‘Reputation management’ is a familiar enough idea to university academics. After all, professional profiles are built and careers developed mainly through publications, citations and conference papers, all essentially indicators of how peers rate the quality of our work.

However few are as aware of the equal need for ‘virtual’ reputation management’. As Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social media become increasingly ubiquitous even in academic circles, Theo Lynn at the Diverse 2011 conference underlined the need to be aware of our digital footprint and what it says about us. As a snapshot, type in your username to namechk to see just how many social networking sites you are on, you may be surprised. You may be equally surprised how open some information is. Facebook, maybe because it is so popular remains the main point of concern. Openbook for example allows anyone to search public information on Facebook, and it is surprising how indiscreet some users are, especially given cases such as the US Teacher Fired Over Facebook case. The teacher wasn’t a particularly heavy Facebook user and according to Dr Lynn this it is this group of professionals, especially in the 26-55 age group who are most at risk. The audience was advised to immediately try to protect your Facebook account.

We were also shown some fascinating tools to track your online footprint, including webmii that collects online public information about you (and other people), klout which gives you an ‘online influence’ score based on your tweeting and so on. These could be used for example to monitor the online impact of projects and research initiatives.

Google Labs’ latest creation (purchase?) is Google Body – a tool which allows anyone to delve into human anatomy in a 3D environment within their web browser. Settings can be manipulated to show or hide the layers of the body, including:

• Skin
• Muscle
• Bones
• Organs
• Blood
• Brain depth (take layers away from the brain)

As shown in the picture on the left we have several of the layers removed and many showing. The body can be rotated on all axes and by using pins, different parts can be labelled automatically.

We’re not here to advocate Google’s tools, however some very interesting things come out of the lab and using Google body (which is free) could be a useful supplement to a quiz, for example using it to take images of the body’s architecture and adding them to questions. Alternatively you could load this up in the teaching space and ask students to correctly identify the areas you point to, adding a pin each time.

And if that’s not good enough, there is also Google Cow – the same thing but moo’ier.

http://bodybrowser.googlelabs.com

Note: You may have to use Google Chrome to view this page and also apply a fix to your OpenGL (which is a bit annoying)

An increasingly common tool for teaching, training, presentation and demonstration is the use of video capture of computer screen activity, usually accompanied by voice-over narrative. When delivered to users as a digital video file, this is known collectively as screencasting.

Free Online Screencasting Tools is a recently-published guide from JISC Digital Media covering the many new applications you can use including ScreenToaster, Screencast-o-Matic and Screenr but not Jing, one of my favourites.

For a more  in-depth guide to the complete screencasting workflow, take a look at the JISC advice document Screencasting Workflow, or for a quick introduction to screen capture read Introducing Screen Capture Software.

CALT organised a stimulating presentation by Prof Geoffrey Crisp of the University of Adelaide about assessment in the Web 2.0 world. Much information at http://www.transformingassessment.com and a similar presentation is on slideshare.

Crisp calls for much more ‘authentic’ learning and assessment – the need to set big questions; for instance in aeronautical engineering we should set students a task to build a rocket in 3 years. This allows them to see reasons for the smaller things. The tendency with conventional assessment is for everything to become very granular – little learning outcomes are assessed with discrete assessment tasks which don’t encourage students to make connections, and which encourage surface and strategic rather than deep approaches to learning.

Of course moving away from more traditional forms of assessment entails proving that the alternative works – traditional approaches are very deeply engrained in the culture of institutions and are not easily challenged. Crisp acknowledged that even in his own institution there is some way to go.

Three points to start with:

1.    Assessment tasks should be worth doing – if students can get answers by copying from web, or asking google, or guessing, then the task is not worth doing. We need to stop setting tasks which are about information since information is everywhere.

2.    We should separate out diagnostic assessment from formative assessment. Diagnostic assessment is essential before teaching and can be an excellent way of starting relationship with students at the outset. The teacher can then build their teaching on students’ current level of understanding.

3.    Think about assessment tasks which result in divergent rather than convergent responses.  In the traditional approach we tend to seek convergent responses in which all students are expected to come up with same answer but divergent responses are more authentic.  Peer- and self-review approaches can support this approach.

