Category Archives: training

WordPress as Content Directory: Getting Somewhere

{I tend to ramble a bit. If you just want a step-by-step tutorial, you can skip to here.}

Woohoo!

I feel like I’ve reached a milestone in a project I’ve had in mind, ever since I learnt about Custom Post Types in WordPress 3.0: Using WordPress as a content directory.

The concept may not be so obvious to anyone else, but it’s very clear to me. And probably much clearer for anyone who has any level of WordPress skills (I’m still a kind of WP newbie).

Basically, I’d like to set something up through WordPress to make it easy to create, review, and publish entries in content databases. WordPress is now a Content Management System and the type of “content management” I’d like to enable has to do with something of a directory system.

Why WordPress? Almost glad you asked.

These days, several of the projects on which I work revolve around WordPress. By pure coincidence. Or because WordPress is “teh awsum.” No idea how representative my sample is. But I got to work on WordPress for (among other things): an academic association, an adult learners’ week, an institute for citizenship and social change, and some of my own learning-related projects.

There are people out there arguing about the relative value of WordPress and other Content Management Systems. Sometimes, WordPress may fall short of people’s expectations. Sometimes, the pro-WordPress rhetoric is strong enough to sound like fanboism. But the matter goes beyond marketshare, opinions, and preferences.

In my case, WordPress just happens to be a rather central part of my life, these days. To me, it’s both a question of WordPress being “the right tool for the job” and the work I end up doing being appropriate for WordPress treatment. More than a simple causality (“I use WordPress because of the projects I do” or “I do these projects because I use WordPress”), it’s a complex interaction which involves diverse tools, my skillset, my social networks, and my interests.

Of course, WordPress isn’t perfect nor is it ideal for every situation. There are cases in which it might make much more sense to use another tool (Twitter, TikiWiki, Facebook, Moodle, Tumblr, Drupal..). And there are several things I wish WordPress did more elegantly (such as integrating all dimensions in a single tool). But I frequently end up with WordPress.

Here are some things I like about WordPress:

This last one is where the choice of WordPress for content directories starts making the most sense. Not only is it easy for me to use and build on WordPress but the learning curves are such that it’s easy for me to teach WordPress to others.

A nice example is the post editing interface (same in the software and service). It’s powerful, flexible, and robust, but it’s also very easy to use. It takes a few minutes to learn and is quite sufficient to do a lot of work.

This is exactly where I’m getting to the core idea for my content directories.

I emailed the following description to the digital content editor for the academic organization for which I want to create such content directories:

You know the post editing interface? What if instead of editing posts, someone could edit other types of contents, like syllabi, calls for papers, and teaching resources? What if fields were pretty much like the form I had created for [a committee]? What if submissions could be made by people with a specific role? What if submissions could then be reviewed by other people, with another role? What if display of these items were standardised?

Not exactly sure how clear my vision was in her head, but it’s very clear for me. And it came from different things I’ve seen about custom post types in WordPress 3.0.

For instance, the following post has been quite inspiring:

I almost had a drift-off moment.

But I wasn’t able to wrap my head around all the necessary elements. I perused and read a number of things about custom post types, I tried a few things. But I always got stuck at some point.

Recently, a valuable piece of the puzzle was provided by Kyle Jones (whose blog I follow because of his work on WordPress/BuddyPress in learning, a focus I share).

Setting up a Staff Directory using WordPress Custom Post Types and Plugins | The Corkboard.

As I discussed in the comments to this post, it contained almost everything I needed to make this work. But the two problems Jones mentioned were major hurdles, for me.

After reading that post, though, I decided to investigate further. I eventually got some material which helped me a bit, but it still wasn’t sufficient. Until tonight, I kept running into obstacles which made the process quite difficult.

Then, while trying to solve a problem I was having with Jones’s code, I stumbled upon the following:

Rock-Solid WordPress 3.0 Themes using Custom Post Types | Blancer.com Tutorials and projects.

This post was useful enough that I created a shortlink for it, so I could have it on my iPad and follow along: http://bit.ly/RockSolidCustomWP

By itself, it might not have been sufficient for me to really understand the whole process. And, following that tutorial, I replaced the first bits of code with use of the neat plugins mentioned by Jones in his own tutorial: More Types, More Taxonomies, and More Fields.

I played with this a few times but I can now provide an actual tutorial. I’m now doing the whole thing “from scratch” and will write down all steps.

This is with the WordPress 3.0 blogging software installed on a Bluehost account. (The WordPress.com blogging service doesn’t support custom post types.) I use the default Twenty Ten theme as a parent theme.

Since I use WordPress Multisite, I’m creating a new test blog (in Super Admin->Sites, “Add New”). Of course, this wasn’t required, but it helps me make sure the process is reproducible.

Since I already installed the three “More Plugins” (but they’re not “network activated”) I go in the Plugins menu to activate each of them.

I can now create the new “Product” type, based on that Blancer tutorial. To do so, I go to the “More Types” Settings menu, I click on “Add New Post Type,” and I fill in the following information: post type names (singular and plural) and the thumbnail feature. Other options are set by default.

I also set the “Permalink base” in Advanced settings. Not sure it’s required but it seems to make sense.

I click on the “Save” button at the bottom of the page (forgot to do this, the last time).

I then go to the “More Fields” settings menu to create a custom box for the post editing interface.

I add the box title and change the “Use with post types” options (no use in having this in posts).

(Didn’t forget to click “save,” this time!)

I can now add the “Price” field. To do so, I need to click on the “Edit” link next to the “Product Options” box I just created and add click “Add New Field.”

I add the “Field title” and “Custom field key”:

I set the “Field type” to Number.

I also set the slug for this field.

I then go to the “More Taxonomies” settings menu to add a new product classification.

I click “Add New Taxonomy,” and fill in taxonomy names, allow permalinks, add slug, and show tag cloud.

