I'd never created a podcast before. I'd listened to them in the past, but without a real "topic of expertise" and an audience, I never tried creating one. This was interesting as we had to have a plan, and not just start talking about something and hope it turned out well.
The tricky thing about creating the podcast was that you had to come up with a subject (In my case, playing a hunter in World of Warcraft) then create a powerpoint presentation based on it, then create a script to follow when narrating. I felt like the creation process should have flowed smoother somehow, but I'm not sure yet how to make it do that. After all the work, I ended up a minute and a half over, and had to cut some large chunks of extraneous information. That in and of itself was a good task to do, as it's always easy to go off on a bunny trail, in fact I remember this one time, when I was at this thing and I....
Yeah, I do that.
I really liked this project, because it took away some of the mystery of creating a podcast. It's not nearly as difficult as I'd always assumed (not that I've stayed up nights thinking about it or anything). When I was finished, I felt like I'd created something good. Granted, it's an example of how to do something not in anyway related to English, but for me it's a proof of concept that I can make something like this in the future when it really matters.
I imagine podcasts would be fantastic in the classroom in a number of situations. If you created a set of them for each topic you covered in class, and a student missed one of the days you lectured, you could point them to the podcast that covered the topic you addressed and they could catch themselves up, and can't use the excuse "I wasn't here that day." The other side of this, is if I'm out sick, rather than relying on a sub to cover some heavy topic I feel like the students really need to learn about while I'm out, the sub can show the podcast and make the kids take notes or something. Education continues even in my absence, and the content is mine, not the school system's. That's nice.
I like that the podcast project wasn't necessarily tied to our area of focus. We're free to teach something that we enjoy outside of school, whether that's drumming or World of Warcraft... We got to have fun, and learn the techniques. I think if you'd tied it to our areas, we'd have done fine as well, maybe to make things a little trickier, find out what subjects are represented in the class (Science, Math, Social Studies, English) and pick a standard for each of them to work under. It's easy to come up with something under a standard we're familiar with, but working under one of the others would be a nice challenge. Granted, with the limited amount of time we're afforded, you can't make it too rough, or it might not get done. Meh, I like it the way it is. Don't change it. :-D
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Project 4
Project 4 centered around creating a website that merged 2 candidates areas of focus. In our case, Social Studies, and English. It turned out to be so easily combined that it's hard to see where Joe's work began and mine ended. We focused on propaganda of WWII and it's effect on the people of that time.
One of the interesting things we ran into, was the question of how to address the heavy racism so much of the propaganda of the time used. This led to some very interesting discussions on how to talk about racism, knowing your students and the area you're teaching in as well as knowing the RIGHT way to discuss something as difficult as racism, as well as the purpose it served at the time.
I think creating and maintaining a website for your students is a neat idea. Maybe have YOUR site as a teacher, and then pages off of it that deal with the topics, you'll be discussing and the projects the students will be doing. I think this would go a long way toward helping a substitute teacher who has to step into your shoes for a day or three. Rather than having them teach on something they may know very little about, or giving the students busy work and losing the time, you can have your sub go to "www.mysitethatcoversthetopicwe'retalkingabout.com" (I should reserve that domain name...) and spend a half hour there reading up on what you want them to teach about. They may not get as in depth as you might, but they'll be better equipped, and may give better instruction than if they'd had to wing it. The difficulty in maintaining a site like this is based around the idea of the pre-test we discussed in class. I can make a website and adjust it to my first year's class, but next year when my second year class understands topic A, but no one gets topic B, I'd have to go back and rework the whole site again to cater to their understanding. That's a pain. I'm not saying I wouldn't do it, but it would be a lot of work
On our team, once we decided on the topic, and the layout of the site, we divided the subject matter and went to it. I did about half of the front page, half of the Allied Propaganda page, I wrote the section on antisemitism and I wrote the page explaining the pamphlet we wanted the students to create.
Because of the nature of the topic, I don't know that either of us had a specific focus other than that of the main project. If I had done the website on my own, I would have looked at the impact of the propaganda the same was as a Social Studies teacher would have, and I think Joe would have done the same.
Joe and I worked well together, and I think the site we created was very good and would be an excellent tool for teaching students about WWII propaganda.
One of the interesting things we ran into, was the question of how to address the heavy racism so much of the propaganda of the time used. This led to some very interesting discussions on how to talk about racism, knowing your students and the area you're teaching in as well as knowing the RIGHT way to discuss something as difficult as racism, as well as the purpose it served at the time.
