Fun On Friday #155: Running Out Of Music

I accept that this week's offering is fun only for a slightly bizarre definition of fun... that definition being: "stuff that I find fun". I hope that you, at least, find it interesting.

Unfortunately, the video can't be embedded, so you'll have to go off and watch Will We Ever Run Out Of New Music? on YouTube.

I like the way he entries to make the mind-bogglingly big numbers accessible. Some of the links with the video are worth a look too.

And tangentially related is this video, which I can embed!

Fun On Friday #154: Stacheify

It is now more than half way through Movember and both my Mo, and money raised, are coming along nicely. But thanks to Daughter Number One, my attention was drawn to an app that provides a hint about the shape of Moes to come:

It is called Stacheify and it reminds me a bit of CrazyTalk in the way it let's you identify key features (eyes and mouth) in a still photograph and then manipulates the image to create an animation.

• Mo-bros: your Moes should already be well established.
• Mo-sistas: Show your support with Stacheify.

And don't forget to donate to Movember.

Fun On Friday #153: Fun with Google

My Higher class were swapping Chuck Norris jokes. Most could only be described as "joke" with a very loose and technically inaccurate definition of the word "joke". But then they Googled, find Chuck Norris, and hit the I'm Feeling Lucky button and... well, follow the find Chuck Norris link, use the I'm Feeling Lucky button and see for yourself.

It amused me. Strictly speaking, it is not a Google trick. I guess the creators of the page use a Google bomb technique to make sure they are at the top of the results list but it made me start looking for Google Easter eggs. It turns out there are loads of them. Here are some of my favourites:

1. I've already posted here on the search: answer to life the universe and everything but it bears repeating.
   
   
2. This is a bit obscure unless you follow the Simon Mayo and Mark Kermode firm review programme or podcast. If you search for Jason Isaacs, immediately above the search results, it says, "Hello to Jason Isaacs".
3. You may have heard of the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game. Search for the Bacon number of an actor and Google will work out links for you. A search for bacon number Jason Issacs reveals he has a bacon number of 2:
   
   • Jason Isaacs and Charlize Theron appeared in Sweet November.
   • Charlize Theron and Kevin Bacon appeared in Trapped.
   
    It is extraordinarily difficult to find someone who isn't a 2! And how's this for synchronicity: as I was typing up this post, what comes on the TV but an advert for a phone company:
   
   
4. And finally, one for the geeks. Search for binary and the number of results found is displayed in binary.

Have you any favourite  Google Easter eggs?

Fun On Friday #152: Movember

Another very late Fun on Friday!

TacheBack - Day 29, a photo by DavidDMuir on Flickr.

A few years ago... 2007 to be precise, I took part in what was then called Tacheback. I was surprised to discover that, just by growing a moustache, I managed to raise £270.50. Well, to be more accurate, by growing a moustache and pestering a lot of people until they sponsored me, I managed to raise £270.50!

So, five years later, here I am growing a moustache for charity again. Tacheback has morphed into Movember but otherwise, it's much the same as the last time. I grow a moustache, grow awareness of male cancer charities and try to encourage people to donate money to cancer charities.

It would be good to raise at least £300 but things have changed since I last tried this. First, when I did it in 2007, it was still relatively unknown as an event, so I was the only person I knew who was growing a tache. That meant it was relatively easy to approach people and demand money knowing that they were unlikely to have already donated. By now though, it is much more well known, there's even another teacher in the school who is also growing a Mo for Movember. And, second, I've changed jobs. Last time I had about 600 staff and students I could extort money from. This time I am in a small school and I believe it is frowned uponto extort money with menaces from pupils.

Anyway, I've made a start. Check out:

• My Movember page
• My donation page

...And a video of progress so far. (Silent at the moment - what would you suggest for a theme song?)

This time, I'm probably going to have to rely more on Internet chums for donations, so is £300 doable? I hope so. With 200 facebook "friends", over a thousand Twitter followers, and many visitors every day to this blog it's not impossible. If twelve hundred people each donate £0.25, that's £300. More realistically (perhaps) if 60 people donate £5 each, that would be £300 too. Last time though, I only managed 34 donors... so it's going to be tricky.

