Integrating a digital project into a class: Amy Cavender's experience

I'm keeping up with Amy Cavender's blog entries about her first attempt at integrating a digital project into a class.

Ms. Cavender's objective is to: "My plan is to replace a traditional research paper assignment with a class project that will involve constructing a website using Word Press. Students will decide together what the specific content will be (the general content will be “interesting and/or important figures in American political thought”), and how they want to design the site to best present that content. Collectively, they’ll decide who’ll do what piece (with each student taking primary responsibility for one figure). Since the class is small (thirteen students, at last count), we can have one project for the entire class".

I think she has a great idea. She just posted an update to the project. In her October 31 blog in the Chronicle she is frank about some of the unanticipated roadblocks. The comments are helpful too: drburlbawl says

" I find many ugrads very good at receiving technology but pretty poor at using technology for generation of academic knowledge or seeking academic knowledge. I fully understand mrsalander's dilemma/problem of having to introduce and teach new skills/knowledge to do basic academic skills.

I think I'm going to try to talk this kind of project up with the history faculty. I'm excited.

Major Developments in Open-Source Software

The Chronicle of Higher Education reported today that the Kuali Foundation is slated to release a suite of open-source software for higher education sites in August. Kauli joins other university-led efforts to release open-source applications, some of which focus on delivering mobile services to end users like students and faculty.

The Kauli news comes on the heels of an announcement two weeks ago that Lyrasis, a regional, non-profit membership organization for libraries, will supply support and consultation for a number of open-source applications, including the open Integrated Library System (ILS) known as Evergreen.

Evergreen is one of several open-source ILS' now available to libraries. Evergreen is best known regionally as the framework behind PINES, the public library service that covers more than half of the population of the state of Georgia. Other players in the open-source ILS space include Koha and the lesser-known Emilda.

Open-source applications represent a lot of promise for libraries as they have the potential to turn librarians and their users into software developers. To tinker with a proprietary system is a roll of the dice that may result in a voided warranty, but following a newer model of using open-source rather than closed software gives libraries the chance to become full partners in building the systems that they use to serve their patrons.

Until now, the lack of support for these emerging open-source systems has hampered their adoption in libraries and universities. While libraries are leaders in using technology few have the resources to be early adopters. Library directors and administrators are right to be cautious about adopting technologies that don't have a solid base of support. I expect the Lyrasis announcement to change how libraries look at open-source systems in the months and years to come.

The Chronicle had a really cool post from Jennifer Howard. She is a real favorite of mine. Her May 23 post Gaming the Archives describes the work of Mary Flanagan at Dartmouth. "Metadata Games is the brainchild of Mary Flanagan, an artist-designer who’s a professor of digital humanities at Dartmouth. She also directs the Tiltfactor laboratory, which is dedicated to exploring “critical play—a method of using games and play to investigate issues and ideas.” Talking to Peter Carini, the Dartmouth college archivist, about the challenges of tagging special collections got Ms. Flanagan thinking about whether an open-source game interface could help solve the problem.

I'm really interested in the notion of "critical play". I've struggled with what to call the pedagogy of using the Flip cameras...now I believe I'm on the right track.

Dr. Flanagan was awarded an NEH Digital Humanities Start-up grant for her work in developing

Digital Writing Labs

Well now I'm starting to collect information on Digital Writing labs. I can see one in Carmichael Library.

University of Texas' Digital Writing and & Research Lab appeals to me.

ASUS Transformer tablet: Farewell Kindle, bye bye e iPad

This caught my eye in the Chronicle today. The Transformer tablet is supposed to conquer the Kindle and iPad.

You can watch this YouTube to see how it works.

Creating a Mobile Library Website

Barnard College's Ellyssa Kroski has put together a great blog on tools for building mobile library websites. As with all things Web- and Library 2.0, there a number of services - - many available for free - - to accomplish the task.

As we look to the next generation of Carmichael on the Web, we need to think about how to deliver services to our mobile users. We know that our students and faculty overwhelmingly have cell phones and smart phones, and they are looking for more out of their mobile devices.

Services like WorldCat Mobile will become increasingly important as our patrons turn to mobile computing as a way of moving through and interacting with the physical environment. I look forward to investigating these new services so that our users will be able to interact with Carmichael Library's collections and content, no matter what device they're using to log on.

The Huntington Library has a Zen garden. Why not us? Take a look and let me know what you think. And a tea room.

We already have the ginkos.