Developing Usable Experiences

Four More Weeks, Lost in Laptops

March 29th, 2010 5:55 am —  37 views

My statistics professor1 loves statistics, there is no doubt, but student participation during lecture isn’t great.2 There are about 35 students (when everyone shows up) and only 5 or 10 of us say anything all semester. You know who you are.

Every student has a laptop and seems to pay more attention to it than the professor.3 The professor has cleverly taken to using an online tool called LectureTools.4

With LectureTools she can post slides of the lectures. We can basically annotate the slides to leave notes. It also allows her to post questions which we can answer during lecture.5 She’ll ask us to answer a question then will call up the results.

When she asks about the answers nobody wants to admit having answered. Nobody responds. The look on her face is like, “Seriously? I know you guys are here, you just voted. Hello?”

I think she’s on to something though. If you’re all going to be in a room together where you can see and hear but are also networked, make use of it for learning. LectureTools holds a lot of promise, keep at it Lada.

It’s easy to get distracted though. At one point the prof (running her lecture off her laptop) switches to an email to find a link to something funny and relevant…I forget exactly what it was because I got lost for a second.

Understand that if the professor mentions a famous person, theory or event, many of us launch a browser tab and Google it. The next 5 or 10 seconds spent skimming data. Augmenting the lecture with facts, figures, pictures.

I started skimming this blog of “indescribable awesomeness” and almost bust out laughing. With practiced discipline I brought my facilities back to lecture. Just barely. A few days later W. and I are looking at some of the older posts and were laughing so hard we were in tears.

But anyway, back to school stuff, this blog, and it’s final days.

There are basically four more weeks of classes. The fourth week is committed to a take-home final in statistics. In one of my classes, I have only 3 more weeks. So even though it’s four weeks total, it’s less than that even. The next 2 weekends are going to be all about writing final reports, wrapping up a 25 page white paper, and a couple more problem sets for stats.

After that I graduate and move on.

Image: Taken on the way to study group and a group meeting in the Ross Business School. This is looking through the class toward a huge granite staircase.

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  1. Before I had my first class with her, I remember an email being sent to SI students to vote for her on Wired.com. [↩]
  2. I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that many are there because statistics is a requirement. [↩]
  3. Except for one person who shares with a friend for LectureTools stuff. [↩]
  4. It was a rough start, but a couple weeks into class she went to a session on how to use it and things improved considerably. [↩]
  5. We can also post questions which she checks every now and then to answer. [↩]

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Long Hard Road

March 17th, 2010 10:17 pm —  14 views

“You know there’s something that you need to know, it’s gonna be alright.”1.

A glance at the clock. It’s 11pm. I usually try call it a night by 11pm. The last couple nights I’ve seen 12:30pm before I made myself stop looking at the clock. Just had to get some stuff done.

Sometimes I think it’s because I have to serialize myself through this keyboard. Kickin’ it QWERTY style. If only I could find that gadget to keep me connected. Maybe it’s time for the iPhone. I want to be able to talk to something and have it sent me an email of what I said. I want my house to listen and respond to information requests. That’s probably a way off though.

Sought some decompression today through golf. It was sunny and warm. First round of the year. The next won’t be for another month. I golfed with a retired aero-space engineer and an incredibly fit asian neuro-surgeon medical student who will learn tomorrow where his 7 year neuro-surgery residency will be. His first choice? John Hopkins in Baltimore. He golfed par. I don’t know what I golfed. I didn’t keep score.

It’s been a long hard road the last few years. Taking classes to fulfill this degree has been arduous. I’m a better person for it. I’ve learned a lot and have been applying what I learn as I’ve been learning it. But still, something is missing. I think it’s interaction, engagement, co-creation. I’m not sure. I’m getting closer though. I love creating things that are useful and get people to interact.

Apparently my personality is one that thrives on feedback and interaction. I need feedback to make good decisions. Otherwise I feel like I’m wandering aimlessly, lost. I find it hard to get people to give you their feedback straight up. Not everybody is a waltzing bear.

W. was asleep when I got home tonight. She mumbled acknowledgement when I rubbed her leg so hopefully she doesn’t wake up later and wonder where I am. My mother used to have us wake her up when we got home late from babysitting. She didn’t want to wake up later and wonder if we’d made it home. She’d say weird things though, dredged from whatever dream she was having.

I didn’t leave the B school until about 10:00pm. After chatting with classmates and walking across campus through throngs of drunken beaded students wearing alls kinds of green I didn’t get home and connected until about 10:40pm. Surf the nets, look for feedback, then give some. Capture the moment.

I’m listening to Sade. I’m tired. I have class tomorrow morning. I have lots to do at work. Spring is parked out front. The living rushing by. Missing my cat every day.

Image: I just like this tree and building. Took this picture last week walking to West Hall.

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  1. Sade, Soldier of Love, “Long Hard Road” [↩]

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Caught in the flow with rapids ahead

March 4th, 2010 10:10 pm —  18 views

So this is supposed to be spring-break for us graduate students. For me it’s a week where I’m able to concentrate on work projects without too much of an academic shadow. And I have, leveraging skills learned over the last couple years.

But right now, even though I could be working on a white paper draft due in less than two weeks, I’m watching cartoons. It’s not like the paper doesn’t have a good start, we’ve already drafted a good part of it. So I watch episodes of Cowboy Bebop that I’ve seen at least twice already. While scheduling group meetings for the weekend.

Judging by how few of my classmates I see online, I suspect they are occupying themselves elsewhere. Hopefully they’re watching alligators or enjoying live music or exploring another country. Seems like a classmate is in Ireland at the moment.

I’m in my basement office, thinking about how value is created. Thinking about how value is created through the tools and resources we use and wondering how to find where things can be improved. Kind of abstract, but I’m working at it. Project’s need direction, attention needs focus. Evolution is driven by competing forces.

So easy to get caught in the raging flow. Swept along. Forced by the current, the circumstance.

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