The merit of flash

I am so happy that I can make my web-site with high design quality and I can put as many things like images, movies and Pdf files as I want in a very professionally looking and fun way. I’m happy that I could try to make a course web-site that someday I would want to teach even if it was just an assuming. Learning a dream weaver and the concept of table and layout was like an epoch-making for my web-site. I was amazed to find out that all the functions we previously learned like making a links using invisible buttons and many other functions can be easily done in dream weaver and by using flash. However, the most important part I accomplished in this class is that I became free of the fear about technique and I became very bold, developed a habit of just exploring and got the notion that I have to be open minded as a life-time learner. I found out that the small chance of my attitude changed a lot for me. I actually became very friendly about technology.

Class Websites

I was amazed how my classmates' web-sites have evolved since the beginning of this course. I think all of my class mates are smart and creative and they all have very good tastes. The feature that changed our web-site most distinctively is, I think, the use of the dream weaver. Using the table and layout, we could make our page look cool and professional and with the choice of various fonts of the dream weaver, we could raise our page's design quality. Considering the fact that we are living in the generation the design matters and the fact that our students are the generations who are technologically savvy and the visual aspects matter a lot to them, ability to incorporate the visual images with a good design quality in our web site is important, I believe. Flash and the dream weaver, even I confronted a lot of unexpected issues to solve, provide us very effective and relatively easy way to present contents in the web -site without using a special language. I'm happy that I learned all that in this class and I'm ready to make my future class web- site now!

Technolgy and education

Reading Susan's blog about the technology in education made me also want to think and blog about it. Education is becoming, more than ever, an amorphous living organism that evolves with the times and technology. The key is to coexist with technology for technology cannot be stopped. A statistic at UNC shows that 95% of the students utilize Facebook. These same students, in all likelihood, went to a high school that does not condone the use of Facebook. The point here is clear; you cannot stop students from doing what is popular. Thus, we must search for ways to coexist with social networking technology. Social networking sites are useful because they are just that: social networking made easier. Many students who wouldn’t have shared lunch let alone ideas in school may be “best friends” online. Many students may find that instant feedback on their pieces of writing or problems are extremely useful to their education. Furthermore, many students who feel that they cannot approach a certain teacher about a problem they didn’t understand could approach these same teachers easily in an online community. Of course I’m mentioning some of the more ideal educational ideas here. However, at the very least, the schools must recognize that social networking and their popularity are not going to go away. Therefore, schools must teach the students how to utilize these networks without exposing themselves too much to potentially dangerous individuals.

Making a flash assigment page in one

1. In the insert menu of the dream weaver, I set the path to put flash and the flash is inserted.

2. I made the animation buttons first when I did the assignment, but it would be so annoying if all plays with sounds simultaneously, so I added a control on the first animation and the second one which is a music video of Big Bang.
3. For the first animation, I inserted the action script in the frame. I put 'stop' on the first frame and in the last frame in the whole and I put 'go to and play' action script on the play button so that it can go to frame 2 and play until it meet the 'stop' action script and stop. I put 'stop' action in the stop button to make it automatically stops if pressed.

4. For the big bang music video, I went to .fla file again and on the stage, in the properties, I chose the option to remove the auto play in the web.

Thoghts on Open Source

Internet has allowed many people to share information at the same time. Now, more than ever, it is allowing people to not only share information, but to edit it and to learn from it. There has been no shortage of success stories of open source websites and software programs. Many programs allow free information to be passed onto those who need it. While the reliability of some of these sites such as Wikipedia.com has been brought to question on more than one occasion, its popularity proves that such sites are here to stay. I believe open source programs and systems are great assets to education. The ultimate goal of education lies in the greater good of humanity. Information, in academic context, should be free and available to all. Allowing free access to books (Gutenberg project) and in some cases exams and course notes (MIT) are incredibly advantageous for those interested in a particular subject. Furthermore, by putting the coursework and the books online, people around the world with similar educational or academic interests can share their ideas freely. In addition, because the information that is accessible is specifically geared towards those who are searching for them, there is no real danger from outside intruders abusing the system. However, if there is one down side to open source systems is that sometimes they can result in misleading information. For example, I know that Wikipedia is not a reliable source for research information because it can be edited by anybody. Nevertheless, if the system is well monitored and scrutinized for errors by a competent staff of experts, then I see no problems in allowing the usage of open source systems as legitimate research resources.

Distance Learning & Virtual Learning

Distance learning is becoming incredibly popular these days. Considering that everything else can be acquired online, I suppose it was only a matter of time before learning was online. There are clearly pros and cons to distance or virtual learning. One of the most advantageous aspects of virtual learning is that it allows students from all over the world to actually see and listen to a lecture by a world famous professor. Sometimes, a Q&A session may even take a place after these lectures to provide an interactive learning experience for the students. Needless to say, such an experience might be a valuable and memorable experience for a student. In addition, virtual and distance learning such as the popular Blackboard program allows the professors to keep the students well informed in all aspects of the class – lecture slides, notes, schedule for upcoming tests, homework assignments, projects, contact information etc.. Organization is one of the most important elements of learning. Most of the students who perform below average have trouble organizing their schoolwork/homework and a program such as blackboard helps the student organize greatly. Clearly, as I’ve mentioned above, there are great advantages to distance learning. It is no surprise that most major universities use the Blackboard program. However, there are a couple of disadvantages to distance learning that I will mention here. First and foremost, ironically, the problem with distance or virtual learning is that it is almost too effective at making it easy for students to attend a classroom without actually attending it. I know from personal experience that many students simply grow reliant on virtual learning programs such as Blackboard to keep up with the class work for them. Thus, the students do not bother to take notes in class because they know that they can access Blackboard for the lecture notes. Even further, the students do not take mental notes about upcoming tests or projects to organize for the same reason for not taking class notes. In short, the students get extremely lazy. As we all know, there is no Blackboard for real life and these students, I believe, will have trouble adjusting to life after school. Secondly, classroom dynamics is more than just learning from the professor; it is learning from your fellow classmates. If it becomes extremely easy for students to stay home and get their degrees , then I believe the students are missing out meaningful connections.

Flying Penguins

I saw this video and I really liked it. I almost believed it. When penguins were flying, I almost thought it was touching, but this is a film made by and broadcasted on B.B.C on April fool's day as a joke to people. I liked the fact that people can have, and share the sense of humor like this.I think humour plays an important and desirable role in many aspects of our life. Sometimes, it can get rid of tension, misunderstanding, fear between people, sometimes it can convey the feelings of understanding, sympathy and so on.