The web has been highly social since it began (listservs, Usenet groups, discussion software, groupware etc)
Web 2.0 breaks “away from the notion of the Web as book, they are predicated on microcontent. Blogs are about posts, not pages. Wikis are streams of conversation, revision, amendment and truncation.”
“Like social software, microcontent has been around for a while. Banner ads, for example, are often imported by one site from another directory. Collaboratively designed web pages sometimes aggregate content created by different teams over a staggered timeline”
“Openness remains a hallmark of this emergent movement, both ideologically and technologically”
“Openness and microcontent combine into a larger conceptual strand of Web 2.0, one that sees users as playing more of a foundational role in information architecture” (tagging)
“How can social bookmarking play a role in higher education?… First, they act as an “outboard memory”, a location to store links that might be lost to time, scattered across different browser bookmark settings or distributed in e-mails, printouts and Web links.
Second, finding people with related interests can magnify one’s work by learning from others or by leading to new collaborations. Third, the practice of user-created tagging can offer new perspectives on one’s research, as clusters of tags reveal patterns (or absences) not immediately visible by examining one of several URLs.
Fourth, the ability to create multi-authored bookmark pages can be useful for team projects, as each member can upload resources discovered, no matter their location or timing. Tagging can then surface individual perspectives within the collective. Fifth, following a bookmark site gives insights into the owner’s (or owners’) research, which could play well in a classroom setting as an instructor tracks students’ progress. Students, in turn, can learn from their professor’s discoveries. ”
Wikis, blogging and RSS are good. (He says more but you surely know this stuff by now
The reverse chronological nature of Web 2.0 is particularly good for queries on current events.
Potential issues – copyright, network security when hosted on local networks, stability/longevity of service providers, preservation of useful pieces of microcontent, corporate buy-ups
Some interesting ideas in this one, much more based in what is happening rather than the hype of what might come.
In which the usually slightly curmudgeonly Stephen Downes jumps on the 2.0 bandwagon and rides it for all it’s worth.
“Where we are now
In general, where we are now in the online world is where we were before the beginning of e-learning [1]. Traditional theories of distance learning, of (for example) transactional distance, as described by Michael G. Moore, have been adapted for the online world. Content is organized according to this traditional model and delivered either completely online or in conjunction with more traditional seminars, to cohorts of students, led by an instructor, following a specified curriculum to be completed at a predetermined pace.”
If it’s online, can’t the learners access any and all of the material when and where they want?
“One trend that has captured the attention of numerous pundits is the changing nature of Internet users themselves. Sometimes called “digital natives” and sometimes called “n-gen,” these new users approach work, learning and play in new ways [2].
They absorb information quickly, in images and video as well as text, from multiple sources simultaneously. They operate at “twitch speed,” expecting instant responses and feedback. They prefer random “on-demand” access to media, expect to be in constant communication with their friends (who may be next door or around the world), and they are as likely to create their own media (or download someone else’s) as to purchase a book or a CD [3].”
I.T and media literacy has seen a boom in the creation of media content but statistically, only about 1% of people visiting web 2.0 sites are actually contributing to them.
“The changing demographics of the student population and the more consumer/client-centered culture in today’s society have provided a climate where the use of student-centered learning is thriving” [6]. Learning is characterized not only by greater autonomy for the learner, but also a greater emphasis on active learning, with creation, communication and participation playing key roles, and on changing roles for the teacher, indeed, even a collapse of the distinction between teacher and student altogether [7].
The breaking down of barriers has led to many of the movements and issues we see on today’s Internet. File-sharing, for example, evolves not of a sudden criminality among today’s youth but rather in their pervasive belief that information is something meant to be shared. This belief is manifest in such things as free and open-source software, Creative Commons licenses for content, and open access to scholarly and other works. Sharing content is not considered unethical; indeed, the hoarding of content is viewed as antisocial [9]. And open content is viewed not merely as nice to have but essential for the creation of the sort of learning network described by Siemens [10].”
The technology might have made it easier but I don’t think it’s given birth to the attitude, I remember friends making tapes of albums for me as a youth.