I also specify that this taxonomy is only used for the “Product” type.

(Save!)

Now, the rest is more directly taken from the Blancer tutorial. But instead of copy-paste, I added the files directly to a Twenty Ten child theme. The files are available in this archive.

Here’s the style.css code:

/*
Theme Name: Product Directory
Theme URI: http://enkerli.com/
Description: A product directory child theme based on Kyle Jones, Blancer, and Twenty Ten
Author: Alexandre Enkerli
Version: 0.1
Template: twentyten
*/
@import url("../twentyten/style.css");

The code for functions.php:

<!--?php /**  * ProductDir functions and definitions  * @package WordPress  * @subpackage Product_Directory  * @since Product Directory 0.1  */ /*Custom Columns*/ add_filter("manage_edit-product_columns", "prod_edit_columns"); add_action("manage_posts_custom_column",  "prod_custom_columns"); function prod_edit_columns($columns){ 		$columns = array( 			"cb" =--> "<input type="\&quot;checkbox\&quot;" />",
			"title" => "Product Title",
			"description" => "Description",
			"price" => "Price",
			"catalog" => "Catalog",
		);

		return $columns;
}

function prod_custom_columns($column){
		global $post;
		switch ($column)
		{
			case "description":
				the_excerpt();
				break;
			case "price":
				$custom = get_post_custom();
				echo $custom["price"][0];
				break;
			case "catalog":
				echo get_the_term_list($post->ID, 'catalog', '', ', ','');
				break;
		}
}
?>

And the code in single-product.php:

<!--?php /**  * Template Name: Product - Single  * The Template for displaying all single products.  *  * @package WordPress  * @subpackage Product_Dir  * @since Product Directory 1.0  */ get_header(); ?-->
<div id="container">
<div id="content">
<!--?php the_post(); ?-->

<!--?php 	$custom = get_post_custom($post--->ID);
	$price = "$". $custom["price"][0];

?>
<div id="post-<?php the_ID(); ?><br />">>
<h1 class="entry-title"><!--?php the_title(); ?--> - <!--?=$price?--></h1>
<div class="entry-meta">
<div class="entry-content">
<div style="width: 30%; float: left;">
			<!--?php the_post_thumbnail( array(100,100) ); ?-->
			<!--?php the_content(); ?--></div>
<div style="width: 10%; float: right;">
			Price
<!--?=$price?--></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<!-- #content --></div>
<!-- #container -->

<!--?php get_footer(); ?-->

That’s it!

Well, almost..

One thing is that I have to activate my new child theme.

So, I go to the “Themes” Super Admin menu and enable the Product Directory theme (this step isn’t needed with single-site WordPress).

I then activate the theme in Appearance->Themes (in my case, on the second page).

One thing I’ve learnt the hard way is that the permalink structure may not work if I don’t go and “nudge it.” So I go to the “Permalinks” Settings menu:

And I click on “Save Changes” without changing anything. (I know, it’s counterintuitive. And it’s even possible that it could work without this step. But I spent enough time scratching my head about this one that I find it important.)

Now, I’m done. I can create new product posts by clicking on the “Add New” Products menu.

I can then fill in the product details, using the main WYSIWYG box as a description, the “price” field as a price, the “featured image” as the product image, and a taxonomy as a classification (by clicking “Add new” for any tag I want to add, and choosing a parent for some of them).

Now, in the product management interface (available in Products->Products), I can see the proper columns.

Here’s what the product page looks like:

And I’ve accomplished my mission.

The whole process can be achieved rather quickly, once you know what you’re doing. As I’ve been told (by the ever-so-helpful Justin Tadlock of Theme Hybrid fame, among other things), it’s important to get the data down first. While I agree with the statement and its implications, I needed to understand how to build these things from start to finish.

In fact, getting the data right is made relatively easy by my background as an ethnographer with a strong interest in cognitive anthropology, ethnosemantics, folk taxonomies (aka “folksonomies“), ethnography of communication, and ethnoscience. In other words, “getting the data” is part of my expertise.

The more technical aspects, however, were a bit difficult. I understood most of the principles and I could trace several puzzle pieces, but there’s a fair deal I didn’t know or hadn’t done myself. Putting together bits and pieces from diverse tutorials and posts didn’t work so well because it wasn’t always clear what went where or what had to remain unchanged in the code. I struggled with many details such as the fact that Kyle Jones’s code for custom columns wasn’t working first because it was incorrectly copied, then because I was using it on a post type which was “officially” based on pages (instead of posts). Having forgotten the part about “touching” the Permalinks settings, I was unable to get a satisfying output using Jones’s explanations (the fact that he doesn’t use titles didn’t really help me, in this specific case). So it was much harder for me to figure out how to do this than it now is for me to build content directories.

I still have some technical issues to face. Some which are near essential, such as a way to create archive templates for custom post types. Other issues have to do with features I’d like my content directories to have, such as clearly defined roles (the “More Plugins” support roles, but I still need to find out how to define them in WordPress). Yet other issues are likely to come up as I start building content directories, install them in specific contexts, teach people how to use them, observe how they’re being used and, most importantly, get feedback about their use.

But I’m past a certain point in my self-learning journey. I’ve built my confidence (an important but often dismissed component of gaining expertise and experience). I found proper resources. I understood what components were minimally necessary or required. I succeeded in implementing the system and testing it. And I’ve written enough about the whole process that things are even clearer for me.

And, who knows, I may get feedback, questions, or advice..

Installing BuddyPress 1.2 on FatCow: Quick Edition

I recently posted a rambling version of instructions about how to install BuddyPress 1.1.3 on FatCow:

Installing BuddyPress on a Webhost « Disparate.