I think creating and maintaining a website for your students is a neat idea. Maybe have YOUR site as a teacher, and then pages off of it that deal with the topics, you'll be discussing and the projects the students will be doing. I think this would go a long way toward helping a substitute teacher who has to step into your shoes for a day or three. Rather than having them teach on something they may know very little about, or giving the students busy work and losing the time, you can have your sub go to "www.mysitethatcoversthetopicwe'retalkingabout.com" (I should reserve that domain name...) and spend a half hour there reading up on what you want them to teach about. They may not get as in depth as you might, but they'll be better equipped, and may give better instruction than if they'd had to wing it. The difficulty in maintaining a site like this is based around the idea of the pre-test we discussed in class. I can make a website and adjust it to my first year's class, but next year when my second year class understands topic A, but no one gets topic B, I'd have to go back and rework the whole site again to cater to their understanding. That's a pain. I'm not saying I wouldn't do it, but it would be a lot of work
On our team, once we decided on the topic, and the layout of the site, we divided the subject matter and went to it. I did about half of the front page, half of the Allied Propaganda page, I wrote the section on antisemitism and I wrote the page explaining the pamphlet we wanted the students to create.
Because of the nature of the topic, I don't know that either of us had a specific focus other than that of the main project. If I had done the website on my own, I would have looked at the impact of the propaganda the same was as a Social Studies teacher would have, and I think Joe would have done the same.
Joe and I worked well together, and I think the site we created was very good and would be an excellent tool for teaching students about WWII propaganda.
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
Project 3
Project 3 was to create a movie in iMovie that taught the students more than they would normally have learned through either reading or normal lecture. This was a cool project (I seem to say that about all of them). Like any project though, it had some difficult parts. Initially I started the project in Windows Live Movie Maker on my personal laptop. It's a great tool as well, but the computers in the lab here at school were literally 13 versions behind. Wow. There was no way I could work on the project here at school durring the class we were supposed to work on it. I started using iMovie durring class, and was able to complete it durring our normal class time. The most difficult part of the project was citing the things I used in my video. Citing an image of a newspaper found on the internet is ridiculously confusing. I even bought the MLA handbook, and it couldn't really help me that much. Citing my references actually took longer than creating the actual video, but as a future English teacher, I figured it was worth doing it right.
I was honestly impressed with the ease of use in making the video (both in iMovie and Windows Life Movie Maker). Years ago I used Adobe premier to put together something similar, and it was extremely difficult. Granted, that was 12 years ago, and in a very high end program, but at the time, that's what you needed if you wanted to make something well. Now you can do it with free tools. That's saying something.
Using iMovie to go more in depth into the history and culture of a book (in this case Grapes of Wrath) was something I really enjoyed, and is something I could see doing for other works of literature I'll have my students read in class. Video and English go hand in hand. That's the whole reason we have movies in the first place.
I could see having my students do either something similar to what I created, where I represent something of the time period, or perhaps have them record themselves recreating a scene from the book (now easily done from your phone) and putting the pieces together in iMovie or something similar. This could be a very cool tool for making literature not only interesting to read, but something they'll never forget.
I was honestly impressed with the ease of use in making the video (both in iMovie and Windows Life Movie Maker). Years ago I used Adobe premier to put together something similar, and it was extremely difficult. Granted, that was 12 years ago, and in a very high end program, but at the time, that's what you needed if you wanted to make something well. Now you can do it with free tools. That's saying something.
Using iMovie to go more in depth into the history and culture of a book (in this case Grapes of Wrath) was something I really enjoyed, and is something I could see doing for other works of literature I'll have my students read in class. Video and English go hand in hand. That's the whole reason we have movies in the first place.
I could see having my students do either something similar to what I created, where I represent something of the time period, or perhaps have them record themselves recreating a scene from the book (now easily done from your phone) and putting the pieces together in iMovie or something similar. This could be a very cool tool for making literature not only interesting to read, but something they'll never forget.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Project 2 Post
The PowerPoint project was a cool one. There are so many tools that we take for granted, using only a small portion of them, because that's the way we've always seen them used, when in fact, under the hood, they're extremely powerful. The ability to program in PowerPoint is one of those secrets that few know about.
I enjoyed the finished project much more than the process. I've never enjoyed programming, but this was simple enough. 12 questions, 3 potential answers equals 48 individual slides, most of which won't be seen (especially if people get the right answer on the first try). I liked that the project required good feedback, even on the wrong answers, so I felt like my students would learn even from choosing the wrong choice. I think that's smart.
