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For this assignment I viewed a slide share presentation titled “I’m Cloud Confused” by Andy Harjanto.  This slide show breaks down the process of could computing and explains it through the analogy of renting versus owning a house.  The slides are neat, clean, and quick to read.  I really enjoyed this presentation although I would have much preferred it if it had sound.  Even though the slides were so easy to read I think if I could have read the slides and heard an accompanying audio track I would have had an easier time following along with the message that was communicated through the presentation.

Here is the link for the presentation:

The article I selected for this assignment was titled “dint u say that: Digital Discourse, Digital Natives and Gameplay”.  This article was written by Jonathan Grantham and was published in the November 2010 issue of Journal of Virtual Worlds Research Volume 3, Number 1.

I selected this article because I have often been intrigued by the use of Leet speak in games.  Leet speak is short for elite and refers to a specific type of dialog that develops among gamers within a specific game or video game genre.  This dialog serves to identify new players from more experienced players.  Leet speak uses in game references and coded symbols to represent other items besides the actual characters.  For example the name Leet is often refereed to as 1337, where the 1 represents the letter l, threes represent e’s, and seven represents the letter t.  Another example would be the phrase “hello gamers” which in leet speak would be “|-|3110 g4m3r5”.  There are many different dialects of leet speak.  Each dialect is specific to the game it is played in and sorts out inexperienced players as they typically cannot understand these commands.  I find this dialog fascinating because it is developed among strangers who share in a unique experience through virtual worlds.

This article wanted to specifically focus on the dialect that is exchanged in game among digital natives specifically.  The study had four hypothesis statements:

H1- Chat is reflected and impacts team dynamics

H2- When a leader is present, chat from the leader will promote and foster team goals.

H3- Chat during gameplay will be predominately serious.

H4- Chat will resemble structure and vocabulary typical of digital natives.

The experiment for this article included a game within a virtual world that was created specifically for this experiment.  This virtual world contained puzzle pieces which were distributed throughout the virtual environment.  There were sixteen players and four groups among these sixteen players.  Of these players 5 were non-gamers.  There were 36 puzzle pieces per puzzle and nine puzzles total.  These pieces were dispersed among 100 buildings in the virtual world.  The researchers studied the chat logs of each player after the game and treated all entered data (incomplete sentences, improper punctuation, isolated punctuation) as appropriate data.

The study found that the most successful group in the game was also the team that communicated the most.  The team that performed the worst in the game exchanged the fewest amount of communicative messages.  A break down of the nature of the exchanged messages showed that the most common message exchanged was strategic, then informative, collaborative, and finally questions.  Typically the first person to start a chat dialog emerged as the leader of the group.  The study also found that there was minimal evidence of vocabulary that is typically found in digital native communication processes such as instant messaging. The players used a dialect similar to spoken American English and typically didn’t use abbreviations or symbols.

I would use information from this article in my business education class for several purposes.  The first purpose might be in teaching a unit about communication.  I could share game messages with the students to see if they could recognize references or see where their might be inconsistency or confusion in the in-game dialog due to lack of facial expressions, body language, or tone.  This lesson would serve to enforce the idea that some messages need to be made in a face to face setting and other messages are more appropriate in documented or electronic form.

I might also use lessons learned from this article if I were grading chat logs or diaries of students participating in an in class simulation.  The article states that it is important for the users to communicate effectively during game play.  One of the ways of achieving effective game play is through the use of sentence fragments because they are quick and easy to read and take up less space in the chat window.  Therefore, I would allow my students to apply informal chat during simulated sessions.

The ideas within this article transfer to the business environment because coded language is used in this setting.  Many jobs use linguistics that apply to specific job positions, tools, or inventory specific to their company on the job.  This article proves that this type of communication is effective and still valid as a form of communication among coworkers.

I think that the study was a little too short to be conclusive about the linguistics of digital natives.  The gameplay only took place for roughly two hours.  This is hardly enough time for a significant change to occur because it limits the amount of time that possible coding can be created, practiced, and exchanged among players.  I think that if the study used a more elaborate game that took place for a longer duration of time the results would be quite different.