BuddyPress 1.2 was just released, with some neat new features including the ability to run on a standard (non-WPµ) version of WordPress and a new way to handle templates. They now have three-step instructions on how to install BuddyPress. Here’s my somewhat more verbose take (but still reasonably straightforward and concise). A few things are FatCow-specific but everything should be easy to adapt for any decent webhost. (In fact, it’d likely be easier elsewhere.)

  1. Create database in FatCow’s Manage MySQL
  2. Download WP 2.9.2 from the download page.
  3. Uncompress WP  using FatCow’s Archive Gateway
  4. Rename “wordpress” to <name> (not necessary, but useful, I find; “community” or “commons” would make sense for <name>)
  5. Go to <full domain>/<name> (say, “example.com/commons” if you used “commons” for <name> and your domain were “example.com”)
  6. Click “Create a Configuration file”
  7. Click “Let’s Go”
  8. Enter database information from database created in MySQL
  9. Change “localhost” to “<username>.fatcowmysql.com” (where <username> is your FatCow username)
  10. Click “Submit”
  11. Click “Run the Install”
  12. Fill in blog title and email, decide on crawling
  13. Click on “Install WordPress”
  14. Copy generated password
  15. Enter login details
  16. Click “Log In”
  17. Click “Yes, Take me to my profile page”
  18. Add “New password” (twice)
  19. Click “Update Profile”
  20. Click “Plugins”
  21. Click “Add New”
  22. In the searchbox, type “BuddyPress”
  23. Find BuddyPress 1.2 (created by “The BuddyPress Community”)
  24. Click “Install”
  25. Click “Install Now”
  26. Click “Activate Plugin”
  27. Click “update your permalink structure”
  28. Choose an option (say, “Day and Name”)
  29. Click “Save Changes”
  30. Click “Appearance”
  31. Click “Activate” under BuddyPress default

You now have a full BuddyPress installation. “Social Networking in a Box”

You can do a number of things, now. Including visiting your BuddyPress installation by clicking on the “Visit Site” link at the top of the page.

But there are several options in BuddyPress which should probably be set if you want to do anything with the site. For instance, you can setup forums through the bbPress installation which is included in BuddyPress. So, if you’re still in the WordPress dashboard, you can do the following:

  1. Click “BuddyPress”
  2. Click “Forum Setup”
  3. Click “Set up a new bbPress installation”
  4. Click “Complete Installation”

This way, any time you create a new group, you’ll be able to add a forum to it. To do so:

  1. Click “Visit Site”
  2. Click “Groups”
  3. Click “Create a Group”
  4. Fill in the group name and description.
  5. Click “Create Group and Continue”
  6. Select whether or not you want to enable the discussion forum, choose the privacy options, and click “Next Step”
  7. Choose an avatar (or leave the default one) and click “Next Step”
  8. Click “Finish”

You now have a fully functioning group, with discussion forum.

There’s a lot of things you can now do, including all sorts of neat plugins, change the theme, etc. But this installation is fully functional and fun. So I’d encourage you to play with it, especially if you already have a group of users. The way BuddyPress is set up, you can do all sorts of things on the site itself. So you can click “Visit Site” and start creating profiles, groups, etc.

One thing with the BuddyPress Default Theme, though, is that it doesn’t make it obvious how you can come back to the Dashboard. You can do so by going to “<full domain>/<name>/wp-admin/” (adding “/wp-admin/” to your BuddyPress address). Another way, which is less obvious, but also works is to go to a blog comment (there’s one added by defaul) and click on “Edit.”

Beer Eye for the Coffee Guy (or Gal)

Judged twelve (12) espresso drinks as part of the Eastern Regional Canadian Barista Championship (UStream).

[Never watched Queer Eye. Thought the title would make sense, given both the “taste” and even gender dimensions.]

Had quite a bit of fun.

The experience was quite similar to the one I had last year. There were fewer competitors, this year. But I also think that there were more people in the audience, at least in the morning. One possible reason is that ads about the competition were much more visible this year than last (based on my own experience and on several comments made during the day). Also, I noticed a stronger sense of collegiality among competitors, as several of them have been different things together in the past year.

More specifically, people from Ottawa’s Bridgehead and people from Montreal’s Café Myriade have developed something which, at least from the outside, look like comradery. At the Canadian National Barista Championship, last year, Myriade’s Anthony Benda won the “congeniality” prize. This year, Benda got first place in the ERCBC. Second place went to Bridgehead’s Cliff Hansen, and third place went to Myriade’s Alex Scott.

Bill Herne served as head judge for most of the event. He made it a very pleasant experience for me personally and, I hope, for other judges. His insight on the championship is especially valuable given the fact that he can maintain a certain distance from the specifics.

The event was organized in part by Vida Radovanovic, founder of the Canadian Coffee & Tea Show. Though she’s quick to point to differences between Toronto and Montreal, in terms of these regional competitions, she also seemed pleased with several aspects of this year’s ERCBC.

To me, the championship was mostly an opportunity for thinking and talking about the coffee world.

Met and interacted with diverse people during the day. Some of them were already part of my circle of coffee-loving friends and acquaintances. Some who came to me to talk about coffee after noticing some sign of my connection to the championship. The fact that I was introduced to the audience as a blogger and homeroaster seems to have been relatively significant. And there were several people who were second-degree contacts in my coffee-related social network, making for easy introductions.

A tiny part of the day’s interactions was captured in interviews for CBC Montreal’s Daybreak (unfortunately, the recording is in RealAudio format).

“Coffee as a social phenomenon” was at the centre of several of my own interactions with diverse people. Clearly, some of it has to do with my own interests, especially with “Montreal’s coffee renaissance.” But there were also a clear interest in such things as the marketshare of quality coffee, the expansion of some coffee scenes, and the notion of building a sense of community through coffee. That last part is what motivated me to write this post.