I'd say the most rewarding part of this project, like I said initially, was the finished product. I feel like this will be a nice study tool for my students, and it's simple enough that they'll be able to do it at their own pace, which works well for students of any learning level.
PowerPoint is a great tool for the classroom because it's so readily available. Many times educators beg for some crazy expensive application that they feel is necessary for teaching. Many times (not always) the tools they have in front of them are more than enough for what they need. In a world where education budgets are consistently slashed, it's good to find new uses for the tools we have at hand.
The only concern I have with PowerPoint is that it is sooooo over used, and is frequently boring. Many teachers and presenters will just read text from a PowerPoint presentation which is just dumb. One of you doesn't need to be there, and if I'm in control of the budget, you're more expensive than that presentation.
Students are frequently encouraged to use PowerPoint for presentations, and I think that's great. It's a tool they'll use in the real world as well, and if we can teach them how to make GOOD presentations, we'll have served them well. I think some of the best ways to have students use Power Point is to have them teach a lesson on the subject matter. Another great way students can use PowerPoint is as an assistive tool in Speech class, many people who struggle with speaking in public find comfort in having a third object "between" them and the audience. One last way I can think of to have students use PowerPoint is a tool like we created here. It isn't something they're creating, but a fantastic tool like we created could be used in many situations.
I enjoyed the finished project much more than the process. I've never enjoyed programming, but this was simple enough. 12 questions, 3 potential answers equals 48 individual slides, most of which won't be seen (especially if people get the right answer on the first try). I liked that the project required good feedback, even on the wrong answers, so I felt like my students would learn even from choosing the wrong choice. I think that's smart.
I'd say the most rewarding part of this project, like I said initially, was the finished product. I feel like this will be a nice study tool for my students, and it's simple enough that they'll be able to do it at their own pace, which works well for students of any learning level.
PowerPoint is a great tool for the classroom because it's so readily available. Many times educators beg for some crazy expensive application that they feel is necessary for teaching. Many times (not always) the tools they have in front of them are more than enough for what they need. In a world where education budgets are consistently slashed, it's good to find new uses for the tools we have at hand.
The only concern I have with PowerPoint is that it is sooooo over used, and is frequently boring. Many teachers and presenters will just read text from a PowerPoint presentation which is just dumb. One of you doesn't need to be there, and if I'm in control of the budget, you're more expensive than that presentation.
Students are frequently encouraged to use PowerPoint for presentations, and I think that's great. It's a tool they'll use in the real world as well, and if we can teach them how to make GOOD presentations, we'll have served them well. I think some of the best ways to have students use Power Point is to have them teach a lesson on the subject matter. Another great way students can use PowerPoint is as an assistive tool in Speech class, many people who struggle with speaking in public find comfort in having a third object "between" them and the audience. One last way I can think of to have students use PowerPoint is a tool like we created here. It isn't something they're creating, but a fantastic tool like we created could be used in many situations.
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Project 1 - Integrating the internet into Secondary Classrooms
First, I have to say, I love this project. This was a lot of fun, and as this is my first actual Education class, it's been a good exercise for learning how to come up with a project for my future students. Very cool. :)
I chose my standard based on what interests me in literature, and what I think my students will remember going forward.
I honestly found the trackstar portion of the project to be the most difficult. Beyond trackstar being slow, old and a pain, searching for websites that would lead my students where I wanted them to go was tricky as well. I wanted them to focus on the fatal flaw of each of the heroes listed in the project, but I found it difficult to find a lot of writing on the subject for some of the heroes. The easiest thing, would have been to just point all of my links to wikipedia, but that would have been cheap. I spent a good deal of time searching for articles that showed what I was looking for, and luckily none of them had annoying banners, or weird extraneous information that wouldn't have been appropriate for this project.
The only real difficulty, like I said earlier was dealing with trackstar. Their site is so old and slow, many times I would wait upwards of 5 minutes for a page to load. I also ran into problems when trying to use a youtube video for one of my links. It wouldn't show in the trackstar frame. I tried using the regular http: url, the embed url and even the old style embed url, none of which worked. In the end, I just used the regular url and an annotation directing the students to watch the video on youtube. I really like the philosophy of trackstar, that of guided learning, but it appears the last time they did anything with the site was 2005. The internet and internet standards have made some significant leaps since then, and trackstar is definitely feeling it. If the site admins were to update this to current web standards (for example supporting browsers beyond Mozilla 1.3 beta /facepalm) seeing as Mozilla Firefox is now on version 12, this could be an excellent tool.
