What is Wolfram\Alpha?

There are search engines that are coming online to challenge Google's dominance of that market.  One of the ones I ran across from reading latest issue of Business Week (article on Google) and chatting with students in my honors class today -- who of course knew about it with me clueless until today -- Wolfram\Alpha. 

According to its website, Wolfram Alpha's long-term goal is to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable and accessible to everyone. We aim to collect and curate all objective data; implement every known model, method, and algorithm; and make it possible to compute whatever can be computed about anything. Our goal is to build on the achievements of science and other systematizations of knowledge to provide a single source that can be relied on by everyone for definitive answers to factual queries...is an ambitious, long-term intellectual endeavor that we intend will deliver increasing capabilities over the years and decades to come. With a world-class team and participation from top outside experts in countless fields, our goal is to create something that will stand as a major milestone of 21st century intellectual achievement.

I performed a modest comparison with Google by asking a computational question, "How many calories in a cup of tuna?"  What I got from Google was hundreds and hundreds of links to websites that had the search terms in the sentence.  What I got from Wolfrap\Alpha was ONE SINGLE PAGE that gave the caloric information.  The same thing happened when I asked, "How many teaspoons in a tablespoon?"  I got the information specific to the question and that was it.  For those of you out there who teach baking enter in some of your formulas to see the response you get because the students I spoke to in class today love the computational capabilities of this search engine.

Tips on Reducing Cheating

Let's face it, there are some students who will cheat.  Heck, I had to change the way I faciliated a community service assignment in my freshman class a few years because the students were cheating on it, which many did not see to be a problem.

Here are some tips from a new book entitled "Cheating in School: What We Know and What We Can Do" by Stephen F. Davis, Patrick F. Drinan, and Tricia Bertram Gallant (published by Wiley-Blackwell).  The authors offer a few strategies instructor can implement to discourage cheating that are covered in depth in their new book:

1. Clearly articulate your expectations for the class and EACH INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT. Can students work with others on their homework assignments, for example? Can they use old exams, lab reports, etc. as aids in the course?


2. Explicitly link assignments to learning objectives. Students often cheat on assignments that they see as meaningless or “busy-work.” If they understand the point of the assignment, especially how it will help them learn the material, they are more likely to push through it on their own rather than copy from someone else.


3. Reduce temptations to cheating. We cannot control student behavior, but we can at least show them that we care about the integrity of our classes by doing little things. For example, space students out during exams, provide multiple versions of the same test, require students to leave all non-essential materials at the front of the room, and have the WiFi turned off in the test room.


4. Talk to students about the relation of academic integrity to professional ethics and their future chosen career. Students are more likely to uphold integrity in academic assignments if they see it as holding more value than just being “another institutional rule.”


5. Report all cheating when you see it, rather than ignore it or handle it on your own. A professor can become known as someone who does not tolerate cheating or look the other way, and then the cheaters will not choose her class! Also, many professors mistakenly assume that they can reduce cheating on their own, but it takes the entire campus. If instructors do not report cheating, that same student may be cheating in other courses and no one would ever know!

A Sad Loss Indeed

In case you have not heard by now, Gourmet magazine was cancelled yesterday by Conde Nast.  Perhaps that magazine inspired you to be a chef or become a better one over the years.  For more information on the magazine and the reason for its demise, read:

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-conde-nast6-2009oct06,0,7266456.story

Sometimes I Wonder if We Matter

We just did  a curriculum revision and I am very proud of it.  We believe it is one that will truly prepare our graduates to manage any hospitality business, anywhere, anytime after graduation.  And then I see videos like the one below.  Take the time to watch the six minute video.  It puts my understanding of the world in perspective and makes me wonder if our curriculum is truly preparing graduates for the global market place:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljbI-363A2Q&feature=PlayList&p=DDE35FD7D46EC29C&index=0&playnext=1

Let me know what you think. 

More Insights on Learning Styles

As long as we are at it, here is another video from Willingham clarifying a point about good teaching he made on the video on yesterday's blog post:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKkHiAA3xu0&feature=channel
Have a great weekend!