Since it is Friday, and my birthday, and I have a stack of papers to grade, and a poster to design – this will be a bit short. Since we (Dr. Al Partridge, Dr. Bev Chiarulli, and myself) gave a SL demo to the IUP Council of Trustees yesterday, we were invited to a very nice lunch today. In addition to the food (with an excellent dessert) we had the opportunity to mingle and talk to lots of people. I was quite pleased that many people complimented us on the presentation and 2 people actually said that we "blew their mind" which made me laugh since that is one of the phrases tossed around at PKAP, especially by Bill Caraher. Anyway, it got me thinking about the range of abilities (computer-wise) in the various populations of people I run into. On one hand, my son at age 4 could boot the computer and start navigating the web and even send email, while on the other hand I know academics who can’t attach or download e-mail attachments. Since I associate with colleagues who have similar interests, we tend to have similar abilities and I mistakenly take for granted that everyone views technology the same way I do — and this is a huge mistake that I need to try to avoid. This will be especially true when I teach my Digital History class this spring and have 24 students who will probably have a very diverse range of abilities and knowledge. This realization also makes me better appreciate having two co-directors working with me on PKAP since they have come up with ideas that would not have occurred to me, such as David creating a Facebook page for the project, and Bill with his work on our documentary and a blog for the project. So I went for a free lunch, but got more than I bargained for.
RSM
Ancient History Ramblings 