No more playing at geek, got to keep going.

Todays mission - install Virtual Box and emulate the XO - I want to be able to use the Sugar operating system on my Mac (for days when I don't have an XO stashed in my bag - rare as those days are) and I want to be able to show others how easy it is to do. 

step 1 - virtual box downloaded from virtualbox.org - tick

step 2 - download Sugar ISO image from ftp://rohrmoser-engineering.de/pub/XO-LiveCD/ - tick

step 3 - see whether I can use results of step 1 and step 2 in a productive way - doh! ok, might need to do a bit more reading first...I will have to finish this tomorrow

So here I must apologise. I have been having all the fun and not sharing my learnings as I go. I will give myself a virtual slap on the back of the hand and start blogging again. Anyone who notices I slacken off again should email, twitter or skype me another virtual slap on the back of the hand, or try some positive motivational method to get me to share what I have been and am doing.

MoodleMoots:

I have had the extreme pleasure of attending MoodleMoots in: Brisbane Australia; Napier New Zealand; Rome Italy; Barcelona Spain. I presented at two of these moots and ran one full day workshop for  teachers new to using Moodle. My presentations were based on inspiring teachers to find creative and engaging ways to use some of the Moodle tools; I focused on glossaries and databases in Moodle and we tried some activities in the presentations that might help teachers to see the possibilities with these examples. Slideshare has a copy of my presentation (setting the scene) and a sprinkling of the examples and ideas are on the elearning school site. 

I took many photos at the MoodleMoots and around the areas I travelled, so you are welcome to peruse and see snippets of the moments shared caught in still forever. They are on flickr with appropriate tags - try moodlemoot tag first off or check groups, that way you see images uploaded by lots of different people. I am half way through uploading my images (as there are hundreds) but they will all be there within the week. 

More blogging to come!

Email: tabitha@learning.ac.nz

Twitter: tabitharoder

Skype: tabitharoder

All the flights are worth it. All the cramped space of aeroplanes, the lack of sleep, the time it takes in the air to get to the other side of the world. IT IS WORTH IT. The sights I have seen in my first day in Rome bring water to my eyes just with the thought.

I cannot sleep, woke up at 5am with excitement. At 6.30am I have given up trying to stay in bed in the Hotel Olly, so I have wandered downstairs and am using the hotels computer to update the world on what I have done so far, and to help me wait out the half an hour to sunrise.
We wandered ancient rome yesterday. Wow! I cant believe I just wrote that. We had an espresso (where we were told by our wonderful Italian host, no you cant add sugar if you are to taste the coffee, and that was actually good advice) and then walked around the Colesseo, then Casa de Augusto. We visited some beautiful little churches. We went into a little museum, could be that we were in Palatino but I am not sure. We took in the views from the gardens at the top of the ancient ruins- wow! I was almost in tears with the beauty of where I am, every time we saw another stunning view I was overwhelmed. Just writing about these views makes my eyes water. You just cannot believe what you are seeing.
We had dinner in a little place on an out of the way side street. We didnt want to go to a tourist place as suggested in the guide book but go somewhere random and try out ordering in Italian. We had pizza proscuitto e funghi, tortellini, vino blanco (it was a bubbly white wine that was quite refreshing and light) and tried an italian beer. Gorgeous food and the chef was quite funny. I could so easily live here! 
I think I am in shock. You see the labour that went into the buildings and the paintings, and it is just awesome.
All camera batteries are charged up for photos today (since yesterday the battery died at sunset). You can tell just how much this place impacts, as we didnt touch any laptops for most of the day! ;-p
Oh, that is right, I am here for the Moodle Italy International Conference... lucky we have another day to explore first.

I am on my way to Italy for the moodlemoot based in Rome this week. Departed from Wellington at 6am this morning, landed in Melbourne at 8am and spent the day with some friends trying to get some fresh air before the next leg of flights. Sitting in the Qantas lounge in Melbourne now waiting to fly to Singapore on to London on to Rome. I was tired before we left but hope that with some sleep on the flights I will be full of energy on arrival in Rome at lunch time on Sunday.

I took the first flight as an opportunity to learn about different engines in aeroplanes, bit of an accidental conversation, and aerodynamics (as we were sitting over the wing).

I have to say it is great that there is such a thing as club lounges in airports as without these I would miss the internet wherever I fly!

 I will have to learn how to disable wireless on the XOs today so that I can keep using these OLPC machines on the plane - good chance to play without interruptions. Failing that I have a few things to read: newspaper, Times magazine, and a book; Peopleware -productive projects and teams by Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister.

Or I will just sleep. ;-p

http://www.slideshare.net/tabitharoder/glossaries-and-databases-p

At a keynote by Martin Dougiamas at MoodleMootNZ08, Martin gave us his idea of the ten steps that teachers progress through using a LMS.

Step 1: "Put the handouts online" - teachers first try to digitise their resources.

Step 2: Create Passive forums - forum just sit there waiting for student activity. Not driven.

Step 3: Start using assignments and quizzes. Basic assessment tools and simple online activity.

Step 4: Start creating better content (wiki, glossaries, databases, etc) this is also the start of student driven content.

Step 5: serious forum use kicks in. No longer passive but teacher driven. Becomes active rather than passive.

Step 6: We start to see activities moving from stand alone to being part of a sequence.

Step 7: Teachers think deeper about the learning activities and how they are deployed. More engaging activities created.

Step 8: start to conduct more effective review of the education process through the use of surveys.

Step 9: Use of tools like workshop to establish peer-to-peer based activities and assesment.

.... if only I had seen step 10....

So TokBox

 http://www.tokbox.com/

Bit like skype, make video calls, or send video mails to your mates, bit of instant messaging capability thrown in....  but ... echoes like mad and drove us insane. Not just hearing yourself repeated once, but three times!!  The site does warn you that you should use headphones to reduce echo. 

Still plan on keeping an eye on this TokBox though, as you can put it into your moodle course and have TokBox video calls within your course. 

Will update on any improvements.  

This video will explain how Creative Commons licenses works.   

http://support.creativecommons.org/videos#wwt

So I have been updating my LinkedIn profile.  It is interesting how over the years you forget when you did what. I had to go back and look for an old resume to work out what year I worked where. 

http://www.linkedin.com/in/tabitharoder

We are in a dry winter (despite the rain in Wellington) here in New Zealand. You might want to check out www.powersavers.co.nz to see how you can help conserve energy and reduce your power bills.

Want to reduce your power use with your ICT:

• Change your power settings in your computer to sleep or standby after 5 minutes of inactivity.
• Use your laptop instead of desktop machine as laptops use less electricity. 
• Switch to Mac laptop - they are more energy efficient than most other laptops.
• Use an energy efficient LCD monitor if you have a desktop machine. Turn it off when not in use.
• Turn off your desktop when you are not using it.
• Turn off other devices at the wall when not in use, such as modems and printers (if you still use a printer).

Standby still uses quite a lot of power, so it is always better to switch devices off. Screensavers also use energy!