Change of Media - change of educational settings

This wiki shall be used as a collaborative workspace for the seminar “Change of media - change of educational settings” at the University of Hamburg, 2008.

What is perception? What is knowledge? What is communication? For centuries each society has answered these questions for itself and has done it in many different ways. The answers to these questions are closely related to the respectively prevalent media used for information and/or communication. The seminar deals with the history and development of media, ranging from the invention of the central perspective and the book print to the emergence of a ubiquitous use of digitally networked and networking media. Cultural-sociological and educational implications in the specific epochs are of special interest. The main focus of discussion will concentrate on the increasing interconnectedness and its impact on further developments particularly in educational institutions.

The students shall understand the relation of media, communication, representation and education. Awareness shall be raised for the impact of technological changes on educational processes and settings.

Within the seminar a knowledge base about the seminar topic shall be compiled collaboratively in this wiki. After a short introduction into the topic the students get material to work with. This material shall be revised, compiled and edited. The students are asked to do a comprehensive research about additional information and material and link it to the material delivered to you. The context of the seminar topic shall always be kept in mind.

The seminar is open to students from the international master programme “ePedagogy Design – Visual Knowledge Building” as well as to students of educational science form the University of Hamburg. For the communication within the seminar the conferencing tool Skype and the platform Adobe Breeze are used for communication. It is possible to take part in the seminar without being present in Hamburg. But for the Hamburg students attendance is compulsory during the project work.

Week 1: Introduction, Date and Time: April 1st, 14:15 p.m. (Hamburg time), Mode: Attendance session in Hamburg

1. First ideas about the seminar topic shall be discussed.
2. The tool for the collaborative work – the wiki – is presented.
3. Everyone should register to the wiki and setup a personal page – to get used to work with the wiki. The personal page should contain questions and comments about what you expect from the seminar.
4. Start to form groups for the project work.

Week 2: Group work - Definitions of media/medium, Date and Time: April 8th, 14:15 p.m. (Hamburg time). Mode: Attendance session in Hamburg + Online session (Skype/Adobe Connect)

1. You get two texts: Marshall McLuhan “Medium is the message”; Torsten Meyer “Education Within a New Medium - an Introduction”
2. Read the texts and start to fill the wiki with definitions of media and medium within your groups.
3. Presentation of the different definitions.

Week 3-6: Project work, Date and Time: April 15th, 22nd, 29th and May 6th, 14:15 p.m. (Hamburg time), Mode: Attendance session in Hamburg + Skype session

1. You get texts ranging in history from the invention of the central perspective to the emergence of the information society. Please read all texts having the main topic of the seminar in mind – the connection of media, communication and education.
2. Everyone must read all texts to be later able to participate in the discussions.
3. Chose one topic within your group as a basis for your project work. Discuss this texts within your group.
4. The aim is to produce collaboratively a knowledge base in the wiki, containing an excerpt of each text with additional media-rich material (texts, pictures, links, audio, video etc). Try to produce small multimedia snippets by yourself, if you think this helps to make the topic clear. Please add definitions of terms and concepts in their own wiki pages and link to these definitions. This allows others to link to these definitions, too, if needed. Please try to integrate your own part into a cohesive wiki on the seminar topic. This means, always have a look on the project work of your peers.

Week 7 (May 13th) no seminar session – vacation in Hamburg

Week 8-9: Continuing the project work, Date and Time: May 20th, 27th,(Hamburg time), Mode: Attendance session in Hamburg + Online session (Skype/Adobe Connect)

Week 10-11: (Intermediate) Presentation of the project work & discussion, moderated by the project groups, Date and Time: June 3rd, and 10th 14:15 p.m. (Hamburg time), Mode: Attendance session in Hamburg + Online session (Skype/Adobe Connect)

Week 12-14: Continuing the project work, Date and Time: June 17th, 24th and July 1st (Hamburg time), Mode: Attendance session in Hamburg + Online session (Skype/Adobe Connect)

Week 15: Presentation of the project group database & discussion, moderated by the project group, Date and Time: July 8th 14:15 p.m. (Hamburg time), Mode: Attendance session in Hamburg + Online session (Skype/Adobe Connect)