After the event, a member of my coffee-centric social network has started a discussion about community-building in the coffee world and I found myself dumping diverse ideas on him. Several of my ideas have to do with my experience with craft beer in North America. In a way, I’ve been doing informal ethnography of craft beer. Beer has become an area of expertise, for me, and I’d like to pursue more formal projects on it. So beer is on my mind when I think about coffee. And vice-versa. I was probably a coffee geek before I started homebrewing beer but I started brewing beer at home before I took my coffee-related activities to new levels.

So, in my reply on a coffee community, I was mostly thinking about beer-related communities.

Comparing coffee and beer is nothing new, for me. In fact, a colleague has blogged about some of my comments, both formal and informal, about some of those connections.

Differences between beer and coffee are significant. Some may appear trivial but they can all have some impact on the way we talk about cultural and social phenomena surrounding these beverages.

  • Coffee contains caffeine, beer contains alcohol. (Non-alcoholic beers, decaf coffee, and beer with coffee are interesting but they don’t dominate.) Yes: “duh.” But the difference is significant. Alcohol and caffeine not only have different effects but they fit in different parts of our lives.
  • Coffee is often part of a morning ritual,  frequently perceived as part of preparation for work. Beer is often perceived as a signal for leisure time, once you can “wind down.” Of course, there are people (including yours truly) who drink coffee at night and people (especially in Europe) who drink alcohol during a workday. But the differences in the “schedules” for beer and coffee have important consequences on the ways these drinks are integrated in social life.
  • Coffee tends to be much less expensive than beer. Someone’s coffee expenses may easily be much higher than her or his “beer budget,” but the cost of a single serving of coffee is usually significantly lower than a single serving of beer.
  • While it’s possible to drink a few coffees in a row, people usually don’t drink more than two coffees in a single sitting. With beer, it’s not rare that people would drink quite a few pints in the same night. The UK concept of a “session beer” goes well with this fact.
  • Brewing coffee takes a few minutes, brewing beer takes a while (hours for the brewing process, days or even weeks for fermentation).
  • At a “bar,” coffee is usually brewed in front of those who will drink it while beer has been prepared in advance.
  • Brewing coffee at home has been mainstream for quite a while. Beer homebrewing is considered a hobby.
  • Historically, coffee is a recent phenomenon. Beer is among the most ancient human-made beverages in the world.

Despite these significant differences, coffee and beer also have a lot in common. The fact that the term “brew” is used for beer and coffee (along with tea) may be a coincidence, but there are remarkable similarities between the extraction of diverse compounds from grain and from coffee beans. In terms of process, I would argue that beer and coffee are more similar than are, say, coffee and tea or beer and wine.

But the most important similarity, in my mind, is social: beer and coffee are, indeed, central to some communities. So are other drinks, but I’m more involved in groups having to do with coffee or beer than in those having to do with other beverages.

One way to put it, at least in my mind, is that coffee and beer are both connected to revolutions.

Coffee is community-oriented from the very start as coffee beans often come from farming communities and cooperatives. The notion, then, is that there are local communities which derive a significant portion of their income from the global and very unequal coffee trade. Community-oriented people often find coffee-growing to be a useful focus of attention and given the place of coffee in the global economy, it’s unsurprising to see a lot of interest in the concept (if not the detailed principles) of “fair trade” in relation to coffee. For several reasons (including the fact that they’re often produced in what Wallerstein would call “core” countries), the main ingredients in beer (malted barley and hops) don’t bring to mind the same conception of local communities. Still, coffee and beer are important to some local agricultural communities.

For several reasons, I’m much more directly involved with communities which have to do with the creation and consumption of beverages made with coffee beans or with grain.

In my private reply about building a community around coffee, I was mostly thinking about what can be done to bring attention to those who actually drink coffee. Thinking about the role of enthusiasts is an efficient way to think about the craft beer revolution and about geeks in general. After all, would the computer world be the same without the “homebrew computer club?”

My impression is that when coffee professionals think about community, they mostly think about creating better relationships within the coffee business. It may sound like a criticism, but it has more to do with the notion that the trade of coffee has been quite competitive. Building a community could be a very significant change. In a way, that might be a basis for the notion of a “Third Wave” in coffee.

So, using my beer homebrewer’s perspective: what about a community of coffee enthusiasts? Wouldn’t that help?

And I don’t mean “a website devoted to coffee enthusiasts.” There’s a lot of that, already. A lot of people on the Coffee Geek Forums are outsiders to the coffee industry and Home Barista is specifically geared toward the home enthusiasts’ market.

I’m really thinking about fostering a sense of community. In the beer world, this frequently happens in brewclubs or through the Beer Judge Certification Program, which is much stricter than barista championships. Could the same concepts apply to the coffee world? Probably not. But there may still be “lessons to be learnt” from the beer world.

In terms of craft beer in North America, there’s a consensus around the role of beer enthusiasts. A very significant number of craft brewers were homebrewers before “going pro.” One of the main reasons craft beer has become so important is because people wanted to drink it. Craft breweries often do rather well with very small advertising budgets because they attract something akin to cult followings. The practise of writing elaborate comments and reviews has had a significant impact on a good number of craft breweries. And some of the most creative things which happen in beer these days come from informal experiments carried out by homebrewers.

As funny as it may sound (or look), people get beer-related jobs because they really like beer.

The same happens with coffee. On occasion. An enthusiastic coffee lover will either start working at a café or, somewhat more likely, will “drop everything” and open her/his own café out of a passion for coffee. I know several people like this and I know the story is quite telling for many people. But it’s not the dominant narrative in the coffee world where “rags to riches” stories have less to do with a passion for coffee than with business acumen. Things may be changing, though, as coffee becomes more… passion-driven.

