ETC 12-2014

Connection EdTech December 2014

Boise State graduated 1,718 students on Dec. 19—53 of them with EdTech master’s degrees and 19 more with EdTech graduate certificates. Hi, Jerry.

I just received the EdTech news-letter with information about the Dr. Thorsen medal. It’s wonderful!

Congratulations to all of you in EdTech for the wonderful achieve-ments. I graduated with the M.S. in 2002 and met everyone at com-mencement and the special lunch. I didn’t realize that I was an early graduate of the online M.S., but I just want to say that I thoroughly enjoyed everything about the pro-gram and faculty.

Please pass this note on to Dr. Thorsen who was also my thesis ad-viser.

I am still teaching in the class-room and fully online in the Thea-tre Arts Department at San Fran-cisco State University.

Jo Tomalin, Ph.D. Professor, Theatre Arts San Francisco State University

EdTech Connection

Published three times a year by the Department of Educational Technology

at Boise State University

Jerry Foster Editor and academic adviser

208-426-4008 [email protected]

LETTERS WELCOME

2 Boise State EdTech Connection

Boise State EdTech Connection 3

E dTech student Buffy Naillon published a novel in late

November and Amazon.com has already christened it

an international best-seller.

Naillon is a writer, rather than an educator, so she is not a

typical EdTech student. Teachers are communicators, of

course, but Naillon works on a broader level. She interned

years ago at Der Spiegel, Germany’s most respected maga-

zine, and later worked in newspapers, public radio, and the

motion picture business.

So what’s her angle? Why is a late-career journalist with a

bachelor’s degree in German literature enrolled in an educa-

tion-focused master’s program?

Because of the skills.

Mobile app design, video game design, web design, pod-

casting, digital story telling—these are book-promotion skills

as much as teaching and instructional design skills. Book pro-

motion and merchandising used to be the purview of publish-

ers and stores. But, authors today, particularly unknowns and

especially indie authors like Naillon, are finding they have to

promote themselves because traditional publishers focus

most of their promotional time and money on big-name writ-

ers with large followings of loyal readers. Left-over allotments

of funding to promote less-known authors is usually too little

to break through the media clutter that smothers book buyers

and other consumers. It’s a sink or swim world.

So, it is little wonder that many writers, like Naillon, are

taking their publishing destiny into their own hands by

choosing to self-publish on Amazon.com because they can set

their own prices and change them as market forces and mer-

chandising strategies dictate. Writers under contract with tra-

ditional publishers don’t have that option.

Because she is a first-time novelist with no following,

4 Boise State EdTech Connection

Naillon has chosen to sell her book

electronically for 99 cents and the

602-page on-demand paperback

for about $11. Ninety-nine cents is

cheap enough that anyone in-

trigued with the book’s description

can buy it without much risk. If

they don’t like it, they’re not out

much. But Naillon is betting that

readers will like it and tell their

friends, which means more book

sales.

For the next few days, she’s offering a free

holiday recipe

book to attract

readers who, she’s

betting, will want

to buy the novel.

The story is a

modern re-telling

of King

Thrushbeard, a

European folktale

in which a self-

absorbed princess rejects all the suitors sug-

gested by her father. When she turns her nose

up at Thrushbeard, a handsome and rich

young king, her father forces her to marry the

next eligible bachelor who comes along, and

that happens to be King

Thrushbeard again, but this time

clean-shaven and disguised as a

penniless minstrel. In Naillon’s

version, The Girl Who Fell into

the Sky, temperaments are re-

versed. The kindly king-father

character is replaced by a media

mogul and the princess is a reluc-

tant reality television star. Every-

thing she says and does—

including dating—is scripted by

her father to manipulate ratings.

Naillon said she has always

wanted to write a book that people couldn’t put

down, so, when an adult friend finished the book

and hugged a pillow

while rocking back and

forth on her couch, Nail-

lon knew she had

achieved intensity.

While most young

adult works are held to

fewer than 200 pages,

Naillon’s book measures

600, which means she

has the courage of J.K.

Rowling, Stephanie Myers, and Suzanne Collins,

whose YA novels boldly exceeded the limit of

conventional wisdom. “If I bucked the trend,”

she said, “it wasn't a conscious decision. I wrote

the story that needed to be told.”

EdTech assistant professor Patrick Lowen-

thal has co-authored a chapter in a new book

called Student-Teacher Interaction in Online

Learning Environments.

The book discusses social presence as a means of improving performance, interaction, and a sense of community in online courses.

Lowenthal’s chapter, co-authored with University of North Texas doctoral student Whitney Kilgore, is called The Human Ele-ment MOOC.

Boise State EdTech Connection 5

Teachers can prepare for the Google Apps

Certified Teacher Exam Jan. 25-31 at Go-Go

Labs, the spin-off professional development

company developed by EdTech faculty members.

The workshops will be facilitated by Sean

O’Neil, a Google Apps for Education certified

trainer. Regardless of experience level, teachers

will learn at their own pace in a quest-based

game environment. Some synchronous events,

which model classroom integration strategies,

will be required.

Email [email protected] for more

info.

EdTech adjunct instructor Jackie

Gerstein has written a chapter in a just-

published book called Experiences in Self-

Determined Learning, in which she traces

education from the monastic model

(version 1.0) to the present constructivist

model (v. 2.0) and predicts that education

in v. 3.0 will be based on personalized, self

-determined or interest-based learning in

which problem-solving, innovation, and

creativity drive education.

Education 3.0 is similar to what Ger-

stein teaches in EDTECH 543-Social Net-

work Learning.

Discover more at her blog:

Http://

usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/

2014/12/01/.

6 Boise State EdTech Connection

Boise State’s Department of Educational Tech-

nology has received two platinum MARCOM

awards for marketing projects designed to promote

the online graduate program to a nationwide audi-

ence.

The projects, a series of posters and online vid-

eos, were created by EdTech chair Brett Shelton in

collaboration with Sovrn, a Boise-based creative

design and branding firm.

“We are honored to receive the top awards in

this year’s competition,” Shelton said. “These pro-

jects reflect the same level of excellence, innovation

and quality we offer in our courses. We strive for

excellence in all that we do and it is great to be ac-

knowledged for that effort.”

The Association of Marketing and Communica-

tion Professionals hosts the prestigious MARCOM

awards competition each year to honor individuals

and organizations who produce exceptionally crea-

tive print, visual, audio or web promotional items.

This year more than 6,000 entries were submitted

from Fortune 500 companies, media conglomer-

ates, advertising agencies, public relations firms,

associations, nonprofits and government agencies.

Educational technology is a graduate degree and

certificate program in the College of Education. All

coursework is offered completely online and is de-

signed for teachers and other working professionals

who want to improve student engagement and

learning through technology integration and online

teaching. The department offers both a master’s

and a doctoral degree, as well as fast-track certifi-

cate programs.

To see the posters, visit edtech.boisestate.edu.

Boise State EdTech Connection 7

QUESTION #1—If the Department of Edu-cational Technology offered a second mas-ter’s degree—related in some way to educa-tional technology—on what topic do you think it should focus?

QUESTION #2—If the Department of Edu-cational Technology offered an Educational Specialist degree (an Ed.S. is an intermediary degree between master’s and Ed.D.), would you be interested in enrolling?

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