Tag Archives: reflecting on

activity

educational technology, technology education, instructional technology?

4 Replies

Interesting! right now I face myself with an new lack of focus and/or understanding. If the title of my blog is so clear: what am I doing?.

Anyway, let me state the question to the public. Is it correct that the primarily focus and/or objectivge of our EdTech group is the option A?. Being the other options also present but secondary objectives. Am I correct or am I missleading myself in here?

Options:
A) We are enhancing the teaching and learning process focusing on the craft or the art of using technology. (Educational technology )

B) We are focus on technological literacy for everyone. (Technology education)

C) We are doing instructional technology. Which might be similar as Educational technology but as difference of it, it stresses more the “scientific and systems approach of instructional problem solving”.

Clear thinking is just a mess.

Once a read that math teachers can’t teach math properly, because themselves can’t understand it. But at this point, I start to believe this phenomena is not exclusive of math.

facilitate learning?

Leave a reply

I do not consider myself, still, at any moment any language fascist. However, I can realized how my affinity to those language fascist speaking supporters increases.

In just some minutes trying to read the procedures of WMUTE , I realized the use of the terms are ambiguous. Specially the magic word “FRAMEWORK”. Maybe I had pushed myself to much with lectures in cultural and media studies. For them the proper use of TERMS is fundamental. Well their lectures had generated gray hair while trying to understand, for me, this new way of thinking. The challenge increases when I have to express myself, because clarity in thoughts and concepts are important, and I am just building them.

Nevertheless, knowing that I am not an exemplar of the correct use of language in ANYWAY, I admit I am trying to learn it. Not only as a personal challenge, also on account of realizing the importance of it for clear communication and thinking.

But oh gosh!!!! the actual type of lectures do not really facilitate my learning process and understanding. Or maybe it does, while showing me clearly how important is to improve on proper and fundamented use of terms.

march in brief….

Leave a reply

Sometime ago, I start to question myself for what do I want my blog?. Different people use it with different purposes. Some complete intellectual, others as a personal diary, others as publicity, jokes, etc. Still I do not have a reason or focus of mine, hence, I really do not know how to personalized it.

Nevertheless this time I want to publish with the goal of remembering. Yeap, March 2007 has been a month with many things to digest and I haven’t moved from my actual physical place much.

Let’s see, from the intellectual part: it was submitted 2 conference papers (March 1st. to DiGRA and March 15th to PerGames. Ok, I know to submit it does not imply to be accepted, which it is fine as long as we get valuable feedback. However it does imply an effort to write. And for ME scholarly writing is a pain in the ass!!! Hopefully one day a miracle will show up and I will be able to do it.

Besides that, a report of activities for my Mexican grant should be sent and reach Mexico before March was over and a trial of my research proposal for the game seminar I am taking in Tampere was due on the 5th of March. My goal was to get some feedback from the Game researchers. To close properly this month, well a submission for the Seminar of Games and Society was due on the 31st of this March.

From practical things, well SciMyst born. Yeap after some months of gestation and hard work, it came to the world in the SciFest . And without a doubt I will write more about it soon. It has a lot of dreams and research. Without doubt looking forward to make it growth. And I should make public that if it was not for the passion and effort of all the members who work on it, it wouldn’t be possible to bring it alive. Thanks to each one.

Also the digitalizing of the Seniors’ games is taking place. For those who knows Joensuu and specially for those who speak Finnish you will enjoy them 😉 Soon they will be available on line for all the public.

However from all that, the most remarkable event was that I turn to be an Aunt and also in the same month Paul went to heaven.

I am from the philosophy to do and be my best. Life is a right and obligation to be lived, as long as we are in here. And it is up to each individual how to live it. However, Paul showed me to fight with all your strength for the life, and to do not complain about the adversities. It is amazing how much can teach and give someone in just one week, such a innocent and little one, and that independently of anything else. Because it doesn’t matter of the loved surround us, money or technology anything is granted. We only have to be our bests. This is really difficult and hard to digest.

Also I would like to read again how Einstein explains relativity. Because in this month I lived on my own person how each moment of time was endless, because I wanted to know about my love ones, and the pain makes the things no easy. And at the same time so ephemeral because I was not able to finish what I wanted to do (even if I prepare tons of things weeks in advance) and that special feeling showed up too when you see some of your dreams come truth after so much effort but you can’t share it with your love ones because there is deep pain too. All at the same time, it is just bizarre!

I think I will need a time to process all these.

Ah!!! And I forget to add, I crashed the Network of the Department, they said it had implications to the University Network. No idea of the impact of my trip to second floor with my baby . As a good chaotic  engineer I made it work in the place I need it 😉 in a really naïve way, because I never wanted to harm the whole network. However, it was interested to have this feeling “wanted dead or alive” oh god!!! what a month!!!

2007 motto: let it flow.

Leave a reply

After some time, today is the first relax day that I feel as enjoying in internal peace from 2007, even if I keep myself in moving chaos (part of my nature). And suddenly ZAS!!! I realized that January is gone! I should be getting REALLY old, because each time life goes faster.

Nevertheless, since last year’s end, and all the way through this January, a big amount of questions have arisen to my brain: What? Where? Why? When?… related with all the topics of my life.

On the other hand, we (some friends and me) always have a motto of a year and this 2007 is: let it flow.

As a conclusion of this post I can say that little by little I realized how important is not only to know what we want to know, to organized ourselves and prioritized on what we are doing, and do it of course, but also to self-regulate us all the time. In here my W’s questions jump. Like Which one is the “meaning” of my blog or Why even I want to blog (because I do not blog that often :/). But while this “philosophical” process is taking place in some hidden part of my brain or being, I want to keep enjoying life and let it flow.

Interesting, right? be aware of the obvious?.

Let’s see which surprises offer to us our 2007

complex systems

3 Replies

While trying to create a couple of  game  workshops for the following fall, one for kids and the other one for seniors’ club. Looking for quality in them and a nice product at the end supported with what it has been read until now, meaning looking for a framework, etc. Surprisingly, the bigger challenge right now it is into the kids design versus the seniors.

Strange, at first point of view, for myself, mainly because I have several years of experience working with little ones (2-10 years old) quiet smoothly. But then I realized in here I am thinking on 12+, which means: teenagers! and the story changes with this fact 😉 that is a tricky one!.

Because when thinking of them, they present an ocean of possibilities for themselves and for the world itself, but how to stimulate properly their “virgin” creativity, to trigger the motion that allows them to move by themselves in an enjoyable way, that is already a challenge itself. Now, focusing on my topic of games, they are already “playing” digital games, and they are merged into this Information Society, as some authors call it, maybe since they had born, at least some of this modern kids, which implies they have higher expectations into the topic already. On the other hand there are some no-IT-knowledge that should be impulse as well. Plus their skills are developing, which implies be careful with their ZPD is key. This list can continue with SEVERAL points.

In here, one quote of Mihaly Csikszentimihalyi enclose all this quiet well: “The more complex any system, the more room it leaves open for alternatives, and the more things can go wrong with it.

This can apply for EVERYTHING. In this case, he correlates it with the evolution of the mind: “as it has increased its power to handle information, the potential for inner conflict has increased as well. When there are too many demands, options, challenges, we become anxious; when too few, we get bored”.

And believed it or not, for those who have teenagers, or are close with teenagers, might agree with me that they are really  explosive  complex systems to work with. Oh well!!!, part of the challenge 😉 and looking for a successful output of this game.

Simple is beautiful, a gold rule. But how to get the proper merge or balance of this simplicity embedded into this complexity, that is one of my constant questions.