If you didn’t attend ALT-C 2007 or fell asleep during my presentation on the HEAT Project (Does a handheld gaming device make an effective assistive technology tool?) then here’s a link to the slides.

The presentation describes the evaluation of an innovative JISC TechDis Higher Education Assistive Technology (HEAT) project investigating the use of the Nintendo DS Lite and Brain Training software package as an assistive technology tool for students from IHCS requiring help with numeracy during the autumn term of 2006. It provides an overview of using mobile devices within a higher education environment and seeks to raise awareness of some of the possibilities that can be created for students and staff.

View Presentation

Peter Murray at Informaticopia mentioned our ALT-C 2006 presentation and being concerned “about the control factor they seemed to be imposing”.

Just to clarify this point, during our blogging@bu pilot although some of the pilots in IHCS and SM were/will be behind a firewall due to issues of content we did run blogs in the clear using a variety of products – blogger, bloglines, elgg and the ubiquitous edublogs. Sorry if this point didn’t come across in our presentation, but it is an interesting area open to debate. There are plenty of instances as to why it might be advisable to exercise control in some cases. One such case can be seen at Slashdot

The slides from the Blogging@BU presentation can be viewed here