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4-H Career Explorations 2009 – Digital Storytelling, with science

Just wrapped up our session and wanted to upload a few pics. This year was a collaborative session, working with Patty Bean and Seth Ring of TERRApod. Will have more to add after the holiday. For now, some pics from our session:

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Posted in Citizen Science, Digital Storytelling.

New user documentation added

In the past two weeks I’ve worked on some user documentation for Wordpress and Adobe Connect. All partof my job and possible of little use to external users but thought I’d toss the link here just for fun:

http://blogs.cce.cornell.edu/pt36itdocs/

Connect Documents:  Converting video for use in a connect meeting and Downloading a copy of your recorded connect meeting.

Wordpress (Mu) :  Google calendar for your blog and Removing links from images

The Wordpress docs are pretty basic. Connect doocumentation is for more advanced users.

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Posted in General Issues.

Learning a language

Last week I began a 5 week Spanish 101 class through our local community college. Last night as I was trying to fall alsleep I strated thinking about the process of learning a language. And today I started a new blog to, hopefully, track my thoughts and progress on the path.

http://pt36espanola.wordpress.com/

I am hoping it might be of some small interest, as it grows.

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Posted in General Issues.

Practice, devalued?

I had a short email conversation this morning with a colleague – we are trying to name a site- and I suggested something with the word “practicing” in it. The initial response was that the term seemed too much like “playing at” something, not quite active and concrete enough. I understood the reaction, though I wish it weren’t so. Practice is such a time honored thing – One practices a craft or an art – and it carries with it connotations of apprentiship and community. Or at least that was a predominate meaning. Now we practice for life…… we pretend in order to get ready for the real thing. Meanings shift, I understand that. Just in this case it struck me more than others.

And it points up to the well worn and time honored issue of how we manage to communicate anything at all, with any clarity, given the disjoints in meaning we carry around with us. But that’s one of the things about practice, it’s generally embodied (in my world view) and involves acting in the world – not just speech acts but tangible, physical acts. So we practice deliberation by doing it – the practice is the doing. And yes, deliberation – more talk less action, but I’ve got opinions and thoughts contrary about that too.

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Posted in Deliberation, General Issues, practice. Tagged with .

Working with the Video Crew at STARR 09

I spent this past Saturday at the NY State Fairgrounds offering my sage advice and guidance to the Video Crew for STARR. STARR (State Teen Action Representative Retreat) is a 4-H event that happens round about this time every year. This was our second year working with video and digital storytelling and thanks to the supremely organized Celeste Carmichael this years activity was more focused and intentional than the previous. Celeste is a Youth Development Progam Specialist here at Cooperative Extension and she is very much more organized than I am, which seemed to make a difference. (Perhaps a lesson here I should heed?)

You can, most likely, imagine the activity. I won’t go into detail regarding technical issues, the flakiness of some operating systems and related topics. The continually memorable thing about any of these events I  participate in with kids and digital storytelling is the boundless energy and creativity they bring to the tasks. Something doesnt work as expected? Try it this way…fluid and flexible in ways we loose as adults, it is energizing to work with them.

We had 4 teams of 3 working with this challenge: You have 4 minutes to creatively get this message across to VIPS everywhere by showing the activities happening at STARR. You will be making a movie – and can do this with still shots, video, audio…etc.

Given the limited amount of time this event takes, they produced 4 videos of varying quality – but all decent. You can check them out at youtube: http://www.youtube.com/nys4h

I, of course, snapped a few pictures during the course of saturday:

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Posted in Digital Storytelling, PD with Teens. Tagged with , , .

Setup for Podcasting

Someone asked me what I use for audio – interviews and such. If I’m flying solo, doing a screencast, I use a Sennheiser USB headset but for multiple voices I dig out the mics and mixer. So, I present, for posterity and everyone’s edification, my audio setup for recording interviews:

  • MXL V63M microphones and am satisfied with the price/performance.
  • You’ll need Mic stands
  • Mic cables
  • I use a Behringer Eurorack UB802 Mixer
  • You will want a
    1/4″ Stero Adapter
  • and a speaker cable to go from the 1/4″ stereo adapter to the soundcard on the computer…can grab those at radio shack or best buy.

Audacity is good and free for recording and editing the sound.

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Posted in Digital Storytelling, General Issues, Podcasts.

Technology for Community Conversation and Learning – Online Summer Seminar

We share a world of finite resources, rapid changes, and evolving cultures. Can technology help us talk about the challenges inherent in this environment? This seminar will focus on case studies of the effective use of a global technology to support local community conversations and learning.

We will critically examine a variety of technology-based tools and how they are being used. Seminar discussions will focus on the impact of these tools in our work, when and where they can be effective, and how to manage online learning and conversation.

The online nature of this seminar allows us to use discussion forums, wikis and other tools to learn together over the course of the summer. The timeframe for this course was set with the hope of making this a low-stress, engaging online experience that you can participate in as the season unfolds.

Session: June 15 – August 29.

