Monthly Archives: May 2016

Ready Player One and the Future of Education

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Somehow, I missed out on reading Ready Player One when it came out. Someone at my son’s school gave me a copy one day and I was hooked. Even though it was written at the height of Second Life in 2010, the technology ideas still hold up with Virtual Reality making a comeback. Also of interest are the ways the author describes education in a VR-dominated world. Of course, there are still issues of access that create have’s and have not’s. But still, an interesting way of looking at how VR could be used in education make their way into the story from time to time. If you are not familiar with it, the basic premise is that at some point a Second Life world takes off in VR and over half the world begins working, playing, living in it. The creator becomes insanely rich and a bit odd. He is obsessed with 80s geek culture and then finds out he is dying. So he creates a super complicated game in his VR world that gives the winner control of the VR and his vast riches. An entire culture and economy develops around finding this treasure, with the hunt dragging on for years and years. Oh, and did I mention they are currently creating a movie about it with Steve Spielberg directing? Can’t wait to see that. The video above in a fan trailer, but it captures a lot of the 80s/90s SciFi/Fantasy references in the book.

Universal Translators are Becoming a Thing… Maybe?

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6SFbSD63IQ

Fans of science fiction are probably familiar with the universal translator – the futuristic device (usually not seen on screen) that allows people to all magically speak and understand English. Well, technically, people/aliens are speaking their native language and hearing other languages translated into their own language. We all knew it would only be a matter of time before this would happen in real life, and it seems that day is getting closer. Pilot is a device that fits in your ear and uses your cell phone to translate what you hear into the language you choose. Well, it’s more complicated than that, and still has many limitations, but the idea is there and should only get better in the future. Will it ever get to Star Trek levels of cancelling out the speaker’s language and replacing it with the chosen language in their natural voice, all while using holograms to make their lips look they are speaking the translatee language as well?

3-D Print Metal in Midair

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One of the considerations when creating objects in most 3-D printers is that the laws of physics and gravity still apply to what you print (unlike what you can create in 3-D software). So supports and bridges still have to be built in to be removed later. Sometimes this is just because printing from the ground up creates gaps in support until the entire structure is finished. In many educational applications, this is a good problem because users have to think through problems, propose design solutions, etc. Some printers are overcoming this limitation in novel ways. A team at Harvard is using a novel combination of metal and lasers to create a printer that can solidify melted medal in midair, making lines of metal that can support more complex creations in midair. You kind of have to watch the video above to see it in action, but it is a pretty interesting process.

MakerSpace Training for All

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One major problem with new technology and ideas is access to the tools. You usually have to have money (one access barrier), acceptance into an elite school (another barrier), and then enrollment into a specific program using the technology/idea (another barrier). MIT is taking a different approach with the last barrier in relation to Maker technology, allowing all incoming Freshman time and training in their MakerLodge (and some funding for supplies as well). Of course, that is hardly the utopia of “equal access to all regardless” that we all hope to see in the world someday, but at least a step in the right direction… for those lucky enough to get into MIT that is. But maybe a trend that can catch on at other Universities and even community colleges? Neighborhood libraries? Its great to have MakerFaires and a MakerSpace website (see video above), but getting more people into the idea of being a Maker is expensive for the individuals. We need more ideas like this that say “everyone come and give it a shot!”

Could Your Food One Day Be Customized Just for You?

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKulRaDQlAw

“Smart Nutrition” is now a thing. We know that we waste too much food, and consume all kinds of stuff we shouldn’t. Oh, and the food guides and dietary guides? We are all different in so many ways that the people that make those guides are just throwing out averages for everyone. So, of course, there is now software that will look at your specific genetics that affect what you should be eating, creating a custom menu for your specific dietary needs (see the video above). It is expensive, and we should be questioning what they do with the data, but an interesting idea. If it actually works, will schools take note and invest in this technology for students? Then there are the people that changing the actual composition of food to make it healthier. Think of lab-grown meat substitutes, but ones that actually taste and chew like meat. And then, of course, are the smart appliance like refrigerators that track your food usage to make sure you always have what you need without waste. How with this all work together? According to the article, “when our smart refrigerators are loaded with apps possessing knowledge of unique genomes, and suggest recipes accordingly, made from environmentally sustainable ingredients chosen by an artificial intelligence algorithm, that’s when the smart nutrition revolution will have finally taken hold.”

