Paperless Study

There are hundreds of ways to make your online class a better experience. Studying online is an increasingly available option - it's cheaper, and in many ways, better. There are lots of articles explaining how to create on-line learning communties and get a sense of belonging with your classmates far away. By far, this is the most important aspect of on-line learning.

But second comes the technology, which I've written an article about here. Unfortunately, teaching hasn't quite caught up to the possibilities digital study has to offer. What this means for you is that you'll have to make obsolete resources match more rapidly-developing technologies. Until the education system catches up, you're going to have to make some accomodations.

La Carpio has no known internet connectivity, partly because of major lack of resources but also because of geographical isolation. It is actually within the capital city of Costa Rica, but because it's a slum built around a garbage dump, it is nicely isolated from surrounding areas by a river on each side, a garbage dump on the third, and the only way in and out is a thin road on a sort of peninsula.

Our partnering with the missionary Steve Edwards who has been serving that isolated community for the last five years, has shaped the Christian impact in that poor area.

A computer lab is already in place and running, installed in August 2008. Steve, the missionary there, has been using the lab almost exclusively to allow kids to use. However, with little supervision, the lab has been largely just an arcade. This has also served to open up the lab to become a nice dish of viruses.

Sometimes, I describe our ministry niche as employing technology to bring Christian education as close to "the village" as possible.  Sounds simple.  But yesterday a few of us met with a family exploring membership with MAF.  Somewhere in the conversation I mused that we in Learning Technologies offer a unique blend of art, on one hand and technology, on the other.

The technology aspects show up easily.  Computers, networks, software development, audio players and cell phones from the IT side.  Curriculum development, course writing, pedagogical theory, and distance education considerations from the instructional side.  But what about art?  Are we just a coalition of baud rates and constructivism?  Or, does human creativity factor into our work as well?

As a jungle pilot I called on isolated villages every day.  And, I quickly learned the peril of ignoring social subtleties.  If I (in my 2nd language) said,  "I'm sorry I forgot to bring your mail," they heard (also in their 2nd language) "I didn't bring it on purpose and if you don't like it you can lump it!"  Kind of a bummer to realize that I'd come such a great distance only to educate them that Christians were mean, insensitive bullies.

An April visit to the Development Associates International (DAI) Ministry Center in Colorado Springs, CO, by MAF staffers Nicholas Ivins and Brian Ward could lead to more effective distance learning through DAI’s ‘Masters of Arts in Organizational Leadership’ program.
   
DAI leadership set out to enhance the learning experience for their Masters program students.   This search lead them to consider new web-based technology products developed by MAF such as DEScribe, DEViewer, and Poodle (Portable Moodle). The next step is ...

MAF-LT is excited to announce a new release of DEScribe!  DEScribe is a course authoring application that supports exporting to DEViewer.  This release of DEScribe includes the following improvements to the DEViewer export process:

• The process of exporting a course to DEViewer has been automated.  The domain, type, and package entries are now automatically configured during the export process.  The user no longer has to manually edit the DEViewer XML to get the course to display.
• A manual DEViewer package can now be created during a DEViewer export.  This is a self-contained zip file that can be manually added to other DEViewer installs.

A set of completed tickets for this release is located on the DEScribe Trac site for release 1.2.2.0.
 
For more information and to download DEScribe 1.2.2, please visit the DEScribe product page.