Bearing this in mind, and drawing on the work by Bobby Elliot (see http://www.scribd.com/doc/461041/Assessment-20), we heard that:

• Assessment 1.0 is traditional assessment – paper-based, classroom-based, synchronous in time and space, formalised and controlled.
• Assessment 1.5 is basic computer assisted assessment – using quizzes which tend to replicate the paper-based experience, and portfolios used mainly as storage for students’ work. Tasks tend to be done alone -competition is encouraged and collaboration is cheating.  They tend to encourage focus on passing the test rather than on gaining knowledge, skills and understanding and don’t lead to deeper levels of learning (indeed Elliot argues that factual knowledge is valueless in the era of Wikipedia and Google.)
• Assessment 2.0 is tool-assisted assessment in which students do things using a variety of tools and resources and then simply use the VLE (typically) to submit the results. This kind of assessment is typically authentic, personalised, negotiated, engaging, recognises existing skills, researched, assesses deeper levels of learning, problem oriented, collaborative, done anywhere peer- and self-assessed, and supported by IT tools especially the open web.

Some nice examples of interactive e-assessment 2.0 design included:

• Examine QuickTime VR image of a geological formation then answer questions based on that – drawing on things wouldn’t be able to see from static image.
• Examine panograph (scrolling and zoomable image) of Bayeux Tapestry and answer questions drawing together different parts – students selecting evidence from different segments of the tapestry.
• Interactive spreadsheets – Excel with macros.  Students can change certain bits and answer questions on resulting trends in graphs. Can have nested response questions so that the answer to the second is based on first. (But there is a need for care with dependences so that a wrong move early on doesn’t lead to total failure).
• Chemical structures using the Molinspiration tool. Students can draw molecular structures using the tool and copy and paste the resulting text string into answer which is held in the VLE quiz tool.
• Problem solving using a tool called IMMEX (‘It Makes You Think’) which tracks how students approach problems.  The tutor adds in real, redundant and false information that the students can draw on to solve the problem.  They can use it all but the more failed attempts they make the fewer marks they get. We saw an archaeology example in which students had to date an artefact.
• Role plays which can be done using regular VLE features such as announcements, discussion forums, wikis.  Students adopt different personas and enter into discussion and debate through those personas.
• Scenario based learning – this is more prescriptive than role play. The recommended tool is Pblinteractive.com
• Simulations – the Bized.co.uk site offers a virtual bank and factory. Students can work within bized then answer questions in the VLE.
• Second Life (virtual world) assessment in which the avatar answers questions which go back into Moodle.

Examples of these and more are available through the http://www.transformingassessment.com/ site – it’s Moodle-based and anyone with a .ac.uk email address can self-register and try out the various tasks. (They also run a series of webinars.)

Crisp argues convincingly for much more authentic and immersive assessment, and for assessments in which  process as well as outcome is evaluated – for example approaches to problem solving;  efficiency; ethical considerations; involvement of others.

A good closing question was whether teachers will be able to construct future assessments or will this be a specialist activity. Is it all going to get too hard for people? There may be a need for more team based approaches in future.

Useful resources

Boud, D., 2009, Assessment 2020 – Seven propositions for assessment reform in higher education, Available at: http://www.iml.uts.edu.au/assessment-futures/Assessment-2020_propositions_final.pdf

Crisp, G., 2007, The e-Assessment Handbook. Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd

Crisp, G., 2009, Designing and using e-Assessments. HERDSA Guide, Higher Education Research Society of Australasia

Elliott, B., 2008. Assessment 2.0 – Modernising assessment in the age of Web 2.0. Available at: http://www.scribd.com/doc/461041/Assessment-20.

‘Photosharing’ is the publishing of photographs online, and sharing them with others and groups. A range of web sites now enable the uploading and sharing of the photographs, with the most well-known being Flikr.

JISC have just released an updated version of their excellent advice document Using Flickr to Organise a Collection of Images covering the features of the site in some detail such as uploading from mobile devices and via email, organising your images, privacy and permissions, sets and collections, connecting a blog to Flickr, licensing and copyright issuesd some of the general things to watch out for when putting your material on such a third-party site.

Photo by yvestown on Flickr – used under a Creative Commons licence

Google does not always do everything as perfectly as we might think. This week they announced (on their blog) Google Wave is shutting down and merging into other projects. Pitched as the ‘answer to email’ (or similar) we never really did get into waving at each other, but it made a good effort to show a new way of collaboration.

Below is a list of tools, originally compiled by LifeHacker, and all credit is due to them, which make great use of the web and our desire to work together (in harmony?).

Etherpad

Google bought up Etherpad, a live, as-everyone-types collaboration site for writing and coding, shuttered the service, and brought the Etherpad team in to work on Google Wave. Luckily, after some wrangling and much outcry from Etherpad users, they made the source code available, and now Etherpad islands have sprung up everywhere. One of the closest replacements is TypeWith.me, which wholly resurrects Etherpad like it had never gone away. If you liked Google Wave mainly for the ability to type with other people in real time, Etherpad and its many new homes is your closest replacement.

