I am enjoying my visit to CCC in Taiwan

I left home on Nov. 3, and arrived in Taipei on Nov. 4th at 6 am. After 14 hours of flight and 2 more hours of high speed rail ride, I arrived at National Chung Cheng University at noon, very tired. There was a reception dinner at a very fancy Japanese restaurant in the evening, food was beautifully arranged and equally delicious. You have to see their guest house. They give me a VIP room, there are two bedrooms, living room, dining room, and a bath. I wish my family is here to enjoy Taiwan with me.

I was told that there are 15 full time faculty members in the Communication Department. Most of them came out to see two scholars from the west, one is from Simon Fraser University in Canada, and one is from SFSU (you know who she is). I asked each faculty member what he/she teaches. I learned the department is composed of a very interesting mix of experts and here they are: Media Policies, Media Economics, Media psychology, Message design, Health Media, Media ethics, etc. Interesting and very rich.


Here is my first impression about Taiwan.
1. Mountains and hills are so beautiful and so green. I love it!
2. Gentle and respectful people.
3. Great food and presentation is a work of art.
4. Hot Spring
5. A fire which is burning right out of pool of water. It is an awesome sight.

But most of all, I was strucked by the way the Communication department colleagues are treating each other. With gentleness and with respect. I am not accustom to this kind of academic culture in America, at least where I work. As I think about this, I just realize that how Americans are treating each other very harshly. I am not even sure how I could describe this harshness, I can't even find a right word to describe what I see in my colleagues and even in me that we brush off people. On the surface, we may smile with cursory greetings, but there is harshness there or no concern for others. Is this harshness comes from hardness of heart? Is our stress seeping from our everyday actions? We are so disconnected and distrustful. I am sure my Taiwanese colleagues too have academic politics and they too sometimes don't get along. But they still keep coolness and kindness and treat each other with dignity. Something that I can't explain with words, but I recognize that sense of empathy is well cultivated and developed in them, thus they are calm, cool, and yet confident.

What is it that people from the West are so quick to judge others. Is this L-brain driven society makes us to behave this way? Perhaps.

This quiet gentleness and kindness that are demonstrated by these bright professors left a great impression on me. I must note that I didn't see this wonderful quality in Korean colleagues when I visited Korea, I wonder Koreans are more like Americans in this aspect of our life. We are quick to judge others, me included.

I need to find out this unique characteristics in Chinese people. Some may say that Chines don't show their emotion quickly, they keep their emotion in their sleeves, whereas Koreans show their temper quickly. Whatever it is, I am curious to know what makes these people different. I noticed that many young, beautiful, accomplished, second generation Korean-American Women marry Chinese-American men. I asked to my young Korean friend. She said, "Chinese men respect their wives. They do house chores where Korean men don't".


The person from Canada presented something about Media politics. I made my presentation on teaching for future with technology. After the presentation, the department chair, Dr Lo and Peter, took us to a hot spring. I saw a most amazing thing; fire is burning from the water, the water looks like oil that gives fuel to burn. Here is the awesome sight I saw.



After a mud spa, I am relaxed and happy. Also food makes me happy too. I ate this big hot pot beef soup all by myself.

I will be leaving for Taiwan today. I am still working on my PowerPoint -- I don't know I will use it or not. I don't like PowerPoint, but I will have them just in case. I am planning to show up for my ITEC 830 class on Thursday via online. I hope I will have an Internet connection at 9 a.m in Taipei time, which it is 7 p.m, my class time in California. Peter Hsu who graduated from ITEC department in 2001, then went on for his doctorate in Instructional Technology at University of Idaho invited me to Taiwan. He is now a professor at National Cheng Chi University. It will be fun to see him again, and also speak about the topics that I am passionate about: Technology and Learning. I will speak at two different universities and also two different topics. Here is my itinerary which Peter sent to me:

11/3 (Monday) 00:15 from SFO

11/4 (Tuesday) 06:05 arrive TPE, I will go to the airport, and we will go to our school first and check in. Later in the evening, we will have a reception for you and the other scholar from Canada, Dr. Hackett.

11/5 (Wednesday) You and Dr. Hackett will give speech in the morning at CCU. His topic will be about mobilizing for media reform in Canada: Opportunities, challenges and lessons; after lunch, we will go together to one of the famous hot spring vista point near our school.

