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Charles Leadbeater, Debbie Powell and Tim Cowie assembled a short video based on Leadbeater’s We-think book, which “explores how the web is changing our world, creating a culture in which more people than ever can participate, share and collaborate, ideas and information.”

(Thanks to Cristóbal Cobo for the link.)

I was amazed to see Czech animation shown on the Mojo HD channel last Wednesday. Pavel Koutský’s Duel highlights the importance of early childhood education –and, for a critical approach to early childhood education. The National Film Board of Canada sums up the film best:

At birth a child is placed on an assembly line that symbolizes the passage of time. Objects representing knowledge - books, magazines and printed materials, videocassettes and compact discs - twirl around him. Suddenly, two hands fasten a funnel on his head. From now on, all the information that reaches him will be sorted, grated or shredded. The child grows up and his thirst for knowledge annoys the censors. They want to make him a model citizen, like the others who come off the assembly line. Outraged, the young man begins an unrelenting duel with the censors. Attacked by an army of cutting tools, he counterattacks by bombarding the enemy with huge quantities of information. The army of scissors beats a retreat. Ecstatic, the young man has won the first battle in his struggle for freedom of expression. But crouching in their corner, the scissors are still a threat… An animated film without words for twelve to seventeen year olds.

I found the film on YouTube (the actual video starts at around 00:51):

From the slightly off-topic department…

After laughing with Idiocracy’s critiques of anti-intellectual culture in American society, this quote from Bill Maher hit home (via Crooks and Liars):

Maher: “New rule, politicians must stop saying, ‘the American people are smarter than that.’ No they aren’t! If the Bush era has taught us anything, it’s that voters want a president carved in their own image. Someone who doesn’t like to read or believe anything he’s told, and is easily distracted by bright, shiny objects.”

The good news is that a new chief executive is coming, providing an opportunity to break from anti-intellectual variants of populism. Why aren’t education leaders talking about what to do when our next president enters office?

You don’t need to understand Mandarin to know what’s going on in these commercials. The videos seem to stream slowly from these Chinese YouTube equivalents, so you may want to brew a pot of coffee as they load. Believe me, it’s worth the wait.

First, a collection of Ozing (好记星) commercials:

Then, the infomercial:

The Chinese are embracing mobile learning (m-learning) devices, and the manufacturer’s use of Dashan (AKA Mark Rowswell) as a pitchman conveys the impression that the West is using devices like this already. On the contrary –we confiscate these things at the school door! Is it too late for the West?

(Make sure to read my previous post on the Ozing V99.)

Following-up from yesterday’s post on the characteristics of co-seminars, here’s a taste of what they look like.

This joint co-seminar, organized between the University of Minnesota, FLACSO-México, FLACSO-Chile and the Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja is an “open seminar” – that is, with permission from the students and collaborating institutions, all course content and most of the interactions are available online through the course content management system and blogs for each of the participating institutions (see the class blogs for UMN, FLACSO-Mex, FLACSO-Chile, and UTPL).

The four institutions connected each work through a different syllabus, but we meet virtually to discuss intersecting points of interest related to various knowledge formats, knowledge management, etc. In this co-seminar, we chose to post mini-lectures online, which are available in both English and Spanish (see Spanish and English examples of this week’s video). Students then bring their questions to a bi-weekly video conference (and Skypecast) for discussion. To compensate for instances where technology breaks down, podcasts of recorded discussions are made available for download, and instructor responses students’ questions are made available as YouTube or Google Video:

So, what makes co-seminar experiences different from other online or in-person learning options? I’ll post more reflections as the seminar continues, but several key areas have already emerged:

1. Student work (posted on the blogs) is phenomenally improved over what typically is produced in courses. What has been posted so far in the past two weeks has been refreshing in terms of thoughtfulness and academic scope – is this because they know other people are viewing and reviewing their writing as professional work?
2. Without a shared, core “empirical reality” of what knowledge is among the cultures represented, participants at each institution are beginning to learn to embrace and attend to the chaos and ambiguities that emerge in such a course.
3. The amount of coordination among international partners required by instructors is tremendous –but, it’s all worthwhile as we are all learning new things and making new contacts.

More on co-seminars coming up over the next few months…

Johnny Chung Lee at Carnegie Mellon University created a couple innovative uses for the relatively cheap Nintendo Wii Remote. Most impressively, by combining a Wiimote, an LCD projector, and a little C# programming, he created a low-cost, multi-touch whiteboard system:

More (including videos of other cool stuff you can do with your Wii) at his project page…

Version 2.0 of the open seminar/co-seminar “From information to innovative knowledge: Tools and skills for adaptive leadership” kicked off this evening with its first meetings. The second version of this training program continues the main characteristics of co-seminars: international, bilingual, and supported with Web 2.0 technologies. The course is designed to enhance learning, utilizing methodologies based on the principles of collective intelligence, troubleshooting in complex environments, and the intelligent and purposive use of information technology.

More at the Open Seminar 2.0 website (View English translation)…

The co-seminar “From information to innovative knowledge: Tools and skills for adaptive leadership” begins this Thursday evening. Our first open conference with three FLACSOs and UTPL will take place on January 31, and additional conferences will take place every other Thursday evening through May. Minnesota students can contact us for details on the course and for information on how to register.

Read the background story…

(Thanks to Darwin Hendel for passing this along.)

This post is a little bit off topic, but it’s good to point out excellent examples citizen journalism –or Journalism 2.0. Many civil service workers at the University of Minnesota are on strike. One of our picketing colleagues, Tom Elko, posted an excellent video of his observations over the past week:

More at Tom’s blog…