To be clear: I’m not saying that serious beer enthusiasts make the bulk of the market for craft beer or that coffee shop owners should cater to the most sophisticated coffee geeks out there. Beer and coffee are both too cheap to warrant this kind of a business strategy. But there’s a lot to be said about involving enthusiasts in the community.

For one thing, coffee and beer can both get viral rather quickly. Because most people in North America can afford beer or coffee, it’s often easy to convince a friend to grab a cup or pint. Coffee enthusiasts who bring friends to a café do more than sell a cup. They help build up a place. And because some people are into the habit of regularly going to the same bar or coffee shop, the effects can be lasting.

Beer enthusiasts often complain about the inadequate beer selection at bars and restaurants. To this day, there are places where I end up not drinking anything besides water after hearing what the beerlist contains. In the coffee world, it seems that the main target these days is the restaurant business. The current state of affairs with coffee at restaurants is often discussed with heavy sighs of disappointment. What I”ve heard from several people in the coffee business is that, too frequently,  restaurant owners give so little attention to coffee that they end up destroying the dining experience of anyone who orders coffee after a meal. Even in my own case, I’ve had enough bad experiences with restaurant coffee (including, or even especially, at higher-end places) that I’m usually reluctant to have coffee at a restaurant. It seems quite absurd, as a quality experience with coffee at the end of a meal can do a lot to a restaurant’s bottom line. But I can’t say that it’s my main concern because I end up having coffee elsewhere, anyway. While restaurants can be the object of a community’s attention and there’s a lot to be said about what restaurants do to a region or neighbourhood, the community dimensions of coffee have less to do with what is sold where than with what people do around coffee.

Which brings me to the issue of education. It’s clearly a focus in the coffee world. In fact, most coffee-related events have some “training” dimension. But this type of education isn’t community-oriented. It’s a service-based approach, such as the one which is increasingly common in academic institutions. While I dislike customer-based learning in universities, I do understand the need for training services in the coffee world. What I perceive insight from the beer world can do is complement these training services instead of replacing them.

An impressive set of learning experiences can be seen among homebrewers. From the most practical of “hands-on training” to some very conceptual/theoretical knowledge exchanges. And much of the learning which occurs is informal, seamless, “organic.” It’s possible to get very solid courses in beer and brewing, but the way most people learn is casual and free. Because homebrewers are organized in relatively tight groups and because the sense of community among homebrewers is also a matter of solidarity.  Or, more simply, because “it’s just a hobby anyway.”

The “education” theme also has to do with “educating the public” into getting more sophisticated about what to order. This does happen in the beer world, but can only be pulled off when people are already interested in knowing more about beer. In relation with the coffee industry, it sometimes seems that “coffee education” is imposed on people from the top-down. And it’s sometimes quite arbitrary. Again, room for the coffee business to read the Cluetrain Manifesto and to learn from communities.

And speaking of Starbucks… One draft blogpost which has been nagging me is about the perception that, somehow, Starbucks has had a positive impact in terms of coffee quality. One important point is that Starbucks took the place of an actual coffee community. Even if it can be proven that coffee quality wouldn’t have been improved in North America if it hadn’t been for Starbucks (a tall order, if you ask me), the issue remains that Starbucks has only paid attention to the real estate dimension of the concept of community. The mermaid corporation has also not doing so well, recently, so we may finally get beyond the financial success story and get into the nitty-gritty of what makes people connect through coffee. The world needs more from coffee than chains selling coffee-flavoured milk.

One notion I wanted to write about is the importance of “national” traditions in both coffee and beer in relation to what is happening in North America, these days. Part of the situation is enough to make me very enthusiastic to be in North America, since it’s increasingly possible to not only get quality beer and coffee but there are many opportunities for brewing coffee and beer in new ways. But that’ll have to wait for another post.

In Western Europe at least, coffee is often associated with the home. The smell of coffee has often been described in novels and it can run deep in social life. There’s no reason homemade coffee can’t be the basis for a sense of community in North America.

Now, if people in the coffee industry would wake up and… think about actual human beings, for a change…

Student Engagement: The Gym Analogy (Updated: Credited)

Heard about this recently and probably heard it before. It’s striking me more now than before, for some reason.

[Update: I heard about this analogy through Peace Studies scholar Laurie Lamoureux Scholes (part-time faculty and doctoral candidate in Religion at Concordia University). Lamoureux Scholes’s colleague John Bilodeau is the intermediate source for this analogy and may have seen it on the RateYourStudents blog. There’s nothing like giving credit where credit is due and I’m enough of a folklorist to care about transmission. Besides, the original RYS gym-themed blog entry can be quite useful.]

Those of us who teach at universities and colleges (especially in North America and especially among English-speakers, I would guess) have encountered this “sense of entitlement” which has such deep implications in the ways some students perceive learning. Some students feel and say that, since they (or their parents) pay large sums for their post-secondary education, they are entitled to a “special treatment” which often involves the idea of getting high grades with little effort.

In my experience, this sense of entitlement correlates positively with the prestige of the institution. Part of this has to do with tuition fees required by those universities and colleges. But there’s also the notion that, since they were admitted to a program at such a selective school, they must be the “cream of the crop” and therefore should be treated with deference. Similarly, “traditional students” (18-25) are in my experience more likely to display a sense of entitlement than “non-traditional students” (older than 25) who have very specific reasons to attend a college or university.

The main statements used by students in relation to their sense of entitlement usually have some connection to tuition fees perceived to transform teaching into a hired service, regardless of other factors. “My parents pay a lot of money for your salary so I’m allowed to get what I want.” (Of course, those students may not realize that a tiny fraction of tuition fees actually goes in the pocket of the instructor, but that’s another story.) In some cases, the parents can easily afford that amount paid in tuitions but the statements are the same. In other cases, the statements come from the notion that parents have “worked very hard to put me in school.” The results, in terms of entitlement, are quite similar.

