Hi Jim --
Here is my challenge! When thinking about learning, I began to think about assessment. Under teaching media, there is drill and practice. I did some research last year on the Computer Adaptive Test that ACT and ETS now use for the ACT, SAT and GRE. It's is and it isn't a drill. Once you start missing questions in a section, you're out! It doesn't let you past the level it thinks that you are at.
Well, that is not exactly a learning environment, but it is one related to learning. Then I took it one step further. There is Adaptive Technology for persons with disabilities -- this includes possibly an overlooked section of data access as well as communication including braille readers/printers, voice recognition/talking computer devices -- all ways to communicate information to the computer as well as to the user. It is control of equipment but does not fit into the Media for Construction section. Another example is Intelligent tutoring systems -- using AI to see where a students strengths and weaknesses are and adapting educational software to their learning styles -- perhaps this will further come to realization as we begin to move into what researchers are now hypothesizing as a "post-literate" society.
If this were to be a new section, I would call this "Media for Liberation." Hope this is in the ballpark of what you are looking for!
Oh hey! Here's a cool site on issues in the design of cognitive multimedia systems at Georgia Tech: http://www.cc.gatech.edu/faculty/ashwin/projects/cognitive-multimedia/
Michelle
D. Michelle Hinn
Doctoral Student in Educational Psychology
Technologies for Learning Program
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Email: hinn@uiuc.edu or Michell615@aol.com
URL: http://www.ed.uiuc.edu/people/mhinn/
Date: Sun, 15 Sep 1996 20:39:30 +0100
To: j-levin@uiuc.edu
From: rrepp@uiuc.edu (Richard Repp)
Subject: Taxonomy
Jim (Would you prefer me to be more formal?),
I looked over your taxonomy and I agree that it is a good start towards what you have in mind, but is a bit rough right now.
The taxonomy is broad enough so that I could not find any eductional media that does not fit it at all, but I did find one exciting site on campus that I do not fits perfectly into the taxonomy.
http://www.cen.uiuc.edu/Mallard/
(quote)
Mallard is a collection of WWW documents and computer
programs that provides students with a complete and customizable
asynchronous learning environment suitable for virtually any subject.
(unquote)
I think this fits under
C. Media for communication 4. teaching media,
and it incorporates all of the three bulleted areas you suggest
tutoring systems
instructional simulations
drill and practice systems
but it goes astep further in that it actually keeps track of the student
grades and stores them for teacher use.
I think an additional category is needed here for _asynchronous learning_ environments. I have heard of a few that have been used here on campus. They have elements of other catagories, but they are not limited to those categories.
I was intrigued by the software because some of my friends are taking Italian, and they have assignments on the web. Being an Arts technologist myself, the use of the web in a nontechnical class excites me.
Also,
I am not happy with these entries
Music making and accompaniment
Music composing and editing
They are vague and incomplete.
The proper term is _Sequencing_, and all of these fit in the category. A category for _Performance_ could be considered as a separate part. Other possibilities for music are Music Notation Digital recording, or just recording in general, depending on you definition of technology. Do you consider a tape recorder to be technology? I do, but I do not think it is what you are after here. Maybe the word _computer_ in the description would help.
In general (and I hope I am not overstepping my bounds here), the document seems like only a draft and tends to suffer from a too traditional view of technology. The most important part of a computer network is the people operating the system. I see too much about the bells and whistles here and not enough about the people who actually use the technology (the communications section is good in this respect). If we are to develop a system for educational uses of technology we need to examine the structure if the systen from the human to the task at hand and only then to the software and hardware requirements.
Richard Repp
rrepp@uiuc.edu
http://www.students.uiuc.edu/~rrepp
The future is not what it used to be.
Date: Wed, 18 Sep 1996 11:26:50 -0500
From: Steve Downey <downey@uiuc.edu>
Organization: University of Illinois
To: j-levin@uiuc.edu
Subject: Taxonomies Review
Dr. Levin:
I reviewed the Taxonomies of Educational Technology reading you assigned. Given their broad nature I found most of the items I thought of would fall into at least one of the four defined categories with many of them falling into multiple categories.
The only items I could think of which I didn't notice identified anywhere were computer languages. When I taught in Missouri, I included BASIC, COBOL, PASCAL, C, and Visual Basic in my Computer Technology program (along with common business software).
I'm not sure where the compilers, themselves, would fall into the taxonomies since its more of a matter of the program code's function. That is to say, my students wrote code to: collect and analyze data (Inquiry Media); create tutorials (Communication Media); display visual/interactive resumes (Expression Media); and generate graphs based upon user-provided data (Construction Media).
Every computer-related example listed in the taxonomies is a function of programming code and the compiler used to create it. How to categorize something which is the basis of most everything else is a task in which I don't envy you and Dr. Bruce.