“In short, the structures and organization that characterized life prior to the Internet are breaking down. Where intermediaries, such as public relations staff, journalists or professors, are not needed, they are disregarded. Consumers are talking directly to producers, and more often than not, demanding and getting new standards of accountability and transparency. Often, they inform the productive process itself, and in many cases, replace it altogether. Passive has become active. Disinterested has become engaged. The new Internet user may not vote, but that is only because the vote is irrelevant when you govern yourself. ”
If producers spend all their time among other producers, are they able to see that most people are still consumers?
“What was happening was that major parts of the World Wide Web were acquiring the properties of communications networks, the sorts of networks found to exist (albeit on a much smaller scale) in the physical world. And that the Web itself was being transformed from what was called “the Read Web” to the “Read-Write Web,” in accordance with Tim Berners-Lee’s original vision. Proponents of this new, evolving Web began calling it Web 2.0 and in short order the trend became a movement.”
In broad terms, yes.
“In a nutshell, what was happening was that the Web was shifting from being a medium, in which information was transmitted and consumed, into being a platform, in which content was created, shared, remixed, repurposed, and passed along. And what people were doing with the Web was not merely reading books, listening to the radio or watching TV, but having a conversation, with a vocabulary consisting not just of words but of images, video, multimedia and whatever they could get their hands on. And this became, and looked like, and behaved like, a network.
Nowhere is this clearer than in the world of blogging. In a few short years the blog went from a few idiosyncratic Web sites to something used by millions of people empowered by content creation tools such as Blogger and Wordpress. Even more importantly, these blogs were connected to each other through the mechanism of RSS, a simple XML format that allows bloggers to send their content to a network of readers (called ’subscribers’).
But it wasn’t just blogging. Creating an online community became a snap with tools such as Plone and Drupal. Moreover, using a collaborative writing tool called the wiki Jimmy Wales and a few thousand of his friends created a site called Wikipedia, rendering Encyclopedia Britannica obsolete in the process. Others, using the free audio-recording tool Audacity, began recording their own talk and music; this, when combined with RSS, became podcasting, a rapidly rising phenomena that is transforming what we think about radio.
E-Learning 2.0
In the world of e-learning, the closest thing to a social network is a community of practice, articulated and promoted by people such as Etienne Wenger in the 1990s. According to Wenger, a community of practice is characterized by “a shared domain of interest” where “members interact and learn together” and “develop a shared repertoire of resources.”
For the most part, though, what constituted “community” in online learning were artificial and often contrived “discussions” supported by learning management systems [15]. These communities were typically limited to a given group of learners, such as a university class, had a fixed start and end-point, and while substantially better than nothing, rarely approached Wenger’s theory.”
Other points of interest
blogs and wikis give a larger audience
blogging gives more personal insights
podcasting enhances convenience
structure comes to resemble more of a conversation
personal learning environments offer a space to showcase work
learning comes not from the design of the content but how it is used
games allow students to take charge of their learning
Overall, some interesting ideas – my feeling is that the technology might allow many things to happen but it is the organisational philosophies and culture that will have to evolve for these things to actually happen.
Gunawardena, C., Lowe, C. & Carabajal, K. (2000). Evaluating online learning: Models and methods. In C. Crawford et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education International Conference 2000 (pp. 1677-1684). Chesapeake, VA: AACE
This one is about methods for evaluating the success (or otherwise) of online learning activities and forms the basis of our final assignment in Network Based Learning (EDGI915) – where we are meant to examine two of the NBL activities we have undertaken over the last 12 weeks and see if it’s up to scratch.
I suspect that this is going to be trickier than it looks as none of the activities on first glance seem to have been overly successful if you look at them based on how much interaction there was between the students – hopefully this paper will offer some useful suggestions for breaking the activity down (as well as the interactions) and seeing why this might have been.
“Online learning designs are often based on constructivist learner-centred principles which provide more learner control, facilitate the sharing of multiple perspectives and places emphasis on individual learners creating their own meaning.”
“Behavioral objectives with a stated outcome for all learners, is not the goal of many online learning projects.
Evaluation questions:
How can we describe online participation, interaction patterns and group dynamics?
Were students satisfied with the experience of participating in the conference? Did they feel that it had been a worthwhile use of their time and one they would be willing to repeat?
Did participants learn?
Was knowledge constructed?
An additional issue to consider is that of: How is knowledge constructed in online learning networks through the process of social negotiation?
How can we describe online participation, interaction patterns and group dynamics?
