of what I wanted to do, I wish I had got advice like this. My favourite ones from the list above are "Pursue your passions" and " Write". Like Kerpen, I have found that when you pursue your passions, "things tend to work out". In advocating that people should write, he doesn't mean you have to become a published author, but doing something like blogging "sharpens your thinking skills, and you'll be taken more seriously at any job".

Class of 2013: Master These 15 Simple Skills from Dave Kerpen

QuinnSpeak - "the ‘seduction’ of technology in education"

The Minister for Education, in a speech at a conference in Dublin Castle, warns us all against the dangers of providing the latest hardware to schools. He tells us that putting your "educational taxpayers’ money on short-term hardware is not the road to go" and that we are “in the midst of a new electronic Gutenberg moment". In his school-master voice he preaches that we have to "separate very clearly the difference between the seduction of modern technology which is a phenomenon of short duration and the necessity of European education which goes right back to the Acropolis and Socrates". Quite a strong message from someone who claims to be a modern reforming minister!

Minister for Education, Ruari Quinn,
needs to come out of the dark ages?
Image source: ruariquinn.ie

All of this is QuinnSpeak for "we are not buying iPads for schools"! I am puzzled as to why he has an objection to "short-term hardware". Isn't all hardware "short-term"? How many years can you get out of a computer? 3-4 max in a school environment I'd say. In mentioning the Acropolis and Socrates he is showing his true colours - does he think that we can teach and learn without any technology more advanced than chalk and blackboard?

There are hundreds and thousands of people working in the education sector at all levels in Ireland, many of whom are pushing the boundaries of what is possible in education on their own initiative using whatever technology is available. We are not stupid - we know that money is tight and that budgets for technology are going to be squeezed. Minister Quinn uses the word "seduction" - I agree, technology is seductive, but so is anything that enhances the learning and teaching experience. "Seduction" implies tempting, luring, or leading people astray - I do not think this is what technology in education does, sorry to disagree Minister!

(Quotes above taken from on-line edition of The Irish Times article "Quinn warns against ‘seduction’ of technology in education" by Judith Crosbie).

Father's Day

Thanks to Kate and Vicki.
baking goddesses!

Today is Father's Day and my daughter's treated me to a brilliant breakfast of French toast, bacon, and delicious real Canadian maple syrup. Best of all though is the fantastic cake that they baked last evening (when I was barred from the kitchen) which features The Beatles, who always were and always will be my favourite band. It will be a pity to cut this cake up, or to decide which Beatle to eat first, but afternoon tea today will have a distinct Fab Four flavour (I'm listening to Abbey Road as I write this post). 

My Dad Joe in the mid 1950s,
before he became a dad.

I called my own Dad (Joe) this morning to wish him a Happy Father's Day. At 82 years of age he is in great form and looking forward to visiting his niece for Sunday lunch. I noticed people on Twitter fondly remembering their own Dads who have passed away. When I see this I always thank the good Lord that I still have my own Dad to talk to. Long life and health to you Dad!

I also remember today the other "Fathers" in my life: my Grandfathers PJ O'Loughlin and Paddy Byrne. Both died when I was young and though I have a few fond memories of each, I hardly knew them. I also remember my Father-in-Law Billy Bourke, a kind man who I did know well for all too short a time.

To Father's everywhere - enjoy the day!

How To... Create and Edit a Basic Table of Contents in Word 2010

Recently a student came to me close to the deadline for submission for an assignment. He was very worried that he would not be able to make his submission before the 5 o'clock deadline and was worried about incurring a late submission penalty. The reason his assignment was not ready was that he could not create a Table of Contents (TOC), and he wanted me to show him how. I felt strongly that this was something that he could figure out for himself and that it was not my role to do this, even though I knew how easy it was to create a TOC. However, in the face of desperation I relented, and took less than five minutes to show him how to create a TOC for his assignment - which he did successfully.

The key to creating a TOC in Microsoft Word is knowing about Headings in the Styles Gallery. Once you've worked out how many and where you want the headings, Word does the rest and creates the TOC for you. Once created it is easy to modify, eg if you add a new heading, or change/delete an old one. Naturally I decided to make a video for my YouTube Channel to show how it is done, and here it is:

Feeling just a little safer on the road thanks to Pope Francis I @Pontifex, @harleydavidson

Here's a story, courtesy of the Irish Independent, that I like: 'Hell's Angel' motorbikes get papal blessing! Never mind the stereotyped headline reference to Hell's Angels - Pope Francis I "performed a "Blessing of the Motorbikes" for hundreds of Harley-Davidson owners who gathered at St Peter's Square to celebrate the 110th anniversary of the brand". I sure would have liked to have been one of the lucky bikers to get such a blessing from the main man himself. The Harley-Davidson Motor Company also presented the Pope with a leather jacket and two new bikes - no doubt he'll give these to charities. A superb job done by whoever in Harley-Davidson's Marketing Department arranged this event!

