Thursday, April 19, 2012
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Tablets
Some would find this purchase to be somewhat odd. Indeed it is, somewhat. Those who know me have heard my rants about needing a "real" keyboard. My typing skills are not the best by any means but I seem to be able to do it faster and with fewer mistakes if I can get a tactile response that's more than the whole device vibrating.
It's why my last computer purchase was a tablet PC - and mind you, I don't regret that purchase. That computer does almost everything I intended for it to do. I enjoyed the challenge it gave me to install and configure Linux on a computer with a touch screen, and for times that I need to use Windows (they do occur) I have to say Win 7 is the nicest version of that OS that I've ever seen.
But here I am, now owning a tablet. I use it for the following things:
Netflix
It has a 10.1" screen, which is large enough for anything I don't intend to use at more than an arm's length away. To that end I'll often go through a Dirty Jobs (or other show) marathon while grading student work on my main computer.
Audible
I love Audible for many of the same reasons I love podcasts. I spend a decent amount of time commuting, and good audio content keeps my mind active. My mind also tends to wander when trying to read nonfiction, so it's a good way for me to digest that information if I have someone reading it to me. The only downside is that since I refuse to pay for a 3G tablet I have to download the books before I head to the car, but that's not hard to do.
Schoolwork
The first school day after I purchased my tablet I decided to see if I could leave my main computer at home. As it turns out SchoolMax (our content management system for grades, attendance, and other student records) works just fine with any Android browser, as does Edmodo. Edmodo even has an app for that, which I recommend. For an intense "grade everything and grade it all now" session I still prefer a more powerful computer, but for what I normally do it works quite well.
Reading
Google Books, the Kindle App, and more are available for most tablets. My tablet weighs about the same as some books I've read and much less than others. One of the biggest selling points I can see for schools switching to a 1:1 ratio is the replacement of dead tree textbooks with digital equivalents. Are there more reasons? Of course! But the biggest complaint I hear about moving to a 1:1 ratio is the cost. Tablets are cheaper than most computers, and the more $50+ textbooks they replace, the better.
Beyond that, there are several apps that make browsing online content very convenient. I particularly like Feedly, though there are others with the same functionality. It has the ability to sink up with my Google Reader feeds and display them in an almost magazine style format that allows me to skim through content without the usual feeling of being overwhelmed.
Games
I fully admit it, I'm a gamer. Puzzle games, adventure games, MMORPGs, I like most categories. There are a wide variety of games available for whatever tablet OS you care to use. My favorite, currently, is Robo Defense. It's one of the few apps I have that wasn't free, and it was totally worth it.
Next up, I'll make a post about the things I don't like about tablets.
Monday, January 09, 2012
Hacked
No, I have not gone into the business of selling recreational pharmaceuticals. One way or another, a malicious entity got access to both my MySQL database as well as FTP access to my server. The links have been removed, the files restored, and (with luck), this will not happen again.
Should you encounter anything wonky or suspicious, please let me know by mailing theartguy [at] gmail.com.
(For the curious, I actually used this post by another victim to help fix my problem.)
Should you encounter anything wonky or suspicious, please let me know by mailing theartguy [at] gmail.com.
(For the curious, I actually used this post by another victim to help fix my problem.)
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Reaching A High Score Presentation
Last year I rewrote my curriculum to make it into a game, and doing so helped my students master the content. This is my presentation on what I did, as given at this year's Powering Up With Technology Conference.
PUWT Conference
Presentation (Hosted on Google Docs)
Class page
Apologies for the poor audio quality, I was projecting (using my "teacher voice") to the participants and that tended to overwhelm my mic every time I was next to the computer.
PUWT Conference
Presentation (Hosted on Google Docs)
Class page
Apologies for the poor audio quality, I was projecting (using my "teacher voice") to the participants and that tended to overwhelm my mic every time I was next to the computer.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Paper Laptop
Naturally, the first thing I thought of was the first grade kids I had been planning to teach!
Now, most of them are able to log in on their own, but most is not the same thing as all. I could have them do an online lesson, but instead I pulled out a project I had my students do a few years ago back when I didn't have a computer lab to call my own.