Simply put, those students who feel a strong sense of entitlement tend to “be there for the degree” while most other students are “there to learn.”

Personally, I tend to assume students want to learn and I value student engagement in learning processes very highly. As a result, I often have a harder time working with students with a sense of entitlement. I can adapt myself to work with them if I assess their positions early on (preferably, before the beginning of a semester) but it requires a good deal of effort for me to teach in a context in which the sense of entitlement is “endemic.” In other words, “I can handle a few entitled students” if I know in advance what to expect but I find it demotivating to teach a group of students who “are only there for the degree.”

A large part of my own position has to do with the types of courses I have been teaching (anthropology, folkloristics, and sociology) and my teaching philosophy also “gets in the way.” My main goal is a constructivist one: create an appropriate environment, with students, in which learning can happen efficiently. I’m rarely (if ever) trying to “cram ideas into students’ heads,” though I do understand the value of that type of teaching in some circumstances. I occasionally try to train students for a task but my courses have rarely been meant to be vocational in that sense (I could certainly do vocational training, in which case I would adapt my methods).

So, the gym analogy. At this point, I find it’s quite fitting as an answer to the “my parents paid for this course so I should get a high grade.”

Tuition fees are similar to gym membership: regardless of the amount you pay, you can only expect results if you make the effort.

Simple and effective.

Of course, no analogy is perfect. I think the “effort” emphasis is more fitting in physical training than in intellectual and conceptual training. But, thankfully, the analogy does not imply that students should “get grades for effort” more than athletes assume effort is sufficient to improve their physical skills.

One thing I like about this analogy is that it can easily resonate with a large category of students who are, in fact, the “gym type.” Sounds irrelevant but the analogy is precisely the type of thing which might stick in the head of those students who care about physical training (even if they react negatively at first) and many “entitled students” have a near Greek/German attitude toward their bodies. In fact, some of the students with the strongest sense of entitlement are high-profile athletes: some of them sound like they expect to have minions to take exams for them!

An important advantage of the gym analogy, in a North American context, is that it focuses on individual responsibility. While not always selfish, the sense of entitlement is self-centred by definition. Given the North American tendency toward independence training and a strong focus on individual achievement in North American academic institutions, the “individualist” character of the sense of entitlement shouldn’t surprise anyone. In fact, those “entitled students” are unlikely to respond very positively to notions of solidarity, group learning, or even “team effort.”

Beyond individual responsibility, the gym analogy can help emphasise individual goals, especially in comparison to team sports. In North America, team sports play a very significant role in popular culture and the distinction between a gym and a sports team can resonate in a large conceptual field. The gym is the locale for individual achievement while the sports team (which could be the basis of another analogy) is focused on group achievement.

My simplest definition of a team is as “a task-oriented group.” Some models of group development (especially Tuckman’s catchy “Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing“) are best suited in relation to teams. Task-based groups connect directly with the Calvinistic ideology of progress (in a Weberian perspective), but they also embed a “community-building” notion which is often absent from the “social Darwinism” of some capital-driven discourse. In other words, a team sports analogy could have some of the same advantages as the gym analogy (such as a sense of active engagement) with the added benefit of bringing into focus the social aspects of learning.

Teamwork skills are highly valued in the North American workplace. In learning contexts, “teamwork” often takes a buzzword quality. The implicit notion seems to be that the natural tendency for individuals to work against everybody else but that teams, as unnatural as they may seem, are necessary for the survival of broad institutions (such as the typical workplace). In other words, “learning how to work well in teams” sounds like a struggle against “human nature.” This implicit perspective relates to the emphasis on “individual achievement” and “independence training” represented effectively in the gym analogy.

So, to come back to that gym analogy…

In a gym, everyone is expected to set her or his own goals, often with the advice of a trainer. The notion is that this selection of goals is completely free of outside influence save for “natural” goals related to general health. In this context, losing weight is an obvious goal (the correlation between body mass and health being taken as a given) but it is still chosen by the individual. “You can only succeed if you set yourself to succeed” seems to be a common way to put it. Since this conception is “inscribed in the mind” of some students, it may be a convenient tool to emphasise learning strategies: “you can only learn if you set yourself to learn.” Sounds overly simple, but it may well work. Especially if we move beyond the idea some students have that they’re so “smart” that they “don’t need to learn.”

What it can imply in terms of teaching is quite interesting. An instructor takes on the role of a personal trainer. Like a sports team’s coach, a trainer is “listened to” and “obeyed.” There might be a notion of hierarchy involved (at least in terms of skills: the trainer needs to impress), but the main notion is that of division of labour. Personally, I could readily see myself taking on the “personal trainer” role in a learning context, despite the disadvantages of customer-based approaches to learning. One benefit of the trainer role is that what students (or their parents) pay for is a service, not “learning as a commodity.”

Much of this reminds me of Alex Golub’s blogpost on “Factory, Lab, Guild, Studio” notions to be used in describing academic departments. Using Golub’s blogpost as inspiration, I blogged about departments, Samba schools, and the Medici Effect. In the meantime, my understanding of learning has deepened but still follows similar lines. And I still love the “Samba school” concept. I can now add the gym and the sports teams to my analogical apparatus to use in describing my teaching to students or anybody else.

Hopefully, any of these analogies can be used to help students engage themselves in the learning process.

That’s all I can wish for.

