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Think-Pair-Share is a strategy designed to provide students with "food for thought" on a given topics enabling them to formulate individual ideas and share these ideas with another student. It is a learning strategy developed by Lyman and associates to encourage student classroom participation. What is Think, Pair, Share? Think-Pair-Share is a strategy designed to provide students with "food for thought" on a given topics enabling them to formulate individual ideas and share these ideas with another student. It is a learning strategy developed by Lyman and associates to encourage student classroom participation. Rather than using a basic recitation method in which a teacher poses a question and one student offers a response, Think-Pair-Share encourages a high degree of pupil response and can help keep students on task. What is its purpose? * Providing "think time" increases quality of student responses. * Students become actively involved in thinking about the concepts presented in the lesson. * Research tells us that we need time to mentally "chew over" new ideas in order to store them in memory. When teachers present too much information all at once, much of that information is lost. If we give students time to "think-pair-share" throughout the lesson, more of the critical information is retained. * When students talk over new ideas, they are forced to make sense of those new ideas in terms of their prior knowledge. Their misunderstandings about the topic are often revealed (and resolved) during this discussion stage. * Students are more willing to participate since they don't feel the peer pressure involved in responding in front of the whole class. * Think-Pair-Share is easy to use on the spur of the moment. * Easy to use in large classes. How can I do it? * With students seated in teams of 4, have them number them from 1 to 4. * Announce a discussion topic or problem to solve. (Example: Which room in our school is larg

"Retrieving legacy files As the old dropbox knew no separation of files by assignment (one of its major limitations), it was not possible to move these files into assignments during the upgrade, and there is no storage area facility available into which they could have been moved, so they are not directly accessible within the application after an upgrade or in courses restored from earlier versions. The old dropbox code used Perl, which has been completely removed from the web application in release 9, so the dropbox cannot be accessed anymore to retrieve the legacy files. A rudimentary Java-based interface is being provided to enable each user individually to download any legacy files they may wish to retrieve. These files can then be submitted in newly created assignments as desired or stored in one's Virtual Hard Drive inside the Blackboard Content System, if that is licensed by the institution and enabled by the system administrator. Unfortunately this interface is not exposed via any link in the application. System administrators or helpdesk staff can however make available such a link to their users, either assisting them with file retrieval on an individual basis or by publishing the download link to their users, e.g. in a system announcement. Community Engagement license holders may also wish to add an HTML portal module with this link, thus simplifying the download process, or add it as external link to the tool panel (in the portal menu column). The location of this interface (relative to your server root) is: /webapps/blackboard/execute/ddb It is important to note that this is not a file system location. You actually have to access the URL via a web browser! Sample HTML for a portal module named something like "Digital Dropbox Download": Download your digital dropbox files here When a user accesses this link, he will either see a message that no files were found for him, or a list of courses in w

researcher at the National Education Policy Center, said research has so far failed to prove that online instruction is superior to face-to-face education. Jeff Hunt, who runs Indian Prairie's online program, said such critiques are a caution to those who want to expand Internet-based learning. "We have to do this well because we can't do it over," he said. "(Poor results) will verify to critics that there's no quality there." Tribune reporter Lawerence Synett contributed. jkeilman@tribune.com Get the Chicago Tribune delivered to your home for only $1 a week > Copyright © 2011, Chicago Tribune Share61(2) RECOMMENDED FOR YOU 2 charged with prostitution at Evanston spa (Chicago Tribune) Ind. couple pleads guilty to duct-taping children (Chicago Tribune) Hospitals drowning in noise (Chicago Tribune) Chicago's at top as gas prices jump again (Chicago Tribune) Chicago discussed as terrorist target, document says (Chicago Tribune) FROM AROUND THE WEB What?! Prince in foreclosure?! (BankRate.com) Every Parent's Nightmare: Your Grad Is Moving Home (CNBC) Little-known credit card perks (BankRate.com) Riskiest Places to Use Your Credit Card (CNBC) Mary Robbins Dies Just 12 Days After Husband (The New York Times) [what's this]   Comments (2)Add / View comments | Discussion FAQ ckotarch at 10:55 PM April 25, 2011 Online learning offers the people who can learn faster than their peers the opportunity to work ahead and learn more and do more in the same amount of time.   The fact that students are graduating early is testament to the fact that there are some superior advantages to it when used that way.  Credit recovery too gives kids the opportunity to catch up to meet their goals of graduation where without it, they would not.  What more evidence does one need?   The benefits are self evident. Arrive2.net at 9:57 PM April 25, 2011 "Gene Glass, senior researcher at the National Education Policy Center, said research has so far failed to prove that online instr