With some construction paper, a little glue, and some markers/crayons/colored pencils, we'll be making our own laptops. The point of the lesson will be to talk about how computers are used to communicate with others online. The end result will be a neat toy laptop to call their own.
You can do the lesson too, if you want. The printable keyboard template (2/page) is below.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
5 Rules* For Working the Social Net
*In this case, these "rules" are not unlike the "Pirate Code" from a popular movie series. They're guidelines, meant to be followed when it's convenient for you. For the most part, they've been convenient for me.
With the advent of Google+ there are a lot of people thinking (and not thinking) about how to properly use a social network. The typical behavior when a new network is discovered is to dive in headfirst and find every person you've ever known that's currently using the service.
This is completely normal. It's akin to showing up at your class reunion and scanning the room for familiar faces. You don't want to be the awkward person that's all by yourself, after all.
What's not such a good idea is what brings me to my first rule:
While the top image is relevant to this rule, the bottom one is even more telling. Mr. Dembo's a very smart person with a lot of Web 2.0 savvy and a job that centers around community building. He could theoretically surf social networks in his office and honestly say that's part of his job description. If he says something is too much, it's too much.
If you want a social network to be social and not just a noise machine, there is a definite limit to how many people you can follow and still have a conversation. On Twitter (the social network I've spent the most time on, historically), my personal limit is somewhere between 50-100 people depending on how active they are and how much time I have to read posts. Your own mileage may vary, but when I see someone following over 100 people I begin to seriously doubt that they could be following any of the conversations.
Of course you can still use your network as a megaphone to broadcast things, but that just requires more people to follow you - not the other way around.
Minecraft creator Notch is doing things right, at least by my standards. The mystery person... not so much.
A good social network is an asynchronous one. With the exception of a newly created account, you should always have more people interested in what you have to say vs. the other way around. Following a grossly disproportionate number more than you have following you - particularly when it's over 100% or 100 followers more - makes it seem like you're playing the numbers game.
What's the numbers game? That's when you've decided to treat your social network like a game and your follower count like a high score. A "cheap" way to get that number up is to break Rule # 1 and follow everyone you can. A percentage of those will follow you back out of gratitude. You then unfollow everyone and repeat the process until you're happy with how many people are following you.
(Except they're not really following you, because if they follow everyone who follows them then they will quickly have all meaningful conversation drowned out by noise and spam.)
If you see someone like the censored picture above, chances are they've no interest in what you have to say. Following them is a waste of your time and a reinforcement of their negative behavior. I tend to block people like that.
The above account was also following 18,514 people at the time I took the screenshot. It started following me while I was writing this post, and I blocked it before I took that screenshot.
There seem to be a lot of people who feel the "block" feature on a social network is meant for accounts that are vile, profane, or promote illegal activities.
It is.
It's also useful for helping to police social networks. Any network that's reached a "critical mass" of users is far too large to be adequately regulated by that network's paid staff. They have to crowd-source that responsibility to their user base.
There's a reason why Twitter has a "Report Spam" option. It acts the same as the "Block" option, except that if enough people report that account the staff will look into it to see if it should be shut down.
Don't be content to allow spammers to follow you. Report/block them, and you'll end up helping to make that social network a better place - one click at a time.
(Which of these two accounts do you think might be more interesting? I know which one I'd pick.)
OK, enough about not following - let's talk about who to follow - me!
Just kidding.
Who you follow is totally subjective and depends on only one person: you. Life is too short for you to spend all your time scrolling past posts that don't hold your attention. Every person you follow should be interesting to you. Frequent posts about mundane activities (I'm going to bed! I'm getting sandwich! I'm studying!) might be interesting to you if you are particularly close to that person, but if you're not, they're noise.
Follow people who frequently post things that make you sit up and take notice.
Yes, I finally caved in and posted a screencap of my own posts. Relevant, I guess....
Chances are that if you want to actively participate in a social network, you want to find people who have interests similar to your own. If you post things that you think are interesting, the (non-spammer) people who follow you will most likely be interested in the same things. It'll take a while for the network to build up, but it will build up.
And you won't have to agonize over what to post next or whether or not something will make you lose followers, because they're already following you for being you.
