Adesina Media

Drip Drop

For the past few months, every waking moment of free time that I’ve had has been handed over to the lovely folks of NOVASTARTALK.  The STARTALK project is a federally-funded initiative that strives to increase the number of people speaking critical-need langauges (such as Chinese and Arabic).  For the past three years, a team at Northern Virginia Community College has been leading special workshops for Chinese and Arabic teachers on increasing student engagement with the use of technology.  The project this year was for the NOVASTARTALK team to turn their face-to-face workshop into an online resource that might be used in conjunction with hybrid and online versions of the workshop.

Cue my involvement – I’ve been beating my 100% very first Drupal installation into shape for the project and I have to say that for the most part, I’m a fan of the CMS.  It is so spartan when you begin working with it, you instantly realize that if you want something for the site, you’ve got to go out and get it – good for making sure that your site proverbially has, “everything you need and nothing you don’t…”  This site has become so content-rich and rooted in the theory that technology shouldn’t be a burden so much as a tool, it’s truly a great resource for more than language educators.  Teacher developers and students alike can benefit from the tutorials on the site and its use of plain language in tackling some seemingly complex programs and concepts.

Here are some shots of the site (a heavily modified version of the popular Acquia Marina template) that’s now up on the web at http://novastartalk.nvcc.edu.

And before I close this post, I’d be remiss in not thanking Patrick Lower (Webmaster at NVCC) for his crazy good work in helping me with any/every technical road bump that I’ve hit along the way.  Patrick, you are officially on my A+ List (Note to self: work on perks for people on A+ list.)