“Participation analysis techniques examine the capacity of a conference to engage members and reveal comparative patterns of participation among learners from varying backgrounds. An evalutation tool we have employed to address these questions is the model developed by Levin, Kim and Riel (1990) for analysing instructional interactions on electronic message networks. This model has four dimensions of analysis: 1) Participant structures analysis, 2)Intermessage reference analysis, 3)message act analysis and 4) message flow analysis”
These methods didn’t suit their particular context, that being more of a community of practice type scenario. Message act analysis doesn’t consider the content of the messages, which didn’t help either. What did help was “we found ther data such as unsolicited participant reactions online, solicited participant reactions, both instructor and student perspectives on interaction and the analysis of computer transcripts to be more useful in forming a picture of events that occurred in the online community (Gunawardena, 1993)”
2 Were learners satisfied with their online learning experience?
“Hiltz (1990) discussed an approach to determining learner satisfaction by examining the social psychological (characteristics of the users); human relations (characteristics of the groups and organisations within which systems are implemented); and technological determinist (characteristics of the system); factors that impact student satisfaction with and subsequent use of computer conferencing. “
Generally speaking, Gunawardena (et al) found that “social presence alone is a strong predictor of satisfaction in a text-based computer conference”
3. Did participants learn?
Gunawardena et al assessed this by looking at the transcripts of text chat/discussion boards and by directly asking the participants their opinions.
“In order to understand the myriad forms of learning that occurs in a computer conference, we have often asked students to keep weekly journals documenting all aspects of learning. These journals have given us a unique perspective of each individuals learning process. Other techniques we have used are to ask students to critique their online learning experiences and to apply and transfer what they have learned from the computer conference to developing a computer conferencing design”
4. Was knowledge constructed?
“Perhaps the most challenging and the most exciting question one can ask in evaluating online learning is: Was knowledge constructed within the group by means of the exchanges among participants?”
“We developed an outline of the process of negotiation which appears to occur in the co-construction of knowledge. The outline led to the development of the interaction analysis model which has five phases, reflecting the complete process of negotiation which must occur when there are substantial areas of inconsistency or disagreement to be resolved. The phases of learning outlined in this model occur at both the individual and social level and can be described as:
“The complex nature of online learning calls for the use of multiple methods and multiple sources of data to understand group as well as individual learning”
“When used in conjunction with quantitative data, qualitative data can overcome some of the shortcomings of using quantitative data alone”
So ultimately, this paper doesn’t say a lot – great.
(At least some of the questions it raises are a little interesting – if not overly helpful)
One of the things I’ve discovered in using 3D games with people who don’t play them (at all) is that the concepts of moving and looking around the space can actually be quite challenging. I’ve had people actually report feeling a little nauseous from the experience, so the need for a very straight forward, highly directed instructional level became quickly apparent.
This is the initial stage of Playing the Game, my attempt to do this.
There’s still a fair slab of work to come but I think it’s on track.
Given the scaffolding nature of the skills being developed, it takes a fairly behaviourist directed learning approach, with each skill introduced and accomplished before the learner moves on to the next one.
Bennett, S. and Reilly, P. (1998). Using interactive multimedia to improve operator training at Queensland Alumina Limited. Australian Journal of Educational Technology, 14(2), 75-87. http://www.ascilite.org.au/ajet/ajet14/bennett.html.
Lockyer, L. & Bennett, S. (2003) Digital video cases: Investigating the effectiveness of technology-supported continuing professional education for general practitioners. In N. Smythe (Ed.), Proceedings of the Apple University Consortium Conference (pp. 13.1-13.7). (Proceedings published on CD-ROM.)
These are two papers published about the process of developing some multimedia learning resources. They are written by some of my uni lecturers, which makes this a little weird but I’ll press on anyway.
The first revolves around a package called Dual Diagnosis, which is designed to assist GPs with evaluating patients with both mental illness and substance dependencies. It includes video clip case study examples of patients attending a number of sessions with a doctor. It also has pre and post tests and a range of printed information and weblinks. There is also the ability to take notes within the tool.
Overall this is a pretty well put together package (well, at least given my knowledge of medicine) – however one thing I would have found useful was more in depth feedback in the pre and post tests. It gives you a breakdown of the questions that you got right and wrong but doesn’t reiterate what they were and what the correct answers should have been. This might have broken the elegance of the single page presentation but would have been more helpful.
