InfoQ: “Post-PC Computing” Is Not a Vision Allen Wirfs-Brock discusses the various computing eras and the change we are currently going through, leaving the PC era and entering a new one characterized by mobility, clouds, HTML and content. tags:computing pc programming [ambient computing](http://www.diigo.com/user/cpjobling/ambient computing) javascript cloud - Plagiarism | Common Craft “An introduction of the basics of plagiarism and how to avoid it, told via a story of a student completing an assignment” as shared by the Wales RSC

Minds on Fire: Open Education, the Long Tail, and Learning 2.0 (EDUCAUSE Review) | EDUCAUSE “Minds on Fire: Open Education, the Long Tail, and Learning 2.0 EDUCAUSE Review, vol. 43, no. 1 (January/February 2008): 16–32″ Cited in Mike Sharples’ keynote for Theme 2: Navigating Pathways of the 2011 JISC Innovating e-Learning Conference tags:jiscel11 jisc educase web2.0 longtail education2.0 [open education](http://www.diigo.com/user/cpjobling/open education) future toread Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Improving deep learning with MCQs and EVS Abstract — Staff and students in the UK often dismiss MCQs (Multiple Choice Questions) as being associated with rote learning, but not understanding. However one of the biggest results ever published in education shows how mistaken this attitude is. The most important aspect of deep learning is probably being concerned with reasons rather than only with conclusions. If you want to test for knowledge of reasons then you can easily design MCQs to give the facts and ask about reasons.

As noted in Innovating e-Learning 2011 : JISC and Poacher turned gamekeeper I am attending the Innovating E-Learning Online Conference during the gaps in my full calendar. Today there was a quite large gap between the morning session (on Work-based Learning) and the final plenary session on Theme 1: Learning Landscapes and I was able to fill in a locally arrange Swansea Academy of Learning and Teaching (SALT) seminar lunchtime seminar on Multiple Choice: The smart choice or dumbing down?

FASTECH: Feedback and Assessment for Students with Technology : JISC “FASTECH is designed to use readily available technologies to support the systemic enhancement of assessment and feedback strategies and practices at programme, faculty and institutional levels. A key aim is to provide evidence of, and guidelines for, technological improvements and change processes that can be used to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of assessment and feedback at these levels throughout the sector.

I think that this is my third JISC Enhancing e-Learning conference. During the first one I was definitely a lurker. By the second, I’d been involved in a MOOC (Plenk) and a couple of the streamed ALT-C events so I was more comfortable with the asynchronous forums and Elluminate and contributed more. (Though I haven’t had the nerve to press F2 yet.) In all cases, I was attending as an academic looking for ideas that I could use in my own practice: and there’s been a rich seam of good ideas to mine.

This is the first of a planned short series of screencasts that I am creating to help my colleagues at Swansea and further afield do more with Blackboard. One thing we ask staff to do is provide a receipt for coursework submissions. But if the classes are large, this can be difficult to do. Blackboard has an assignment tool that can be used by students to upload electronic documents. If provides a receipt; can enforce submission deadlines; and the submissions can be graded and feedback provided all from the same interface.

Learning about Moodle with the help of a couple of books and a lynda.com training course (which is really rather good!) Watching the recordings of Moodle Moot UK 2011 on YouTube (tag mootuk11) Signing up for the 2011 JISC Innovating e-Learning online 2011 conference Thinking about Non-Barking Dogs Re-evaluating Ning (Elesig) and Cloudworks And looking forward to migrating some of my Blackboard courses to Moodle. I have also just downloaded an e-copy of Rethinking Learning for a Digital Age and will be reading it over coffee.

It’s that time of year again. I just signed up for the Innovating e-Learning 2011 : JISC online conference subtitled “Learning in Transition”. Is anyone I know going to be attending? If there’s anyone at Swansea Um shall we try to arrange a group viewing of one or more of the keynotes?

With the hype following the demise of Steve Jobs, this news item slipped under the radar, and I only picked up the news that Dennis Ritchie has died aged 70, when I listened to the Tech Weekly Podcast of 19th October this morning. Here’s the opening of the Guardian Obit: “The American computer scientist Dennis Ritchie, who has died aged 70 after suffering from cancer and heart disease, was one of the co-inventors of the Unix operating system and the C programming language.

Today I reached enlightenment via the Ruby koans. Today I completed the “path to ruby enlightenment” with Ruby Koans. Ruby Koans is a test-driven tutorial produced by Edgecase.com that explores some of the basics as well as the darker corners of the Ruby Programming language. It took the best part of 3 days to complete, and was quite challenging in parts. But I’m glad I did it. Thanks to Charles Max Wood’s Teach Me To Code screencast Ruby Koans for the inspiration.

Swansea Airshow 2011, a set on Flickr. A splendid photo opportunity! Beautiful weather, stunning displays, decent camera. What more could you ask for.