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InSPIRING

27 May, 2012 by Keith Lyons

There will be an official opening of the InSPIRE Centre at the University of Canberra this week.

I see the Centre as a physical tipping point in my own thinking about and practice in educational technology.

I like the idea of being InSPIRED and hope to spend much of my nomadic time at the University in the Centre.

The Hiperwall there is just one of the many tools for engagement and connection.

The imminent opening of the Centre has encouraged me to think about the ethos that underpins connected and emerging communities.

Thanks to a link from Stephen Downes to a MediaShift Idea Lab post by Jonathan Stray about visualising documents, I discovered a 2009 post by Dan Schultz that helped me clarify my thoughts.

I have written about reciprocal altruism in this blog and I have been exploring the invisibility of openness. Dan’s post was an excellent catalyst for my thinking. His post is titled In Search of a Community That Takes ‘Me’ Out of Social Media.

He concludes that:

Community tools exist, but they are drastically underpowered… As a result, they are drowned out by the far more successful alternatives… To change this, we need something that can:

  1. Host niche communities without isolating them from the rest of the world.
  2. Give individuals a chance to shine without letting their egos dominate the content.
  3. Attract enough people to drive collective intelligence, while maintaining the level of granularity needed to provide a truly personalized experience.

That isn’t too much to ask for… right? I personally believe that these systems will be the key to meeting community information needs.

I think we will have an opportunity to address these issues in and through the InSPIRE Centre. The Centre:

is a learning commons, a place to imagine, experiment and design new ways of working and learning digitally. INSPIRE services highlight quality teaching and contemporary learning practices through staying connected to global initiatives and trends about learning design and design thinking. We focus on a futures perspective and developing foresight, not just knowledge and skills.

I am hopeful that my visits to the Centre will help me explore learning ethnographies of the emergence of inspirational practice.

Posted in Australia, Communication, Community, Creative Commons, Education, Ethnography, Networks, Open Access, Public Sphere, Radical Transparency, Teaching and Learning, Wayfinding | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

Performance Environments: Nurturing Nobel Laureates

26 May, 2012 by Keith Lyons

From a post by Michael Michalko on How Geniuses Think.

Creative geniuses are geniuses because they know “how” to think, instead of “what” to think. Sociologist Harriet Zuckerman published an interesting study of the Nobel Prize winners who were living in the United States in 1977. She discovered that six of Enrico Fermi’s students won the prize. Ernst Lawrence and Niels Bohr each had four. J. J. Thompson and Ernest Rutherford between them trained seventeen Nobel laureates. This was no accident. It is obvious that these Nobel laureates were not only creative in their own right, but were also able to teach others how to think creatively.

In his post Michael identifies eight strategies “that are common to the thinking styles of creative geniuses in science, art and industry throughout history.” Geniuses:

  • LOOK AT PROBLEMS IN MANY DIFFERENT WAYS
  • MAKE THEIR THOUGHTS VISIBLE
  • PRODUCE
  • MAKE NOVEL COMBINATIONS
  • FORCE RELATIONSHIPS
  • THINK IN OPPOSITES
  • THINK METAPHORICALLY
  • PREPARE THEMSELVES FOR CHANCE

Photo Credit

Horizon Glow & the Conjunction

Posted in Communication, Performance | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Leadership: Conversations with Neil Armstrong

26 May, 2012 by Keith Lyons

I was driving home on Thursday evening and was listening in to Radio National’s PM program.

By coincidence I was think about some correspondence with a PhD student about authentic leadership.

Serendipity brought me news of a series of CPA interviews with Neil Armstrong.

Alex Malley, the CEO of CPA, interviewed Neil Armstrong and observed that:

Look he’s got an extraordinary humility, there’s no question about that and when you look at what they were able to do in ’69 in relation to the journey they went on; these are things we just haven’t seen for a long time.

His capability to constantly talk about team; to have shown the world something that was beyond their mind and just getting the balance right between initiative and entrepreneurship and risk management, whereas these days we seem to be telling each other we can’t do things because of the risk and yet they did that literally on a wing and a prayer.

What is special about the four interviews with Neil Armstrong is that they offer a rare insight into his thinking.

He does not do a lot of interviews so I believe these are outstanding resources with which to contemplate leadership, risk and humility.

Driving home in the twilight did not seem so arduous on Thursday particularly after I heard Neil Armstrong say of the lunar landing:

Then the computer showed us where it intended to land and it was a very bad location, it was on the side of a large crater about – I suppose 100 or 150 metres in diameter. So I took over manually and flew it like a helicopter out to the west direction; got into a smoother area with not so many rocks, found a level area and was able to get it down there safely before we ran out of fuel.

