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Learning

Here's a great blog entry about learning for educators and lurners alike:

Donald Clark Plan B: 10 techniques to massively increase retention

There's a lot of really good stuff in there, hopefully stuff we're already trying to do in Swansea. Note number 9: mobile technology. The author talks about drip feeding assessment via those mobile devices that we all have in our pockets. Hopefully some of you have noticed that I've been coincidentally trying to do exactly this using the medium of the moment: Twitter.

Twitter pretty much started with mobile devices (you could use the internet and SMS text messages to post tweets really easily). Can yours follow twitter? If you have a mobile browser on your phone then, yes. Otherwise see this twitter mobile phone FAQ (although that's a little bit retro).

Follow me @samuelwebster and keep your eyes on the twitterwall (which is also linked to from the elearning section of the Swansea Blackboard).

I'll be drip feeding questions that you should be able to answer. You know, the sort of stuff that comes up in exams.

Higher Education Academy mag & Turning Point clickers

I've been a proponent of using interactive feedback technology in lectures (which means I can ask questions in my lecture, students can answer using a remote control with 10 or so buttons on it and we can all see how well we're doing) for some time. As such I've been occasionally pulled out to demonstrate the tech and to get other people using it.

I've written a couple of brief things about how we've been using this in embryology lectures in the School of Medicine and the Higher Education Academy's magazine "01" has included an article in this quarter's copy.

The students like it and the lecturers like it. Everybody likes to use the clickers (instant gameshow) and teachers get to see immediately how much the audience is getting from the lecture. It's simple to use and as more people have used it more Schools have bought their own sets. I imagine that in modules with very large student numbers if you can afford enough clickers you'll learn a lot about your audience. Is it possible to interact with every individual in a lecture with 300 students in an hour in any other way?

For more information:

- see the HEA 01 article here (HTML) or here (pdf)
- visit Turning Technologies to find out more about the tech

Heart rate and power

Heart rate and power, originally uploaded by samwebster.

Here is an example of why I think it's helpful to know both heart rate and power. Here's a screenshot of a part of today's ride, climbing the main hill.

You can see that heart rate rises early in the climb and continues to increase as the climb progresses. You can also see that with each steeper section I'm able to put out a decent amount of power to a certain point. After that point each power peak is smaller and smaller, yet my heart rate stays very high (unusually high). I'm putting in a high level of effort but my legs are unable to continue putting out high levels of power. They're done in.

This makes sense of course, because I've not been doing any aerobic training for the last six weeks that I've been in plaster and my legs have "detrained".

My point is that without the heart rate data I would have been wondering if I truly had been putting in a decent effort. The power data is obviously useful.

By repeating this session I'll be able to see in the data if my fitness is improving. Good, eh?

Polar to Garmin

Like me, my Polar heart rate monitor, chronometer, speedometer and sole training partner (other than my shadow, but he hasn't been out much lately) has been struggling recently. His memory failed this week after getting a little water inside his case, and he's never really recovered. Sorry buddy, but it's time for a replacement.

Polar have gone weird since I bought this S625x many years ago. Their cheaper models are crippled so that you can't get all your data off (but instead are only given the amount of time you spent in certain heart rate zones - useless for reviewing intervals and tempo work) and their expensive models are super expensive (and no longer competitive). They seem to have dumped their software development and keep hinting at new technologies using new standards (i.e. their stuff will only work with their stuff). Sod that, I thought. The move to Garmin gives a device with Mac software so I don't have to keep rebooting into XP just to get my data every day, clever online software so I can upload from different machines and still get the original data out to use elsewhere, ANT+ connectivity so I can use devices from a bunch of other manufacturers, and built in GPS. Their accessories are sensibly priced too.

The Forerunner 305 has also been around for some years now, but people have been very, very happy with their 305's and the price is awesome for the features (around £135 on Amazon). OK, this thing is a massive chunk of plastic on my wrist, which I wasn't too impressed with. I would have gone with the smaller 405 but I'm a little lean in the wallet after Christmas, kids' birthdays, the exhaust falling off, tax returns, etc. Really, as a wannabe triathlete, I should have bought the Garmin 310XT - it's the only device like this in their range that is waterproof. You can't swim with the 305. The 310XT has a bunch of extra features that makes its price of twice that of the 305 worthwhile. I'm not going to be racing with this chunk on my arm though, so I decided I'd take the cheap option. I don't want all this data when I'm racing but I do want it for training (as much for studying after as for during). I'll try to pick up something cheaper and smaller for racing (time, laps, HR and waterproofing will do me).

So this thing is a chunk of tech. It's not ugly, but it ain't pretty. It's light enough so that you don't really notice it when running. Just like the iBike though, when you start using it and you see the huge range of data collected, stored and displayed you see the thing's worth. Using GPS and tracking your route instills a feeling of flexibility (maybe I'll nip down that path & I don't have to remember the route later, it's all going to be collected) and confidence in its accuracy. If it can see a bunch of satellites and show you which side of the road you ran on it has got to be pretty damned accurate for pace and distance. Running with a footpod (an accelerometer that calculates pace and distance from the movements of your foot) is fairly accurate once you've calibrated it, as long as you run in the same shoes and don't change surfaces too much. It puts you off exploring off-road trails if you want to collect your data somewhat obsessively like me. Running tempos or intervals downhill gave bizarre speed readings with the footpod, but I expect the GPS to be more useful here. We'll see.

This morning's complicated run gave it a good test, although on snow and ice I could only guess that the pacing was about right from experience. The next few months should give it a strong test though. It's already feeling good to be able to access my data on my computer and not be forced to reboot into Windows.