“Case-based methods are considered to support learners in making links between theory and practice – specifically such methods support active, independent learning with authentic situations and interactions. (Bromley, 1986). Learners are required to analyse these ‘real-world’ problems, reflect on their understandings, interact with other learners and thus explore multiple perspectives and reflect upon or suggest a course of action. (Bennett, Harper and Hedberg, 2002). Specifically these strategies are seen to support deep understanding, critical analysis, decision-making and communication skill development”
This package was tested on two groups of GPs – one that had attended a face-to-face orientation session and another that hadn’t. This paper was written before the evaluation was complete but some of the responses to and concerns about the package were interesting – “Participants expressed concern about using it in an office setting – particularly with a patient in the office. They also identified that they already felt pressed for time and were unsure that they would find opportunity to work through the package. Some identified lack of access to a computer or were concerned that they might lack the necessary technology literacy to use the package”
This suggests to me that some people will instinctly react against the use of multimedia technology and that the design of the interface should be as simple as possible (which I think it is in this case) and probably should reflect something that the learner is already familiar and comfortable with.
The second package is a fairly specific training package for alumina producers at an aluminium refinery in Queensland. It is very much about training workers in particular processes to ensure maximum efficiency and safety.
Bennett begins by illustrating the proven usefulness of multimedia in education.
“Interactive multimedia can offer a range of benefits over traditional training approaches by providing improved flexibility, cost and time effectiveness, consistency and availability… Forman (1995) identifies benefits and values in four major areas – organisational benefits, instructional benefits, learning effectiveness and business efficiency.l Multimedia can also provide improved and more consistent testing and administration… Keppell and Richards (1996) also suggest that self paced multimedia materials offer a private environment which enables trainees to review the material as many times as they wish”
The multimedia package was designed as a supplementary resource to the face to face instruction.
“A new training structure was designed which incorporated a multimedia tutorial which could be used before, during and after practical training sessions with an experienced operator”
There was a comprehensive development cycle used:
Needs assessment
Costing and scheduling
Content collection
Planning grid development
Editorial
Client review
Revision and sign-off
Image collection
Digitising
Authoring
Audio
Beta testing
Client review
Revision and sign-off
Delivery
Trial and evaluation
“These multimedia packages were developed to train operators of heavy mining equipment and were designed to address limited literacy and computer skills through the following strategies:
the use of simple direct language
limiting screen information to a single concept
logical explanations for procedures
use of graphics to support and explain text
use of large buttons
avoidance of icons
limited navigation options (next, back, help, quit, menu and settings”
“Further development of this model has seen the inclusion of optional, full narration which matches the on-screen text and text/audio help which provides an explanation of the features on each screen. Kenworthy (1993) recommends that information be both visualised and verbalised for poor readers and that supporting audio match on-screen text exactly to allow the identification of unfamiliar words.”
Those are some particularly handy hints – the use of audio in a lot of educational multimedia resources is very underdone and I think it should be used in most places that you have text. I was surprised by the avoidance of icons – maybe this means icons by themselves without accompanying text – I might have to follow that up.
All in all a couple of interesting projects with some good detailed information about the multimedia design and development process.
Perhaps this is a display of my ignorance about academic writing but the fact that it takes Bannan-Ritland 7 pages to explain the method that she used to create this overview of academic writings that relate to interaction (particularly finding a definition for the term) seems pretty counter-productive and makes for some rather turgid reading. (Given that it only took her a couple of paragraphs to explain that there is a fair degree of difference of opinion in the writings about the definition)
Once she gets going though it gets much better and some interesting ideas about the nature of interaction are covered.
