Interesting article about teaching from space.
Asked how teaching compared to being an astronaut, Mrs Morgan, 55, replied: “Astronauts and teachers actually do the same thing. We explore, we discover and we share.
“And the great thing about being a teacher is you get to do that with students, and the great thing about being an astronaut is you get to do it in space, and those are absolutely wonderful jobs.”
Interesting article from the BBC on how researchers are using Bluetooth and Facebook.
A team of UK researchers is combining the power of social network Facebook with communications tool Bluetooth to learn more about human interactions.
Bath University scientists have created a tool which can use the unique ID of Bluetooth devices, like a mobile phone, to build new friendship networks.
Users register with the Facebook tool, called Cityware, that tracks encounters in the real world via Bluetooth.
So there I was on leave, when I got a phone call from work, someone needed access to JORUM. Though they had an Athens account, they probably weren’t part of the staff group we have which allows access to JORUM (as JORUM is a staff only resource). So using my Athens Administrator account details I tried to login to Athens from home, only to find that I couldn’t because it was also restricted by IP address! So unfortunately the member of staff will have to wait till next week, because the other Athens administrator is also on leave (come on it is August, virtually no one is around).
Now I suppose if we had a VPN at work I could have logged into that and then I could have access. Or if I had my home IP address “added” to the list of safe IP addresses (I have done this before with other IP restricted resources). However at this point neither of those are possible, so the member of staff will have to wait a week!
Will Shibboleth solve these issues? Maybe, maybe not, as you still need to administrate accounts with Shibboleth.
Found this interesting article on the BBC News website.
Girl overdoses on espresso coffee – A teenager was taken to hospital after overdosing on espresso coffee.
It would appear that she had seven double espresso coffees and as a result had overdosed on caffeine!
A warning to all coffee lovers out there, I know that a lot of teachers and lecturers seem to thrive on coffee, or they can only survive through the average day in FE by drinking coffee.
It would seem that extra caution is needed where I work as we now have Starbucks coffee available in our college cafes and I quite like the off Starbucks espresso now and again .
TechDis have published the third of their accessibility essentials guides. This third guide can tell you all you need to know about creating accessible presentations in PowerPoint.
As multimedia presentations are increasingly favoured as a means of delivering lectures, the importance of making them accessible to all learners becomes crucial. Software such as PowerPoint can present barriers to some learners, but it can also support others, and this Guide to Creating Accessible Presentations can show you how.
It has four sections:
The guide also looks at the importance of making PowerPoint components accessible for others to re-use.
Check out the guide.
I am getting use to the Sony VAIO UX1XN Keyboard now. It is very small, but entirely usable using your thumbs, though I prefer my fingers.
However for serious typing it is (still for me) much easier to use an external keyboard.
The JISC-funded TechWatch service recently published a major – and hugely popular – report on Web 2.0 and its implications for education and research. In this Podcast Philip Pothen speaks to TechWatch’s director Gaynor Backhouse about the work of the service and why the report has been so successful.
Find the podcast here.