Learning Systems Wishlist

In a blogpost, Learning Systems ’08 host Elliott Masie lists 12 features learning management systems could/should have.
Elliott Masie’s Learning TRENDS – Learning TRENDS – 12 Wishes for Our LMS and LCMS

A summary:

  1. Focus on the Learner
  2. Content, Content and Content
  3. Ratings, Please
  4. More Context
  5. Performance Support Tools
  6. Social Knowledge
  7. Learning Systems as Components
  8. Focus on the Role
  9. UserContent Authoring
  10. Learning Systems as Service
  11. The Lifecycle of Learning Systems
  12. Learning Systems as Human Capital/Talent Systems

While Masie’s focus is on training and learning in corporate situations, many of these ideas are discussed in other types of learning contexts, including higher education. Some of the most cynical of university professors might say that the reason this list could apply to both corporate and university environments is that university are currently being managed like businesses. Yet, there are ways to adapt to some of the current “customer-based” approaches to learning while remain critical of their effects.

Personally, I think that the sixth point (about “social knowledge”) is particularly current. Not only are “social” dimensions of technology past the buzzword phase but discussing ways to make learning technology more compatible with social life is an efficient way to bring together many issues relating to technology and learning in general.

Masie’s description of his “social knowledge” wish does connect some of these issues:

Learning Systems will need to include and be integrated with Social Networking Systems. Some of the best and most important knowledge will be shared person-to-person in an organization. The learner wants to know, “Who in this organization has any experience that could help me as a learner/worker?” In addition to the LMS pointing to a module or course, we need to be able to link to a colleague who may have the perfect, relevant experience based on their work from 2 jobs ago. The social dimension of learning needs to be harvested and accelerated by a new vision of our Learning Systems.

Throughout the past year, I’ve been especially intrigued about the possibilities opened by making a “learning system” like Moodle more of a social networking platform. I’ve discussed this at the end of a longish wishlist for Moodle’s support of collaborative learning:

  • Another crazy idea: groups working a bit like social networking sites (e.g. Facebook). You get “friends” with whom you can share “stuff” (images, comments, chats, etc.). Those groups can go beyond the limits of a single course so that you would use it as a way to communicate with people at school. The group could even have a public persona beyond the school and publish some information about itself and its projects. Moodle could then serve as a website-creator for students. To make it wackier, students could even maintain some of these contacts after they leave the school.
  • Or Moodle could somehow have links to Facebook profiles.

My curiosity was later piqued by fellow anthropologist Michael Wesch’s comments about the use of Facebook in university learning and teaching. And the relevance of social networking systems for learning strategies has been acknowledged in diverse contexts through the rest of 2007.
One thing I like about Masie’s description is the explicit connection made between social networking and continuity. It’s easy to think of social networks as dynamic, fluid, and “in the now.” Yet, one of their useful dimensions is that they allow for a special type of direct transmission which is different from the typical “content”-based system popular in literacy-focused contexts. Not only do large social networking systems allow for old friends to find another but social networks (including the Internet itself) typically emphasize two-way communication as a basis for knowledge transmission. In other words, instead of simply reading a text about a specific item one wants to learn, one can discuss this item with someone who has more experience with that item. You don’t read an instruction manual, you “call up” the person who knows how to do it. Nothing new about this emphasis on two-way transmission (similar to “collaborative learning”). “Social” technology merely helps people realize the significance of this emphasis.

I’m somewhat ambivalent as to the importance of ratings (Masie’s third point). I like the Digg/Slashdot model as much as the next wannabe geek but I typically find ratings systems to be less conducive to critical thinking and “polyphony” (as multiplicity of viewpoints) than more “organic” ways to deal with content. Of course, I could see how it would make sense to have ratings systems in a corporate environment and ratings could obviously be used as peer-assessment for collaborative learning. I just feel that too much emphasis on ratings may detract us from the actual learning process, especially in environments which already make evaluation their central focus (including many university programs).

Overall, Masie’s wishlist makes for a fine conversation piece.

Computer Repairs, Consumer Protection

This one has been making the rounds:
CBC.ca – Marketplace – What you should know before you call a geek in to fix your computer

Typical television story: Several computer repair technicians fooled by television team. Consumers be warned.
[Disclaimer: though I’ve been troubleshooting most of my own and some of other people’s computer-related issues, I’m no technician and have never been one. I do consider myself something of a power-user and enough of a fan of geek culture to half-jokingly call myself a “wannabe geek.”]

Comments on the show’s site are particularly numerous and many of them are quite virulent. Comments on the Consumerist page about the Marketplace piece seem more insightful than those on the CBC site. That might have to do with the Consumerist coverage of the Geek Squad scandal making Consumerist readers aware of the current debates about computer techs.

While I do agree with many of the comments about the report being biased/one-sided/skewed/sensationalist, there could be more discussion about consumer protection and about technical training. I even think that the show’s overall presentation style may have generated more knee-jerk reactions than reflections on the state of the computer repair industry. If so, that’s quite sad.

Come to think of it, the segment’s title could lead to something interesting: what is it that people should know before they get service from a computer technician?

A general idea could be: “computer repairs are often quite expensive, quality of service may vary, there are other issues to consider besides the cost of the repairs.”

The show itself mentioned a few pieces of advice from people with whom they talked:

  • Fix it yourself
  • Search online for tech advice
  • Take control. Back up your data
  • Keep virus and spyware protection up to date
  • Get advice from support lines
  • Get referrals
  • Get more than one quote

All good advice, IMHO. Not that easy to implement, though. And several points remain, in terms of consumer protection.
This all reminds me of a recent episode (#69) of the Real Deal podcast about how to “Be your own IT department.” Simple yet useful advice on how to set things up for a friend or family member who may need simple tech support with their computer.

Some ideas popping in my head about computer repairs:

  • Training in computer maintenance is valuable. Maybe it should be provided as a community service.
  • Given the stakes (especially in terms of privacy), certification programs and hiring requirements for computer technicians should probably be as strict as those for other professions.
  • Some association/union/corporation for computer technicians could help deal with issues like these as is the case with other professions.
  • Though analogies with other professions are tempting, there are issues which seem quite specific to computer techs (especially having to do with data privacy and value).
  • Maybe we just need computers that are easier to troubleshoot.

