Geostatistical interpretation of paleoceanographic data over large ocean basins - Reality and fiction

A promising approach to reconstruct oceanographic scenarios of past time slices is to drive numerical ocean circulation models with sea surface temperatures, salinities, and ice distributions derived from sediment core data. Set up properly, this combination of boundary conditions provided by the data and physical constraints represented by the model can yield physically consistent sets of three-dimensional water mass distribution and circulation patterns. This idea is not only promising but dangerous, too. Numerical models cannot be fed directly with data from single core locations distributed unevenly and, as it is the common case, scarcely in space. Conversely, most models require forcing data sets on a regular grid with no missing points, and some method of interpolation between punctual source data and model grid has to be employed. An ideal gridding scheme must retain as much of the information present in the sediment core data while generating as few artifacts in the interpolated field as possible. Based on a set of oxygen isotope ratios, we discuss several standard interpolation strategies, namely nearest neighbour schemes, bicubic splines, Delaunay triangulation, and ordinary and indicator kriging. We assess the gridded fields with regard to their physical consistence and their implications for the oceanic circulation

Towards Mobile Learning Support for the Transition from School to the Workplace

Glahn, C., Specht, M., & Wishart J. (2010). Towards Mobile Learning Support for the Transition from School to the Workplace. Paper presented at the MATEL Workshop in conjunction with the 5th European Conference on Technology Enhanced Learning (EC-TEL 2010): Sustaining TEL: From Innovation to Learning and Practice. September, 28 - October, 1, 2010, Barcelona, Spain: Stellar-project.This paper analyses the requirements for supporting young people in placements, who are using a mobile widget framework. Placements are a way to smoothen the transition from an educational system into working life, that allow young people to connect the competences they have developed in formal education with professional practices. The wide adoption of mobile devices among young people suggests seeking for a mobile learning solution for supporting learning processes during placements. Widget based PLEs introduced attractive concepts that were adapted to work with mobile devices. This paper discusses three perspectives on aspects that influence the application of mobile technologies for workplace based learning. Each of these aspects adds a requirement for the development of a mobile learning solution. Given to the special nature of learning during placements, the paper identifies four challenges for future research.The research presented in this paper has been partly sponsored by the GRAPPLE project (www.grapple-project.org) and the STELLAR Network of Excellence Towards Mobile Learning Support for the Transition from School to the Workplace 7 (www.stellarnet.eu) funded by the European Commission’s 7th Framework Programme

Location-based and contextual mobile learning. A STELLAR Small-Scale Study

This study starts from several inputs that the partners have collected from previous and current running research projects and a workshop organised at the STELLAR Alpine Rendevous 2010. In the study, several steps have been taken, firstly a literature review and analysis of existing systems; secondly, mobile learning experts have been involved in a concept mapping study to identify the main challenges that can be solved via mobile learning; and thirdly, an identification of educational patterns based on these examples has been done. Out of this study the partners aim to develop an educational framework for contextual learning as a unifying approach in the field. Therefore one of our central research questions is: how can we investigate, theorise, model and support contextual learning

Contextual support of social engagement and reflection on the Web

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Implications of writing, reading, and tagging on the web for reflection support in informal learning

Glahn, C., Specht, M., & Koper, R. (2008). Implications of Writing, Reading, and Tagging on the Web for Reflection Support in Informal Learning. In P. Dillenbourg & M. Specht (Eds.), Times of Convergence: Technologies Across Learning Contexts – Proceedings of the Third European Conference on Technology Enhanced Learning, EC-TEL 2008 (pp. 110-121). September, 16-19, 2008, Maastricht, The Netherlands: Lecture Notes in Computer Science 5192 Springer 2008, ISBN 978-3-540-87604-5.The use of tags as user generated meta-data as well as the visualisation in tag clouds has recently received a lot of attention in research and practice. This paper focuses on supporting reflection of learners by using different presentation approaches of user-generated meta-data for reflection support. Previous research has shown that implicit interest expression can be a valuable source for reflection support. Visualising implicit or “tacit” interest in tag clouds could help learners to understand the connections of their content related activities to the tags that are assigned to the content. For grounding this potential in the social practice of using tags in teams and small communities, we conducted a three month experiment. This experiment focused on the social practices of using tags explicitly and implicitly. In this paper we analyse the data of the experiment with regard to social navigation of teams and small communities, relations of implicit and explicit interest in tags, and usages of tags on different participation levels. The findings on these dimensions of the social practice of using and sharing tags in groups help to develop a better view on the requirements of providing reflection support.The work on this publication has been sponsored by the TENCompetence Integrated Project that is funded by the European Commission's 6th Framework Programme, priority IST/Technology Enhanced Learning. Contract 027087 [http://www.tencompetence.org

Smart Indicators and Learner Monitoring

Glahn, C. (2007). Smart Indicators and Learner Monitoring. Prensented at the TENCompetence Workshop. June, 22, 2007, Barcelona, Spain.This presentation shows and discusses the components of the architecture for smart indicators.The work on this publication has been sponsored by the TENCompetence Integrated Project that is funded by the European Commission's 6th Framework Programme, priority IST/Technology Enhanced Learning. Contract 027087 [http://www.tencompetence.org

Smart Indicators on Learning Interactions

Glahn, C. (2007). Smart Indicators on Learning Interactions. Presented at Second European Conference on Technology Enhanced Learning, EC-TEL 2007. September, 20, 2007, Hiraklion, Greece.This presentation introduces the key concepts of the Smart Indicator Environment. The presentation focuses on the research motivation, personalisation strategies of interaction indicators, and provides an example strategy for a web2.0 community.The work on this publication has been sponsored by the TENCompetence Integrated Project that is funded by the European Commission's 6th Framework Programme, priority IST/Technology Enhanced Learning. Contract 027087 [http://www.tencompetence.org

Supporting the Reuse of Open Educational Resources through Open Standards

Glahn, C., Kalz, M., Gruber, M., & Specht, M. (2010). Supporting the Reuse of Open Educational Resources through Open Standards. In T. Hirashima, A. F. Mohd Ayub, L. F. Kwok, S. L. Wong, S. C. Kong, & F. Y. Yu (Eds.), Workshop Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Computers in Education: ICCE2010 (pp. 308-315). November, 29 - December, 3, 2010, Putrajaya, Malaysia: Asia-Pacific Society for Computers in Education.In this paper we analyse open standards for supporting the reuse of OER in different knowledge domains based on a generic architecture for content federation and higher-order services. Plenty OER are available at different institutions. We face the problem that the mere availability of these resources does not directly lead to their reuse. To increase the accessibility we integrated existing resource repositories to allow educational practitioners to discover appropriate resources. On top of this content federation we build higher order services to allow re-authoring and sharing of resources. Open standards play an important role in this process for developing high-level services for lowering the thresholds for the creation, distribution and reuse of OER in higher education.This paper has been partly sponsored by the GRAPPLE project (www.grapple-project.org) that is funded by the European Union within the Framework Programme 7 and the following European Projects funded in the eContentPlus Programme: MACE (ECP-2005-EDU-038098, portal.mace-orject.org), OpenScout (grant ECP-2008-EDU-428016, cf. www.openscout.net), and Share.TEC (ECP-2007-EDU-427015/Share.TEC, www.share-tec.eu)