Pope Francis I is shown a leather jacket from Harley-Davidson Motor Company
Senior VP Mark Hans-Richer, at the Vatican.
Image source: Huffington Post.

The Harley-Davidson Motor Company likes anniversaries - my own bike, a Heritage Softail Classic (FLSTC) is a 100th anniversary model. This year they have special 110th anniversary models and five years ago they had 105th anniversary models. Does anyone else do this? They are milking anniversaries for every sale. I would not swap my 100th anniversary model for anything - 100 years is special, 105 and 110 are not. Maybe 125 years is OK?

'Why Believing "Nothing to Hide" Leaves You Vulnerable' by danah boyd (@zephoria)

Recent news of what the National Security Agency (NSA) in America is up to is brought under the microscope by Danah Boyd who is a senior researcher at Microsoft. Her post on Linkedin Why Believing "Nothing to Hide" Leaves You Vulnerable really questions the balance between the right to privacy and national security.

We've long accepted the principle of Innocent-Until-Proven-Guilty, but this is changing with the advent of Big Data and Government's use of such data. Most people would favour a Government mining through suspected terrorists' email and on-line communications to foil a bomb plot or an assassination. In fact, when these things do occur, many in the media ask why was more not done to prevent such things happening?

But where do law-abiding citizens fit in, or as Boyd says if you "feel immune from state surveillance because they've done nothing wrong"? Like her, I count myself as a law-abiding citizen. But she writes "proving oneself to be innocent takes time, money, effort, and emotional grit". Earlier this year I posted about my experience with the Educational Building Society where I asked the question I am not a money launderer or a terrorist - why do I have to prove this to the EBS? Recently when my youngest daughter turned 18, her passport was not sufficient proof of her identity to get an Age Card - she needed TWO forms of identity!

Big Brother is watching you!
Image source: Mr. Geib.

Big Data can give us all many things that were not possible in the past, including increased security and protection from harm - after all, a Government's first duty is to protect its citizens. Boyd writes about how "data is used by our current government. It's used to create suspicion, not to confirm innocence". If we lived by the Utilitarian Principle that "the greatest possible good for the greatest possible number of individuals" should be applied, then we have to accept Big Brother watching over us. Others will value individual privacy over all else - kind of like Immanuel Kant’s Categorical Imperative: "If an action is not right for everyone to take, it is not right for anyone".

In her post, Boyd further explores our perceptions of other people, especially when we "generate suspicion of others who aren't like us". Doubt can be created because people are different. None of us will want our own privacy to be invaded, but many are OK if the privacy of others such as gangsters, terrorists, drug dealers, and perverts is invaded. However, we can't accept a society where "Spy on someone else" becomes the norm. Boyd carefully asks: "Is your perception of your safety worth the marginalization of other people who don't have your privilege?". This is a difficult question to answer.

We may get used to it - we are being monitored almost every minute of every day and generating vast amounts of data. Nobody is collecting this to stick it on a hard drive somewhere and then ignore it forever.

Chris Hoadley's 3 laws of Education Technology @tophe

Professor Chris Hoadley of New York University sets out three simple laws of education technology (as reported today by Jeff Dunn in edudemic)...

• Law #1: It’s not the technology. It’s what you do with it
• Law #2: It’s not what the technology makes possible. It’s what technology makes easy
• Law #3: Pay attention to the trends in learning, not in technology.

...which is basically saying that it is not about the technology. Dunn writes about technology that if "you’re not learning, growing, or enhancing your life, then put that tech down and move on!". In the presentation below (code embedded from edudemic), Hoadley compares the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of hardware and software in business as being accepted at about 25% with education. The rest is all intangible assets such as human capital, and training. The same applies in schools according to Hoadley, implying that technology is still just a small part of the TCO of education. He also takes a look at "Societal Changes" and their meaning for education. The slideshow is 17 minutes long, but it is worth listening to what Professor Hoadley has to say:

Educational Media & Technology in 2013: What’s Next?
 from nycmedialab

Summer in Dublin

Irish people are experts at weather - we know the four seasons: Autumn, Winter, Spring, and a Sunday! Today (an actual Sunday) was one of the few glorious weather days in Dublin over the past few years, and Roma and I decided we needed a walk by the sea. The radio news warned us about heavy traffic in Dún Laoghaire, so we decided to walk along the South Wall in Dublin Port.