11/6 (Thursday) It will be your second speech at CCU; after that, we will go Taipei. (Taipei 101 and the forbidden city)

11/7 (Friday) Your speech will be held at NCCU in Taipei, the College of Communication; then, after a short rest, we will go to the east part of Taiwan, the back garden. We will stay in one of the best hotel there.

11/8 (Saturday) We will go one of the most famous travel spot in Taiwan, Tarroko; and go back To Taipei at 2:30pm. We will arrive Taipei after 4:30pm. Your flight back to SFO will be 23:15 pm.

Would you please reconfirm the topics you are going to give speech to?

at CCU
1. Teaching for Future with Instructional Technology
2. The Impact of Emerging Technology in Education

at NCCU
3. The Impact of Emerging Technology in Education (chosen by their Dean)

We are looking forward to seeing you and with you have a good time with us in Taiwan :-)

Peter

November Newsletter for my church

Attitude of Gratitude

At the October Women’s meeting, Diana, Betty, Shirley, Lillian, Eldora, Caryl, Linda, and I had a great time of fellowship. Our church is pretty famous for fellowship and eating. Once I heard Linda’s 3 year old grandson called our church, “The Restaurant Church”. Every time he came to church, he saw us eating. This time was no exception. Lots of donuts, breakfast cakes, deviled eggs, quiches, and all the sweet stuff that would cling to my waist were there. After we ate, we talked about business items such as collecting food for Golden Gate Seminary students, collecting winter coats for the homeless, and collecting children’s Christmas gifts for the Women’s Crisis Center.

We then had a time of sharing what God is doing in our lives. These were some of the reports: “I thank God for giving me patience to deal with family responsibilities”, “ I thank God for giving me a peace of mind”, “giving me wisdom to choose the right thing to do”, “giving me energy to do things I need to do”, “giving me insight to adjust my expectations”, “giving me an opportunity to help my grown daughter”, “I thank God for having a family and working with a good boss”.

As I listened to each person’s praise, I realized the power of gratitude. Our attitude of gratitude was like a sweet fragrance spreading in our midst and rising to the throne of God. We became tender toward one another. Is it my imagination or my wish? When we ask for prayer requests, we tend to focus on our own problems and disappointments, but when we share what God is doing in our lives, we tend to focus on God and His work in our lives. My point is this: Let’s praise God more and talk about ourselves less. Then a sweet fragrance will fill our life, an aroma that can transform our home and our church.

Eugene Lee, CEO of Socialtext

Eugene Lee, the CEO of Socialtext came to my class, and inspired us with so many great stories. He captured our attention, almost 2 hour without any break, I am talking about late night, 10 p.m. I can see he is passionate about what he is doing, and he made great points for being connected with others in the business world. Also his experience with Twitter convinced me to use Twitter, which I often thought why anybody in the world wants to know what I am doing, such as I am grading papers or I am eating my lunch. Out of all those Web 2.0 tools, Twitter was the least useful for me as a teacher. But Eugene inspired me to try to use it again. So I shall follow those who are having fun working, and you can follow me if you want to know what I am doing.

When Eugene came to the class last year, he was the new CEO to the Socialtext and he just got off from Adobe as a VP. By the way, when I met him when Adobe invited educational leaders to the conference from all over the world, everyone wanted to make a connection with him including myself, people were lining up to introduce themselves to Eugene. He looked little uncomfortable, at least to my eyes. He was little stiff. But boy, this time, he looked happy and relaxed, and he made jokes. He is actually very funny. I sense that he found the right work to use his talents, creativity, and his personality. Eugene is having way too much fun.

You have to watch this movie!

In my class, students are telling a story without words to demonstrate six senses of Danial Pinks book. Brian who is a movie producer did an excellent job to demonstrate six senses which we are discussing in ITEC 830. I think that a good piece of art brings out different emotions, evoking empathy, harmonizing different elements thus create a great symphony. I watched this movie several times, and my response to it was different each time (meaning). If he used words, it would not have the same effects on me. Also don't forget about "playfulness" of this piece. This movie got a five star rating from me. Here is Brian's blog site for more info. http://jipclass.blogspot.com/

Daniel Pink's book and video

We, ITEC 830, are reading A Whole New Mind by Daniel Pink this week. The key points of the book is about using both sides of the brain to make successful living in the 21st century global economy. I found his commencement speech at MCAD is interesting and is a good summary of his book. I also think he is a great speaker whom I wish to learn from.

part I


The following video really describes the importance of design, story, empathy, symphony, play, and meaning.

