Results tagged “teaching” from Michael Tyworth

Today I begin my postdoctoral fellowship at the College of Information Sciences & Technology, The Pennsylvania State University.  I will be working on the Network-Centric Cognition & Information Fusion project (NC2IF).

I will be also teaching IST 110:  Information, Technology & People this summer.

For the upcoming fall semester I will be teaching three courses at Washington & Jefferson:

ITL 100 - Information Technology & Society

A survey of information technology innovations that changed society in fundamental ways, within the context of a more broadly defined discussion of the "history of technology."Topics within the history of information technology include the development of the integrated circuit, the personal computer, the Internet and the world wide Web, etc.Topics within the history of technology (broadly defined) include ethical, legal, environmental, and feminist issues involved in the development and implementation of new technologies.The course entails a combination of historical overview and a number of individual case studies of technology development and implementation.The latter will focus on issues of leadership, the identification and solution of complex problems, and the unexpected consequences of technological advances.

ITL 102 - Introduction to Proramming

An introduction to object-oriented programming, with an emphasis on program design, problem solving, methodology, and algorithms. Students will master the fundamental concepts and structures common to programming.

ITL 112 - Database Concepts

An overview of the role of databases within a variety of academic, business, and governmental organizations, and an introduction to database design and management. Students will be required to create databases related to their major fields or areas of academic interest using both small business and enterprise-class database management systems.

I have accepted a position in the Information Technology Leadership program at Washington & Jefferson College beginning in the fall of 2009.  The position is a 3 year visiting professor position in which I'll be engaged in undergraduate teaching.  When not teaching I will be writing and continuing my research.

I'm really excited to be getting this opportunity and think it will be a fantastic chance to hone my skills as a teacher.

I'll be teaching IST 331 this upcoming fall semester, an opportunity I'm very excited about for a a couple of reasons.  One, it gives me the opportunity to stretch out my teaching experience into a domain in which is not my usual area.  I feel confident that I have the requisite knowledge to introduce IST undergraduates to HCI even though it is not my area of research.

A second reason I look forward to the opportunity to teach IST 331 is that it will allow me to introduce social informatics thinking into a domain (HCI) that too often focuses on the individual or the artifact to the exclusion of the the broader social context within which socio-technical systems are engaged.  This does not mean that I see little value in the cognitive approach to design that dominates the HCI field, or in the building of novel systems; quite the contrary.  Rather it's as Phillp Agre, Lucy Suchman, and others argued in the case for cognition as situated rather than internally symbolic, that the situation matters too.

To get things off to an interesting start I plan on having the students read a chapter from Don Norman's The Design of Everyday Things and Charles Perrow's chapter on the Three Mile Island accident in Normal Accidents.  Perrow strays a bit too far into the dystopian view of technology for my liking, but the chapter is informative regarding the consequences of bad design.

Speaking of the context of design, the Chronicle of Higher Education is reporting on some University of Maryland researchers who have built a piece of hardware that looks like a book and mimics the actions of a book.  An interesting proof-of-concept, but I'm not sure I see the broader utility of such a device.  Some questions that come to mind are:  Can it include the greasy thumbprint from lunch on specific pages?  How do you dogear your place?