Steve Downey
Date: Wed, 18 Sep 1996 10:29:45 -1000
From: Sun Lee <sunl@hawaii.edu>
To: j-levin@uiuc.edu
Subject: Challenging taxonomies for Ed. Technology
I keep surfing WWW, rereading the article, and squeezing my brain to find out an example of an educational use of technologies that doesn't fit the taxonomy, but I failed. I scarecely think about some games. However, if they are educational (i.e. cross-word puzzle, problem-solving type game), they can be considered as teaching media, even though they can be considered as a media for entertainment. Most examples that I can find fall under two categories: either media for inquiry or media for communication. Soooo, I cannot help but give up finding it.
Date: Thu, 19 Sep 1996 07:25:34 -0500
To: Jim Levin <j-levin@uiuc.edu>
From: k-leand@students.uiuc.edu (Kevin Leander)
Subject: taxonomy
Hi Jim,
It's awfully hard to imagine some technology that can't be argued to fit in one of the four broad categories. The closest I can come was a possible use for my old 512 K Mac, which I couldn't bring myself to dispose of for a long time. It might fall under "Media to hold papers in place on a shelf," which is, of course, an important educational function. ;-)
Anyway, there do seem to be some obvious hybrids. One I would point to is Powerpoint. It could be argued that Powerpoint would be a media for communication. However, it can be readily seen that such a program lends itself to a lot of self expression through the available design choices, etc. Less visibly, perhaps, would be to call this a media for construction, but I take it to be one. For instance, when I plan a presentation through power point, I construct my ideas with the mediation of the tool--I don't just put them together and then use it as a conduit. The way that the program lays out slide frames, permits notes to go with them, permits graphical elements, etc, is a framework for the construction of the presentation, and, I think, has very real effects on how the thoughts are constructed as well (e.g. slide-by-slide thinking is very different than reading a paper aloud).
But, in thinking about hybrids, I'm wondering again of Dewey, and how he presented these four impulses. Did he represent them as four distinct activities, or moreso as four moments, that would be closely related, and fold back on each other recursively?
Kevin Leander
Graduate Student, Curriculum and Instruction
805 W. Pennsylvania, Rm. 308, MC 024
(217) 333-6604
Home: (217) 384-0256
Date: Mon, 23 Sep 1996 14:06:27 -0500 (CDT)
From: barbara j funches <bfunches@students.uiuc.edu>
To: j-levin@uiuc.edu
Subject: Homework week 2 and 3
Jim,
Here is the assignment I didnt finish last week:
An example of educational technology utilization that doesnt fit the
taxonomy-
I have been unable to connect with this particular site but here is the
URL and the idea. The URL is apparently a collection of articles and
information about the research.
http://onyx.slu.edu/igs/contents/articles/001/0.html.
The Army (Walter Reed Army Medical Center) is using virtual reality technology for educational purposes to simulation surgery. This fits the taxonomy. However, the Army is also using technology to provide telepresence surgery and assistive surgery. Physicians are performing surgery using high tech gloves, helmets, suits, etc without being in the same room as the patient. This is a new level.
thanks, bjf
Date: Sat, 23 Nov 1996 19:12:15 -0600 (CST)
From: jonathan a moore <jamoore1@students.uiuc.edu>
To: Jim Levin <j-levin@uiuc.edu>
Subject: Taxonomy
Dr. Levin,
I read the taxonomy a while ago. For the past month and a half exceptions to it rattled around in the back of my mind when walking across campus, brushing my teeth, or whenever. I re-read it this weekend and have a few ideas.
1. Technology has been used to increase the functioning of the handicapped. By this I mean computers help those with limited functions to hear, speak, and move. Perhaps the first of these two, are covered in the taxomony, but how they fit in is vague. The taxonomy, as it is now, has "communication" as one of it's units, mentioning word processing, desktop publishing, and even video and audio teleconferencing. But these types of communications are for the communication of work and ideas, not for communication at it's most basic level - simple comprehension. Hearing aids and speech-production devices allow those with verbal difficulties to function more readily in our society. So, yes, communication is in the taxonomy, but not at this level.
Also, technology improves the movement and actions of the handicapped. This is not covered by the taxonomy. Computerized devices perform actions for those that cannot do them for themselves such as opening doors, answering the phone, and even voice-automated typing.
2. Along a similar vien of movement/actions for the handicapped, technology is also used to move parts of equipment. For example, computerized telescopes can function 24 hours a day, capturing distant galaxies, without a need to man the telescope laboratory 24 hours a day. True, this example may be covered in the taxonomy (Inquiry), but I can think of others off the top of my head. At a more trivial level, technology starts a pot of coffee for us so that it is ready when our alarm clock sounds. At a much more serious level, computer-guided lasers are used in surgery to do work that is much to minute for the human hand.
3. Computers are used for data storage of personal records and items. People keep journals, calandars, and cooking recipies on their computers. Clearly, these items do not fit the taxonomy.
4. Finally, technology is used for entertainment. I'm sure this has been address many times by your students. Plain 'ol computer games. This are not used for inquiry, communication, construction or expression.
These are my ideas. If I mis-understood the taxonomy, let me know.
Later,
Jonathan
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