I am not political but I am for good design

Here are some good design by a special person who happens to be an artist and my son. Smile.

http://08electiongear.com/


Flash work by Simon
http://wunderpup.com/crackle/HDNA/480X70/v2.html
http://wunderpup.com/crackle/HDNA/test.html
http://wunderpup.com/crackle/HDNA/544X306/

http://wunderpup.com/crackle/AF/gravitySimulation.html
http://wunderpup.com/crackle/AF/AF_Crackle_Overlay.html


http://wunderpup.com/crackle/VOD_Banner/VOD_invideo_overlay_480X70_V5.html
http://wunderpup.com/crackle/VOD_Banner_544X306/VOD_invideo_overlay_544X306_V3.html
http://wunderpup.com/crackle/VOD_Banner_300X40/VOD_invideo_overlay_300X40_V1.html

Weekend Trip to Oregon

We got started on the road to Portland at 4 a.m. Chris was driving and I was sleeping, so it didn’t matter how early we started. Once we crossed the Oregon border, I began to see more greenery. As always I said, “How pretty. I love the green, let’s retire in Oregon”. We are the only Californians in our family. When our parents were alive, we made frequent trips to see them. Now that they are gone, we only head north once a year. This time our purpose was to attend our nephew David’s wedding.

We stopped in Turner, Oregon, about 4 p.m. My sister Nancy owns a grocery store in that small town. As soon as we sat down, she started offering us food. Then she looked at me intently at my face and declared “you need a miracle cream that works wonders”. She brought out cosmetic package labeled “Better than Botox”. She always showers me with gifts. I was really surprised to see that package, because it was the exact same brand that I wanted but I didn’t buy. A few days earlier, I was shopping at Costco. I had a coupon for this wrinkle-removing cream, so I picked up the package. At the check-out I learned the price. My jaw dropped. Who would pay $137 for a tube of facial cream? I couldn’t buy it, even though it might do my face some good. Sometimes God not only supplies my needs, but also my wants. It was too expensive for me to buy, but God supplied my wants through my sister.

We visited Chris’ brother and three sisters along with my sister and two brothers. After a Sunday church service, we held an Africa mission meeting. Many attended to pray and support the team. Seven of us are going this January, and six members were there. We talked about the mission trip. There were many questions and excited hearts as we came together to plan God’s work in Rwanda.

How wonderful it is to have both a blood-related family and a God-related family. It made our journey fun and meaningful. Ninety hours after leaving San Lorenzo, we were back in town and happy to be with our church family once more.

Another conference for my students

If you want to go to MacWorld Conference & Expo, from January 5-9, 2009, sign up now. Here is a priority code CKD31888, you need to sign up before September 26, 2008 for a FREE Expo Hall Pass. Unfortunately I will miss this one. I will be in Rwanda from Dec. 29 to Jan. 20th, providing faculty workshops at the National University of Rwanda.

We are so lucky!

One of my students asked me today how I keep up with the rapid changing field. I read blogs, go to conferences, ask people I know who are active learners. Another words, I net work.
Living in SF is wonderful! Look at these great conferences which we can go to, when others pay $$$ to get here to attend these events. Some of my students in ITEC 830 are going to attend Web 2.0 Summit, Nov. 5-7th, http://en.oreilly.com/web2008/public/content/home Too bad, I can't attend it. I will give talks on "The impact of emerging technology on teaching and learning" in Taiwan.

But there is always another chance to go to another conference in this town. I will be able to attend e-Learning Guild conference.

Time: November 11, 2008 at 9am to November 14, 2008 at 6pm
Location: Fairmont San Jose
Organized By: The E-Learning Guild

Event Description:
DevLearn 2008 Conference & Expo is where the most experienced and knowledgeable professionals in the e-Learning industry convene each year to explore, discuss, and learn about the best ideas and technologies for e-Learning. It’s for learning design, development, and management professionals who are leading e-Learning efforts, and who need to keep abreast of emerging technologies, strategies, and best practices in order to effectively deploy them in their organizations.