MediaWiki

It is, of course, the software that powers Wikipedia, and might seem a bit dated in the light-speed-paced world of webapps. Still, MediaWiki’s power lies in how easy it is for multiple people to make and commit changes to a document, link inside and out of other pages, create page structures and hierarchies on the fly, and work from pretty much any browser on Earth. Nobody needs to sign into any account unless mandated by the administrator, and everybody gets the information they need without having to fiddle any knobs.

TimeBridge

This meeting facilitator aims to eliminate the mess of emails and mass confusion over whether it was meeting room 130 at 2pm, or room 230 at 1pm. Create an account, plug in your coworkers’ emails or SMS numbers, plug in a few times that work for you, and TimeBridge takes on the work of contacting them all and asking which of those times work, then presenting the results for your consideration. The webapp also reminds participants of the details by email or SMS, and a just-released iPhone app helps you keep things moving along with an agenda and details view.

Google Groups

“Isn’t that the thing that Google turned Usenet into?” Yes, but Groups lets a, um, group of like-minded folks hash out arguments, answer questions, and point to helpful resources without software or constraints. Users of a group can rate posts for helpfulness, search out answers across their own groups or other similar-themed topics, and get their answers and responses delivered from an easily filtered email source. It’s an oft-overlooked tool in an age of fancy-pants social tools, but it gets everyone hooked up and talking pretty quickly.

TextFlow

It’s easy to ask everyone’s take on a piece of text, but much harder to actually incorporate their ideas, revisions, and word choices without spending twice as much time as on the original. TextFlow, a free Adobe Air app that runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux, takes in all the documents spawned from an original, analyzes the changes, and presents them to you to show what’s different, accept what you want to change, and make it easy to see how far you’ve moved off the original draft. For a certain kind of work, it’s a real time saver, and it makes it easy to respond when your collaborators ask why their masterful lead-in sentence didn’t make the cut.

DimDim

Makers of “webinar” software are feverishly pitching the idea of at-your-desk conferences as a money-saving alternative to travel these days. DimDim, an open-source meeting platform, offers web users a truly money-saving experience, with up to 20 users able to view a presentation, three of them with microphone access, with no software installations required. It’s a nice step up if you need something a little more professional than a social video chat room, and is surprisingly responsive on freehand drawing, text, audio, and even screencasting across a variety of connection speeds.

MindMeister

How many 10-minute verbal explanations would have worked much better as a one-minute cocktail napkin sketch? Plenty of them, we’d suspect. For ideas and projects where drawing a line through your thoughts helps keep them together, MindMeister is a great helper. Not only does their web-based design tool allow for easy branching, notating, and organization, but if you just want to jam in a few ideas to be molded into shape later, it allows for email additions. You can, of course, share, publish, and collaborate on your mental diagrams, and doing so might just save you a really unnecessary phone call or stop-and-chat.

present.io

File-sharing service Drop.io is really convenient because it lets you store up to 100 MB of files without a sign-up, password, or software. Present.io, a group-focused tangent, lets you gather a team of chatters around a set of images, text, audio, or even video files and let them tell you what rocks and what stinks about them. Those away from a computer can call in mid-stream and leave MP3 voicemails for all to hear or join in a phone conference call. Meanwhile, the “drop” administrator keeps the show moving by queuing up new files on viewers’ screens, and nobody has to log in or be accepted to join in—they just need the right URL.

Campfire

Not that we aren’t at least thinking of holding our Lifehacker chat and brainstorming sessions in Wave, but for the time being, Campfire does a remarkably good job of letting multiple people yak it out and learn from each other. It’s searchable, it makes uploading files to everyone easy, it can be a walled garden or open to those you link in, and it sits nicely in a browser tab, changing its page title when new chats arrive. There’s a fair number of third-party clients and input tools available for 37Signals’ collaborative chat platform, but it works just fine as a quiet spot to talk.

Zoho

It’s hard to jump in and describe the best features about Zoho’s vast suite of online editing and group organization tools, because so much changes on a week-to-week basis. That said, if you find Google Docs to be impressive for a single user, but not a great back-and-forth facilitator, Zoho is where you should look next. It’s able to handle both the lower-level tasks of group editing, document sharing, and other work, as well as the milestone tracking, group chat, invoice creation, and other tasks needed by teams that aren’t sitting right next to each other. It’s good stuff, and it’s free.

Original article: http://lifehacker.com/5373339/