Registration is open from April 1 thru May 10, 2009. Register online for this course at: http://pt36.wufoo.com/forms/technology-for-community-conversation-and-learning/

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Posted in Deliberation, Democratic Practice, Extension, Online Collaboration, e-learning, scenario based social elearning. Tagged with , , , .

Broadband- A tool for civic engagement and sustainability?

Powerpoint hot off the virtual presses! Click the link to dl/open the pptbroadband-civic-engagement-and-sustainability

High speed internet access can be a powerful tool for communities. During this webinar we will explore some of the practical and potential uses of broadband in addressing issues of civic engagement,sustainability and economic growth. Any discussion of this topic must, however, look at ways to bridge the “digital divide”. In light of that fact, we’ll also look at Issues of access and digital literacy How creative can we be in creating inclusive engaging opportunities that make use of the potential of broadband technology? During this session we’ll have ample opportunity for dialog and discussion.

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Posted in General Issues, Presentations. Tagged with , , , .

Scattered thoughts about the commons, rivers and wells

I’m trying to find the right metaphor for a presentation I’m doing next week. The subject under consideration is broadband and the model/metaphor I currently have is that of a river and a village well. Which almost but doesn’t quite work, I think. What I’m trying to get at is the difference between viewing the internet as an outward journey to find things (video, wikipedia, fantasy baseball, etc.) which you then “bring home”, or things you take from home to launch “out there” (videos, pics, etc) as opposed to/ or complimentary to using the bandwidth locally to engage others in your community around issues of local import. The river and the village well.

These two uses are not exclusive of each other, but rather build on each other – the connection out into the broader world allows for the infusion of new ideas and information which can then be brought to consideration locally. Or perhaps not even overt consideration but an in-flowing of the exterior. ( And yes, bad things can come in too but that is an other conversation).

And the commons – as I was thinking about this today a number of things came up, such as why do we pay so much for internet access at home but again thats a whole other conversation, which I tried to focus down to some consideration about the nature of the online commons (or internet as commons). Some of the conclusion depends upon your orientation- is the internet a for profit venture, a megamart online with preferred services and all that that implies or is the net a common good, open and self replenishing, a market of ideas and communication? For profit implies a limited resource, gatekeepers, tollbooths, checkout counters (virtually) – an economic relationship. A common good implies other values ( and this had me sidetracked a bit on speculation on how few common goods we actually have any more) such as accessibility openness, etc…

So ones orientation towards the net is an aspect of ones political orientation- it exposes or at least points at economic relations, intellectual relations and activities and so on. This is not a news flash but has implications on the provision of service, equal access, open access which, I think, should be articulated clearly and more prevalently that is current. This also implies a stance towards education which is well worth looking at, re-enforcing and bring from a virtual to an embodied position.

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Posted in Democratic Practice, General Issues, practice. Tagged with , , .

Deliberating online : Can we disintermediate power relations through the use of technology?

Very much first draft thinking….

The issue:

How can power be neutralized such that participants engage in a deliberative process with equal weight to their (valid?)is there a pre-supposition of validity to any claims made here? -Paul 2/14/09 11:12 AM claims given differing factors such as economic background, level of education, varying claims and types of expertise, etc.

The three powers- administrative, economic and cultural (wiklund 2005)

Why deliberate?

Bridging the chasm between what is and ought to be:

1) Begins as a linguistic/communicative act
2) Must attach itself to the tangible (direct,visible results as an endpoint) – Actionable
3) The ought may be (should be?) aspirational – but not utopian.

A proposal:

A potential system:

If we accept that expertise comes in different forms (modes) and that public participation is open to all, the leveling process (disintermediation of power relations) and creation of norms of deliberation can be arrived at by providing 3 zones as constituent of an online deliberative sphere. These zones (Educative, Dialogic and Deliberative)

Each participant can engage in any of the 3 zones as needed. Ideally the educative and dialogic zones provide tools to minimize knowledge differentials and allow for the establishment of a deliberative norm.

In this instance dialog does not equal deliberation. Dialog=talk/discussion. Deliberation = intentional, directed process to arrive at a conclusion/decision. Public reasoning Support for social learning.

The 3 zones

Assumption of equal access and digital literacy
– A fundamental, and troubled, assertion of this system is that access to the online sphere is equitable such that none of the three powers exerts an influence on participation. Given the current state of access to the internet, as well as issues of digital literacy, the current proposed system depends upon several steps or actions prior to the full realization of it’s potential.

Weakness of placing the deliberative zone online – Ideally the deliberative process should include embodied interactions in a physical sphere. Thus the ideal solution would likely include educative and dialogic zones which could be constructed online with either a hybrid online/in-person or an completely face to face physical zone for deliberative functioning.

Anonymity vs accountability – There is some evidence that anonymity (cite) can encourage participation in online environments, however in a deliberative space ownership of ones words is fundamental to establishing trust,

Fundamental embodiment of the practice and it’s outcomes
– Democratic practice as craft combining techne and phronesis this may be questionable, open to debate -Paul 2/15/09 12:52 PM

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Posted in Deliberation, Democratic Practice, e-learning.