Dublin in summer is lovely, just like every other city in the world. The difference for us is that we rarely get good weather combined with a weekend. The South Wall was full of people out for a walk, and there were plenty of fishermen trying their luck - but we saw no fish.

On our way back we witnessed a Stena Line Dublin-Holyhead ferry entering Dublin Port. There is a curious effect when this ship, and I'm many others of similar size, enter the port. The ship slowly travels between the North and South Walls, but a Tsunami-like effect can be witnessed as the ship passes by. I shot the video below with my iPhone today to show what I mean. The effect of the waves washing up at the pier gives an idea on how a tsunami like wave can be generated in a very small space of time - very powerful.

Ireland down the Mighty Faroes with #Keano magic

Last evening I went to see the Ireland vs Faroe Islands World Cup qualifier match. Normally this would not be an attractive fixture to attend, 'cos the Faroe's are shite at football. But I thought it would be nice to see Ireland win a match for a change. A fine evening got off to a good start with a goal in 5 minutes by Robbie Keane (in his 126th game for Ireland) - Wes Hoolahan, who was pulling the strings all evening at midfield, set up the goal. Hoolahan and Keane were the stand out players for Ireland in a game where they never really had to get out of 2nd gear to win against a poor Faroe side. Best performance for the Faroes was by a fan behind me who kept shooting "Fi Yar" every time they got the ball - I'm a sure it is Danish for Faroe Islands. This won't be enough to get Ireland to Brazil for the World Cup finals next year, but nevertheless it was enjoyable to see a win.

I have been attending Ireland matches for over 30 years, and this is the first time I had seen an Irish player score a hat-trick. Robbie Keane is a once-in-a-lifetime experience for Irish football fans - it may be many generations before we see his record of 59 goals for Ireland bettered by another Irish player. Only the legendary Ferenc Puskás and Sándor Kocsis of Hungary, and Gerd Müller and Miroslav Klose of Germany have scored more international goals for a European country than Keano. And he is still playing! Magic!

Robbie Keane (#10) celebrates a hat-trick!

Why a simple experiment like "The Pitch Drop Experiment" is important today

The School of Mathematics and Physics in the University of Queensland has been running an experiment since 1927 that shows that some materials behave differently from what we expect. The Pitch drop Experiment was set up by Professor Thomas Parnell to show that what appears to be a solid, pitch, is actually a liquid at room temperature. In 1927 Professor Parnell heated a sample of pitch and poured it into a glass funnel with a sealed stem. Three years were allowed for the pitch to settle, and in 1930 the sealed stem was cut. From that date on the pitch has slowly dripped out of the funnel - so slowly that now, 83 years later, the ninth drop is only just fully formed (University of Queensland, 2013). 

No one has seen any of the previous eight drops fall, so there is a webcam on the experiment to capture the next imminent fall of a drop of pitch. Pitch shatters into small pieces if you hit a  block of it with a hammer. Nevertheless, it is a liquid but is about 100,000,000,000,000 times more viscous than water! Check out the video below with the current custodian of the Pitch Drop Experiment, Professor John Mainstone:

So - why do I think this is important today?

Science disciplines of every branch, including computer science, need to attract more young people to study. To want to study science, you need to have a curious mind, and experiments like the Pitch Drop are just what is needed to instill curiosity into young minds. Hopefully they can look at this and ask: Why is this experiment running so long? Why does pitch work like this? What is going on here? Who set this up? Will I see the drop fall?

So many questions, the foundation of curiosity, can be asked, which will make the curious mind want more. Thanks to technology, anyone in the world can view and find out about experiments like this - we need more iconic experiments to keep up the interest, and curiosity.

Course Builder for @YouTube - Google Steps Up Educational Offerings

At the recent EdTech 2013 Conference in UCC, one of the keynote speakers Ross Mahon (@roscomahon) of Google, told us about Course Builder which is still at the experimental stage, but the tool is available (here) for early adopters.

According to the Course Builder website, it "contains software and instructions for presenting your course material, which can include lessons, student activities, and assessments. It also contains instructions for using other Google products to create a course community and to evaluate the effectiveness of your course. Some basic technical skills with HTML, Python, and JavaScript are recommended to get started.

