Life-long Learning
Saturday, December 31, 2005 at 10:54AM I still have a big lump in my throat after waving good-bye this morning to my daughter and family who have spent the week with us. They are heading back to Fargo which is located exactly four and a half hours too far away from Cleveland, MN.
As a last hurrah, we spent yesterday at the Minnesota Zoo, where I was left with 3-month-old Miles Benjamin while the rest of the group troope
d off to see some exhibits for about half an hour. While the others looked at exotic critters, I took a very close look at this baby. One of Miles's major tasks right now seems to be figuring out what these two strange things are that sometimes appear in front of his face and give him a great deal of comfort when inserted in the mouth. During the week he was with us, his hand-to-mouth accuracy rate seemed to go from about 30% to about 60%. He is learning. (At left, Miles is enjoying either the dophin show or his toes.)
With much less patience, Grandpa Doug has been trying to learn as well. While I've had the fingers-in-the-mouth thing down pat for a few years, I'm on a steep learning curve with Moodle. Current frustration involves inserted graphic files going into the summary field instead of the contents area. Like Miles and his fingers, I will get it eventually. I hope.
What is more than a little scary is reading a posting like this one from the Thinking Out Loud blog about MoodleBug
The Elgg gang have recently announced their collaboration with Catalyst IT to develop “seamless interaction between Moodle and Elgg”. How cool is that? I’m a big fan of both platforms, and I really think there’s a huge strategic advantage for both in this, since there’s currently both resurgence of interest in Open Source learning platforms and the political imperative for institutions to start considering their e-portfolio options.Catalyst IT is already a Moodle Partner, and hopefully the iron-clad FOSS credentials of the team behind them - NZOSVLE, will calm the Open Source communities concerns about previously small Elgg team.
I have absolutely NO idea what Andrea is talking about.
I only hope I can demonstrate Miles perseverance, optimism, and patience when it comes to learning.
Reader Comments (3)
Amazing how fast this stuff moves. I'm on a very steep learning curve reworking http://pedersondesigns.com this week. Incredibly exciting changes. I'm starting to nail down a number of design/UI issues that I have with blogs in general, especially the comments, finding related posts, and interactivity. Still not sure about all of it, but it's been fun.
Finally, I really appreciate the "personal" flare of your blogging. Among my "Top 5 for 2006" is to get a little more personal in my writing...part of that overall "story" and "building community" thing.
Thanks for the starter info on elgg. Once Moodle is somewhat mastered, I will take a look. And yes, this all moves very quickly - especially for those of us who have other obligations (budgets, supervision, families, etc.). I am amazed by people like you and Tim Wilson who always manage to stay on top of things.
I appreciate the work you are doing in redesigning your own site, especially all the info in the right hand column. I always get great ideas from you.
I go back and forth about how "personal" to make this blog. While interactions with my family, friends and colleagues definitely inform and influence my perceptions on education and technology, I don't want the blog to become a year-long Christmas letter either.
It is interesting that I get a real sense of connectedness when speaking to a group when I personalize a topic with short anecdotes about my kids. You see the heads go up and down when I mention I have one child who was an academic and one who was not. Of course, these stories go back to a point I'm trying to make. I appreciated Daniel Pink's observations about STORY. He'd dead on.
Since few of us are to paid to write our blogs and no one is required to read them, I will suit myself and will throw in something downright personal if the spirit moves. I hope you do the same.
All the very best and Happy New Year,
Doug
It was great to read your reaction to my Breif elgg moodle post. I'm enough of a newbie to be enthralled with the idea that someone is reading and reacting to my mess. I do have a favorite moodle guide to share if you would like me to email you the doc files. It isn't posted on the moodle.org site any more, but it helped me the most.
Happy Moodling!
A