"I used to think that I needed to help teachers to use tools, but now I think I need to help teachers meet learning goals." "I used to think that I needed to guide teachers through new technologies, but now I think I need to create safe spaces for them to play and explore." "I used to think that my workshops should be named after new technologies, but now I think they should be named after learning goals." "I used to think that I needed to keep my teachers up to date on new technologies, but I now I think I need to give them a framework to think about how to use technology in their teaching that can adapt to new technologies."

We have an opportunity in course design, to bring all of the stake-holders to the table. Course design should not just be up to a dept. or a single teacher. Course development can be an opportunity to bring in a librarian, someone from student advising, disabled student services and programs, and developmental education. A course design process can show an instructor how to connect their classroom with other students, instructors, and experts in the field. It can be an opportunity to connect students with professional networks as well as other colleges and schools.  What I have been finding is that when you bring everyone to the table to talk about a course, you can discover many different ways to connect your course to the community than you would have ever thought of yourself.

Higher education conferences over the past few years have been full of presentations, papers and panels on the processes involved in migrating a campus and its people to Google Apps for Education. While it is useful to hear about marketing tchotchkes, data validation, and the pros and cons of web clients, what seems to get ignored is the process that led to the decision to move to Google Apps in the first place. At North Carolina State University, where students were already using Google Apps, the decision to move employees involved almost as much time, effort and heartache as the technical migration. As the users saw it, they had a working system, even if that system only worked because of huge expenditures of time and money both on the backend server maintenance and the client need to implement terribly complex workarounds for simple functionality. The end result: a 94-page white paper and the realization that it's hard to sell ice to Eskimos1 , even if you show them that their ice has already melted. This paper and presentation will discuss the information gathering and needs assessment done by NC State prior to the decision to move employees to Google Apps, and the successes and difficulties involved.

There are several widely-accepted rubrics (Quality Matters, the ION one in Illinois, etc.), but in my opinion, they focus on course design, not on teaching the course. When I was at Black Hawk College, we created a Best Practices for Exemplary Online Teaching set of standards based on the Chickering and Gamson's "7 Principles of Good Practice for Undergraduate Education" meta-analysis. Individual best practices for online teaching were pulled from the literature and listed as possibilities under each of the 7 principles, and an 8th was added with some of the course design elements not already mentioned in the first 7. In other words, we created a local document that could assist faculty in doing self-assessment, peer evaluations of each other's courses, and potentially institutional review of online courses. However, our instrument was not used for institutional assessment because it was not approved as part of the faculty [union] contract. It is important for a document like this to be shared with the faculty ahead of time so that they know how their courses are going to be evaluated. I also think it is helpful to have several people evaluate various aspects of online courses, such as someone who is an expert in online education who can evaluate the learning experiences and course design elements of the course, someone from the faculty member's department who can evaluate the quality and accuracy of the course content, as well as the administrator whose job it is to evaluate teaching. If the institution uses a type of rubric or assessment document when evaluating face-to-face teaching, it needs to be vetted by online experts to determine if it emphasizes appropriate, comparable variables in the online environment. For example, if activities to promote student engagement is on that form...what does that look like online? Not all administrators or faculty who have not taught online would know what to look for as indicators of student engagement.

To experience the world of high quality reporting from North Korea, meditations on the state of journalism, and a wide range of other stories, direct your browser to the Global Journalist website. Originally created for the International Press Institute in 1995, the publication moved to the Missouri School of Journalism in 1999. Today, journalism students work with staff members to produce content for the site and its accompanying radio show, which is broadcast on KBIA, central Missouri's NPR affiliate. With funding provided in part by the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute, the people at the Global Journalist provide users with current and archived radio shows on the homepage. After listening to a few recent stories, interested parties may wish to click on the Free Press Watch section. Here they can use the interactive map to learn about various transgressions committed against members of the press around the world. Also, users shouldn't miss the Blogs area, which contains links to high-quality news blogs from "Persian Letters" (billed as "a window into Iranian politics and society") to the Guardian's "Newsblog

