OllieBray.com

Learn Geography for the Nintendo DS

Dreamcatcher Interactive has recently announced ‘Learn Geography’ an educational title for the Nintendo DS. According to the press release it aimed at students between 3rd and 4th Grade in the USA – it doesn’t look like there is a UK version of the game yet?

The game includes the following features:

• Jigsaws - piece together parts of a world map and learn to identify the countries within each continent. There are a number of jigsaw puzzles available for each region.

• Lessons – to help you learn about world geography.

• Timed quizzes and mini games – to test your geographical knowledge.

• Training Mode - to help you practice identifying country names and locations on a world map.

Apparently you work through the lessons as a little green vampire. I think I’ll need to see it before I really pass comment!

(Thanks to the future making serious games blog for the heads up)

Ubiquitous Mobile Computing at the Abilene University

I went to an interesting  talk on Thursday afternoon at the Department of Informatics and the University of Edinburgh. The talk was on the introduction of the iPhone / iPod Touch at the Abilene Christian University in Texas, USA.

Every student that goes in to the University gets given either an iPhone or an iPod Touch. This is bought for them from the University. The difference is that if you opt for an iPhone the individual student has to enter into an 18 month contract with the mobile phone operator (in the US this is AT&T). There have been nearly 2000 devices distributed to students of which 68% are iPhone and 32% are iPod Touches.

The university then provides resources for its students via  an interactive website that it optimized for the iPhone /iPod Touch. Lecturers and university professors also suggest and develop Apps that the students might want to download to help them with their learning. The results were quite staggering in terms of how much the students believed that the devices improved their learning and gave them confidence in class.


One of the big questions from the audience was on cost and how ever did the Abilene University afford such an initiative. It seems that the university made three very clever but significant cost savings in order to fund the initiative.

1. Cut back on open access computer suites

One of the things that the University did was cut back on the open access computer facilities that were available to students. Particularly the facilities that were available in dorm rooms (halls of residence).

After research they found that these facilities were not being used as much as they were in the past because 98% of students going to the university brought with them their own laptop. They also found that the biggest usage of the open access areas in the student accommodation was between 11pm – 3am when students were playing first person shooter games with each other!

By cutting back on and not refreshing these underused facilities they saved thousands.

2. Cut back on traditional telephone

Another significant saving was with telephone bills. As most university professors and a large proportion of students were now using the iPhone and as calls from one iPhone to another (in the States anyway) are free they effectively created a free telephone service across the campus. They also saved by not refreshing the telephone infrastructure within the University. Why would they bother – everyone has a mobile and there is a Skype App.

3. Photocopying

If everything available electronically as pdfs or as podcasts, savings on photocopying were significant.

iPhone Vs iPod Touch

One really interesting part of the study was how it seemed that the iPhone was the more successful device with the students.

This was possibility down to a number of reasons:

• Anytime, any place connectivity (and learning)

• Students felt more ownership over their phones (even though they were given them, they were still paying for them on the contract)

• Phones were nearly always brought to class and charged up where as the iPod touch was left at home more or not brought fully charged (students seemed to embrace the social connectivity of the phones more – eg: they needed their phones to stay connected to each other)

• Although it wasn’t mentioned I’m guessing that the phone also has a camera which can be used as powerful tool for learning.

Is the project iPhone / iPod Specific?

One other question from the audience was about platform and if the project completely relied on the iPhone / iPod touch. Although there were a number of university lectures (and students) who were developing Apps specifically for the Apple platform. The main resources produced by the university were all web based but optimized for the iPhone. This meant regardless of the device students could access the material in different ways.

It also means that if a more appropriate device comes along the University can easily migrate their content.

Overall a very interesting study that I would like to replicate in a school. You can find out more about what the university have done over on their website.

iGoogle Comic Themes

A couple of months ago Google released some pretty cool computer game iGoogle themes. Unsurprisingly, the Guitar hero themes was one of my favorites!

This week to celebrate the 40^th Anniversary of Comic Con in the United Sates they have also launched a range of comic book themes for iGoogle. You can browse the gallery of themes at www.google.com/comicsthemes to choose from a range of popular comic book characters to liven up your home page.

Here are a few of my favorites:

Superman

Iron Man

Garfield

Popeye

Batman

One of the great things about iGoogle is its highly customizable nature from thousands of widgets and hundreds of themes. It will be interesting to see if iGoogle eventually becomes fully integrated into Google Apps for education. The customizable but safe nature of the iGoogle themes will be particularly appealing for children and for schools.

For the moment I have selected the batman theme for my iGoogle page. Batman fans may also be interested in the location of the batcave – which can been found here on Google Streetview (link to: Google Sightseeing).

iPhone and mobile devices in education

I was asked to speak yesterday at the UK Apple Regional Training Centre Conference in Glasgow. I’ve been an Apple distinguished educator for a while now and it was nice to be asked to contribute to the conference on my home turf! I presented on using mobile devices (particularly phones) in education.

Unfortunately it was bit of a flying visit and I didn’t get an opportunity to catch up with anyone due to other commitments.