I chose my standard based on what interests me in literature, and what I think my students will remember going forward.
EL.LIT.3.6 2006 Evaluate the way in which authors have used archetypes (original models or patterns, such as best friend, champion, crusader, free spirit, nurturer, outcast, tyrant, and others) drawn from myth and tradition in literature, film, political speeches, and religious writings. [11.3.6/12.3.6]I then narrowed it down from all archetypes, to heroes of twentieth century literature. The twentieth century is an interesting time in literature however, because we've broken the media mold. We now have books, television, movies, comics, the internet etc... So it's a bit broader than previous centuries. I tried to hit on a few heroes from books, movies and comics to show the breadth of literature throughout the 20th century, and I also tried to find heroes who would fit the assignment well.
I honestly found the trackstar portion of the project to be the most difficult. Beyond trackstar being slow, old and a pain, searching for websites that would lead my students where I wanted them to go was tricky as well. I wanted them to focus on the fatal flaw of each of the heroes listed in the project, but I found it difficult to find a lot of writing on the subject for some of the heroes. The easiest thing, would have been to just point all of my links to wikipedia, but that would have been cheap. I spent a good deal of time searching for articles that showed what I was looking for, and luckily none of them had annoying banners, or weird extraneous information that wouldn't have been appropriate for this project.
The only real difficulty, like I said earlier was dealing with trackstar. Their site is so old and slow, many times I would wait upwards of 5 minutes for a page to load. I also ran into problems when trying to use a youtube video for one of my links. It wouldn't show in the trackstar frame. I tried using the regular http: url, the embed url and even the old style embed url, none of which worked. In the end, I just used the regular url and an annotation directing the students to watch the video on youtube. I really like the philosophy of trackstar, that of guided learning, but it appears the last time they did anything with the site was 2005. The internet and internet standards have made some significant leaps since then, and trackstar is definitely feeling it. If the site admins were to update this to current web standards (for example supporting browsers beyond Mozilla 1.3 beta /facepalm) seeing as Mozilla Firefox is now on version 12, this could be an excellent tool.
Monday, May 21, 2012
Technology Autobiography
My name is Kyle, but you can call me Kyle.
I'm a Secondary English Grad Student, studying to be a High School English teacher.
I've lived a heavily technological life for the last nine years of my life as I've been working in the IT field. In my previous work, I did everything from server maintenance to training on smart phones. I've had a smart phone of some type for the past seven years and don't know how I'd live without it! This drives my wife crazy, but having access to Google maps, Facebook, Wikipedia, email and the rest of the internet in the palm of my hand has been helpful on many occasions. I've used both a mac and PC and am fluent in both, but I prefer the PC. Mac's have become extremely popular over the past few years, but it's honestly hard to come up with a business reason to spend 2 to 3x more money on one. PCs are cheaper, and easier to fix when they break which when it comes to computers, happens no matter what platform you choose. My family and I have also been using lots of technology around the house. We've been using a DVR in the house for a few years now and it's completely changed the way we watch television. We almost never see commercials and when we DO, our kids get confused! :) I'm definitely cool with that. We also connect to Netflix through our Blu-Ray player which is fantastic for our two kids. Whether watching Dora the Explorer or Spider-man and his Amazing Friends, there's always something available for the kids to watch. Just recently I bought a Kindle Fire and am trying to find a way to fit it into our lives. It's fantastic for reading, watching movies, and playing games, but it's hard to find where it fills a need that isn't already filled by something else.
Most of the technology that we use either gives us access to research utilities (laptop, iPhone, Kindle) or to entertainment (laptop, iPhone, DVR, Netflix, Kindle). The amazing thing is how blurry the line is getting between entertainment devices and research devices. a Kindle which originally was made for reading, now gives me access to the internet, email, netflix and games. My iPhone, which was of course originally just a phone, now does everything my laptop or Kindle does, but it fits in my pocket.
