Notes on Research and Planning

CCT 693: Evaluation of Educational Policy and Change
Last Updated: 2 April 2007

Project Description

I plan to provide an online forum for people to discuss, research, and contact local area electricians. To engage the user population, I have decided to approach the project as an online learning community. This perspective allows me to leverage best practices from education while at the same time building a constituency of informed, active teacher-students whose content will drive the site. Because the user community will supply most of the content, I hope my site will host useful, high-quality, trustworthy information that would otherwise be difficult to find.

Class Presentations

Presentation Notes: (March 26) Includes an overview of the project, a hint of the underlying motivation and educational theory. Rationale behind my (eventual) surveys and persona design, with working-draft example.

Class Assignments

Project Description
KAFQ Matrix
Evaluation Clock

References

Software Engineering for Internet Applications. Philip Greenspun, Eve Andersson, and Andrew Grumet. MIT Press 2006.
Information Architecture for the World Wide Web (2nd ed.). Peter Morville and Louis Rosenfeld. O'Reilly Press 2002.
Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability (2nd ed.). Steve Krug. New Riders Press 2005.
The Visual Display of Quantitative Information (2nd ed.). Edward Tufte. Graphics Press 2001.
Envisioning Information. Edward Tufte. Graphic Press 1990.
Visual Explanations: Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative. Edward Tufte. Graphic Press 1997.
How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School: Expanded Edition. National Research Council (U. S.) Committee on Learning Research and Educational Practice (corporate author). National Academy Press 2000.
Humane Interface: New Directions in Designing Interactive Systems. Jef Raskin. Addison-Wesley Professional 2000.
The Design of Everyday Things. Donald Norman. Basic Books 2002.
Neuromarketing: Is There a 'Buy Button' in the Brain? Selling to the Old Brain for Instant Success. Patrick Renvoisé and Christophe Morin. SalesBrain Publishing 2005.

Related Links

The Origin of Personas An article about Alan Cooper's method of personas in design by the man himself.
Visual Complexity, a gallery of complex data sets and associated visualizations.
Ben Fry, an archive of work developed by a doctoral student at the MIT Media Lab researching computational information design.
Raskin Center for Humane Interfaces, a group of people working to design and build ways of interacting with computers starting from an understanding of the needs and frailties of the human mind.
My blog. Just for my ego's sake.