Thing #17 - Three Inches for Rollyo

If you'd looked for me last Sunday, you'd have found me in Cancun, sitting under the shade of a papa, a dusting of white sand on my toes, warm breezes stirring the pages of my book, the crystalline waters of the Caribbean shimmering only yards away. Five days of heaven...

But, the problem of "getting away from it all" is that it is all still here when you return! For some that provides comfort -- my husband, for example, is always ready to get back to our normal routine. I would be in the opposing camp. Normal seems pale and dull and, well, so normal.

So maybe that explains my indifference to Thing #17 - Rollyo. For someone coming off a vacation high, it is just so linear , so focused. It allows for no spontaneity, no discovery. It creates a very small box.

Remember that scene from "The Jerk" when Navin (played by Steve Martin) is working at the carnival? To the question of what prize a particular winner gets, Navin responds "Uh, anything in this general area right in here. Anything below the stereo and on this side of the bicentennial glasses. Anything between the ashtrays and the thimble. Anything in this three inches right in here in this area. That includes the Chiclets, but not the erasers."

I know, I know - Sometimes, especially in the vastness of cyberspace, you long for someone to say "Look here - right in these three inches. This is where you will find your answers". Sometimes you want focus, sometimes you just want information, free of distractions. You know the websites you like, you know the ones you don't like, you know which are credible and which are just junk. Yes, sometimes a small area, created through a personalized search engine like rollyo, is exactly what you want.

And I'm sure in the fall, when I am helping my students with research or when I am looking for a particular piece of criticism, I will be glad to have put boundaries on the vastness of cyberspace, to have defined my own three inches of shelf space.

But not right now, not today. Today I want to keep the fullness of my vacation alive: bare feet, lightly tanned, splish-splashing down miles and miles of coastline.

Thing #16 - Wikitopia: A solution to all of my technology problems?

Whew: talk about controversial! I think I'd rather talk about the upcoming election or religion or The College Bowl System than get into a debate about Wikipedia. Oh, you didn't know there was a debate?

Well, neither did I really: I knew there were concerns about the credibility of the contributors, and because of that I forbade my students from using Wikipedia as a source in research. Instead, I wanted my students to use criticism from scholarly sources and databases. It seemed an easy answer for me - end of story, right? Wrong!

Apparently, there is a whole storm a-brewing out there about the margin of error found in Wikipedia, how that margin compares to long-revered sources such as Encyclopedia Britannica, rebuttals from Wikipedia's founder...what a brouhaha! Or is it?

Honestly, credibility is an issue in every form of media isn't it? And isn't it incumbent upon us as consumers (of thought as well as material goods) to carefully screen whatever we purchase, whatever we believe? Do we allow our opinions, thoughts, values, etc. to be shaped by one source? Hopefully not.

That determined, I move on to more salient topics: creating our own wikis. Once again, the guys over at Common Craft make simple work of the topic. (I think I love them. Really.) For the last year or two, my partners and I have tried different technology applications hoping to generate online discussions among our students. Unfortunately, none of them worked very well. There was always some limitation, procedural or within the technology available, that hindered meaningful discussion.

I am hoping that wikis might offer a solution to the problems encountered. Looking at the wikis and blogs through the learn2play page, I came across some really neat applications. There was one great wiki on Hamlet. Have you guys seen it? If I can find it again, I will include the link in this posting. And the one from the New Jersey Public Library? Great!

I have only one question - how does what one posts in the sandbox differ from what one posts on the wiki itself? Anyone know? Am I exposing my ignorance again?