Ah, well…

Defending Quebec's Cegep System: Back to School Special

Someone using the nickname “Erasmus” replied to my post about Defending Quebec’s Cegep System. She/he makes interesting points. Here’s my own reply to her/his comments.

Erasmus,

As it so happens, I agree with almost all of these points.
It’d be interesting to know more about your background and experience. You make interesting points and it’s always fun to know where people are coming from, in terms of their ideas.

To give you more of my background (assuming you don’t know me). As explained in my post, I do teach at the university level and have gone through the Cegep system a long while ago. My father spent his whole career teaching students with learning disabilities at a junior high school (Secondaire I) in what is generally recognised as a socially and economically “disadvantaged milieu” («milieu défavorisé»). Much of my teaching philosophy comes from him. He studied with Jean Piaget but has always been a real “hands-on” kind of guy, especially in his teaching. His goal wasn’t to fill students’ heads with non-essential information but to help them get the tools they needed to cope with social life in Quebec. For instance, much of his math training was based on very practical training (for instance, calculating how much money you can save in one situation or another). His goal was never to “keep children in school” but to make sure students got something out of school. Many of my father’s former students did get a lot out of school and have had fulfilling careers afterwards.

I completely agree with my father’s goals. Teaching at the university level, I see the role of the university as having quite distinct goals from high schools. Not that there isn’t any continuity. But that universities aren’t supposed to be “general training for life.” When universities are limited to that, they are very costly and ineffective.

I sincerely care about the varied fates of people who aren’t university-bound. In fact, it’s one of the things I was trying to say in my post: a Cegep is a place where some people can find out that going to a university isn’t the best solution for them. There’s no use in going to a university if all you want is to have a happy life doing something you can effectively learn outside the university system. Many people who never went to a university are more “learned” than many university-goers. To be blunt, I think some people’s attitudes toward universities is too prestige-oriented. In fact, to be blunter: I think some people are snobs.

From what I can see, the main point of disagreement between you and I has to do with the way we frame “education systems” in general. I want us to take a broad view of Quebec’s education system as a whole instead of blaming one dimension of that system.
Some people blame universities, others blame high schools, many blame Cegeps. What I’m saying is not that Cegeps are free of blame but that the ‘g’ part of the Cegep mission is more important than some Cegep critics seem to assume. Especially since a lot of people do go through Cegeps, whether or not they start university degrees afterwards. I know too little about the ‘p’ part but I do know some people who teach in professional Cegep programs or who have gone through a professional Cegep program and I still see many of those programs as fairly equivalent to community colleges in other parts of North America. In fact, some professional Cegep programs look much more effective than many university degrees, especially in technical fields.

I also don’t think that Quebec society’s woes are due to one specific aspect of its cultural context. My view is holistic, not deterministic. In fact, I don’t even think that Quebec is such a bad place to live in. It’s pretty much equivalent to other places where I’ve lived (in Canada, Switzerland, Mali, and the United States).

One thing I dislike about Quebec’s education system is that there is this assumption that everyone should go to a university. Too frequently, professional training isn’t valued at the high school level and some professional Cegep degrees aren’t as valued as they should be. My friends who have not gone through Cegeps or universities often feel dismissed by “Quebec Society.” Part of it might be their own attitude toward formal education. But part of it is systemic, IMHO.

In Switzerland, for instance, apprenticeships are well-considered and universities have a specific mission. There are issues with the way career paths are chosen “for” students in Switzerland, but I like the idea of valuing non-university training.

Personally, I don’t think Cegeps are taking anything away from high schools. I’ve seen a lot of people who come directly out of high schools in other parts of North America and I really don’t see the one year difference as detrimental to Quebec high school graduates. As for school “dropouts,” my point is exactly about making sure that people distinguish goals of different parts of the education system. I personally think that high schools focus too much on preparing students for universities. And I dislike the application of ideas from social constructivism in the so-called «approche par compétence». To me, it’s typical MEQ mumbo-jumbo which often does more harm than good.

Yes, you can call me a “bench critic” of high schools. I never taught there. But I do dialogue with teachers at different levels and I don’t think I’m that far off. If you tell me more about your background and explain exactly where I’m off the track, we can all get something from this discussion! 😉

Effort vs. Talent

Fascinating overview by Philip Ross on the notion of expertise from a psychological perspective. An article has been published in Scientific American and the magazine’s podcast has a segment with Ross.

One interesting issue is the very emphasis on expertise. Experts, like race horses, are heavily specialized. Examples in the article are mostly from chess and musical composition in the classical style. The study refers to “effortful study” which sounds a lot like Csikszentmihalyi’s notion of flow. In both cases, performance and achievement are allegedly easy to assess. But, well, where’s the fun?

Ross talks about golfers who stopped improving because they always play with the same people. But what some people seem to forget is that playing golf without improving can in fact be quite fun, especially if golf is just a part of the complete activity.

In the interview, Ross does allude to the link, common in the U.S., between schooling and work training. Schools are there to prepare a workforce and improving society as a whole is less important.

An important claim in the article and in the interview is that talent, if it does exist, is less influential than some people seem to think. We see similar things in music, especially if we adopt a broader perspective than simply thinking about skills. “Talented” musicians, those who have a specific predisposition for some musical practise, can succeed in many ways but music doesn’t simply progress by accumulation of skills. This notion is quite important in Ross’s article. Today’s experts are now more numerous and more proficient than during previous generations. Part of this must have to do with today’s emphasis on expertise (people are becoming over-specialized just to fit in the workplace). There’s also the well-known “standing on the shoulders of giants” principle, which accounts for the rapidity in training (although today’s Ph.D. candidates are, on average, much older than previous generations of Ph.D. holders!).

A lot of other things to think about this. But, recently, my policy has been to blog in short bursts. Hey, it’s fun!