This reading selection focused on podcasts, wikis, and blogs as a means of increasing communication throughout a school system and the surrounding community.  I was really interested in the scenario where the English teacher was sharing podcasts with parents so that they would hear her read science fiction stories to their children.  I think it would be really neat to record sessions of my course or even have my students record their thoughts or concerns and post them on a class website.  I love the idea of informing parents about class discussions and topics.  When I was in high school my younger brother and I would often reenact class discussions for our parents at the dinner table.  We were fourtunate enough to have family dinners every night but sadly, this is not a common trend for many families.  Posting recorded podcasts and making them available for parents is a great way to continue the process of informing the parents on class topics.  I really like the idea of the students posting their thoughts because this allows their reflections, concerns, and thoughts to be directly heard by others.  I believe that this experience would enhance the critical thinking skills of the students and truly engage them. 

I think one of the biggest benefits of this scenario was the inclusion of everyone.  Administrators, parents, other faculty members, board members, and students were all engaged in a multi-faceted way in this scenario.  I was especially impressed with the amount of increased support and communication between all of the teachers within this school system.  I think that teaming up on concepts and subject matters across disciplines builds legitimacy for the topics in the minds of the students.  I often benefit during semesters where my classes all seem to align in subject matter.  For example, I might be taking a professional selling courses, an integrated marketing course, and business management course which would all cover interpersonal skills and communication.  This would make the concept clearer for me and studying for tests easier as the concept was the same across disciplines.  If we could do this for high school students, I think we would reinforce their knowledge by providing them with more breadth and depth of knowledge on specific tested concepts. 

Perhaps a weakness of this scenario is the amount of additional time it would require to manage the multi technical aspects of this environment.  Instructors would not be able to manage these sites during class time because it would take away from their students.  They must screen the content that is being posted to make sure that the students are learning and posting appropriate content which could become tedious.  Also, we experienced difficulties with wiki’s in our class as multiple students tried to simultaneously edit the same post.  If multiple students or administrators were trying to accomplish this task and ran into the challenges that we faced, they might become reluctant to continue with the process.

Chapter nine focuses on the evolution of schools towards the future.  This chapter mentions the importance of making software students use at school available for students at home.  This would allow students to continue their work once they left school and a bigger opportunity to personalize their work as they familiarize themselves with different types of technology and the services those programs can do.  The chapter also mentioned the importance of Internet speed.  Many households don’t have broadband Internet connection and students in these households do not have the same advantages as those who can use the Internet quickly and efficiently from the benefit of a fast connection.  It is discussed that the use of a telephone in the 1930’s was viewed as an essential commodity in American life.  It’s rather astonishing that the Internet is not viewed in a similar light and provided to underprivileged citizens as telephone service is. 

One important thing mentioned in the text concerning education was the sheer vastness of resources available on the Internet.  The chapter mentioned a vision of the future in which teachers could easily recommend software programs, lessons, units, and other resources to each other openly, freely, and easily.  One of the most frustrating things with the Internet is the sheer vastness of it’s size.  There are many wonderful resources available for educators presently but where to find them is another obstacle and can be incredibly frustrating.  How is one suppose to know about a wonderful resource if they don’t know that it exists?  I think it is extremely important that changes be made to assist educators in finding valid information and resources to provide their students so that the instructor’s time can be used more efficiently and the students can be exposed to a variety of learning. 

The text also mentioned the importance of assistive technologies to improve the learning process for students.   These programs would pay attention to how students learned and make recommendations to assist them based upon their preferences and learning style.  As technology, laws, and procedures constantly change, perhaps this sort of technology is one that would benefit multiple users outside of the school.  If this sort of a program were to be adapted for corporations, the training process could become much easier and more cost efficient for companies.  One of the most frustrating aspects of training, is loosing employees after they have completed the training process and have been paid to do so.  If there were a way to reduce employee turnover and save money on the training process by catering the experience to the needs of the learner I think that this would be a highly desirable product.

Chapter eight discusses the multiple technological problems that teachers and their schools are faced with.  These problems might be a result of technology growing at the speed of light or as commonplace as troubles with funding and financially supporting technology systems.  The authors specifically targeted the issue of the increase in students who do not speak English as their primary language.  As students who fit this description increase, the opportunity to assist them linguistically increases as technology improves.  The key to successfully using technology to assist these students, is to ensure that the instructors are using proper assessment.  The students must be engaged in a dialog that is useful and meaningful to them so that they can make connections and gain a deeper understanding of the English language. 