“Interaction can be viewed as a function of:
learners participation or active involvement
specific patterns and amounts of communication
instructor activities and feedback
social exchange or collaboration
instructional activities and affordances of the technology
She goes on to look at the papers that address each of these possible definitions and look at examples
Interactivity as defined by Active involvement by the learner
“the researchers concluded that students have specific goals for each interaction in an eLearning environment, including getting help or sharing information related to the content of the course, getting help on the technology, submitting homework and participating in discussion to exchange ideas of socializing”
The Gunawardena, Lowe and Anderson (1997) model of knowledge construction “relies on an active view of knowledge construction by the learner that moves through five phases, including:
sharing/comparing of information
discovery and exploration of dissonance or inconsistency among ideas, concepts or statements
negotiation of meaning and/or co-construction of knowledge
testing and modication of proposed synthesis or co-construction
phrasing of agreement, statements and applications of newly constructed meaning
Interactivity as defined by Patterns of Communication among learners/instructors
“Identifying the purpose of online messages as organizing, lecturing, humanizing or expressing opinions provided a detailed view of interaction patterns in an eLearning environment”
“Vrasidas and McIsaac (1999) explicitly and broadly defined interactivity as “reciprocal actions of two or more actors within a given context” (p. 25)… In addition, data on teacher and student views of interaction were collected, ultimately determining that multiple factors such as structure of course, class size, feedback and prior experience with CMC influence interaction”
“Synchronous communication was determined to be more interactive, demonstrating a type of discourse mimicking face-to-face interaction. Asynchronous communication was more constrained than synchronous but also more complex”
“Also in a small group context, Ahern and Durrington (1995-6) investigated the effects of anonymity and interaction in a computer-mediated discussion and found that anonymity promotes increased participation by students”
Interactivity defined as Instructor/Learner communication
“Mahesh and McIsaac (1999) operationalized interactivity as the dynamic of instructor-student communication and the actions of the instructor to encourage communication among students. Instructor time spent on these activities also provided an operational definition of interactivity in this study”
“These researchers concluded that eLearning is dependent on the personal and unique style of instructors and their activities in an online course as well as instructional and logistical factors”
Interactivity as Social, Cooperative or Collaborative Exchange
“…messages that asked questions, answered questions, provided support, clarified ideas, built consensus and contained social messages were interactive in nature. Asynchronous bulletin board conferencing provided more task-related messages and were more appropriate for self-reflection, while synchronous chat demonstrated more interactivity… and much less task-oriented communication”
Interactivity as a Range of Instructional Activities and Technologies
“Luetkehans (1999) determined that interactivity is most prominent in contexts where multiple strategies and activities, including instructor feedback, collaborative learning strategies and multiple technology mechanisms encourage student participation”
Bannan-Ritland moves on to examine the specific types of eLearning interactions identified in the literature
“structure, class size, feedback to students and participants prior experience with CMC are prominent variables related to interaction”
“teachers are more concerned about the level of participation and interaction with students in an eLearning course than a traditional one and… students stated that a lack of feedback from both instructors and their peers contributed to feelings of isolation and dissatisfaction with the course”
Bannan-Ritland identifies some gaps in the current research (or at least in the research she investigated)
“This review did not reveal any studies focusing on learner-non-human interactions, nor did the review reveal research that demonstrated the higher-level learner instruction interactions that incorporate a meta-level strategy or deliberate arrangement of events”
Some of the key findings that Bannan-Ritland drew from her review are that:
high levels of interaction need to be modeled by the instructor for students
a cooperative goal structure requiring students to interact with other students can promote interaction
Asynchronous and synchronous forms of communication afford different instructional strategies
instructor’s teaching style and background impacts course design, structure and level of interactivity implemented
small groups using asynchronous communication demonstrate task-directed behaviour in problem solving
instructors should expect to spend more time on an eLearning course than a traditional one
sychronous discussions are highly interactive and demonstrate more student control
asynchronous mode offers more complex language than synch and primarily demonstrated student responses to teacher requests
instructor or subject matter expert needed to draw out new concepts
pair advanced students as mentors to novices
promote issue-based introductory questions allowing students to develop own ideas and thoughts.
The summary of all the research papers at the end – broken down by focus, types of interactions and conclusions is the most useful part of this as it is packed with good practical tips.
After my last effort which clocked in at a fairly ridiculous 4000 words, I’ve decided to take a more sane approach and really just try to focus on the heart of these articles.
This article on possible uses of current technology was written in mid-2003 and while many aspects of it are still quite pertinent, some already seem a little quaint. There is a large focus on what might be done, less so on what is being done and it takes a slightly tech-evangelical bent at times – but it’s nice to see enthusiasm.