What do you think? Is £300 possible? Send a donation, and help me on my way.

CASScot12: The Conjurer's Classroom

{Live capture from CASScot12 presentation.}

Convergence of Computing and conjuring. Brings together: Computational Thinking, Creativity, Confidence and CfE.

Computational Thinking
Algorithms, computer programming, testing, algebra and abstraction. You can demonstrate these things through things such as self-working card tricks. Allows learners to see that following a set of instructions carefully will always produce the magic effect. Important that the magic trick always works: cf. testing a program. We can use algebra to prove tricks and programs work which leads naturally to abstraction.

Creativity: encourage people to think laterally.

Self confidence: magic is about performance and can lead to increase confidence.

Learning intentions: might not always be revealed until after the trick. Talked about. Gave example of sleight of mind where you choose a card and then computer guesses it and destroys it. There are learning outcomes can come out of it related to salience and for example relation to HCI.

Another example was using an algorithm to develop a magic square.

Entertaining and Interesting contexts to introduce difficult concepts.

CASScot12: Steven Grier Microsoft

Partners in Learning CPD Check out the ten guys in a lift video.

News later about a competition for schools.

Showed XBox Kinect video which talked about how people took the KInect and used it in ways they just didn't expect. For example, in the video an example was shown of a boy with motor difficulties seeing the joints and muscles in his leg as he moved it to gain points depending on how far he moved it.

Dreamspark is a way that Microsoft provides free access to a range of technologies. For example Windows Phone Development Centre.

Windows Azure Educator: cloud services. Grants are available to make it available in schools.

Competition for schools: The KoduKup. (Launched January 2013?) Individuals or small teams can enter. Three different areas: recreate a classic arcade game; the environment (applications that have an environmental aspect); and the exploration of Mars.

Glow Academies: multi-vendor, industry certification; Glow Ltd. School based social enterprise focused on technology and app development; Partners in Learning - worldwide CPD network for teachers and free tools for teaching.

CASScot12: Doug Belshaw - Open Badges

{Live capture of session from CASScot12 session.}

Doug Belshaw works for Mozilla Foundation and wanted to make it clear they we a not for profit organisation.

Learning today happens everywhere and often difficult to get recognition for achievements that happen for learning that takes place out of schools. the problem is that qualifications we have live in silos and don't always connect with the rest of our lives.

Open badges are more than just images. Baked into the badge are all sorts of meta-data such as who issued it, who got it and why. Means that you can't just copy someone else's badges. They can represent hard and soft skills and work well with peer assessment. Open badges can capture all sorts of soft and hard skills.

Stealth assessment: learners can just be doing stuff and when they cover enough targets, a badge is unlocked. Can be linked to doing something often enough, or perform a set of related activities, a badge can be unlocked.

All works through a shared badge ecosystem and infrastructure (OBI - Open Badge Infrastructure) and is a universal standard. organisations issue badges. These badges are stored in an "earner's backpack". By default the earner can keep these private or chose to show them on Displayers - organisations that support the showing of such badges. The are also Endorsers - organisations that will recognise achievements.

Easiest way to get an idea of what this means and how it works is to go to the Open Badge site, earn a badge, create a backpack and then share your badges.

Question: how do teachers issue badges? You can install an issuing engine (which is tricky), there are Word Press plugin (see Doug's blog for details), or you can use third party sites such as Badg Us to create and issue badges.

Can issue badges to recognise achievement but can also be used for motivation (e.g. "Most improved behaviour" badge).

Will this take off? Various organisations on board already, e.g. Facebook, some job sites, some universities, Class Dojo, Code Academy, ... Charlie Love also mentioned that they are talking about incorporating Open Badges into SQA/Glow/ePortfolio developments.

Can third parties search for people with specific badges? Absolutely. Some site already doing this.

Special Bonus Stuff

Doug showed us a WebLiteracy curriculum at mzl.la/weblit. He'd be interested in feedback. Mozilla are trying to create a generation of "Web Makers" - it is a good thing that people can do more than just consume stuff that's on the web.