Friday, November 27, 2009

Saturday, November 07, 2009

Social Isolation and New Technology


Today, I came across interesting article and a report about technology and isolation. Both holds much of my context in Sudan. I will take some time this week to summerise and forward to others in the e-learning field in Sudan, but for now,I am copying and pasting from George Siemens, eLearning Resources and News:
"Technology use is routinely equated with social isolation. We are often told (and in turn tell our youth) to "log out and interact with the real world". Barry Wellman - with his Netville research - was the first researcher that I'm aware of who questioned the tech use=isolation viewpoint. People who are connected online often have higher levels face-to-face interactions. A new Pew Internet (motto: "why say it in 20 pages when you can say it in 84") report, Social Isolation and New Technology, explores how Internet and mobile use influences network diversity and socialization (or isolation). In the process, the report challenges most myths about online participation: most people have diverse networks, are socially connected (not only in remote online relationships but also to local online networks), participate more actively in volunteering than individuals with less online activity, and visit libraries and public spaces".
Read online

Friday, November 06, 2009

What Makes Sudan a Unique Country?


I decided to make two of my students join an international project with international educators who play as facilitators to their students to create blog posts about what makes their country unique. This project, about what makes Sudan a unique country, has been done by 2 students, Anas and Mohamed Babiker, in their second class at Computer Science College, University of Science and Technology,(Al-Tagana). They used "Ulead VideoStudio" . I uploaded the video to YouTube.