Category: My Research
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Interaction Analysis – Part 2
As a learning scientist with a Psychology and English background rather than a Computer Science one, I find the Suthers’ et al. (2010) article a little bit difficult to digest at times. It’s conceptually dense and sophisticated, so it is not exactly easy reading for a sleep-deprived academic mom, but it’s pretty rewarding. I wish…
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Interaction analysis
Tatiana seems to be settling into an afternoon nap routine here in Paris, so I’ve been trying to catch up on my reading of journal articles. I’ve been meaning to read the Suthers, Dwyer, Medina, & Vatrapu’s (2010) article, A Framework for Conceptualizing, Representing, and Analyzing Distributed Interaction that Dan handed out copies at the…
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Autumn in France
Traveling with an infant is always a challenge, but being academics, we’re often on the road for conferences and such. Fortunately, Tatiana is a seasoned traveler. She’s been in four countries in less than fourteen months. First, we flew to Munich when she was just four months old for the STELLAR Alpine Rendez-Vous 2009. Next,…
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Guest lecture for a KMDI course
Like Stian, I’ve been invited to give a talk for a course at University of Toronto’s Knowledge Media Design Institute. The graduate seminar course, Knowledge Communities: Patterns and Practices, is taught by Jim Slotta, Cheryl Madeira, and Hedieh Najafi. The theme for the week is “knowledge building for 21st century knowledge communities,” which is at…
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Motherhood and Academia
It’s been a while since I last blogged. I’ve been meaning to, but writing has become more challenging lately since my little one is now too big to fit into a sling and too wiggly besides! I actually had two drafts of this very post, but neither one had made it to the publishing stage.…
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Co-authored paper projects
Now that I’ve recovered somewhat from the jet lag and inevitable cold that accompanies me home from Europe, I can get to work again on various paper projects. There are those with obvious deadlines coming up, and then there are those with no definite deadlines that I have to just submit to journals despite strong…
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Latent Semantic Analysis
Five years ago, it seemed inconceivable to me that I would someday use Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) to assess online discourse data. I recall vehemently arguing against LSA in a certain online graduate course at OISE, in which Teplovs (2001) was one of the assigned readings. I came up with rather elaborate examples in which…
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Social Network Analysis
My previous blog entries (for e.g., in 2006 and 2007) on social network analysis (SNA) flirted with tools available in Knowledge Forum. At the time, I was focused so intensely on completing my thesis that I couldn’t delve very deeply into the literature or software (scroll down to see download links for UCINET and others). I did…
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To Do Lists
Many people ask me what I am doing with all the “spare time” that I must have now that I have completed my dissertation. Admittedly, unlike professors who have to serve on thesis committees (see Michele Jacobsen’s blog entry, for e.g.: http://girlprof.blogspot.com/2009/03/do-i-control-my-schedule.html), my schedule is more manageable. I am surprisingly busy, however, with academic work…
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Collaborative writing and wikis
I’ve experimented with various kinds of wikis over the past few years. I’ve previously blogged about my thoughts on the process as I co-authored peer-reviewed proceedings on Writely (for e.g., http://dreff.wordpress.com/2005/12/16/mystery/ and http://dreff.wordpress.com/2006/01/30/deadlines/) which eventually became Google Docs. I also played with other wikis like Peanut Butter Wiki, now called PB Works, and the TaTE…