Currently browsing author

Page 4

Synote, video and distance learning

I’ve been a bit quiet on this blog of late, partly because of devoting my time to two very interested but concurrent MOOCs. Both of them from University of Southampton and FutureLearn, they started in the same week. One, Shipwrecks and Submerged Worlds: Maritime Archaeology was only four weeks long, though, so having completed it, and this week’s work on Web Science: How the Web is Changing the World, I have a little more time to catch up with the blog. Continue reading →

Minecrafting Italy

Last week I set up my first Minecraft server. I’d been discussing how we might build Portus on the University’s Minecraft server, but because we don’t yet have Admin access to that I thought I ought to set one up on one of my own machines to start understanding how it all works. I say “one of my own machines” because I had planned to run it from my University Windows laptop, but I could not get it to work. Continue reading →

Playable Cities videos

I wasn’t able to get to the Playable Cities conference (for the second year running – next year, I must try harder), but handily they put a number of the sessions online at http://www.watershed.co.uk/playablecity/conference14/watch-talks/ They are quite quiet for my deaf old ears, I needed to turn them up to full both in the player and on my computer to get them above a whisper. Continue reading →

Bluetooth LE again

An opportunity may be coming up that has been thinking again about heritage spaces and narrative. This year’s Museums and Heritage Show was full of companies offering Bluetooth LE (BLE, or if you prefer, Apple’s trademarked version, iBeacons) interpretation. Most worked along the lines of “approach object/artwork with your device (phone or tablet), and a BLE beacon will tell your device where it is, whereupon it will serve up interesting tidbits of information. Continue reading →

On Minecraft

It’s been an interesting couple of weeks in which to start thinking about building Portus in Minecraft. A fortnight ago, after a consultation with my nine year old Minecraft expert, and some reading around the subject I was about to recommend Bukkit to my colleagues as as the best way to set up a custom server, perhaps using some Rome specific modifications and textures (more on those later). Continue reading →

Reading about forum participation as a component of on-line learning

I’ve participated in two MOOCs so far, one through Coursera and one through FutureLearn. One difference between the two platforms is the use of Forums. In the Coursera course on Statistics, the forum is presented as an add-on, a tool that was available to students who wished to interact with other students, discuss concepts raised, offer feedback on the course and, especially, seek help with the weekly assignments that were the main form of assessment during the course. Continue reading →