Course Builder is Google's attempt to provide a platform for building on-line courses "whether they're for 10 students or 100,000 students" ranging from full University courses to short "How To..." videos. They are a little late into this space following the success of Udemy, Udacity, Coursera, and EdX. But I've no doubt that Google will make a success of this mainly because of all the content that they already have on YouTube EDU. Check out the video below from Peter Norvig, Director of Research at Google, who introduces Course Builder: 

The Gathering of Irish Learning Technologists at #EdTech13, Day 2

The second day of the EdTech 2013 Conference started out with a keynote presentation from Kyle Peck of Penn State University. I hadn't heard him speak before and he talked about "opening up education". He gave us some very interesting comments on badges, which he said "equals currency for future employers", and told us that we may end up giving "away learning experience and charging for assessment" with the advent of MOOCs and badges. He also made the prediction that, what he called "nomads", would be wandering the educational landscape for learning opportunities, and in the process become "knowmads".

My next three sessions were breakouts: I saw some brilliant work my Seán Ó Grádaigh from NUIG about using iBooks for teaching, and some honest and interesting feedback from Aidan O'Donovan of UCC about a project to add lecture capture tools to each classroom in UCC. This was a lesson in perseverance! The final breakout was a really interesting talk from Robert Griffin of IADT about open data - there's so much about open data that I did not know, but I am much better informed now.

There were two more keynote presentations - the first by Ross Mahon from Google, brought us through Google's thinking about enabling education. Ross summarized Google Apps for education and told us a bit about "Course Builder", though not quite fully ready will allow us to create courses in Google. This is intended to be a platform for MOOCs from Google. Eoin O'Dell from Trinity finished the day off nicely with a discussion on copyright. He brought us through copyright law, and managed to keep it very interesting with reference to St Columcille and bull's heads.

"#edtech13" report from TweetBinder.

I used Twitter a lot during the conference. I hadn't really planned to, but I found it a great way to take notes - I referred back to them by searching for the conference hashtag "#edtech13" for writing this and the previous post. According to TweetBinder, there were 1,029 tweets during the conference using the #edtech13 hashtag, with contributions from 189 Twitter users - that's more than were at the conference. With 51 tweets, I came out on top in the "Most Original Tweets Generated" category, while I was also the third "Most Active User" (data from TweetBinder, see screen shot to left for more). I probably would have tweeted a bit more, but my iPad was running very low on power preventing me from doing so. I like this type of "back chat" - in addition to a great way to take notes, it also lets you see what others were thinking during the presentations (including ones I missed).

This was a great EdTech conference, and many congrats to the organisers for putting on such a memorable event. Until next year!

The Gathering of Irish Learning Technologists at #EdTech13, Day 1

University College Cork was the venue for this year's  two-day EdTech Conference hosted by the Irish Learning Technology Association. This is the annual meeting of folks involved in learning and teaching who are passionate about using technology of all sorts to enhance education.

The organizers of EdTech 2013 kindly fixed for fine weather and I had a glorious blue sky all the way from Dublin to Cork on my Harley-Davidson. I arrived late for the fist keynote by Catherine Cronin of NUI Galway, but I still heard her talk about open education and student voices (I also discovered later in the conference that Catherine is a 1959 baby-boomer like me!). Later, ILTA Chairman Paul Gormley gave us some interesting preliminary results from the 2013 Technology-Enhanced Learning Survey. One of the most interesting was the result that "44 students" out of 5,500 surveyed don't use Facebook.

Presenting at EdTech 2013 (and looking worried).
Photo courtesy of  Tomás Tyner of UCC.

I was presenting during the first of the breakout sessions - the title of my talk was "Anatomy of Two and a Half Million YouTube Learners: Who's Watching and What are they Learning". I got a good crowd who were interested in the learning analytics from my YouTube channel. With hindsight I tried to show too much in the 15 minutes available and I was very rushed. I judged that I could run through the analytics live from YouTube, but I would have been better off taking a small selection of data and presenting that instead of trying to squeeze in too much.

Next up was a talk about a blended learning pathway for the credit unions run by Bridget Carroll and Olive McCarthy of UCC. This was a real blend of everything - they even produced a manual that they use! The last talk in this session was by Enda Donnellan of Mater Dei Institute of Education. I had never met Enda, but feel as if I know as I follow him (@donenda) on Twitter - it was nice to meet face-to-face. He told us about a very successful tool, called METIS, for managing student teachers at Mater Dei. The nature of breakout sessions where there were four parallel talks is that you miss everything in the other sessions. There were talks on MOOCs, Moodle, Digital Literacies, and using tablet computers that I would have liked to have attended.