Photo Credit

Neil Armstrong

Posted in Teaching and Learning, Digital Media, Communication, Australia, Education, Leadership | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

Submission: Wheels on Fire

25 May, 2012 by Keith Lyons

Dennis Puniard submitted his PhD thesis for examination on Thursday.

The title of his thesis is:

The Role of the Internet and Online Technologies in Destination Choice for Australian Cycle Tourists.

This is the third PhD to be submitted for examination since the establishment of the National Institute of Sport Studies at the University of Canberra.

It is the first thesis to emerge from a cross faculty collaboration. Dennis is registered for study with the Faculty of Business, Government and Law. I have been his primary supervisor from NISS in the Faculty of Health.

Some of Dennis’s findings about cycle tourists:

  • They are very active in their use of online technology to explore their options for cycling away from their home base.
  •  They seek general information about accommodation and natural attractions at a location, albeit with some cycling specific aspects in view, such as cycle friendly accommodation and cycle friendly routes to attractions.
  • Transportation options to reach a destination were identified as important, but with options that allow them to take their own bicycles with them.
  • Information about  cycling related facilities is important to this group, as is information about cycling events, specifically from a participant’s viewpoint.
  • Information about organised cycling tours was seen as important to many in this group.
  • Bicycle hire (especially overseas) and access to drinking water were identified as important information items and the weather forecasts are more important to cyclists than to many other tourists who have options to avoid bad weather.
  • Age is not a barrier to the use of technology, and in many respects those that are not time poor (older/retired) are just as active online as their younger counterparts.

Overall, Dennis points out that:

The standout feature of this research in regards to cycle tourism is that road safety for cyclists came through as the most significant aspect of cycling away from the home region. Information related to safe routes for cycling was paramount in the needs of this group, and this has significant implications for cycling specific maps both hard copy and online.

Immediately after handing in his thesis for examination, Dennis packed his bags to present a a paper on his work at the Velo City Conference in Vancouver.

Posted in Australia, Digital Media, Education, Writing | Tagged , , | 4 Comments »

Goal-Line Technology Update: May 2012

25 May, 2012 by Keith Lyons

iSportConnect carried a story today about the use of goal-line technology in football.

The story indicates that:

  • England’s friendly against Belgium at Wembley on 2 June will be used to test the Hawk-Eye goal-line technology system.
  • Independent testers from the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology and representatives from FIFA will monitor the system.
  • It will not be available for use by the match officials on 2 June.
  • The Hawk-Eye system was tested in a English minor league cup final between Eastleigh and AFC Totton in April.
  • An alternative system, GoalRef, has undergone trials at two Danish league matches this month.
  • The International Football Association Board will consider reports from these trials to consider the introduction of goal-line technology at its special meeting in July.

Photo Credit

Goal!

Posted in Computer Science in Sport, Performance, Sport | Tagged , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Critical Care Nursing: Sharing Insights

24 May, 2012 by Keith Lyons

I had the good fortune to work with some remarkable critical care nurses today.

We were exploring how to develop a Wikiversity resource to support continuing professional development.

I feel more comfortable each time I use Wikiversity but I have lots to learn. I am hoping that this project will help me do so.

James Neill is helping with the back office part of this project and the whole idea is the brainchild of Holly Northam.

I am hopeful that this project will have the energy exuded by Ian Miller in his blogging.

Ian aims with his eclectic mix of reflections, tutorials and articles to:

educate, to stimulate some introspection, to inform and amuse. More importantly, they are offered in the hope that they might be used as a jumping off point to inspire other nurses to think about their own practice, to explore the latest research, best practice guidelines, and to search out and deepen their knowledge, improving the quality of care they deliver.

Posted in Australia, Communication, Community, Digital Media, Education, Teaching and Learning | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

@Inspireoz for an eportfolio workshop

23 May, 2012 by Keith Lyons

Shane Nuessler is facilitating an eportfolio workshop in the InSPIRE Centre at the University of Canberra this afternoon.

Some proposed outcomes for the workshop are:
  • Locate an existing professional portfolio relevant to you and deconstruct by identifying and extracting key concepts and features.
  • Plan your own professional portfolio by integrating and organising the key concepts and features you have identified, as well as any other concepts and features you wish to integrate.
  • Identify the range and types of tools available for portfolio implementation and choose one that suits your needs.
  • Begin construction of your own professional portfolio.
  • Identify good practices for application in your own eportfolio teaching strategies.

The workshop is taking place as the InSPIRE Centre is completing preparations for a grand opening next Monday. These preparations include the installation of a Hiperwall.

RT @INSPIREDU2:

The awesome @Hiperwall coming to INSPIRE soon … just ask @munnerley@rfitzgerald

The workshop comes at the end of a semester when 70 students on the #SCP12 unit have developed their own eportfolios.

Their collective efforts have been curated on a Wikiversity page.

Posted in Teaching and Learning, Digital Media, Communication, Australia | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment »

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