I'd say the 4 most significant technologies in my life would have to be my iPhone, laptop, DVR and Netflix. My iPhone, as I said before, is my constant link to the internet and all the information available there. My laptop gives me that access, but has a keyboard big enough to write blog posts and papers, as well as gets me connected to the games I like to play which require a bigger screen, and a lot more processing power. My DVR, as I said previously, has changed the way I watch TV. I don't watch commercials and I pick only the shows I want to watch. Netflix has changed children's television in my house. Shows that I wouldn't have access to because I don't have cable tv (like Dora) and not just the episode that the network decides should be on today but ALL the episodes from all (or most) of the previous seasons. Being able to pick for instance, from the last 8 seasons of Sesame Street, is fantastic.
I'm a techie kind of guy. That's the way I live, think and work, and I'm certain that my classroom will be heavily reliant on technology once I become a teacher. The generations that I'll be teaching will not have known a world without youtube or facebook, and I feel it's my duty to communicate with them in ways that they'll best understand.
I'm a Secondary English Grad Student, studying to be a High School English teacher.
I've lived a heavily technological life for the last nine years of my life as I've been working in the IT field. In my previous work, I did everything from server maintenance to training on smart phones. I've had a smart phone of some type for the past seven years and don't know how I'd live without it! This drives my wife crazy, but having access to Google maps, Facebook, Wikipedia, email and the rest of the internet in the palm of my hand has been helpful on many occasions. I've used both a mac and PC and am fluent in both, but I prefer the PC. Mac's have become extremely popular over the past few years, but it's honestly hard to come up with a business reason to spend 2 to 3x more money on one. PCs are cheaper, and easier to fix when they break which when it comes to computers, happens no matter what platform you choose. My family and I have also been using lots of technology around the house. We've been using a DVR in the house for a few years now and it's completely changed the way we watch television. We almost never see commercials and when we DO, our kids get confused! :) I'm definitely cool with that. We also connect to Netflix through our Blu-Ray player which is fantastic for our two kids. Whether watching Dora the Explorer or Spider-man and his Amazing Friends, there's always something available for the kids to watch. Just recently I bought a Kindle Fire and am trying to find a way to fit it into our lives. It's fantastic for reading, watching movies, and playing games, but it's hard to find where it fills a need that isn't already filled by something else.
Most of the technology that we use either gives us access to research utilities (laptop, iPhone, Kindle) or to entertainment (laptop, iPhone, DVR, Netflix, Kindle). The amazing thing is how blurry the line is getting between entertainment devices and research devices. a Kindle which originally was made for reading, now gives me access to the internet, email, netflix and games. My iPhone, which was of course originally just a phone, now does everything my laptop or Kindle does, but it fits in my pocket.
I'd say the 4 most significant technologies in my life would have to be my iPhone, laptop, DVR and Netflix. My iPhone, as I said before, is my constant link to the internet and all the information available there. My laptop gives me that access, but has a keyboard big enough to write blog posts and papers, as well as gets me connected to the games I like to play which require a bigger screen, and a lot more processing power. My DVR, as I said previously, has changed the way I watch TV. I don't watch commercials and I pick only the shows I want to watch. Netflix has changed children's television in my house. Shows that I wouldn't have access to because I don't have cable tv (like Dora) and not just the episode that the network decides should be on today but ALL the episodes from all (or most) of the previous seasons. Being able to pick for instance, from the last 8 seasons of Sesame Street, is fantastic.
I'm a techie kind of guy. That's the way I live, think and work, and I'm certain that my classroom will be heavily reliant on technology once I become a teacher. The generations that I'll be teaching will not have known a world without youtube or facebook, and I feel it's my duty to communicate with them in ways that they'll best understand.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Assistive Technology
Monday in class we watched a video called Freedom Machines about Assistive technology. While I've never had use for the kinds of technology needed and demonstrated in the video, I've had a bit of experience with some of it in my previous career.
Two of the people featured in the movie, (Bonita and Kent) used a program called JAWS that is essentially a screen reader for the blind. While working at the University of Notre Dame's Help Desk we had a student who also used JAWS and visited us from time to time for help. The thing that amazed me about JAWS was that it didn't JUST read the text on the screen, it read where your mouse was pointing. This is amazingly helpful if you're on the internet. Imagine if every time you went to a different page on a website, it read all the header information, all the menus, ads, and all of the things you really don't care about. I'd give up pretty quick just from annoyance. But it's smart enough to read the section your mouse is hovering over.
