New+Scholarship+and+Emerging+Forms+of+Publication

Topic Reviewed: The New Scholarship and Emerging Forms of Publication

 * 1) What do you understand about the trend itself?
 * 2) Why do you think the trend is important for the future?
 * 3) If the actual report is written for adults, how could the project teams make the information easier for you to understand?
 * 4) What would you expect to find out in each trend's section?
 * 5) How will you decide if the project team has done a good job of their trend?


 * 1) I think that the trend involves traditional forms of publication and learning being revolutionized, in particular via the internet. For example, blogs and podcasts have recently become important academic areas in more modern schools, while other schools retain the more orthodox written reports. Some argue that this trend is degrading the quality of the work itself, whilst others believe that it is providing a new angle of view to certain issues. One of the most important aspects of this 'revolution' is that people can comment and provide feedback easily and even before the project is finished, as it is publicly accessible.
 * 2) We believe that this trend is very important in that it creates online communities that can be made up of people from entirely different backgrounds and even living in different people. Academic, Industrial, Economic, Agricultural--in fact, all--progress has so far been constricted to a local environment, and only through physical travel has it been able to spread. Progress in these areas, however, is speeding up,and now it is possible to instantly communicate--online!
 * 3) Perhaps team members could use more photos and statistics rather than bare, black-and-white facts. In addition, it might be useful to paraphrase certain areas of the reports, especially since the Horizon Report seems a touch repetitive. Finally, they might suggest a course of action, something that we as students or perhaps our teachers and school staff may do to push this progress in a direction that is beneficial to students academic learning.
 * 4) I would expect to learn a bit about certain areas of the trend, such as wikis, blogs, publicly accessible information storage sites (such as wikipedia), etc. I would also like to know more about where the progress seems to be heading and what major changes are expectable in the future.
 * 5) Deciding if a project is good or bad is difficult, and cannot be based on one thing only. However, a rubric has been created for us to evaluate it and we will be using it.

Criteria-based Feedback:
2. Is there a standardized form of fonts, sizes, boldness, etc? If not, could one be introduced? 3. In one are, there are quotes from an article entitled [| Online knowledge sharing tools: any use in Africa?]. Can you explain these? For example, what are the ICTs? ||  ||
 * Criteria Descriptors || Student Reviewer Feedback ||  ||
 * **Quality of Content** ||  ||   ||
 * Does the content (writing) make sense? || Yes, the writing makes good sense. However, there are certain sentences which are left unfinished. We advise the creators to go over their project and check for spelling, punctuation and grammar. ||  ||
 * Can you identify any areas which need clarification? || The first two major blocks of the project, Topic and Introduction + Background, are clearly introduced. However, the third area lacks an introduction. Perhaps it would be useful to include one for the reader's benefit. ||  ||
 * Pose three questions that arise from your reading || 1. Opposition--what are some reasons that this trend is not so good? Who are against it?
 * **Communication** ||  ||   ||
 * Look at the Discussion pages of the wiki pages - effective communication? || So far, there have been 101 comments. It looks like they're really communicating online, and compared to other teams they are doing well. ||  ||
 * Do they need more? || It looks great so far... Perhaps to involve the public more, a link or a pointer could be included inviting viewers to comment! ||  ||
 * Are they clear in their messages to each other? || It looks like it. They seem to know each other well, or at least the are speaking--typing informally with each other ||  ||
 * Is there a sense of negotiation and collaboration? || Yes. However, not everything seems to be up there and also they have resorted to using e-mail which is probably a whole lot easier for some than this discussion page. ||  ||
 * **Collaboration** ||  ||   ||
 * Does the work appear to be equally shared? || In the comments, they have discussed certain issues as to who is doing what and these seem resolved, though they are working in different time-frames ||  ||
 * Does there appear to be any difficulties by one or more members of the team? || No, they seem to be doing well in this aspect. ||  ||
 * **Presentation - Layout and Design** ||  ||   ||
 * amount and relevance of graphics and media - comment on that || In the beginning, there are much more images than nearing the end. Also, we recommend a change in the pictures' layout--in some places they are too close to each other, etc., though this may be impossible due to the differing of screen sizes. ||  ||
 * Recommendations? || All of the above, and also: try to clarify some paragraphs. If you are working mainly on videos, etc, it only takes half an hour to clean up a few things and make it more easily comprehensible for anybody who hasn't read the Horizon Report ||  ||

Summary of Feedback:
//What do you think are the three key facts from the project?//

1. In the past, people have used mainly paper-and-pencil, physical working methods. Writing reports and taking notes in a large classroom have been common. 2. This is changing! Today, we are using the Internet for a lot of our work. We are using blogs, wikis, tags, etc. 3. This is impacting our world in huge proportions. Some schools are converting to laptops and computers rather than the usual methods. Some are not. It is very controversial.

//Evaluate the accessibility and usability of the project (video, links, alt text, etc...)? Can you find the information easily? Is it formatted clearly?//

Formatting looks good; however a bit of work with the pictures to make sure that they are well formatted with the text would be good. Information was easily accessible, formated clearly and hyperlinks worked well.

//Is there anything that you would add? There may be important links or ideas that we have covered in class that you could add to this project.//

Yes, I think there should be a separate paragraph about reasons why this 'trend' is not good, and articles of the opposition like [|In digital age, more t's are crossed poorly - The Boston Globe] could be included there.


 * Technorati Tags: [|hz07]** **[|horizonproject07]**