After lunch I attended two more very interesting talks. The first was from Dan Coakley and Martin Howley who gave us the story of using a building for learning, ie the new engineering block in NUIG. They found that Thermodynamics and Heating was the toughest module for engineering students, so they use a Predicted Mean Vote method among students to answer the question "How comfortable is a space?". This was followed by my colleague from NCI, Leo Casey, who entertained and informed us about the diffusion of innovations, and how this can help us understand how and why innovations in education are so important.

The afternoon keynote was presented by Sian Bayne of the University of Edinburgh - she gave us the low-down on MOOCs she and her colleagues developed via Coursera. 309,628 students registered for the  MOOC, a respectful 29% "completed". Great presentation which included some samples of videos created by students of the MOOC. The day ended with the Jennifer Burke Award for Innovation in Learning and Teaching. I was a finalist in this competition two years ago, so I know how nervous the finalists this year must have felt. 

In the evening we adjourned to the Shelbourne Bar in MacCurtain Street for a nice pint, followed by dinner in Greene's Restaurant across the road. Great as always to meet both the familiar faces and some new folks too. An excellent meal and excellent conversation to round off a great day of learning.

I stayed in Jury's Inn, very comfortable and convenient. Just a mention to say thanks for letting me park my bike safely in the small hotel car park.

4th Year Project Showcase at the National College of Ireland (@NCIRL)

Today at the College we hosted a Showcase for the School of Computing 4th year students. For them it was their last event in the College as undergraduates. There were over 100 projects on show, and there were also over 30 representatives from industry - many who were looking to recruit. It was a very busy two hours where we heard keynote speaker Patrick McLaughlin of Oracle congratulate the students. He also told them it was a great time for IT students to be graduating, and also that they should continue to learn. He also mentioned that it was a good idea to move around different companies to get more experience!

We had some fantastic research projects, mobile apps, web sites, applications, and games on view. Our students can be very proud of their achievements - we are very proud of them at the College. While some have already secured employment, many are now setting out on the job hunting road - I wish them all the best of luck!

What would you give up to be 18 again?

Last week my youngest daughter Vicki had her Graduation from Loreto College Foxrock, along with about 90 of her 18-year old classmates. We were invited to the ceremony which was a Mass followed by speeches and a Reception. The girls sang beautifully and the two Head Girls spoke very eloquently and entertainingly. The school hall was full of very proud parents, including Roma and me.

Coincidentally I read an article on Linkedin by T. Boone Pickens entitled Class of 2013: Here's What I'd Give Up to be You. In the article Pickens recalls a speech he made at a graduation ceremony where he offered everything, including his "Gulfstream airplane" and his "68,000-acre ranch" just to be sitting where the graduates sat. But, there was a catch - he said "If you make the trade, you have to be 79 and I get to be 18 again". Of course he got no takers as all the students "decided that no amount of wealth could persuade them to change places with a man about to turn 80". This got me thinking what I would give up to be an 18 year old again. Of course I'd give up all material things (even my Harley-Davidson!), but not family - we can't turn the clock back.

It is a wonderful thought - being 18 again. In the video below dating from 1980, George Burns (then aged 84) sings "I Wish I Was 18 Again". Jeez - I'm turning into an old man nostalgic for my younger days!

Experimenting with backgrounds

For a change I'm trying out some new backgrounds on this blog. I like the new one you see here - it is called "hdoddema" and is taken from the Textures category of the templates available in Blogger and it is one of the few I like that are available. Most others are boring and many have the business part of the graphic in the middle where it cannot be seen 'cos this is where the blog posts go. I've also tried to upload some of my own photographs to use - but there is a file size limit of 300KB in Blogger. Ideas for the future are pictures of my Harley-Davidson, seascapes from my tour of Ireland last year, and maybe an axe.

I miss blogging!

A break from blogging is probably good for everyone who blogs. It's nine days since I last posted and it is a few years now since I had such a long break. At the beginning of 2010 I started blogging on a much more regular basis going from an average of around 10 posts per month to closer to 20.

The past week is normally the busiest one of the year for me at NCI. Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday were taken up with project marking, while Thursday and Friday were taken up with teaching. Very full days that have left me very tired with little time for blogging. Project making is particularly hard as they are final year undergraduate projects worth a high proportion of marks - so much depends on the project for the students' final grade.

I've also got some feedback on my 100 Corners of Ireland book which now needs to be drastically reduced in size - or no one will publish it. So I've been trying to figure out what's best to do - hopefully I will be meeting a publisher in the few 2-3 weeks (finger's crossed!).

