News
Literature Online (LION) partners with OUP
The popular Literature Online (LION) reference resource is now
offering an enhanced cross-searching service including results from
more than thirty literary reference titles in the Oxford Reference Online
collection including the new 5-volume Oxford Encyclopedia of British
Literature, the new 4-volume Oxford Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature,
the 4-volume Oxford Encyclopedia of American Literature, the Oxford
Companion to English Literature, and The Oxford Guide to Literature in
English Translation. Details are available at
http://lion.chadwyck.co.uk/marketing/whatsnew.jsp
25 New Digitisation Projects!
Following the successful launch of the first six projects in the JISC
digitisation programme, 16 new projects have recently been approved
representing a £12million investment in national scholarly resources. Of
particular interest to the English Subject community are: The First World
War Poetry Archive (Oxford) – Preserving and sharing memories of the
Great War through the words of its poets; Electronic ephemera (Bodleian
Library); discover hidden treasures of everyday life from the 16th to the 20th centuries; British Newspapers
1620-1900 (British Library) – Read the first three centuries of newspapers from all regions of the British Isles; a
Digital Library of Core e-Resources on Ireland (Queen’s University Belfast) – a one-stop shop for Irish studies
e-resources. Read more about the projects on the JISC website: www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/programme_digitisation.aspx
Create a Course at Wikiversity
The School of Language and Literature at Wikiversity is part of the large
community established for the creation and use of free learning materials
online using the popular Wiki format. Whilst it is clearly early days in terms
of content in our discipline, the pages are growing rapidly and the site is
always looking for contributors. Now might be the time to share the module
of your dreams with the world!
http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/School:Language_and_Literature
Focus on…
Digital Imaging Service
TASI (The Technical Advisory Service for Images) is a JISC service that provides
a wealth of information for anyone working with digital images. Whether
you are interested in fi nding images to illustrate your VLE course or lecture,
scanning in your own images, developing an image collection or have a
question about copyright of digital images TASI can help. The website also
offers an extensive archive of tutorials on image related issues as well as
a workshop programme run from their base in Bristol. TASI is defi nitely a
website to add to your bookmarks: http://www.tasi.ac.uk
Tools
Web conferencing
Two tools for those interested in moving beyond the limitations of asynchronous
communication online are described below.
Yugma is a free web-based conferencing service that allows you to share what you see
on your desktop with other users: handy if you want to discuss a piece of writing with an
individual student, or a group, deliver a presentation etc. You can also switch presenter to
allow you to see the desktop of the person presenting. There is an annotation facility as well
as a text-chat facility. The beauty of this tool is the ease with which you get started. When
used in conjunction with Skype or the telephone this could be a powerful tool.
www.yugma.com/index.php
Marratech is free and simple web-based videoconferencing software. Simply downloading the software turns your computer into a meeting centre. You can host a meeting of up to fi ve people live with voice and video connections – you can also collaboratively work on a writeboard. This software is for high-speed connections and you must have a static IP address. www.marratechfree.com/
Free Hosted Wikis
PBWikis – Another externally hosted wiki service popular with the educational community http://pbwiki.com/edu.html
TiddlyWiki - Allows you to create personal SelfContained hypertext documents that can be posted to a WebServer, sent by email or kept on a USB thumb drive to make a WikiOnAStick. http://www.tiddlywiki.com
Schtuff – A Classic wiki interface with tagging facilities. http://www.schtuff.com/
Take a Stretch Break
Everyone working for long periods of time with computers needs to be aware of the
potential health risks when spending too much time seated in front of screens. Regular
breaks, stretching exercises and good ergonomic furniture are just some of the things you
need to aware of!
Stretch break is a nifty software program that reminds you when to stretch and has animations to show you how. You can time the messages to pop-up whenever you want them to (e.g. every twenty minutes) and there are 36 different stretching exercises in the program. There’s a 10 day free trial or the software will cost you about £23.00.http://www.paratec.com/index.htm
For other tips and techniques there are many websites available online e.g.
Ergonomics for workstations (http://dohs.ors.od.nih.gov/ergo_computers.htm ) or
Stretching exercises for hands and fingers: (http://www.stretchnow.com.au/exercises/hands.htm)
New Books
HTML Mastery: Semantics, Standards & Styling by Paul Haine Publisher: Friends of Ed ISBN: 1-59059-765-6
No One Cares What You Had for Lunch: 100 Ideas for Your Blog by Margaret Mason Publisher: Peachpit Press ISBN: 0-321-44972-X
Moodle E-Learning Course Development by William Rice Publisher: PACKT Publishing ISBN: 1-904-81129-9
E-learning Groups and Communities by David McConnell Publisher: Open University Press ISBN: 0-335-21280-8
Making the Transition to E-learning: Strategies and Issues by Mark Bullen & Diane James Publisher: Idea Group ISBN: 1-59140-950-0