Another thing that stuck out to me from the video was how expensive these things were, that the schools were expected to pay for them, and that in some cases, only 1 or 2 students at a time could benefit from them. That sounds harsh at first blush, but if you're a school administrator who has to deal with a ever decreasing budget and are struggling to just keep your teachers paid, it's hard to find money for an Assistive technology to help one child in your school. While I agree that every student should have the opportunity to learn in the classroom, and this kind of technology is far and away some of the best ways to help with that, in most cases, schools just don't HAVE the money to put toward these things. It seems like pressure would be better put on government to give grants to schools for A.T. so that the money is there when and if it's needed, rather than forcing a school board to decide between having enough teachers, and having the tools to teach our special needs students.
One other thing that really jumped at me in this video was how varied these students handicaps were. Lets say you're an inventor and you decide you want to make a keyboard for people who are physically handicapped. Where do you start? Well, you look at the handicaps that are prevalent in the world, and see that, for instance, 75% of physically handicapped people have a hard time finding the keys on a keyboard. Great, you've found a problem, and a group of people you can help. So you develop a keyboard where the keys are maybe spread a little further apart so keys aren't accidentally pushed, and you also tie it to some kind of predictive text input software so that typing the letters "SOFTW" might auto-complete to "SOFTWARE." You take it to market, you charge a reasonable price for the device to recoup your costs and make some money for yourself and think you've helped the world. And you have! but what about the other 25%? Some of them can't use their fingers properly, some of them can't control their arms at all, some have NO arms! Handicaps aren't standardized. If they were, we'd have solved this issue long ago. Can we help a blind person read? Yes! We can give them braille books! But what about a blind person with no hands, or physical problems as well? Umm, well, we could use audio-books! Well, that helps, but what about books that haven't been converted to audio? Do we limit the experience of this subset of handicapped people, or do we find another way to help them?
This is a big messy problem, and I doubt there will ever be a solution that will help 100% of the handicapped people of the world 100% of the time, and all for a reasonably price they all can afford. But I'd assume you solve the problem the same way you eat an elephant. One bite at a time.
Two of the people featured in the movie, (Bonita and Kent) used a program called JAWS that is essentially a screen reader for the blind. While working at the University of Notre Dame's Help Desk we had a student who also used JAWS and visited us from time to time for help. The thing that amazed me about JAWS was that it didn't JUST read the text on the screen, it read where your mouse was pointing. This is amazingly helpful if you're on the internet. Imagine if every time you went to a different page on a website, it read all the header information, all the menus, ads, and all of the things you really don't care about. I'd give up pretty quick just from annoyance. But it's smart enough to read the section your mouse is hovering over.
Another thing that stuck out to me from the video was how expensive these things were, that the schools were expected to pay for them, and that in some cases, only 1 or 2 students at a time could benefit from them. That sounds harsh at first blush, but if you're a school administrator who has to deal with a ever decreasing budget and are struggling to just keep your teachers paid, it's hard to find money for an Assistive technology to help one child in your school. While I agree that every student should have the opportunity to learn in the classroom, and this kind of technology is far and away some of the best ways to help with that, in most cases, schools just don't HAVE the money to put toward these things. It seems like pressure would be better put on government to give grants to schools for A.T. so that the money is there when and if it's needed, rather than forcing a school board to decide between having enough teachers, and having the tools to teach our special needs students.
One other thing that really jumped at me in this video was how varied these students handicaps were. Lets say you're an inventor and you decide you want to make a keyboard for people who are physically handicapped. Where do you start? Well, you look at the handicaps that are prevalent in the world, and see that, for instance, 75% of physically handicapped people have a hard time finding the keys on a keyboard. Great, you've found a problem, and a group of people you can help. So you develop a keyboard where the keys are maybe spread a little further apart so keys aren't accidentally pushed, and you also tie it to some kind of predictive text input software so that typing the letters "SOFTW" might auto-complete to "SOFTWARE." You take it to market, you charge a reasonable price for the device to recoup your costs and make some money for yourself and think you've helped the world. And you have! but what about the other 25%? Some of them can't use their fingers properly, some of them can't control their arms at all, some have NO arms! Handicaps aren't standardized. If they were, we'd have solved this issue long ago. Can we help a blind person read? Yes! We can give them braille books! But what about a blind person with no hands, or physical problems as well? Umm, well, we could use audio-books! Well, that helps, but what about books that haven't been converted to audio? Do we limit the experience of this subset of handicapped people, or do we find another way to help them?
This is a big messy problem, and I doubt there will ever be a solution that will help 100% of the handicapped people of the world 100% of the time, and all for a reasonably price they all can afford. But I'd assume you solve the problem the same way you eat an elephant. One bite at a time.
Monday, May 14, 2012
Here's a second one
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