I just love this photo, taken by my friend Patti Kuche.
Still hanging on . . . Late to the party but Happy New Year wishes to you all!
Frost Bite
12 Jan
Back on the Air!
26 NovJust letting my faithful blog readers know that I will have Out of my Depth? Nah! up and running again soon. Thanks for your continued support and encouragement!
About time for a new post….
30 Jul
- Port Power at TIO Stadium in Darwin
Port Power warming up at TIO Stadium in Darwin, before being thrashed by the Western Bulldogs.
July 17 2010
A little bit of Moonta in Darwin.
30 Jul
Moonta House Building, in Darwin
I don’t know what happens in the Moonta House building in Darwin, but it was good to see it up there.
Martha is on the blog, at last!
13 JulAfter a week of delays (xtranormal.com is currently having a few problems) my film introducing Martha Favarolle, which I mentioned in the post of 8th July, is finally ready to be viewed. Have a look!
Why books are a “hard sell”
8 JulThis is an article by a high school librarian in the USA. It is from the Boing Boing site, and I accessed it on 8th July, 2010. It touches on the topic of my previous posting, the link between shallow thinking and skimming texts. Every day at work I teach students how to locate resources, both physical items and online articles. These information literacy skills are vital in locating relevant information for assignments – but I hadn’t given much thought as to whether the information, once found, was actually read and assimilated, or just skimmed to satisfy citation requirements.
The article is quite short – so we shouldn’t have too much trouble coping with it!
Shallower thinking? Multi-tasking or unable to focus?
8 JulI have been reading a few articles lately in newspapers and on blogs which examine the question ‘Is the Information Age making us dumber?’ Information overload is certainly not a new phenomenon. Even in the 1980s I remember watching a documentary in which Barry Jones warned that the sheer amount of information that people had to take in was becoming unmanageable, and that we needed to become more selective.
I don’t think that even Barry Jones, with his huge intellect, could have imagined the changes in technology and the explosion of information sources which have occurred in the last 20 years.
We hear much about Gen Y’s ability to multitask – facebooking, texting on the phone, listening to music, tweeting, watching youtube and conducting an online conversation all at the same time. I wonder, though, whether the ability to focus on a task is being eroded. I’m not even talking so much about ‘deep thinking’ in an academic sense – though that may be a problem – but even reading a book and being able to immerse oneself in the action on the page – or indeed on the virtual page of an e-reader. I know that my attention span is much shorter for reading newspaper articles. There is just so much to take in all the time, that I flit from article to article and page to page, scanning headlines and pictures. When I do find something that I know I should read, I tear it out of the paper and keep it in a pile which steadily gets bigger and bigger….
I’m finding it more difficult to concentrate on a task for any length of time, because there is so much to do, but also so many distractions. The hyperlinks in web pages often take me on a wonderful journey of discovery (last week I spent more than an hour reading comments on a blog about the different methods that people used to keep squirrels out of bird feeders in North America). It is easy to be diverted from the original aim of the research. The sheer immediacy and often the humour in the writing are very enticing. ‘Happening upon’ information occurs, rather than ‘researching in a considered way’.
Hmmm…. I’m off now to research this topic in a considered way.
Introducing Martha Favarolle, Managing Director of Speckled Hen Productions
8 JulMartha Favarolle, of Speckled Hen Productions, explains just how technologically savvy she is!
I made this film with the help (and hindrance) of xtranormal.com Thanks!
My new website!
1 JulI mentioned in the last post that the website I had built had never been uploaded to the web. This was because, in the old days, (even three years ago) it was a Big Deal to find a webhosting service for a reasonable price, which didn’t throw up ads all over your site. Now, however, it is Not So Bad, as my gym instructor is fond of telling me.
Now I am trying to work out a way for you to see my website, old fashioned and daggy and static though it undoubtedly is. And while you are there, you will be able to go into View – Source, and have a look at all the html coding we had to learn about, only three years ago.
It has taken me rather a long time (days!) to work out how to actually get this working, and it still isn’t… so I’ll have to have another think about it…
Background
28 JunPrior to taking this subject the main interaction I had with Web 2.0 was a Facebook page, and the only knowledge of blogs I had was from watching the film Julie and Julia. In my library studies course a few years ago I built, using HTML coding, a website with five pages, text, photos, and some links to other relevant sites. We were not required to upload it to the actual, really truly Web, so until I work out how to do that, I can’t provide a link to it.
I’ve used WebCT and Moodle from a student perspective. I have used various automated library management systems pretty much since their inception in the late 1980s, and can find my way around today’s online academic journal databases (having first cut my teeth on microfiche and then CDs).
In the dinosaur days my early career at the Bureau of Statistics was that of a Data Processing Operator on the very first ‘multi-access keystation’ in the country. Data was saved to huge magnetic tape reels and somehow, with the intervention of a whole flotilla of computer programmers, stagers, computer operations people and tape librarians working around the clock to facilitate the ‘running of the job’, statistics on all manner of things were eventually extracted.
I say all this to illustrate some of the computer-based technological tools that I have used over the past 30-something years. It is obvious, however, that my knowledge is distinguished by its disparity, disjointedness and diversification, with the exception of some very specific experience with various library applications.
The task that I have set myself with this blog assignment is to explore my own learning journey of breaking new ground and becoming familiar with the many tools of digital technology.
Outofmydepth? Nah! 