King's Corner

While I drew legitimately on the article title, I think the original author chose an attention-getting title rather than the real focus: effective learning. I know I did. Few people actually seem to want to learn; they want to get good grades. Ironically, though, learning effectively is the easiest way to get good grades, so it’s not pure fraud to dangle “Ace your exams.”

Take a look at How I Was Able to Ace Exams Without Studying. This will be a win-win: you’ll get better grades, and I’ll get the satisfaction of knowing you learned something along the way.

It’s an ongoing frustration of mine that I don’t have (or, perhaps, take) the time to write on this and other blogs. I can’t believe I haven’t posted since December. But the evidence is right there.

I still don’t have time to go into depth, but I wanted to share a post called What We Know, Don’t Know, and Never Knew. It’s from a personal finance blog, but it gets at something very much at the heart of education. I often tell students, “You must be willing to feel dumb on the way to getting smart.” Too many people quit because they’re uncomfortable, whereas if you’re really learning something you don’t already know, you are bound to feel uncomfortable. This post looks at another side: the likelihood that you will continue to feel dumb, even when most other people would view you as accomplished and competent.

This is the first post in a new category for this blog, called simply “Buccaneering.” The idea comes from an approach to education explicated by James Bach in his book Secrets of a Buccaneer-Scholar: How Self-Education and the Pursuit of Passion Can Lead to a Lifetime of Success. Some people love the book, some hate it, but there is food for thought here. Learning is a much more complex thing, and yet a much simpler thing, than many in the education establishment would have it. I’ll have several posts jumping off from these ideas, but I’m hoping we’ll have some discussion around the idea of what constitutes education.

You can get some quick background by taking a look at Bach’s own blog, How I Learn Stuff.

This isn’t a new video, but it’s new to me, and has been getting a lot of attention in recent years. Sir Ken Robinson, a very entertaining speaker, makes solid points about the nature of the public education system and what needs to change about it. Take a look at “Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity” on TED.com.

Though the video dates from 2006, CNN just published an opinion piece by Robinson about the video’s impact.

We mentioned a couple of weeks ago that we are reconfiguring one of the islands PSCC has in Second Life. We’re organizing a meeting to talk about what to do with it; if you would like to be part of it, you can make use of the form here.

To defeat spammers, I’ll remove this post after we’ve gathered the input.

Draxtor Despres has produced a detailed video about how architects and architectural students from all over the world are collaborating using Second Life, and how SL even enables them to communicate more clearly and meaningfully with client. I noted the participation of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Southern California. If you’re not familiar with them, they have mad cred.

As Draxtor notes in the description:

Four leading architects from the US, New Zealand and Egypt discussed what [Pres.} Obama promised in his Cairo speech: an online network, facilitating collaboration across geographic and cultural boundaries.

The event featured was sponsored by the U.S. Department of State. That’s some serious support, however you look at it.

The Second Life College Fair is going on this weekend. (More information about the College Fair in general here.) There are a lot of speakers (full list), but three have particularly caught my eye, and I wanted to share what little I know at this point in hopes that it might serve someone else.

• Claudia Linden of Linden Lab will speak at 5 p.m. SLT (8 p.m. Eastern time), topic not announced yet, but Claudia is the liaison for much of higher ed in SL.
• At 6:30 p.m. SLT (9:30 p.m. Eastern), P Charles Livermore of St. John’s University in New York will address “WHY SECOND LIFE???” I particularly like the triple question marks; I suspect he will be getting really practical.
• If you can get yourself up on Sunday morning and don’t have church conflicts, I think you’ll benefit from hearing Dr. Anthony Curtis, a professor at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke (just over the hill!) speak about “Educational Uses of SL.” It’s at 7 a.m. SLT (10 a.m. Eastern).

All speakers should be findable at this SLurl: http://slurl.com/secondlife/International%20Schools%202/101/156/55.

Here is a great, practical post about using virtual space effectively for learning. I’m taking a chance putting it out there–now I’m going to have to try to apply it.

This is primarily for those Pellissippi State folks with an interest in our presence in Second Life.

Things languished the last year or so, as we anticipated. We were all overwhelmed with moving to a new Course Management System, a new Content Management System, a new Student Information System, budget cuts. overwork, etc. Along with others, I found myself having to track my time and energy into other things. That situation has improved somewhat, and so we are looking at that potential again.

As we’ve mentioned in other articles, Second Life has fallen off the radar of the mainstream media, but since I’ve gotten back into it I’ve been impressed with the continued growth of educational endeavors there, and the ways in which people are figuring out how to use it to foster learning, along with the serious research that is being conducted on SL as a medium for education in distance and hybrid situations. The University of Texas system, for instance, has announced a system of around 50 islands to provide significant space to each of their 16 real-life campuses. Plus, we have people working on an open-source version that can reside on our own servers and potentially hook into the larger metaverse, part of a larger world-wide effort that is likely the next stage in developing a virtual universe that might be considered Web 3.0 or 4.0.

Several faculty were interested in the possibility of SL at one point. We would like to completely rebuild the island known as WindingRiver Campus2 to make it more useful for learning, given SL’s unique capabilities. We’ll have a meeting to discuss this when we get back from fall break, probably at 3 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 23, but subject to rescheduling depending on feedback. If you are interested, please drop an email to dking at pstcc dot edu to make planning easier. Thanks!

The Fully Informed Jury Association’s Web site starts with this quote (as of today):

The primary function of the independent juror is not, as many think, to dispense punishment to fellow citizens accused of breaking various laws, but rather to protect fellow citizens from tyrannical abuses of power by government.

The Constitution guarantees you the right to trial by jury. This means that government must bring its case before a jury of The People if government wants to deprive any person of life, liberty, or property. Jurors can say no to government tyranny by refusing to convict.

You’ll find a library of information, including legal precedents and links to other sites on the concept of jury nullification. It sounds dry, and it can be, but on the other hand, it’s also solid, and has the potential to empower average citizens.