Tools for Presentation - Prezi

I've used Prezi to make a brief presentation on Web 2.0 in medical education. It's a great tool that allows to you upload images, free text, draw images, and even embed YouTube videos. Enjoy the show!

Web 2.0 in Medicine on Prezi

Tools for Collaboration - Challenges and Rewards in Distance Education

This week, Carol Becker, Roozbeh Sharif and I looked at the Challenges and Rewards in Distance Education. We used VoiceThread to add comments to our PowerPoint slides.

Click below to view and enjoy!

Tools for Feedback, Reflection, and Social Networking - Cachinko

Cachinko (http://www.cachinko.com/) is an online social networking site that also acts as your own personal job finder. You can look for jobs on this site, post job listings, or even recommend friends to specific jobs. This website is very similar to monster.com or jobfinder.com but a nice perk: if you recommend someone who eventually gets hired for a job, you might end up with a few hundred dollars in your pocket from the employer as a finder's fee. You can also use Cachinko to connect with your friends and discuss job opportunities around the country. You could be relocating to another part of the country and in need of a new job, maybe your friend knows of a job that would be the perfect fit for you. All you need is a computer with internet access to start getting connected. 

I met with Lauren Hooke who told me a little bit about Cachinko and helped me navigate the website. There were a lot of options that were not apparent on my first pass through! She helps us from getting an account, to adding friends, searching for jobs, and learning about all the privacy settings.

So let's get started!

Lauren shows us her account.

I told you it was a lot of information!

And it's always important to discuss privacy settings for any online social forum.

There are many applications for Cachinko in medical education. The primary one, is what to do after you've finished all this education! Fours years of undergraduate education followed by four years of medical school and now you have to head off to residency. Except you may have realized that perhaps medicine is not really for you but you still have tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of dollars in student loans to pay off. Enter Cachinko and all your contacts across the country. There could be a job waiting for you somewhere that doesn't involve working in a hospital or a potential mentor who could help you navigate through the hard times that may be ahead. Not only jobs are shared but ideas can be shared too. The possibilites are limitless!

The advantages of Cachinko are numerous and have been outlined above by Lauren. The disadvantages have also been seen too: this is a relatively new site so unlike Facebook with millions of users, Cachinko has not reached "viral" capacity yet. There are also some glitches to work out with delays and time-outs on the weekends. This could be fixed pretty readily with a better server. And while the website boasts money-making potential, the job search community is very large and there are no guarantees that you're going to make the right fit.

All-in-all, a useful website to connect with friends and to find a job.
 

Tools for Critical Thinking and Problem Solving - Draw Anywhere

Draw Anywhere can be found at www.drawanywhere.com. This is a simple, free online tool where anyone can create diagrams. It is an excellent resource that allows for critical thinking and looking at any process with an analytical eye. All that is needed is internet access, a flash player, and a diagram that you want to create.

Flowcharts, process diagrams, and organizational charts can all be made online without having to download a program. The diagrams can be made at any computer with internet access and modified at any time. The diagrams can be shared online, linked to a webpage or saved as an image file and emailed.

The first thing that needs to be done is create an online account: all you need to do is put in an email address and come up with a password that you can easily remember.

As you can see, you can sign up for the basic version, which is Free or can sign up for the Premium version, which will cost you some money. The biggest difference appears to be how many diagrams you can make, how much storage space you're given and how many users can use one account. Between gmail, yahoo mail, hotmail, and all the other possible email accounts you can make out there, you shouldn't have a problem making additional accounts on Draw Anywhere.

So let's get started. Click here.

Your final project would look like this:

Draw Anywhere allows for "concept mapping," which is a technique for visualizing relationships between different ideas or thoughts. A map is a graphical tool for organizing knowledge. In medicine, there are a slew of concepts that intertwine like a web of knowledge that can confuse anyone, even the most intellectual, astute learner. There is a lot of information to process and can be overwhelming for someone who is already working plenty of clinical hours, despite the new ACGME hour regulations. This tool can be used to help medical students and residents connect concepts learned. They can also build diagrams of clinical pathways that they may not completely understand. This tool could be used when discussing cases with medical learners. Instead of using a whiteboard or chalk board, a computer wired to a projector can be used to help them discuss symptoms and associations or build differential diagnoses. By using a visual tool, more connections can be made from what is read to what is seen in the clinical arena. This tool can also be used by the medical professional to develop evidence-based guidelines and protocols.

As stated above, there are many advantages to this tool. The basic version is free and there isn't anything to download onto your computer. You can also access this tool from any computer with internet access. There are more advanced features that were not covered completely in this post but the basic diagram tools would be the most beneficial for someone in medicine and/or education. For the more advanced user, exploration of the other types of diagrams or objects is just a click away. On the website there are sample diagrams that anyone can peruse for ideas. The primary disadvantage would be the limitations of the free version of the tool: only 3 diagrams can be saved at a time and the 10MB storage limit is also a hindrance. It's still a great tool and one can keep opening new accounts with any email address.

Introduction to Distance Learning - What in the world is Web 2.0?

It's funny how you can use all of these "Web 2.0" tools on a daily basis: Facebook, Skype, ooVoo, Twitter, xtranormal, blogs, etc, and not realize that they fall under this umbrella. The last week of June, I was in DC - well, actually I was in Virginia but it's just 15 minutes from DC - on "staycation." I didn't really have any specific plans other than reading all of our assigned reading prior to the start of class. The pile of reading was somewhat daunting, but I thought getting a leg up on this new concept (new for me) was important. The more I read through everything, the more I kept thinking that this is the direction education is heading and I need to keep up. (I also kept thinking if I was clever enough, I could have designed a blog like MacRumors.com a few years ago and skipped medical school, residency, and fellowship altogether and the student loans that came with it. I could be rolling in it now.)