Nice work!

Here's the new banner my son did for Amazon and NBC. It's going to run on Youtube, Myspace, Amazon and a few other sites. He is an amazing artist who does amazing work , I have total confidence in him that someday his work will be shown at major galleries. Meantime he has to support his family by creating websites for small companies. He learned tools such as Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Flash, and different apps on his own. He never took any course to learn software. So there is a lesson. When you have a project that you need to do, you learn the tools to accomplish it. He went to art school and learned design principles. In the similar way, I tell my students to focus on learning principles and instructional design principles in order to become a good instructional designer. You can learn the tools while you are creating your instructional piece.

Instructional Video

The Common Craft Show is a series of short explanatory videos by Lee and Sachi LeFever. I have used their video in my class in the past several years, and each video is so simple and clear.

1. Wikis in Plain English
2. Social Networks in Plain English
3. Social Bookmarking in Plain English
4. Twitter In Plain English
5. Podcasting in Plain English
6. RSS in Plain English
7. Google Reader in Plain English
8. Google Docs in Plain English
9. Online Photo Sharing in Plain English
10. Wetpaint Wiki in Plain English
11. Blogs in Plain English
12. LinkedIn in Plain English
    

First Day of the school

I love school, especially the first week of the school. With an anticipation of seeing familiar faces and with an expectation of meeting new people, I anxiously wait my class to begin. How many people have a privilege to work with bright, hopeful, intelligent graduate students, and get paid for learning from them?

Here is a sample work which my students did as an icebreker exercise in ITEC 830 last night. I formed five small groups, 3-4 people in each group. Since we will discuss the impact of Web 2.o in education throughout the semester, I wanted to know how much they already know about this topic. I gave them 10 minutes for them to brainstorm about Web 2.0, then make a presentation. After 10 minutes later, they came up with the following poster. Josh who is my TA this semester took these photos with his cell phone, then e-mailed them to me. I put these same photos in the class social networking site http://myitec.ning.com/photo for them to use in their blog if they want.

A Weekend to Remember

Our front sidewalk is bordered by several large rose plants. I often see passersby stop to smell the roses. I happened to be outside when a woman folded her hands toward the sky and expressed her gratitude for these beautiful roses. She said “Thank you!” to me. I have to confess that the one who deserves the “thank you” is our deacon John King. He drops by once in a while and prunes back the bushes. I learned that there is a correct way to clip a rose bush. You cut just above six leaves on a stem to make new roses come up year around. It takes care as well as knowledge to properly care for plants.

I sometimes think about marriage as a rose bush. On occasion, my husband and I are caught up by the busy-ness of life and we neglect to clip our rose bush. In past years, we didn’t know how to tend the garden of our marriage and make the roses grow year-round.

When my son, Simon, was married in 2006, we wanted to give him and his new bride a special gift. For a few hundred dollars we paid their way to “A Weekend to Remember” which is a marriage enrichment conference sponsored by Family Life. Our daughter-in-law, Dilia, called me after their special weekend in upper New York State. They had a great time at a nice hotel and learned a lot about each other. They also learned about being a godly husband and a godly wife. My husband and I were so glad that provided a supportive part in their weekend to remember.

First Southern is now seeking married couples in our church to attend “A Weekend to Remember” in November at beautiful Monterey. I made the first announcement of this conference last Sunday morning. When God speaks, the godly listen. After the service, a young couple came to me, and said “We want a Weekend to Remember.” Do you want to enrich your own marriage, then you can sign up too. Just phone the church. You can also pay the way for children or grandchildren. I know some churches that help by babysitting for the weekend. Chris and I plan to attend. We need to learn more about tending the garden of our own marriage.

We remember stories

Psychologists and neuroscientists have recently become fascinated by the human predilection for storytelling. Why does our brain seem to be wired to enjoy stories? And how do the emotional and cognitive effects of a narrative influence our beliefs and real-world decisions? Interesting article about this.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=the-secrets-of-storytelling&print=true

KQED Digital Storytelling Summit

I am at KQED. I just finished my 10 minute talk about what I am doing with DST with my students at SFSU Instructional Technologies. Howard who is a teacher from Urban School is presenting what he is doing with DST--Oral History Project. Authentic doing--doing real world project-- Student project as an accessible product, and contributing to knowledge base.