Google Takes Virtual Reality in an Interesting Direction

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While focused in some meetings yesterday, I got a Slack message from our ex. director George Siemens asking what I knew about Google Daydream. I got online and saw various news sources exploding with references to Daydream. It’s an interesting approach to VR – Daydream is more about making sure hardware (especially phones) and software are ready for Virtual Reality. Or maybe think of it as a VR ecosystem with Google as the center of many devices. Sounds familiar, or course. Connecting to Google could mean interesting things for tools like Google Maps, Google Earth, and YouTube. This article looks at the general idea, as well as how YouTube already has a VR mode that other apps could copy. I think the basic idea is that you start experiencing your phone as VR (hopefully not while walking). The cool thing is that Google can sometimes do cool things and this has promise, but then again Google has a bad track record of letting things die… and the fact that they are everywhere is creepy at times (what will Daydream mean for data, privacy, etc).

Teaching in the Open With GitHub (via @acroom)

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Many online courses have been using WordPress to deliver the syllabus and content for quite a while now. I used to teach courses that basically kept the syllabus and discussion on a WordPress blog that was embedded into a Blackboard course shell. Adam Croom of Oklahoma University took that idea to the next level by using GitHub to host his course content (in place of WordPress or an LMS). GitHub is basically a great place to share open content that you don’t mind getting forked. That is forked, not… something else 🙂 GitHub is popular among people that want to openly share code, but it can be used for anything else that people imagine. Forking is basically a process where someone can copy content to their account and then update their copy of it. The trail of what was forked and what was updated is preserved, so you can see where ideas came from and how they developed. This is an innovative idea in course design for subjects that are more interested in development of ideas in conjunction with others. We focus so much on plagiarism in education that we often miss how remixing and reimagining ideas is an actual skill needed by learners today. Be sure to read Adam’s post for some good food for thought, or watch the video above for an intro to GitHub.

Google Spaces Gives You, Well… A Bunch of Stuff

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Not sure whether to report this as innovation or just something you will probably hear about. Google announced today a new service for mobile devices called “Spaces”, a mobile app that “lets people get people together instantly to share around any topic.” It comes with Google Search, YouTube, and Chrome built in, so the claim is that it will simplify group sharing. Not sure that was a problem many had complained about, but I could be wrong. Also sounds like a simplified GoogleWave, or maybe an improved Google Plus, or a less synchronous version of Hangouts, or…? Not sure how Spaces will simplify – seems like it will just create more options. As with most things Google tried, it will not be an issue of whether it works or not as much as how many people you know that use it. GoogleWave had some great features, but failed because it was hard to get an invite to join, and when you did, people barely used it. Social anything online needs people there – old school bulletin boards are still very effective where people use them on a consistent basis.

Painting in 3D in Virtual Reality

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Another “cool” application of Virtual Reality. Also, another fairly limited one – but still really cool. Draw in virtual reality with a variety of colors and paint brushes of light. The video above doesn’t show it, but someone used this tool to make a sweet dragon… sculpture? VR 3-D painting? Wonder what people will call these creations. Of course, this is a Google tool limited to one specific phone. So not very available for, well, most people. The videos show that you can walk around your creations from all sides. But can you share them with others to view? Can you work collaboratively on the same piece? One interesting use I could see for this beyond art: build 3D models more intuitively than existing 3D modeling programs, and then export those designs to games, 3D printers, etc.

3D Pens Take Writing Into Three Dimensions

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3Doodler pens have been around for a bit, but mainly to people that supported the Kickstarter. Of course, the good news is that they are real and not another failed Kickstarter project. Even better news for those that missed the fundraising round is that the new improved/updated version is now available for anyone to pre-order. I wonder what the learning curve is with using these devices? The official website showcases some pretty cool creations, so I am guessing you can get the hang of it pretty easy. Also of note is the special EDU version with educator discounts, power packs, and soon a pen with no hot parts. Not to mention that some have been combining the tool with legos for some cool things. With a $99 price tag, not too expensive to start with, but also requires a more specialized focus to really figure out what to do with these things. I wonder if you can melt down and recycle your mistakes?