The authors also mentioned assistive technology.  I feel that assistive technology is a field that grows exceedingly fast.  When I was first interested in becoming a teacher, I observed a classroom with a student with special needs using an electronic lap keyboard.  The student would type assignments with the keyboard due to poor hand writing or poor pencil coordination.  The keyboard would save the student’s input and either print it or transfer the information to a computer.  Now this former assisstive technology would seem clunky, awkward, and out of date.  Keyboards have evolved and decreased significantly in size.  As a future educator, it will be important to stay informed in regards to assistive technology applications that may help students who are struggling in my courses.

The book also mentioned the use of electronic portfolios.  It seems as though electronic portfolios are all the rage for education majors but perhaps their popularity needs to be felt in every discipline.  These tools would forever serve students as they transition from school to employment opportunities.  Paper and contact information can be lost or damaged.  However, electronic information can be saved to a website or Internet file space and kept forever.  The developmental experiences of high school students should be photographed and summarized electronically to assist the students in the future.  I think any employer would be impressed with a student who could navigate to their resources online and manipulate the web in a way that displayed their digital talents.

Chapter seven discusses critical Internet safety issues that many educators and administrators struggle to deal with.  One of the major issues concerning Internet safety is the use of copy righted materials.  Many students are uncertain of the laws protecting these objects and violate copy right laws out of ignorance.  Another major concern is the existence of online predators.  These individuals seek personal information about students for piracy or perverted intentions.  Schools who allow students access to the Internet are required by law to protect students from such individuals.  Unfortunately, protecting anyone from harmful Internet threats is an enormous and oftentimes difficult task.  The Internet is ever changing and evolving.  Often, security measures that are established can be over come by advanced coding (hacking) or other measures.  There is also the issue that sheltering students too much from problems they will face outside of school fails to prepare them for such issues.

As a future business educator I am highly concerned with Internet protection and the harms of it’s restriction.  It can be very frustrating as an educator to find resources that you wish to show your students but you cannot access these materials from your classroom because the side is block.  It is my plan to work hard to develop a strong relationship with the technology administrator for my classes.  As I gain the support and trust of this individual it will be possible for certian sites which might be restricted such as YouTube, to have temporary access permitted.  I also want to know what it is about Internet security and my students that I don’t know.  What I mean by saying this is that often times students find ways of getting around the preventative measures that are enforced in the school system.  Sometimes this even occurs without the instructor of the course ever being aware that it has happened.  By friending the technology coordinator for my school, I will be able to ask this individual what techniques the students are using to break school policies and what I should watch for to prevent this from occurring.

 As previously mentioned, the real world is not censored.  Company websites encourage customer feedback and usage of their sites to build upon the brand image in consumer’s minds.  For this reason, it might be tricky to monitor the usage of e-commerce sites and student security.  It is important that students have access to such sites and that they are familiar with the different aspects of a company site and how to use them.  Yet, getting to some of the features available at these sites might be tricky when dealing with school firewalls and other protective instruments.

I choose a presentation titled Online Student 2.0 e-remite or e-xhibitionist? by Eva R. Fahraeus. Through her presentation she discusses the expectations students have of teachers and librarians in the web 2.0 community. She also discusses the potential risks with working with 2.0 sources including false sources, inaccurate sources, and sources which might not be available for access at your school. The presentation explains that it is the responsibility of the educator to inform students about the risks of technology and to inspire the students to create their own original dialogue. Many of the tools we have used in class are discussed in this presentation including blogs, wikis, rss feeds, social bookmarks, and virtual worlds. The presentation concludes with the statement that it is the responsibility of the teachers to excite and explore these new tools. I liked this presentation because it had a positive message and it offered further suggestions for using these technologies in the classroom. I also thought the creator of this presentation was an interesting person because she has conducted research in the field of information technology and has published several articles and books.