Erica talks about her organization--Streetside Stories-- and how she trains classroom teachers to use DST in their teaching.

8/24/08
Lynda took these photos and sent them to me. I had a great fun to meet educators who care about what they do and also use digital storytelling as a medium of instruction. I was pleasantly surprise to see so many of ITEC alums, current students, and also incoming students at this event.

I am checking in, and see who is here? Kathleen from our department.

Leslie, who is the queen of DST, is introducing us.

Here are SFSU ITEC people. It is so wonderful to meet like-minded people outside of my class.

Digital storytelling and 21st Century Learning skills.

• Critical and Analytic Thinking, Problem Solving,
• Creativity and Innovation,
• Effective Communication and Interpersonal Skills
  
• Cultural Competence.

Instructional Technologies Program http://www.sfsu.edu/~itec

• Graduate Program for working professionals
  
• Project-Based Curriculum
• Team Work
  

ITEC 800 Learning Theories iLearn site

Goals for DST in ITEC 800

• Learning by Doing
• Meaningful Learning
• Reflective Learning
• Community Building for ITEC program
• Learn Multimedia Tools
  

DST Experience --ITEC 800 Blog site

• Walter http://walteritec800.blogspot.com
• Arl
• Natalia

New semester

If you are interested in Digital Storytelling, there is still room for you to register. I will see you this Saturday.

When: Saturday, August 23, 10am - 2pm
Where: KQED Studios, 2601 Mariposa St, SF
The event is free and open to the public.
Please RSVP to Leslie Rule at lrule@kqed.org

We invite you to explore with us the intersection of Digital Storytelling and 21st Century Skills and Literacies. This event will enable conversations with other digital storytellers: educators and community activists, practitioners and deep enthusiasts. The focus is on education and community outreach, and our panel of experts will share best practices and lead audience roundtables on using Digital Storytelling to support and nurture these 21st century skills: Critical and Analytic Thinking, Creativity and Innovation, Effective Communication and Interpersonal Skills, Problem Solving, and Cultural Competence.

2008 Vacation Bible School

We completed the 2008 VBS last Friday. There were about 60 to 70 people attended each night, from July 27th to August 3rd. This year's topic was God's unshakable truth. The motto for this year was, "Learn the Truth, Speak the Truth, Live the Truth". Sue and I were in charge of the adult class, we had about 20 people each night came to the class. We played games, made wordless books, shared personal stories about spiritual journey, and studied God's truth. On the last day, Ken brought a roasted pig for us to eat. Well, some of us didn't want to eat it--you can see why. It was still smiling!

Kim is saying "Hello" to her pig friend

Al was the winner for this game


Team teaching was fun

Who Will Go?

Every Friday for several months, an outreach team from First Southern has been going to the Villa Fairmont Mental Health Center, just a few blocks from our church. After passing through several locked doors, we arrive at the social room. Leah who has been attending our church greets us with a big smile as we enter the room. She excitedly tells us that she has found a room in Oakland. She is moving out from this place. We have been praying for her and her prayer has been answered.

As we arrange chairs for the meeting, an announcement goes over the speaker system that the Baptist Church is having a Bible study. Braz tells us that she has been reading from the Psalms. She thanks Shirley for handing over her own personal Bible to her the week before. Several residents ask us to provide Bibles and we promise to bring some next time.

We usually read a few verses from the Bible, then talk about what the words mean to us. Participants are eager to share their stories about why they came to this place and how desperately they seek God’s help to get well. We ask the Holy Spirit to guide us to be sensitive to the needs of this group. The residents need our listening ear more than anything else. Sometimes I am unsure about how to respond to their comments. But one thing I know is that they want us to pray for them.

The only qualification to join our mission team is a willingness to listen and to pray. It would be so wonderful to see more people from our church join this ministry group. The residents in this institution need friends who demonstrate the compassion of our Lord Jesus. Here are men and women who are at a low point in their lives. I could be a resident at the Villa Fairmont, but by God’s grace I am not. In the Old Testament, God asks Isaiah “whom shall I send?” Isaiah answers, “Here am I, send me.” I pray that many will say “Here I am, Lord. Send me”.