Weekly Learning Technology Digest... 16

A bit of blue sky for you after a very grey week!

So... the weekly Learning Technology Digest is creeping out of the stalls a day late.  Whoops!  Was just too busy to write it yesterday... was at the Google European User Group at the University of Portsmouth (will blog about that later) and my day was rammed with driving / hearing about interesting things / giving a presentation / hearing about more interesting stuff / more driving!  Hence... we're a little late with the digest, but that doesn't mean that there hasn't been lots to look at.

Let's get started...

• Social Media in Higher Education - a case study - though this is a US-based study, it's still an interesting read and you know what tickled me most?  The things that get liked on Facebook by students!  Apparently if you mention Friday in any post, even if it's a Monday, they're more likely to 'like' it!  :o)
• Ever wondered what happens to YouTube videos when you die?  No?  Oh, come on... anyway, Mashable had the answer this week!
• I spotted a publication from JISC which might be interesting to read - especially because we've just got an institutional license for PebblePad at the university - 'Crossing the threshold - moving ePortfolios into the mainstream'.  Packed with case studies and ideas, this is well worth a look.  Like the range of formats they're offering the publication in too - great stuff.
• Though this is a little bit 'marketing-speak', the 6 types of social media user (infographic) from Smart Insights is pretty handy.  Particularly if you are using any kind of social media to supplement your learning and teaching, getting to understand how people are interacting with your content is really useful.
• Another infographic - this one's the revolution of email - and comes from MakeUseOf.com.  Now, it may or may not be of interest, but if ever you're trying to explain to someone where things have come from and where they're headed with learning technology, knowing about some of these sorts of facts and stats can be handed!
• Oh, and a sneak peak came in Edudemic of a new search engine for scholarly articles called, unsurprisingly, Scholar.ly.  Think this will be one to watch out for - the way it ranks free articles higher than ones behind a paywall is particularly interesting given the recent debates about academic publishing.
• I'm going to lump together a few interesting articles I saw in The Guardian because there were three that I think are particularly worth heading over to - Teaching with Twitter: how the social network can contribute to learning, What is an internet troll? and if you have no time to read either of those two, make a little bit of time for Using the web for learning and teaching - a new understanding.  The last article is a really thoughtful bit of writing on the way people engage online using the visitors and residents model (as opposed to the rather awkward idea of 'Digital Natives' from Marc Prensky).  Bookmark and read later if necessary!
• 10 technology skills every educator should have - from the Educational Technology Guy - mostly I'd agree, though I think I'd swap the hardware skills for knowledge of copyright etc!
• And finally... a little bit of YouTube joy to send you off with... it's a parody video of Gotye's 'Somebody that I used to know' and... apologies for the language in places (I didn't write the lyrics, y'know!)... but it did make me laugh!

And that was the week in learning technology. Oodles of interesting stuff. Oodles to think about. Oodles of 'hadn't thought about that' moments.  As ever!

Until next week...

Sarah