20/4/2016 0 Comments Technology bite club?
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15/4/2016 0 Comments Using apps for sketchingI've tried a few free apps on my ipad for sketching. My favourite is doodle buddy, my kids love it too. It's handy to sketch quick design ideas, but not great for fine detail. When I am sketching free-hand and with hard lines, it is always better than trying to sketch or draw with the tops of my fingers! There are some good filter apps too, so you don't have to open jpegs through instagram to get similar effects.
14/4/2016 0 Comments Moy Materials visit
Having facilitated a number of CPD (Continuing Professional Development) toolbox talks at GMIT over the last few years, I have come to the conclusion that claims to be green may not necessarily be green after all. Some flooring systems are advertised as 100% recyclable. A true fact. However, on further inquiry, it should be noted that currently there are no municipal waste recycling plants in Ireland capable of recycling these products. Materials of this nature need to be shipped to mainland Europe for recycling. Similarly, Architectural Technology specifiers would do well to consider how 'Irish' some insulation's claim to be. Some are manufactured in Ireland with raw products being imported from Europe, others are directly imported from Germany, China, Austria or other parts of mainland Europe. The implication in terms of carbon footprint is missing from brochures and glossed over when looking at technical detailing. The embodied energy, cradle to gate or cradle to grave analysis can be deceptive if the Irish context of green building component choices is not realistically evaluated. No pun intended. There are some saving graces - Ecocel in Cork supply blown cellulose insulation, which is all recycled, all Irish, all green. Hurray! 13/4/2016 2 Comments Multi media and social media
13/4/2016 0 Comments Changing profile photo and themeI have been contemplating changing my profile picture for a while. I did not have a professional photograph to use, so I chose to take a casual 'selfie' for my home page. With that, I chose to change theme from a brown background which worked with sepia photographs, to a cleaner interface and dark background with white text, which is more dramatic and does not detract from the material I have uploaded. I have been trying to put up a video blog to explain more about my choice of photograph, however, the free version of weebly is not allowing me to put it directly into the blog without upgrading?!
I tried to upload my amateur v-blog and use a hyperlink, however, the 10MB limit precludes this as well. It's only a minute of video captured on an ipad mini and its 96MB! Frustrating but good to know. It means that all recordings I might make will need to be uploaded perhaps through 'you tube' and then put the link up onto Moodle, as Moodle has an upload limit as well (200MB, from memory). I've tried to convert .MOV to .SWF so I can upload a flash object on this blog instead. I found a few websites that do these conversions for free https://cloudconvert.com/mov-to-swf This also didn't work, probably because the movie is so large. It worked on my next blog post, though. Progress! 3/6/2015 0 Comments Post-it... or forget about itHaving lectured on the Architectural Technology programme at GMIT for a number of years, a lot of my hours are now concentrated in years 2 and 3.
As a result, it has facilitated a greater transference of knowledge between my Architectural Technology module into my CAD/BIM module. Project work is based around Detail & Design studio projects in second year, for which I am a tutor as well, so this means that I can learn the project in studio, teach the necessary underlining technology (if I can keep up) and get students to CAD up, all within the one week. The best thing I have tried this year was to get students to write reflections on their details on a post-it, immediately after they have had a critique of their detail in technology. I remind them to take out their rough work details in the next subsequent CAD class, and get them to adjust their detail as they CAD it up (hopefully for the first time... hand-drawn first, details from first principles, then we move on to electronic drafting). They can then tick off the list on the post-it as they work through a proper scaled detail in CAD class. It is amazing how much can be forgotten over a weekend, and I can not give detailed feedback to every student in every class... it is their own memory jogger! Next years' plan is to try different coloured post-its for different building regulation requirements, post-its for reflective practices in Studio (perhaps?) or even a different coloured template on a sheet to mimic post-its (for specific project elements, or specific building regulations, for example)....I'll re-blog if it works out! Massive open online courses (MOOCs) are becoming prevalent in some countries, particularly in the US. The question of whether a MOOC is appropriate for a particular programme or a module within a programme is a very interesting one. Badges can be gained for completing competence based tasks, which essentially cannot be failed. Every student has the opportunity to repeat assignments / submissions through MOOCs until they are successful.
The difficulty I have with them is what is to stop all-out plagarism or the instant black market which must become available with solutions for MOOCs, as soon as an online course is rolled out? And what measures are taken to ensure that the submission is the students' own work in the first place? They could have given their IP address and log-in details to a paid adversary to do their submissions for them?! Perhaps I do not fully understand the IT side of MOOCs, nor do I think it wise to freely map random MOOCs back with a wide range of topics to gain a subsequent award, unless it was fitting to do so. I do think that forethought and greater controls should be at the forefront of new technologies and award systems, and that not all vocational training is suitable for MOOC transfer. And I secretly love the idea of mobile learning in bite-size pieces, to break down barriers between those who are studying and those who are afraid to try. Lets just hope all grannies and grandads of the next generation are more techno-savy, so that they can join in the fun too! I firmly advocate open access for all. |