Graphical/Clustering Searches for LO/OER Information

22.08.09

Every now and then I like to do graphical searches related to Learning Objects and Open Educational Resources because I find that these searches sometimes yield different frameworks for understanding the information and sites that emerge than I get from my regular reading of rss feeds and blog entries. Recently I tried the new WikiMindMap and was pleased to see that the entry for "Learning Objects" is very good; the entry in Wikipedia for "Open Educational Resources" is a bit sparse, but not bad for starters. If you try "OER" alone as the search term you'll get not only Open Educational Resources but Oregon Electric Railway, Odaku Electric Railway, Offense Efficiency Rating, and Oxygen Efficiency Ratio.

Getting outside Wikipedia. I used my favorite graphical search engine, Kartoo. The Kartoo search for "Open Educational Searches" put the fairly new OER Commons right at the center of the display which I thought was accurate and timely.

A colleague, Dr. Russ Poulin from WCET, recently recommended the clustering search engine Clusty, so I tried it for both "Open Educational Resources" and "Learning Objects." Ten times as many results were returned for the second search term than for the first, indicating (I suppose) that Learning Objects have been discussed longer in the professional literature than Open Educational Resources. I liked the way Clusty ordered and outlined the results.

Finally, I did a search in Google for "Graphical Search Engines" and discovered a kind of meta search engine tool called, appropriately, the Graphical Search Engine Comparison Tool from SEO Tools. This handy tool permits the user to select two from among five popular search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN, Vista, and AlltheWeb) and then enter search terms for the two different search engines (e.g., Google and Yahoo) to compare their results. The resulting display shows which links are at the top, middle, and bottom of one search vs the other and what percentage of the sites overlap in the searches (in this example, 46% for "Learning Objects," 36% for "Open Educational Resources"). Using this tool will convince searchers how important it is to NOT rely on a single search engine. Highly recommended. ____JH

 

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List of Learning Object Repositories

22.08.09

This is a useful list of the major learning object repositories, divided into general and discipline-specific listings. The web pages are hosted by the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee at the Center for International Education. ____JH

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Stanford Engineering Everywhere

12.01.09

Stanford is making core courses in computer programming and engineering available for free to non-registered students. This offering is a fine opportunity for self-guided students and for students and instructors in other institutions to share Stanford's intellectual resources. ___JH (Thanks to Free Culture News for this reference.)
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"For the first time in its history, Stanford is offering some of its most popular engineering classes free of charge to students and educators around the world. Stanford Engineering Everywhere (SEE) expands the Stanford experience to students and educators online. A computer and an Internet connection is all you need. View lecture videos, access reading lists and other course handouts, take quizzes and tests, and communicate with other SEE students, all at your convenience.

This fall, SEE launches its programming by offering one of Stanford's most popular sequences: the three-course Introduction to Computer Science taken by the majority of Stanford's undergraduates and seven more advanced courses in artificial intelligence and electrical engineering."

Example:

Introduction to Computer Science | Programming Methodology

This course is the largest of the introductory programming courses and is one of the largest courses at Stanford. Topics focus on the introduction to the engineering of computer applications emphasizing modern software engineering principles: object-oriented design, decomposition, encapsulation, abstraction, and testing. Programming Methodology teaches the widely-used Java programming language along with good software engineering principles. Emphasis is on good programming style and the built-in facilities of the Java language. The course is explicitly designed to appeal to humanists and social scientists as well as hard-core techies. In fact, most Programming Methodology graduates end up majoring outside of the School of Engineering. Prerequisites: The course requires no previous background in programming, but does require considerable dedication and hard work.

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DiscoverEd

15.01.10

This Creative Commons site provides a starting point to search for open educational resources. Search results are given a brief description and identified by Curator, Education Level, Language, License, and Subject Tags. ___JH

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DiscoverEd is an experimental project from ccLearn which attempts to provide scalable search and discovery for educational resources on the web. Metadata, including the license and subject information available, are exposed in the result set. We are particularly interested in open educational resources (OER) and are collaborating with other OER projects to improve search and discovery capabilities for OER, using DiscoverEd and other available tools. Contact us if you are interested in this work.

DiscoverEd is a prototype intended to explore how structured data may be used to enhance the search experience; there are a number of known issues.

Read our white paper that describes the rationale for and design of DiscoverEd, as well as our thoughts regarding possible future enhancements that could make the tool, or other search tools like it, even more compelling.

DiscoverEd is also being discussed among participants of the OER search and discovery community. You can also find slides on Slideshare about DiscoverEd. If you are aware of any related resources, please post them to the OpenEd community site, and we will cross-post them to this FAQ as we can."

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You Tube Edu

22.08.09

This site address at You Tube provides links to video courses and lectures from large universities. It's a useful one-stop starting point.  __JH

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35 Seriously Creative Examples of Digital Artworks

08.06.10

Collected by WDCore Editorial Creativity has no boundary, no limit, and no measurement; it is basically the act of turning new and imaginative ideas into reality. It involves critical thinking and then turning your imagination into reality. There are many artists who are well-versed with converting their dreams and imagination into paper, canvas, and computer screen; [...]

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10 Disney Chicks Sexier Than Your Fav Pornstar

22.02.10

Collected by smashinglists Like everyone else, I have also spent my childhood seeing these Disney fairy tales but of course as I grew my love for them died. Since you can’t probably watch those cartoons to cherish your memories for the Disney princesses, the ten images below provide a way to that memory lane but in [...]

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