Two recent articles have highlighted popular teaching content (and the professor- stars who have created it)

The New York Times proudly proclaims: At 71, Physics Professor Is a Web Star. Professor Lewin’s course materials, including videotaped lectures are available on OpenCourseWare at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and at iTunesU.

Fans e-mail him from all over the world, discussing both his inspirational style as well as the concepts he has taught them from watching his videos. Even people who are not students have a new appreciation for physics after watching his presentations.

Two mathematics professors, Douglas Arnold and Jonathan Rogness, at University of Minnesota have created a YouTube hit about Möbius transformations; in the 6 months since this was posted, it has received over one million hits. An article in the Chronicle of Higher Education describes the animation.

We may be able to all have our 15 minutes of fame on the internet. Or, use someone else’s popular content in our teaching.

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Would you like to have your students work together to build an annotated map? Google Maps has just added a collaboration feature. When you are creating a personalized, annotated map using the “My Maps” feature of Google Maps, there is a new button entitled “collaborate“. This feature allows you to email an invitation to others to allow them to help annotate the map. For example, a group of students could create a map based on a course reading, annotating placemarks with insightful interpretations. Alternatively, students could map geological features, watersheds or species distributions. Students involved in community projects could place their own pictures together on a map.

Next to the collaborate button on Google Maps is another feature for sharing information. If you’ve found or created a wonderful KML/ KMZ file using Google Earth, and want to share it with someone who does not have access, click the “import” button to upload the file from the web or your computer. You can then send Aunt Mary the link to see your vacation trip, or share the link with your students via Blackboard. Your students or Aunt Mary do not need to have or use Google Earth to see your map.

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The Chronicle of Higher Education (CHE) reports on a new search engine from MIT’s Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Laboratory that makes it possible to look for particular terms or phrases within a recorded lecture.

According to the brief news item, users can search for terms like “white dwarf” in a lecture on astronomy, rather than browsing the recording the old-fashioned way. Want to learn more? Go to the Lecture Browser home page and search for the desired term in one of more than twenty different disciplinary categories. The search engine will return a list of MIT lectures in that field which contain the term, with links to cue up the recording at the point(s) in each lecture where the term is found.

At present, this tool is available only at MIT, but the CHE report indicates it may be made available to other universities at some point in the future.

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Amazon.com will be soon releasing their highly anticipated e-book reader device, code-named Kindle.

The CIT tested the Sony Reader earlier this year and the Amazon device has many similar features - a screen that uses E Ink technology that resembles a printed page and the ability to hold up to 200 titles. However, Amazon’s entry into the market will include wireless capability that allows for purchase of titles directly on the device without a computer and can even be used to update purchased titles with new information. It can also search through books for particular words and phrases. Amazon has several partners in the publishing industry, providing what promises to be a wide range of content.

feature article at Newsweek

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The 3D SpaceNavigator plugs into your computer via USB to facilitate moving around in a 3D environment. I’ve tried it with Google Earth, and after a brief adjustment period, I was able to investigate in three dimensions smoothly and effortlessly. This device is advertised as a 3D mouse, but it does not exactly function like a mouse. It moves easily in 3D, but its only button opens the menu to adjust the navigator properties. The recommended use is with the SpaceNavigator in one hand and a mouse in another (which is enjoyable, saves time navigating, and is very smooth).

3Dconnexion’s website has excellent videos to show how the SpaceNavigator is used. According to the website:

“The key advantage of a SpaceNavigator over a mouse and keyboard is the ease of performing intricate adjustments to camera views and models with out repeatedly stopping to change directions, zoom, or rotate models. With a SpaceNavigator you can do all three at once. “

This device would be very useful in building your 3D projects. It is compatible with over 100 3D programs, including Google Earth, Maya, AutoCAD, eDrawings, SketchUp, SolidWorks, and many others.

Other uses include:

• smoothly navigating presentations with 3D content
• using the SpaceNavigator while creating a movie of 3D materials
• Holiday presents

The SpaceNavigator is $59 plus about $12.50 shipping (it is heavy).

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Google has added a presentation package, similar to PowerPoint, to their free online collaborative tools suite, GoogleDocs.

The presentation tool in GoogleDocs is simple and lacks many features - it offers limited choices for fonts, color and layout and doesn’t offer the ability to “build” a sequence to demonstrate a concept. However, it does allow multiple people to edit the same slides in real time.

Slate has a review of the software and, at the end of the article, a PowerPoint presentation presented as a movie that summarizes the article - it’s a good example of ways that presentation tools can be used to emphasize points or clarify concepts.

review at Slate

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Google Earth has updated its images for North Carolina (and many other places) on October 23, 2007. Bostock library is now visible in Google Earth (but not yet in Google Maps)! Below,  I’ve embedded the Google Map above an image from Google Earth. Do you see what’s missing in the map?    Google Maps images of Duke were updated less than a week after Google Earth; now the images are the same.

There have been updates to other areas - Crater Lake in Oregon is an even better demonstration of the terrrain in 3D.

There are new tutorials for Google Earth to show you how to publish the same material in both Google Earth and Google Maps, including videos in your materials.

Here’s a PowerPoint presentation on including Google Maps in your website. And a tutorial. (But, it’s pretty easy - you can go to Google Maps, click “link to this page” and follow the directions. )

Frank Taylor, on his Google Earth Blog, points to several sources of images and mapping tools for the California fires.

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The Creative Commons add-in for MS Office allows you to embed a CC license of your choosing in your Word document, Excel Spreadsheet or your Powerpoint show. A big advantage of doing this is to explicitly specify how you would like others to use your work. For example, a “Share Alike” license specifies that others may use your work as long as it for non-commercial purposes, you are given credit and anything they make with it has to carry the same license. You can get the add-in or read more about Creative Commons.

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Verizon has announced the Verizon LG Voyager to be released in the Fall of 2007, a product that will directly compete with the Apple iPhone. Verizon’s Wireless Chief Marketing Officer claims, “It will kill the iPhone.”

The Voyager has a touch screen exterior (like the iPhone but smaller), but users will be able to unclamp the phone to reveal a second screen that comes with a full QWERTY keyboard. Other features include:

* HTML browser
* Full V CAST-capabilities
* V CAST Mobile TV
* V CAST Music
* Ability to play .mp3, .wma and unprotected .aac files
* V CAST Video
* High-Speed Wireless Broadband Access
* Removable microSD memory (8GB).

Verizon says the Voyager should be in stores for the holidays.

You can see photos of the Voyager or watch a video demo of the phone. No word yet on the price, but reviewers say they expect it to be in the $300 and up range. One reviewer gushed, “The Voyager is so awesome, your hand will tremble in fear.” (Maybe he works with the Verizon Marketing Officer.)

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“Authentic learning”—or learning-by-doing— engages students in the multidisciplinary problem solving and critical thinking researchers and experts use every day. Advances in technology enable access to a greater range of real and virtual environments. Why Today’s Students Value Authentic Learning, a white paper from the Educause Learning Initiative (ELI), explores student attitudes toward authentic learning, highlighting its benefits as well as potential concerns.

Haptic technologies are one way to make learning more realistic for students. Haptics simulate physical properties such as weight, momentum, friction, texture, or resistance through interfaces that let users “feel” what is happening on the screen. For example, medical students may use haptics for a simulation of giving an injection or performing a surgical technique. ELI’s paper on The 7 Things You Should Know About Haptics provides a simple overview of how haptic technology can enable authentic learning.

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