Case in point, my nephew, who just finished the fourth grade, submits the majority of his homework online and if he or his parents have any questions for his teacher, they can post comments or questions to her on a private discussion board that is viewable by any child in the class. He knows how to upload his homework and submit it to his teacher. He's just 10 and is already more savvy in distance learning than me! Next thing I know, he'll be blogging about his life and the woes of being a 10-year old living in suburbia.

In a world where it seems that everyone has an iPhone (or the HTC EVO which is much better!), iPad, laptop or netbook, the more technologically advanced a class is, the more today's learners will stay involved and stay plugged in to what's going on in their class. Videocasts of lectures missed might not encourage students to get out of bed in the morning, but at least they are getting the information the teacher wants them to learn. Discussion boards, chat rooms, video-conferencing can allow students to interact with each other in the comfort of their home. How great is that? Saying that this is the wave of the future sounds cheesey but understanding how to capture today's learner is something every educator should know.

Finally, as an avid cook and foodie, I just wanted to tell you all that my favorite blog is the Julie/Julia Project: http://blogs.salon.com/0001399/

Check it out. Julie is a very entertaining writer and the movie does not do her any justice.

Tools for Creativity and Innovation - VocabGrabber

Part 1: Getting started. Click here: VocabGrab_1

 

Part 2: What it can do? Click here: VocabGrab_2

Part 3: I want more. Click here: VocabGrab_3

What your text should look like after your text is "grabbed."

VocabGrabber would be a great tool for the novice to medicine who is trying to make headway through a highly intellectual article. Well, not even a novice but even someone who has been in medicine for years but is reading an article that has nothing to do with their field of expertise. I would use this when I have medical students or residents critique an article. This innovative tool allows you to copy and paste electronically available text directly onto its website and it will define all the words in your text for you. There’s no need to go and find your handy (and possibly cumbersome) dictionary because it’s now at your fingertips, literally. Medical, biological, and anatomical terms are also easily defined. Vocabgrabber will also generate synonyms and antonyms for each word. This makes for more connection between what is being read and what is already known. And if all else fails, it will at least highlight the most relevant words so you can get an idea of what might be going on without suffering through every word of a long article.

This would also be an excellent tool for someone who is writing an article for submission to a publication. The author can critique their writing and see if they are using words in the proper context and if they are using the same word over and over again. With the generation of synonyms, other words can be inserted into the text to prevent redundancy.


The advantages of this tool include knowing the definitions of the words you’re reading and making a connection between the new word learned and other words that are in you’re vocabulary. In younger learners, this would be a fantastic resource for improving reading, writing, and communication skills. With a subscription to the program, students can also hear the words pronounced correctly. Basic VocabGrabber is FREE! But the more sophisticated you want to get with VocabGrabber and its parental unit Visual Thesaurus, the more likely you’re going to have to spend some money. Otherwise, there are very few disadvantages to VocabGrabber that I can think of. Any thoughts on your end?

Tools for Communication - ooVoo

Presenting ooVoo, which you can find at http://www.oovoo.com/. This is a communication tool that you can use to connect with anyone, anytime, with video calls, video messages, phone calls, text and more. Features of ooVoo include:

Two-way video calling is always free. Unlike Skype, with ooVoo you can video chat with up to 6 other people at one time. This feature is free for the first 30 days after you sign up and after that, you have to pay for this premium service. You can also talk to friends who have not downloaded ooVoo by using Web Video Call. Web video calling allows you to video call with your AIM or Facebook friends - just send them the Web Video Call link from the chat window.

ooVoo also allows you to:

Here’s a screenshot of my nieces leaving me a message on ooVoo. Disregard the big add from Clear Communications.

To use this tool, you need to download the application onto your computer. Then you will see this on your desktop:

Click on the “Add a Friend” button and start adding friends using their ooVoo ID, telephone number, or email address. Once they are online, you just need to double click on their name and start chatting. This is what things will look like once you have a friend to chat with:

In order to use ooVoo, you will need broadband internet access and a computer with a webcam and microphone (a headset works great if you have one).

Just like I outlined in my research proposal for Week 1, video conferencing can be used to connect “experts” to learners who are trying to learn how to do a procedure, run a code, operate on a patient, or if classmates need to share ideas with one another and don’t have time to meet face to face. Let’s say it’s the middle of the night and I’m in the ER by myself. I’m alerted to a trauma coming in to the hospital in 5 minutes. After my initial heart rate has stabilized, I call up Dr. Paul Sirbaugh, the medical director of the ED and a very smart man, so he can assess the situation and offer guidance as needed. Since I can video call up to 6 people on the same call with ooVoo, I could even contact the trauma surgeon, an anesthesiologist, and my mother if necessary. As a learner, having someone on a video call can be a relief and their assistance can only reinforce appropriate patient care. Later on this semester, we are going to work together on a project that was outlined by Dr. McNeil where we are going to create a presentation using any of the Web 2.0 tools but have to use other resources other than meeting in person. This will allow us to meet literally “face to face” without being in the same physical space.

Clearly, an advantage of this tool is that one’s teaching can come from anywhere as long as you have internet access and have a webcam. If someone has developed a procedure in Bali and don’t have the means to fly across the world (or they don’t want to go anywhere because let’s face it, they live in Bali!), they can present their findings in an international forum without leaving their hometown. And when a student is off to medical school a 1000 miles away from home, they can see their family on a call if they are feeling homesick.

Disadvantages of this tool include needing the necessary equipment in order to use this tool. If you don’t have internet access or don’t have a webcam, video calling would be difficult. The other disadvantage is being seen: no more calls to your boss in your pajamas!

Hopefully you will find this tool to be very useful and a great alternative to Skype.