Discussion1: Lifelogging –Memory and Forgetting

With development of technology, I think memory can be recorded completely by lifelogging or other new things some day. Development of technology is indeterminate and difficult to image, such as, 100 years ago, people could not image that it spends only 8 hours in getting Sweden from China.

However, as Miriam and Shelagh said, memory is more than storage: in essence it must be activated. Intelligent as machines or technologies are, they can not think about something as human being. In my opinion, memory is not only a record but a process of thinking. Lifelogging is able to record people’s memory but it can not identify what is people‘s want and what is not. Sometimes people may want to forget some bad things. Maybe a famous man’s memory will be made a document because he made a big contribution in some fields. How the technology identify which is job experience or privacy? I do not think machine can do that.

So I think machines cannot replace human being‘s thinking ability.

Creative learning about me

In my opinion, creative learning is a new way to study through Internet, some software and cyberspace, such as, Delicious bookmarks and Moodle. This is a revolution of education. It can help me to enlarged my world and widen my knowledge quickly and conveniently.

For example, I have a course "Professional Issues in Interactive Media". In this class, my teacher Joe asked us to have an account of Moodle. In moodle, there is much useful information about this course, such as, lecture slides, forum and so on. Teacher can post useful podcast that can help students whose first language is not English to study. In forum, students can post feedback and ask questions of each lecture, such as, what are your ideas of this lecture? Which part do you interested in?

I think it is a good method to students who study in foreign countries, because they may not understand all the contents in class. They can learn something they miss in class. It is also suit for timid students who are bashful to discuss a question in public.

The second advantage is that we can communicate with students who are in USA. We can have chance to share different cultures, thinking and methods.

My Research

In my final project, I am trying to design a website to help Chinese students who have a plan to study abroad deal with a series of troublesome matters by themselves, such as, how to apply for offer and how to get Visa and so on. The aim of my website is supplying plenty of useful and specific information including both life and study to future students. I am looking for some specific data, such as, how many Chinese students study abroad per year, how fast the number of students study abroad grow? I think it can enhance my project's feasibility.

I plan to use the method "UCD"--"user-centred design".

At the beginning, I have interviews with future students who are studying English in English language centre in UL. Because they will enter our university to study and I think it is very difficult to interview students in China. In this process, I think I can get large amount of need of users. I am thinking that whether I contact with the leader of language centre and ask some questions.

After getting this information, I begin to make my website. In this step, I want to use some useful software, for example, Dreamweaver, Flash, Photoshop and 3D Max and so on. Now I am improving these skills.

Next, I invite students who are also in language centre to test my website and tell me the advantages and disadvantages. According to their feedback, I repair my website. And then, I invite them to test it again.

At last, after the circle design, I hope my website is effective and efficient. Users can get information that they want and satisfaction. Actually, I hope that current students in language centre use my website to apply for our university. If this dream comes true, I want to talk with the leaders of International Office and discuss that whether can my website put in our university?