I did promise to post my slides below – here they are!

iPhone and mobile devices in education

View more OpenOffice presentations from olliebray.

If you’re looking for links from the presentation or a write up on any of the iPhone Apps that I mentioned then click on the iPhone/iPod Touch Category in the left hand tag cloud to see any apps that I have reviewed (most were mentioned in the presentation).

A huge thank you to all the positive ‘tweets’ that I received as a result of the presentation. It really is appreciated.

BETT 2009 – StudyWiz (QT Mobile and their new Google strategic global alliance)

It was nice to catch up with the team from StudyWiz at BETT 2009 and see what they have been up to since Handheld Learning. I have recently been impressed with their ePortfolio tool and think it has real potential for tracking student achievement and also for recording learning stories in early years.

The thing I really like about StudyWiz is how well it integrates with a mobile interface such as a mobile phone or PSP. They even have a nice version of their software that re-sizes when running off a net book (such as an Eee PC).

One of their latest products is QT Mobile. This allows the uses to access Quizzes and Tests via their mobile phone. The results of which are up-loaded directly to their personal learning space. I managed to get a screenshot of one of the test question (see below). You can also write your own test questions.

One other interesting announcement from the Etech Group (the people who produce StudyWiz) at BETT 2009 was there strategic global alliance with Google designed to bring increased learning opportunities to support 21^st century learning.

According to the press release from the 14^th January,

‘The newest product resulting from the integration combines Google Gmail with Etech groups Studywiz learning environment. The joint online solution will facilitate more effective communication and collaboration by enabling users to send, receive and view Gmail messages securely within Studywiz’.

Interesting stuff.

Nintendo DS in Education: Harper Collins 100 Classic Book Collection

Over the holidays I’ve be reading The Three Musketeers. I’ve seen various adaptations of the text into TV and Film (including the famous Dogtanian!) but I have never read the book. In fact, I never may actually read the book in its traditional sense.

You see, I’ve been reading the ebook of the text on my Nintendo DS. I got a copy of the 100 Classic Book Collection when it was released on Boxing Day and I have to say that I have been very impressed.

You hold the DS like a book, pick your title from the library of 100 books and touch the screen to turn the pages. If you have not heard of the book before you can read a brief description or find out about the author. The software also allows you to search for books depending on what mood you are in and will give you recommendations on what to read. It has a nice bookmark function so you don’t loose your place. You can select small or large size print to aid accessibility and despite the screen size being small I found the DS a pretty good eBook reader.

The software currently costs around £15 (current Amazon price) and contains exactly what it says on the packet, ‘100 Classic Books’. The complete list of books is here.

Now if you think about it, I think, this is a bit of a bargain. Let’s take the 22 Shakespeare titles included on the 100 Classic Book Collection cartridge. They are:

1. Well That Ends Well
2. Antony and Cleopatra
3. As You Like It
4. The Comedy of Errors
5. Hamlet
6. Julius Caesar
7. King Henry the Fifth
8. King Lear
9. King Richard the Third
10. Love's Labour's Lost
11. Macbeth
12. The Merchant of Venice
13. A Midsummer-Night's Dream
14. Much Ado About Nothing
15. Othello, the Moor of Venice
16. Romeo and Juliet
17. The Taming of the Shrew
18. The Tempest
19. Timon of Athens
    
20. Titus Andronicus
21. Twelfth Night
22. The Winter's Tale

Individually, as paperbacks the cheapest versions of these books would probably cost you between £3-5. So at the cheapest price (£3) the 100 Classic Book Collection gives you £66 worth of Shakespere for £15 and you also have another 78 classic titles to read. So, I guess what I’m saying is as soon as you start to look at the cost of software like the 100 Classic Book Collection and a class set of Nintendo DS’s, the idea starts to become quite affordable.

I think where the idea becomes really affordable is when schools start to consider putting some of the 100 Classic Book Collection Software into school libraries.

Students could book out the software in the same way that they lone a library books. Imagine, if you told your school librarian that they could have 100 books for only £15 of their budget? This idea becomes particularly powerful when you consider that the DS is now the biggest selling consol of all time in the UK and that there are over 7 million of these little devices drifting around in the UK and mainly in the hands of children.

But will the Classic Book Collection sell and be popular? I think it will at the time of writing it’s temporally out of stock on Amazon and it’s also (at the time of writing) Play.com’s most popular DS Title. I wonder how long it will be before we start to see more software like this available in a similar format for devices like the PSP and Smartphones. Both the PSP and Smartphone already have a number of eBook titles available for them – but nothing quite like this.

How could the Classic Book collection be improved and be developed? I think there are a few improvements and optional changes that could improve the product – although it would probably increase the price?

Quick improvements could include:

• The ability to change the colour of the text.
• A touch screen glossary for difficult words
• Increased titles to download

Longer term development could include:

• More pictures or the option to read the book with or without pictures (particularly if there is a children’s book version or if the product wants to start challenging reluctant readers)
• Links with audio (audio ebook)

Anyway, time to get back to the Three Musketeers!

iPhone in Education: Google Earth now available on iPhone and iPod Touch!

