Forum LAMS Newsletter: Newsletter 18, 12th Mar, 06

By: James Dalziel

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Praise for LAMS from Matthew Pittinsky, Chairman of Blackboard

The LAMS Blackboard Building Block was highlighted by Blackboard Chairman Matthew Pittinsky during his keynote address last week at the annual Blackboard Users Conference, Bb World 2006. “The LAMS Building Block provides cutting edge functionality for Blackboard users, offering an easy-to-use, visual display of the tasks and activities within a particular course or assignment. This Building Block makes it so simple for instructors to organize and sequence the different tasks of each lesson, which in turn makes it easier for students to learn and collaborate. We expect many instructors to take advantage of this unique new tool.”

International Week at LAMS

It seems that the past week has been "International week", with a number of important developments for LAMS users around the world, particularly those who speak languages other than English.

New LAMS Community for Languages other than English

We've just launched a new community area within the LAMS Community for all those who wish to discuss LAMS and share sequences, but who speak languages other than English. To join this community (or any others you are not already part of), visit the link below and click "Join".

http://lamscommunity.org/dotlrn/manage-memberships

So far there are discussions forums in Italian and Spanish. I'm delighted to report that the Italian forum is already off to a flying start with contributions from 10 different people to date!

Next generation LAMS to support many languages

We're pleased to announce that the next generation of LAMS (V1.1 or "Dolly") will support a wide range of languages, including double byte character languages such as Chinese, Japanese, etc. This week I saw my first pictures of the new LAMS interfaces running in languages that I can't read (eg, Chinese), which was very exciting and slightly unnerving (how can I give user interface feedback if I can't read the page?). More details will be available over the coming months - if you're interested to help us with translations, please let me know, or post a message about this in the technical forums.

Reminder: Educational Support 4-5pm Sydney time Thursdays

Just a reminder that we have commenced an hourly session each Thursday 4-5pm Sydney time for educational advice and support. See the new forum in the Getting Started community for more details.

Posted by James Dalziel