I have been busy preparing a micro-site for the DMin outlining the program information, admissions requirements, frequently asked questions etc. This site launched on schedule yesterday (March 25, 2008) and has already been drawing in visitors!

As usual this has been a team effort – special thanks to Janet, Karina, Kim, Paul and Phil.

Check out the web site!

So what is your style?

Welcome to the Free Classic Audio Books site where you can download free audio books in either mp3 format or m4b audio book format for iTunes and the iPod. Some of our audio books are human narrated Librivox recordings and others are narrated using the latest high quality text to speech voices.

Swing by and download some classics!

Here is a sample of the audio:
(Pilgrim’s Progress part 1)

Tyndale University College plans to start a one-year consecutive Bachelor of Education program in January 2008, subject to accreditation by the Ontario College of Teachers.

You can find more information here

Click here to view the embedded video.

Originally posted here.

The other day I also had a faculty (Richard Davis) come by my office for some advice on a newsletter. He was in the process of creating a newsletter for his department – the purpose of this newsletter was promotion. Not promotion of himself but of Tyndale and the Philosophy program that he is part of. He was convinced that putting out this newsletter would draw the attention of more prospective students.

I like Richard’s thinking – I know that he is not the only one thinking this way either – especially on the University College side of the faculty. Newsletters, blogs, web sites, wiki’s and so on are all great tools to deliver information within the educational context – but these are also great promotional tools!

Are you a faculty member? Do you have some great ideas of ways to use technology either in the classroom or for promotional purposes? Do you need our help to do it? We have this down to an art now and would love to help! Give us a call…

So here we go…

A book that changed your life:
Well I am going to have to give that good old perfect Sunday School answer and say the Bible (ESV)

A book that you’ve read more than once:
Intimacy with the Almighty

A book you’d want on a desert Island:
No-brainer – The Bible – it has peotry, History, great stories, wisdom…

A book that made you giddy:
- um do comics count?

A book that made you sob:
I sob every time I have to pay $70+ for a technology book!

A book you wish had been written:
A how-to manual that comes with each newborn kid

A book that you wish had never been written:
… I got nothing

A book that you are currently reading
Taking a break… nothing right now

A book you have been meaning to read:
Build your own AJAX Web Applications – I have started it but it’s not held my attention yet

I’m tagging: Keith, Phil and Darren

The article is called “Technology Spices Up Learning for Net Generation� which caught my eye – yes because of the word technology. We in the ITS department love technology – but not (always) for technology sake. Here is a quick snip from our department mission statement.

“ITS …provides information technology tools and services to encourage and enable effective learning…â€?

We desire to use technology to encourage and enable effective learning. This article discusses different ways we can use technology to better meets the needs of the “Net Generation�

Read the article then come back here to my blog and post a comment–

Do you think technology can make a difference in effective learning?
What technologies do you think we need to embrace at Tyndale?

Tyndale can help you with this at our classifieds web site. Just jump over to http://www.tyndale.ca/classifieds have a look – If you want to sell you will have to register for an account – if you just want to buy you will not need one. There is no cost involved in selling using this service!

Can’t find what you need there? Try here:
http://www.acollegetrades.com/auctions

Often groups collaborate on a document by “pushingâ€? it out to each member – emailing a file that each person edits on his or her computer, and some attempt is made to coordinate the edits so everyone’s work is equally represented. But what happens when two people think of the same idea and include it in different ways in their respective copies of the file, or when one group member misses an agreed upon time to finish their changes and pass on the file to the next member? Who decides what to do? Using a wiki “pullsâ€? the group members together to build and edit the document on a wiki page, which strengthens the community within the group, allows group members with overlapping or similar ideas to see and collaboratively build on each other’s work. It also allows all group members immediate, equal access to the most recent version of the document.

Well that all sounds fine and dandy Andy but I don’t have a wiki! So what do I do?

There are some great free services on the web that can help you here. Let’s look at one…

http://pbwiki.com/

At pbwiki you can create your own wiki in seconds – really… Just add your site name (example: tyndaletry) and tell them your email address – done – well they do want you to confirm your email address. Once you confirm you are asked to supply a password (only those who know the password can edit the site), whether or not the wiki should be publicly viewable (or only with password) and then to agree to their terms of service. After you answer these 3 questions you are done!

Here is a tip – in the drop down box labeled “what is this wiki for?” choose education. They will then give you 3 templates to work from – one being “Create a Group Project”

At this point you can create new pages and start working on your project! Editing your wiki is really quite easy and there is a full tutorial online for you to look at.

Just want to play? Well I have actually added the wiki we used as an example above. You can go to:

http://tyndaletry.pbwiki.com/

and poke around… If you want to edit anything or setup a new page feel free! The password is “tyndale”