Image source: Illuminated Living.

The "Pass By Compensation" rule

The University Observer reports today that UCD is to abolish the pass by compensation rule. This is the rule common in most colleges (including NCI) where you may pass if your grade is between 35% and 39%, and where you have enough marks in other subjects to "compensate" - it's a kind of "Get-out-of-jail-free" card. There's always a limit in the number of subjects you can PBC, and if you get less than 35% in any subject the PBC rule cannot be applied. Where UCD go, other Colleges will be certain to follow. 

Image Source: MemeCreator.org.

As someone who has benefited in the past from the PBC rule, I'm not totally in favour of abolishing this option. In 1979 against all odds I somehow manage to pass my 1st year exams in Trinity. I had an F1 grade (35-39) in Chemistry and under the PBC rule I was allowed to progress to 2nd year. Of course I had no idea at the time what it was or how it applied, and to be frank I didn't really care as I was through to the next year. I was just relieved that I had escaped failing the year and having to drop out or repeat. 

The rule is always a source of confusion to students as I get queries on this after every set of exams. Due to rounding, a student with a low mark of 34.5% could pass the year under PBC, and many academics think that this should not be allowed. In my own experience, anyone receiving a mark in the PBC range has done a bad job in their assessments. My professional opinion on a paper with this grade is that it is a "fail". If it is only one subject, I am in favour of the PBC rule being retained, but I have on rare occasions seen students pass two or more modules by PBC.

The reality is that the PBC rule really only applies to a grade of 35%, 36%, or 37%. I know one College where 39% is automatically rounded up - I would never leave a student on this mark. In another College a grade of 38% is not automatically rounded up, but a rule applies where it is considered by the Exam Board. This is one of those areas where I wish there was consistency between all third-level colleges - the same rule should apply to all students.

My Favourite Teachers - thank you Mrs Keating, Mr Hallahan, Mr Ó Riordáin, Mr Shanahan, Mr O'Loughlin, and Dr Jeal #thankateacher

Last week I wrote about Can Teachers Touch Students' Hearts? and listed some of the teachers who inspired me during my own education. Today I watched this short video about President Obama who talks about his fifth grade teacher Mrs Hefty who taught him that he "had something to say"...

...and I wondered what I would say about my teachers?

I attended two primary schools: Carnew National School in Co Wicklow, and Scoil na nÓg in Trabolgan, Co Cork. In Carnew my first teacher was Mary Keating. I don't remember very much about her Junior Infants class, but I do have one memory that I carry with me to this day. She was the first, and last, teacher to hit me in class. I don't remember her being cruel, but she did use a ruler as corporal punishment. When once I was slapped it was for not knowing the answer to a question. I figured out very quickly that if I learned my lessons, did my homework, and was able to answer questions - I would not be slapped! Perhaps this is one of the most important influences I have ever had during my school years. But my favourite teacher in Carnew was Seán Hallahan who was my teacher in 4th class (1969/1970). He was funny, passionate, caring, and tough. He had a brilliant way of making things simple and stating the obvious. He often asked "What is white wash?" to which his answer was always "a wash that's white" - I use this a lot in my own classes to this day. In Scoil na nÓg my teacher was Tomás Ó Riordáin - a tough, but fair teacher. I learned a lot from him, especially Irish and History. He was the only teacher I ever had that made Irish an interesting subject.

I also attended two secondary schools: Cistercian College Roscrea in Co Tipperary, and FCJ Bunclody in Co Wexford. In Roscrea, John Shanahan was my stand-out teacher. In teaching French, he spent almost the entire first year concentrating on the spoken, rather than written French word. He was also my introduction to technology in education - I posted about this last September. He was my French teacher for five years and I enjoyed his classes very much, though I now have very limited French due to lack of practice. In FCJ Bunclody, Tony O'Loughlin (no relation) was both my English and Geography teacher. He had much more of a focus on exams and getting the subjects done than my teachers in Roscrea had. He made you want to work hard, learn, and do well. It also helped that there were only a handful of lads in a mostly girls class, and I think he had a tougher focus on us.

In Trinity, I had many lecturers who I would rather forget. For example, one Physics lecturer used to come into class, and transcribe his notes onto an overhead projector for us to copy down. I don't think he ever looked up from the OHP, and certainly never engaged us. He was clearly bored with teaching, and he made no effort to hide it. But the standout lecturer for me in Trinity was Dr Frank Jeal. It was he who gave me an interest in Zoology (especially paleontology and marine biology). He regularly delivered lectures with no notes, and he had a knack of telling interesting stories about long dead dinosaurs. He was also very approachable and accessible, and to me, was one of the few Trinity lecturers that had an interest in what students had to say.