Hopefully, being you comes naturally.
With the advent of Google+ there are a lot of people thinking (and not thinking) about how to properly use a social network. The typical behavior when a new network is discovered is to dive in headfirst and find every person you've ever known that's currently using the service.
This is completely normal. It's akin to showing up at your class reunion and scanning the room for familiar faces. You don't want to be the awkward person that's all by yourself, after all.
What's not such a good idea is what brings me to my first rule:
1. Don't follow everyone!
While the top image is relevant to this rule, the bottom one is even more telling. Mr. Dembo's a very smart person with a lot of Web 2.0 savvy and a job that centers around community building. He could theoretically surf social networks in his office and honestly say that's part of his job description. If he says something is too much, it's too much.
If you want a social network to be social and not just a noise machine, there is a definite limit to how many people you can follow and still have a conversation. On Twitter (the social network I've spent the most time on, historically), my personal limit is somewhere between 50-100 people depending on how active they are and how much time I have to read posts. Your own mileage may vary, but when I see someone following over 100 people I begin to seriously doubt that they could be following any of the conversations.
Of course you can still use your network as a megaphone to broadcast things, but that just requires more people to follow you - not the other way around.
2. Have more followers than you follow!
Minecraft creator Notch is doing things right, at least by my standards. The mystery person... not so much.
A good social network is an asynchronous one. With the exception of a newly created account, you should always have more people interested in what you have to say vs. the other way around. Following a grossly disproportionate number more than you have following you - particularly when it's over 100% or 100 followers more - makes it seem like you're playing the numbers game.
What's the numbers game? That's when you've decided to treat your social network like a game and your follower count like a high score. A "cheap" way to get that number up is to break Rule # 1 and follow everyone you can. A percentage of those will follow you back out of gratitude. You then unfollow everyone and repeat the process until you're happy with how many people are following you.
(Except they're not really following you, because if they follow everyone who follows them then they will quickly have all meaningful conversation drowned out by noise and spam.)
If you see someone like the censored picture above, chances are they've no interest in what you have to say. Following them is a waste of your time and a reinforcement of their negative behavior. I tend to block people like that.
3. Block people!
The above account was also following 18,514 people at the time I took the screenshot. It started following me while I was writing this post, and I blocked it before I took that screenshot.
There seem to be a lot of people who feel the "block" feature on a social network is meant for accounts that are vile, profane, or promote illegal activities.
It is.
It's also useful for helping to police social networks. Any network that's reached a "critical mass" of users is far too large to be adequately regulated by that network's paid staff. They have to crowd-source that responsibility to their user base.
There's a reason why Twitter has a "Report Spam" option. It acts the same as the "Block" option, except that if enough people report that account the staff will look into it to see if it should be shut down.
Don't be content to allow spammers to follow you. Report/block them, and you'll end up helping to make that social network a better place - one click at a time.
4. Follow interesting people!
(Which of these two accounts do you think might be more interesting? I know which one I'd pick.)
OK, enough about not following - let's talk about who to follow - me!
Just kidding.
Who you follow is totally subjective and depends on only one person: you. Life is too short for you to spend all your time scrolling past posts that don't hold your attention. Every person you follow should be interesting to you. Frequent posts about mundane activities (I'm going to bed! I'm getting sandwich! I'm studying!) might be interesting to you if you are particularly close to that person, but if you're not, they're noise.
Follow people who frequently post things that make you sit up and take notice.
5. Post things that are interesting to you.
Yes, I finally caved in and posted a screencap of my own posts. Relevant, I guess....
Chances are that if you want to actively participate in a social network, you want to find people who have interests similar to your own. If you post things that you think are interesting, the (non-spammer) people who follow you will most likely be interested in the same things. It'll take a while for the network to build up, but it will build up.
And you won't have to agonize over what to post next or whether or not something will make you lose followers, because they're already following you for being you.
Hopefully, being you comes naturally.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-
I don't assume that all these rules apply to everyone. They're my rules that I'm trying to follow myself. That said, I've found them to be very helpful to me.
If you're testing the waters of social networking - or you feel like you're drowning in the deep end - perhaps some of these might work for you as well.
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