The article I choose to read was titled “Fostering Self-Efficacy through Time Management in an Online Learning Environment”.  This article was written by Krista P. Terry and Peter E. Doolittle.  The authors were interested in the self efficacy and self regulation skills of high level learners.  They wanted to determine if a study could be conducted where participants in the study could use feedback as a form of reinforcement to enhance their self efficacy and self regulatory abilities.  It was very important to the authors to use high performing students for the study.  Thus of the 64 students involved in the study 55 of them were graduate students.  The participants of the survey were asked to document how much time they had planned to spend sleeping, studying, working, and for personal matters.  Then once, the allotted day had passed that the participants had planned for they had to document whether or not they had met this goal.  As the participants documented their progress they received feedback concerning how well they had served their goal. 

As the study progressed the participants did report that the use of their time became more easy to manage and they began to track very closely to the predetermined goals they had established for themselves.  The study did not conclude that the feedback offered by the authors had assisted these students in a positive way.  Thus the feedback provided in the study did not change the way the students felt about themselves or their performance even though the students did achieve growth in their time management skills. 

I believe that it was perhaps a mistake to involve graduate level participants in the study as the majority.  If I were conducting a study on self efficacy I would want to include secondary and beginning post secondary students in my study.  The authors reported that the average age of survey participants was roughly 31 years old.  Students who have reached graduate school and have reached this age are typically very aware of their self image. If the study were to use younger participants who are perhaps more susceptible to feedback and criticism, I believe that the feedback would have been more influential on the student’s self image.

Chapter six discusses the effect of administrators on school technology.  Administrators decided what technology schools can and cannot have access to and fight for funding to have multiple technologies in the classroom.  Many school administrators are excited about creating school blogs or wikis where teachers and parents have more open communication.  Teachers are able to instantly inform all students and parents of upcoming events or assignments due to publishing updates to all users.  These tools help support school pride and successes through keeping students and parents informed and active.  The biggest strain on administrators concerning technology advancements is the cost.  Not only can the initial price of implementing technology be quite costly for a district but, these tools cost money to maintain into the future as well.  The text suggests investing time into researching open source technologies as a potential solution.  However, they do caution that this is no easy task and much self training and research is necessary to be successful at implementing these sources. 

I think it’s awesome that teachers are able to display student work on school websites for all parents to see.  So often kids go home and their parents ask them “what did you do in school today?” and the student responds with minimal effort and will groan at the question.  Creating a way for teachers to continuously update and show parents what is going on in their classrooms pulls the parents into the experience.  It creates a channel for parents  into your classroom and this can buy you favor as an educator in the eyes of the parent.  When the parents see projects and updates on their children, they will feel curious, proud, and vested in your classroom. 

I feel it is equally important for administrators to reach out to their local businesses for technology advice and support.  The purpose of schools is for the betterment of society and the establishment of a competent workforce.  Schools are often on the laggard end of adapting new technologies and it is important for administrators to make connections to improve this trend.  Schools are a business themselves and it is always important for businesses to understand their industry.  By creating a technology advisory panel composed of local tech-savvy business officials, administrators will have a source to use for direction, advice, or feedback on specific technologies that might be worthwhile to adapt in their own school system.

It is easy to see that technology in schools is not reaching it’s full potential as mentioned in the beginning of the chapter.  I agree with the chapter that the cause of this is due to the lack of experience teacher have in creating relevant items.  Often times the teachers are asked to understand the technology and the purpose it serves but, they are not challenged to create something for their personal classroom through the introductory technology.  As a future business educator I am nervous about the lack of technological experience other teachers I might be working with will posses.  I have observed my mentor teacher being bombarded with multiple requests a day to perform simple technological tasks for other instructors who simply don’t know how.  I wonder if it would be more beneficial for me to make an appointment with that instructor and walk them through my actions step by step so that they can observe and take notes on the tasks I perform for them.  I would then provide the other instructor an opportunity to perform the same tasks and explore the technology with me present.  I think that educators helping fellow educators is a great start to increasing the productivity of technology in classrooms.  It maybe more time consuming in the short run to train other educators but you are providing them with multiple potential future benefits once they can work independently and freely. 

Many businesses use technology at a much larger capacity and are more successful in adapting these sources than educational systems.  I feel that this is because the relevancy for the task is perhaps more apparent when in a job setting.  Training is mandatory and the trainees are shown exactly how they will use technology to benefit them directly.  If educators who are learning new technologies for their classrooms could be shown authentic applications for the content they were learning I believe the adaptation rate would be much higher and match that of modern businesses.