LEGO Universe

Could LEGO Universe be the nail in the coffin for my WoW gaming? I hope I won't have to pay out for two accounts (one for me, one for Jack) to play LEGO's new, MMO game this summer, but I have a feeling that I will.

It's likely that Jack will go nuts for this. I wonder if his friends will also get involved and they'll all be playing together online. My generation didn't do this until we got to university age & had left home. It's likely that LEGO will get this working perfectly for kids, but I wonder if it will have serious pull for adults. Will it feel to childish? Or will parents want to play it so that we can play more with our children, playing games that they want to play? I look forward to finding out.

Links:

LEGO Universe
Gizmodo - LEGO Universe

How much energy can you produce on your bike?

For 12 hours?

The BBC's Bang Goes the Theory programme investigated (and demonstrated) what it would be like to try to power a single household by pedal power. Sure, it's not a practical idea but it gives the viewer some real energy awareness. Well, if the viewer has ever ridden a bike anyway.

I won't be powering the microwave when I'm on the turbo then.

See the whole thing on iPlayer if you're in the UK (probably until the 10th December) here.

Google Wave, aha, I get it

There's been a lot of chatter about Google's new product, "Wave", for the last couple of months. Looking from the outside it's difficult to see what it does, what it does different, and what we can really use it for. It's in beta at the moment so only a limited number of people are able to actually use it.

I was kindly given an invitation to try it and as soon as I got into the preview it was clear how hugely beneficial this could be to people like me with organisational nightmares. To teach anatomy we have 2 main lecturers, 3 technicians and dozens of clinical teachers. We need to co-ordinate the teaching of 450 learning outcomes, a shed-load of exam questions, and the use of a varying number of prosections, models, bones, projectors, laptops, and rooms among a different group of people every week. Try doing that through email. Luckily Jo's brain can cope with much of this but we still make mistakes.

So imagine something that's easy to access that looks like email. Except that we can all edit, add to and delete our plans live (we can all edit the same stuff at once, and see those edits in real-time) and talk about it while we do it. This is all well organised in itself and we share these waves among those that need the information and keep the others to ourselves.

I can see who will be teaching which learning outcomes, have a discussion about how to link my bits in with other people's bits, lob up images for the other teachers to use, and Greg (our technician) can suggest the materials we have available and we can all argue about who gets to use the plastic model of the arm with the nerves on it and who gets to use the prosections. Good stuff, eh? I can argue with a surgeon that he's better suited to teaching part of the abdomen, and I can amend his assigned learning outcomes and he can suggest additions and take away stuff that's not important. The history of this development is all recorded - nothing is lost and we can all see who did what.

The discussions we need are far more likely to take place in this environment than face-to-face. We're all too busy and most of the people involved need 6 weeks notice to get help with clinics if they're going to spend a morning with us. Try getting 4 or 5 of those people in a room together. It's not easy.

The key here is that it's very easy to use. People are scared of wiki's but they won't be scared of this. The whole School of Medicine could take advantage of this.

Take a look at this long preview video and see if it makes sense for you. You can use Wave with me using samvwebster@googlewave.com.

Yet another great reason to buy a Rhoomba

Or several Rhoomba floor cleaning robots if you really do want to play Pac-Man with them.

Link: Gizmodo - Video: Hacked Roombas Used to Play Pac-Man, Finally!

More MS Courier Info

I still really like the ideas within Microsoft's future Courier device, but I bet it won't play nicely with all my data.

Link: Gizmodo - Courier User Interface in Depth

I love Halloween

I've always loved Halloween, maybe from an interest in all things ghoulish (and I guess that interest may have lead me to my current job).

Go and get your Halloween wallpaper:

- Lifehacker: Wallpaper Roundup: All Hallow's Eve and Spooky Scenes

Embryology quiz

I'm writing the quiz for my introduction to embryology lecture that I'll be giving to the first years next week. The quizzes use the Turning Technologies interactive 'clickers' systems, and we use them anonymously. There's no record of how well an individual scores within the lecture quiz - it's just for fun (and instant lecturer feedback and concept checking, of course).

Last year we had a competition for boys vs girls over the whole series that went very well (albeit with a little cheating). This time around the embryology lectures will be spread wide across years 1 and 2, and there will be fewer of them. I don't think I can use the competition format again. I'm sure if I asked the students not to cheat they would listen and refrain, but I think that the competitive element will be lost by spreading the lectures out over so much time.

Maybe I could pick the highest scorers for each lecture (but that misses the anonymous answering aim), or have teams per lecture without tracking through the year (but the competition got stronger as the year progressed and the scores built for each team). I'm a bit stuck. I'll have a think about it.

Media, information, access

How do you access most of your information? As a learner? As a teacher? (Unfortunately this is a question you'll have to think about, as I still haven't fixed my comment system).

Mobile phones in developing countries

Jezebel have an interesting article on the importance of easy communication, in this case via the mobile phone, in developing countries. (I don't read Jezebel, honest - this was linked to from Gizmodo). There's an important need to be able to easily contact someone, but also to access information.

I'd love to know more about how students, lecturers and clinicians use mobile phones in our links (e.g. Gambia, Nigeria: swanih.org).

How Mobile Phones Contribute To Female Progress In Developing Nations (Jezebel, via Gizmodo).

A Microsoft tablet? It might not be what you think.

Take a look at the Courier, Microsoft's potential addition to the tablet market. It's quite different to what you might expect, and looks very, very useful. It almost looks, er, Appley. It's more of a booklet than a tablet.

See the Gizmodo article: Courier: First Details of Microsoft's Secret Tablet

BMW's Augmented Reality repair manual

Via Gizmodo.