So to my favourite teachers - a big THANK YOU!

The Lion King at The Bord Gáis Theatre - Brilliant!

Yesterday afternoon I saw the Lion King on stage for the first time. I had seen the movie when the girls were small and I'm sure that we still have the video somewhere. Lots of the songs are familiar to me, but despite this the stag show was breathtakingly refreshing and original. One of the best shows I have ever seen - no exaggeration! The singing and dancing were fantastic and I can't think of anything (other than noisy kids in the audience) to fault the show. Don't miss it!

Can Teachers Touch Students' Hearts?

A YouTube video that made the news this week shows High School student, 18-year old Jeff Bliss from Duncanville in Texas, unloading on his teacher in a world history class. He castigates her for not making students "excited" about their class and that she should "touch his freaking heart". He lectures his teacher to "take this job serious" and clearly has a problem with her "packets" as a way of teaching. Of course, here we only get one side of the story, but this student makes some very valid points that all educators should sit up and take notice of. Check it out:

In a later interview, Jeff Bliss said he had no regrets about what he had said on the video. He said that teachers should "interact, get involved, discuss, talk, question" in class. Teaching is a tough job and it is not always an easy one to do. Most are passionate about their work, but just like everybody else, there are good days and bad days. I would even go so far as to say that it is almost impossible to make students excited about all subjects, all of the time. This inevitably means that students will not be excited some of the time. 

I think back to my own education and to the teachers who made me excited about learning: Seán Hallahan and Tomás Ó Riordáin in primary school, John Shanahan, Fr Patrick, and Tony O'Loughlin (no relation) in secondary school, and Dr Frank Jeal in Trinity. They all had one thing in common for me - passion about what they did. This passion translates across the classroom floor into enthusiasm and excitement for students. In the video above the teacher is sitting in a corner behind a desk - not good, she immediately placed a barrier between herself and her students (of course we don't know the full story yet, apparently the video was taken as Bliss was being thrown out of the class - we don't know what for either). However, even if a teacher is passionate about their subject, not all students are going to be excited at the same time. At the other extreme, we cannot make our content boring by disengaging with un-excited students. Where the balance is, that is the question!

Two and a Half Million Learners - Thank You!

This morning when I checked in on-line I noted that my Learn with Dr Eugene O'Loughlin YouTube channel had passed the 2,500,000 viewers landmark. A huge THANK YOU to every single one of those folks who have checked out my videos. As I have written many times before on this blog - I am delighted and humbled that so many people are finding my modest efforts useful.

What started out as an experiment with an e-Learning class has turned into something that is starting to dominate my own learning and teaching experiences. Everyday I check the analytics for the channel to see who is learning what - it's addictive. I often look out for new ideas to create videos, and keep saying to myself "I must do more". I teach far more people via YouTube than I do in the classroom - at a wild guess I'd say at least 1,000 times more in the last 11 years since I left SmartForce (Skillsoft) and joined the National College of Ireland. Some of my own students use the channel, but 99% plus are from outside my classes. 

It's hard to write about this and not sound like I am slapping myself on the back and saying "Ah sure aren't you great!". But I've given up been falsely modest a long time ago. I am proud of each and every one of my students both inside and outside the classroom. After a lifetime in education I feel I might finally be getting something right. If I can help students in any way, however small - I will.

10 Essential Digital Skills for Graduates via @mashable

It's close to the end of Semester II and the time of year when final year students are approaching their last days as undergraduates. In addition to the uncertainty and adventure ahead, there is also some value in looking back and seeing what students have learned during their time in College and can these skills and knowledge help get a job. One thing that students should certainly have nowadays are some digital skills.

Matt Petronzio, writing for Mashable, says Don't Leave College Without These 10 Digital Skills. They are:

1. Setting Up a Wi-Fi Network
2. Backing Up to the Cloud
3. Basic Photo Editing (Photoshop)
4. Basic Video Editing (Final Cut Pro)
5. Google Drive and Microsoft Office (Seriously)
6. HTML and Basic Coding
7. Setting Up a Website and Domain
8. Converting File Formats
9. Online Banking
10. Branding Yourself

Source: Mashable

I certainly had none of these when graduating in 1983, but then that's no surprise as most had not been invented yet! One thing that strikes me about above is that these skills are now developing into everyday skills for people to be able to manage their digital lives, not just skills that you learn in College. I see teenagers in secondary school who are able to do much of above as technology gets smarter and easier to use. I should add that it is hard to expect students to know all these skills without Colleges providing the facilities to learn them. Should they be part of all courses? A Digital Skills module based on above ten points would be an ideal general module for all students to take - that way they will not leave College without these skills.