In short:
Edutainment is the meshing of education with entertainment
Audio and video files are large and accessibility issues should be considered
Streaming’s advantage is that files begin to play while they are still being downloaded
As chunk 1 of a file is playing, chunk 2 is being downloaded. When chunk 2 plays, chunk 1 is deleted and chunk 3 is downloaded (Funnily enough, I didn’t actually realise that chunks were deleted)
Uses of audio – lectures, guest speakers, student projects, classroom interaction, audio files, music performances, readings of language pieces,
Uses of video – lectures, demonstrations of how to do things, adding motivation/interest to content
Push technology creates channels to put created content on desktops (This has been and gone and surpassed by pull technology such as RSS)
Educators should be watchful that push technology is used in schools for educational, not commercial purposes in schools
VOIP – it works and is cheap and good for distance learning and accessibility
Uses of VOIP – supplement to classroom based e-mail pen pal programmes, good for language, cultural exchange
Web Whiteboard tools – useful for collaboration, graphical display and brainstorming
Instant messaging – useful for immediate communication between teachers and students
Handheld/Wireless/Mobile technology – it’s coming and will be bigger than Ben Hur (It’s here, some uses but we’re still waiting for the oohh-ahhh moment I think)
Uses of mobile learning – accessibility
Peer to peer file sharing – good for exchanging files (well duh) and setting up repositories of learning objects
Knowledge objects – discrete items which might be image, text, video, audio etc
Learning objects – Knowledge objects with a lesson attached to them.
Usefulness of learning/knowledge objects – breaking learning into digestible chunks.
Looks like they missed the whole Web 2.0 boat, as well as Learning Management Systems, Personal Learning Environments and a few other things.
Not a bad article for an overview of some things but definitely a reminder of how quickly things are changing.
Ok so this is my first major attempt at a heuristic – I think it went ok – it certainly helped having a structure provided (which i now know is a cognitivist strategy).
1. Interactive multimedia makes Behaviourist learning strategies more engaging.
The use of simple online games and quizzes provides positive reinforcement to learners and adds interest to subjects which focus on fact based learning by bringing variety and heightened sensory experiences to repetitive tasks.
Robyler and Havriluk (1997) point out that among the “needs addressed by directed instruction” (their term for the Behaviourist approach) are “making learning paths more efficient… especially for instruction in skills that are prerequisite to higher-level skills” and “performing time-consuming and labor intensive tasks (e.g., skill practice), freeing teacher time for other, more complex student needs”.
This has been demonstrated in a project undertaken in the Learning Medical Terminology subject at the Canberra Institute of Technology (CIT). A range of vocabulary learning exercises have been turned into simple drill and practice online games, making them more fun and interactive.
Anecdotal evidence from the teacher of the subject indicates that students now learn and retain the words more quickly and complain less about the subject.
This heuristic is useful to me as a learning resource developer at CIT as we are part of the Vocational Education and Training (VET) sector and many of the initial subjects in our courses require learners to acquire a certain base level of technical subject-specific knowledge. Many of these games can be produced easily by teachers with free or inexpensive software and require minimal technical ability to create and put online.
I chose to write about it as I am a firm believer in the educational possibilities of interactive multimedia, particularly in the form of games and quizzes. Games are a familiar, accessible and engaging medium which can be used in situations ranging from Behaviourist drill and practice exercises to more Constructivist problem based scenarios. There is currently a growing group of educational game producers – known as the Serious Games movement – focusing heavily on the possibilities of the latter.
Learning practitioners wishing to make use of interactive multimedia in the form of games and quizzes should allow themselves adequate time to become familiar with the game/quiz creating software that they wish to use. While most of it is designed with the less technically inclined user in mind (i.e. a wizard based approach), it can often still require the uploading of multiple supporting image and javascript files to your website or learning management system.
Writing reflectively seems like it should be easier than digesting and regurgitating a swag of other people’s writings into a new and coherent form, but if you take it seriously it’s surprisingly in depth.
We’re working from a new template for the critical reflection process which is being tested as part of one of the PhD students studies. (Click on image for fullsized view)
In essence, assuming I have it right, it breaks down like this.
Discuss what you are doing, how you feel about it and what you know
Discuss why you made the decisions here that you did and how you felt about them
Discuss what you have learnt from that.
So far this seems like a pretty strong system to use for reflection.
That said, the first one has been something of a challenge – this structure seems to work pretty well when you have actually begun work on something but for the first reflection we have been asked to consider our overall knowledge and skills in the area of designing multimedia and to look at what kind of projects we might undertake and what kind of skills we are going to try to build.
Fortunately I have a number of work projects coming up (particularly relating to training teachers in using audio and video in online learning) that this subject seems ideal for, so with a bit of luck, the two will cross over nicely.
