I’ve been thinking a bit about how Facebook could be incorporated in Education. My thoughts are more on how “Facebook type” activities can be used to enhance social collaboration in courses, unit, programs (or what ever your Institute calls these things). I base the following suggestions on what I like and use on Facebook (in other words my suggestions are opinionated). I hope the following list will trigger some discussion and ultimately stop Facebook from being used as a regular LMS.

• Make a Quiz, Take a Quiz
  I enjoy taking Quizzes, receiving challenges from my friends and sending out challenges of my own. This could work quite well between groups. Groups could create a Quiz on an Instructor directed Subject Area and challenge other groups to take the Quiz. Creating a Quiz is a great knowledge construction activity - students will have to gain a thorough understanding of the subject matter and also be able to answer all of the questions.
• Creating community with FaceBook Status
  The ability of seeing who is online is meant to contribute to enhanced community sense in the online world. Surely FaceBook status takes this to the next level. Facebook Status is akin to Twitter ie Micro Blogging - a form of personal reflection. The ability to get an overview of what others are doing or have done could also inspire lurkers to contribute. Examples include x Students took a Quiz, x Students visited/contributed to forum y, x Students have started working on project z, x Students have signed up to a group, etc. Note that no specific students names are mentioned. Making swarm intelligence work for you in an Educational setting.
• Let Students be the Author/Creator
  In the traditional LMS the Teacher/Lecturer is the only one to add/specify activities. The Teacher/Lecturer reviews the content and at certain spots, inserts an activity or links to it (eg participate in a forum, submit a proposal, take a self check quiz, reflect on the activity, etc). I think this model is out of date and needs to change. Students need to be able to add their own activities/applications that can be shared and contributed to by other students. It is after all quite easy to add a new Facebook application!
• We need developers and more experimental EDU Facebook applications
  The is the developer in me speaking out! LMS extension mechanisms and plugins suck - the frameworks and API’s exposed are awful. They are designed for admin type addons. We need a framework that allows new experimental activities, allows for custom data storage and custom rendering. Facebook has a great extension model and the traditional LMS architecture could learn lots from it!

Getting EDU institutions to support the design and development of experimental EDU activities is a challenge. I’m an EDU developer, but I can’t find any EDU development work (with reasonable pay) especially in South East Queensland, Australia.

Adsense is coming to a web video near you! Ah - that’s what has been missing in YouTube vids!

Nope - its not a New Kids on the Block song, though I hear a come back is planned with the Kids already in the studio.

Step by Step is a viable alternative to creating recorded video tutorials on how to use and navigate a site. It makes annotated walk-through’s via embedded Javascript. No large downloads. I think its a great way to highlight new functionality. Sometimes users get too familiar and don’t take the time to explore new functionality.

Ever type ‘Hello World’ in Word, save the file to HTML and then take a look at the source code!!!! You’ll be amazed at the bloat.

Ajaxian has just posted a blog post on Javascript driven ‘Hello World’. What do you think?

The problem based learning creation and deployment/playback tool from UQ just got renamed to SBLInteractive - Scenario Based Learning. Theres even an article in the Australian on PBLInteractive.

I came across a Del.icio.us network explorer that was built in Processing - a visualization toolkit. I took a look at the code, with the aim of extending the application to plot the structure of social networks. Processing has a Java like syntax, but I could not figure out where the classes were or where the code to make it run within an applet was. I still saw potential so I proceeded to download Processing to give it a try. I then went searching for a build script eg Ant or Maven. I got a surprise!!!!

Processing comes with its own IDE like environment called a SketchBook. Load any script and you can run it or export it to either a Java application or an applet. Both the applet and the required HTML files are generated. Very impressive

Well the Blackboard vs Desire2Learn trial has begun, there is a Jury and the first witness is in the process of testifying. I await the verdict anxiously.

I guess the end for the instant polaroid photos was inevitable, with Digital cameras, the ability to easily share photos online (or via mms) and print photos either via your own portable photo printer or at your local computer/department store. …still its sad to see something that was a novelty from your childhood days discontinued.

I am using Windows Live Writer to make blog posts to RandomSyntax. So far all works like a dream - Live Writer is able to connect to my WordPress instance, allows me to add/select categories, insert pictures and even insert screen captures make with Windows Snipping Tool (via a plugin) in blog posts. I am pretty impressed.

George Siemans has written an insightful paper entitled "Learning and Knowing in Networks: Changing roles for Educators and Designers". Definitely worth a read!