The good news from Petronzio is that these skills are "guaranteed to increase your overall digital know-how, and you can learn them all on your own". So if you are graduating soon, and do not have these skills - it's time to start learning.

How To... Embed a YouTube Video into a PowerPoint 2013 Presentation (and dealing with the "version=3" problem)

Two of the most popular videos on the Learn with Dr Eugene O'Loughlin YouTube Channel are about embedding YouTube videos into PowerPoint 2003 and 2010. My most recent addition today is about doing the same for PowerPoint 2013. The procedure is straight-forward enough - all you have to do is find the embed code for the video you want from YouTube and use the tools in PowerPoint to insert the video.

Normally you do not need to do anything to the embed code, but recently, YouTube have added "version=3" for a new Player that causes problems in PowerPoint (no problems embedding anywhere else such as web pages). You now need to delete the references to "version=3" in order for it to work with the current version of PowerPoint. The image below shows the code with "version=3" highlighted - just delete this taking care not to remove any other symbols or characters beside it, and do the same for "version=3" in the third last line below. Some day Microsoft will provide an update to allow this to work, but for now it doesn't unless you take it out.

The video is made at home as the College has not yet updated to Office 365 - so the sound quality is not quite as good as it would be using better equipment in the office. I plan to redo more of the videos that have been successful for Office 2003 and 2010 tools, in the past this has been a good way to build viewing numbers. So here's my latest effort:

Adults Only in Our House!

Today I feel just a little bit older, the youngest of my three daughters Vicki, is 18 years of age. It's adults only from now on. Tomorrow Vicki is off to get an Age Card from the Garda station - just think she can now vote, buy Lotto tickets, buy alcohol, and ignore her old Dad if she chooses!

It was 1977 when I reached 18 years of age, and the world was a far different place. I too was about to sit my Leaving Certificate at a time when a "good Leaving" could get you a job. Very few people could have predicted things like the arrival of the World Wide Web, mobile phones, satellite TV, crisps in chocolate bars, computers in the home, peace in Northern Ireland, the end of apartheid - today, 36 years later. 

I wonder what the world will be like in 36 years time - Jaysus, I'll be nearly 90!

Happy Birthday Vicki!

Ouch - Lectures "are doomed" according to @jimmy_wales

The BBC reported yesterday that Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales says that the "boring university lecture is going to be the first major casualty of the rise in online learning in higher education". As I am  lecturer I was of course interested and concerned when somebody of Wales' stature makes a statement like this. In the article, Wales tells us about learning more about learning calculus from betamax tapes than from his "very boring and bad teacher". A few weeks ago I wrote about "Boring" Classes - You Can't Polish a Turnip, when one of my own students had come to me after class to tell me that he found the class "boring". So are lectures, and by extension lecturers, "doomed"?

Jimmy Wales.
Image Source: Wikipedia (of course!).

Well - I have to agree with Wales on this point - we are doomed if we keep doing what we have been doing for the last few hundred years. He tells us that "you're still likely to be in a large lecture hall with a very boring professor, and everyone knows it's not working very well. It's not even the best use of that professor's time or the audience". The more I do this job, the more I agree with this sentiment. On Monday last, 8 (out of a class of 68) students attended the last class this semester for one of my modules. On the same day my YouTube channel had 7,806 learners. You can guess which was the more productive, and satisfying.

While all professors/lecturers are not "boring", some of course are. We risk voting ourselves out of a job if we don't adapt and use technology more - and I'm not talking about simply using email and putting class notes up on Moodle/Blackboard. College authorities and management are shamefully lacking in initiative as they struggle with tighter budgets and increased demands of students (Wales calls this "a certain inertia in the system"). USA colleges are leading the way in accepting MOOCs and making lectures and content freely available on-line. The signs are slowly showing in Ireland that MOOCs are getting some attention with Sligo IT, UCD, and DIT recently announcing MOOCs. Many lecturers see MOOCs as a threat (I do), but many will embrace this and other on-line technologies (I do too).

Last word to Wales on the model of using recorded lectures, and class time for discussion: "It seems much more effective and is the direction I think we're going to go".