From Google Mobile blog:

'The world just got a little bit smaller. Google Earth is now available for the iPhone and iPod touch, allowing you to fly to the far reaches of the world from the palm of your hand. Since we launched Google Earth for the desktop in 2005, we've had over 400 million unique downloads, and people from around the world have used it to view their house, research travel destinations, learn how to make the world a better place, find local businesses, and view geo-located photos. Now, with a free download from the iTunes App Store, you can fly through the same 3D immersive world of Google Earth you've come to love, without having to fire up your desktop computer.'

Check out this You Tube video tour to see Google Earth for iPhone in action:

Handheld Learning 2008 (2of 5) – Pecha Kucha and Gabcast (an Interesting Podcasting Solution)

On the Monday of Handheld Learning I caught the second half of the "Pecha Kucha for 21st Century Educators". Pecha Kucha is similar to Teachmeet in that there are rules that you have to follow if you want to present.

The rules for Pecha Kucha are, ‘Anybody can present but you're allowed 20 images that you show for 20 seconds each giving you a total of 6 minutes and 40 seconds before the next presenter is up.’ More information about the origins of Pecha Kucha are here.

During the sessions I saw a number of interesting things including two great slots from Tony Vincent on Twitter and the iPhone. I’ve been subscribing to Tony’s Learning in Hand website for over a year now and I always like what I read. I was also really pleased to see that Tony has similar ideas to me on the use and potential of the iPhone/iPod Touch in Education.

For me however, the real highlight was seeing James Clay (of e-learning stuff fame) talk about Podcasting. At first I throught James was going to talk about a load of stuff that I had heard before. But then right at the end of his presentation he mentioned a website called Gabcast.com.

I had never heard of Gabcast before (although I’m sure it won’t be new to some people). Basically, once you have set up a Gabcast Account you get a unique telephone and pin number that you can telephone.

When you ring this number you can record directly from your mobile phone to the Gabcast website as an .mp3 file. The service for doing this is free although you have to pay for the phone call (London Number). You can download the .mp3 file from the website and edit it with Garageband or Audacity or you can embed it into your blog or website for people to listen to.

This could be a great way for getting people started with Podcasting and also a great way for students to broadcast information directly back from the field.

If you have used Gabcast before, I would be interested to find out how you have used it or similar services in your classroom.

I’ve created a quick example below:

Gabcast! Ollie Bray's Test Podcast Channel #1

iPhone in Education: Runkeeper

Runkeeper is a fantastic free application that is available for download from the Apple Apps Store. It uses the phones inbuilt GPS to track the outdoor fitness activities (eg: walking, running, cycling, skiing etc…).

It records data such as speed (at certain points and average), altitude, total rise, Altitude Vs Speed and you can view your path on a Google Map. All of the data that is recorded on your phone is easily exported to the runkeeper.com website.

Here is a screenshot of the Runkeeper data screen from half of a cycle ride that I did today from Pencaitland East Lothian out towards the Whitadder Reservoir in the Lamermuir Hills.

 

Let me now talk about each part of the screen shot in a little more depth (click on any of the images to see them bigger):

First of all, the column on the left hand side of the screen documents previous journeys that you have undertaken. It shows the most recent journey in the drop down menu. From the shot you can see that I was cycling for just over and hour and a half, and had travelled just under 12.5 miles. Runkeeper also gives my total assent and average speed (I need to get fit!). It is also possible to transfer units between miles and kilometres for distance, and feet and meters for altitude.

 

The next shot is the map of the journey. As it is superimposed onto a Google Map you switch between map, terrain, satellite and hybrid views. Runkeeper also adds little flags to the map for every 10 miles that you do.

 

For me, the next part in the most impressive. In the bottom display Runkeeper maps your speed, distance and altitude gain onto a graph (powerful stuff). You can move your mouse over any part of the graph to see what your speed and altitude was at that particular time in your journey.

Now let’s think of the educational possibilities here:

1) First of all there are obvious links to PE and Health and Wellbeing. The ability for individual students to track their fitness progress on their own website has great motivational possibilities. Links to the map also introduces improved spatial awareness for students (direction, distance, place etc…).

2) There are lots of other cross curricular link for numeracy, geography and health and wellbeing that I can think of. For example, the data that is created could be very useful as a context for discussion and cross curricular working. Why? For instance, does the average speed go down when the altitude increases?

3) Runkeeper could also be used as surveying tool for geographical Fieldwork. The GPS allows you to track distance and altitude. This would be a very interesting way for students to record long slope profiles that could then be exported as screen shots and further annotated. The survey line would also appear on a Google Map.

Any other ideas?

Off to Handheld Learning 2008

I’m going to be at the Handheld Learning Conference in London between Monday – Wednesday (13^th – 15^th October 2008). If you are at the conference and want to meet up exchange ideas or just for a coffee and/or pint email or twitter me.

I'm also speaking on the Wednesday if your interested.