This document is a code of best practices designed to help those preparing OpenCourseWare (OCW) to interpret and apply fair use under United States copyright law. The OCW movement, which is part of the larger Open Educational Resources (OER) movement, was pioneered in 2002, when the Massachusetts Institute of Technology launched its OpenCourseWare initiative, making course materials available in digital form on a free and open basis to all. In 2005, MIT helped to organize with the support of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation a group of not-for-profit organizations interested in following the OpenCourseWare model and standardizing the delivery of OCW material. This group of institutions, known as the OCW Consortium (OCWC), has grown into a concern of more than 200 universities worldwide promoting universal access to knowledge on a nonprofit basis. The mission of OCWC is "to advance formal and informal learning through the worldwide sharing and use of free, open, high-quality educational materials organized as courses."

This will be a great resource as we help faculty/students put more content online. "This document is a code of best practices designed to help those preparing OpenCourseWare (OCW) to interpret and apply fair use under United States copyright law. The OCW movement, which is part of the larger Open Educational Resources (OER) movement, was pioneered in 2002, when the Massachusetts Institute of Technology launched its OpenCourseWare initiative, making course materials available in digital form on a free and open basis to all. In 2005, MIT helped to organize with the support of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation a group of not-for-profit organizations interested in following the OpenCourseWare model and standardizing the delivery of OCW material. This group of institutions, known as the OCW Consortium (OCWC), has grown into a concern of more than 200 universities worldwide promoting universal access to knowledge on a nonprofit basis. The mission of OCWC is "to advance formal and informal learning through the worldwide sharing and use of free, open, high-quality educational materials organized as courses."

"This is my "to-do" list of tools to add to this site; new ones I have found or others have suggested. Keep in mind that my criteria for something to be included in the collection: * The tool allows you to mix 2 or more media types to create something you can publish to the web * The tool is free to use * The tool exists on a web site (e.g. not a download or a mobile app) * The tool is not specific to any operating system or browser"

cogdog's take on new web-based storytelling tools

Cogdog's take on new web tools for storytelling

Web 2.0 has been, during the last years, one of the most fashionable words for a whole range of evolutions regarding the Internet.Although it was identified by the current analysts as the key technology for the next decade, the actors from the educational fielddo not really know what Web 2.0 means. Since the author started to explore and use Web 2.0 technologies in her owndevelopment/improvement, she has been intrigued by their potential and, especially, by the possibility of integrating them ineducation and in particular in the teaching activity.The purpose of this paper is both to promote scholarly inquiry about the need of a new type a pedagogy (Web 2.0 based) and thedevelopment / adoption of best practice in teaching and learning with web 2.0 in higher education (HE).The article main objectives are: * to introduce theoretical aspects of using Web 2.0 technologies in higher education* to present models of integrating Web 2.0 technologies in teaching, learning and assessment* to identify the potential benefits of these technologies as well as to highlight some of the problematic issues /barriers encountered, surrounding the pedagogical use of Web 2.0 in higher education* to propose an agenda for future research, and to develop pedagogy 2.0 scenarios for HE sector. © 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

The Oral History in the Digital Age website connects interested persons and organizations to a range of resources related to crafting a meaningful and dynamic oral history project. Crafted by people at Michigan State University with funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), the site contains critical essays, How-To guides, and an elaborate wiki. The Getting Started area is a good place to begin, as it features helpful playlists about oral history projects. The Essays tab leads to another highly informative section of the site. The short pieces in this section are divided into three topics: Collecting, Curating, and Disseminating. The individual essays include "Enhancing Discovery: Connecting Users to Y our Oral History Collections Online" and "Oral History and Social Networks: From Promotion to Relationship Building." Finally, the Ask Doug option features expert responses to key questions on oral history projects from noted oral historian Doug Boyd

Why are so many people in their 20s taking so long to grow up?

From an LMS provider's standpoint, the more open and flexible the LMS, the more it can be integrated with other programs for robust analysis of student activity and interaction.  According to Lou Pugliese, president of online learning solutions provider  Moodlerooms, that kind of integration is needed. Technologies exist to measure student data and interactions on a large scale, Pugliese says: The focus now is how to effectively collect data and conduct reporting on-demand within the LMS. "Over the past ten years, the LMS has managed to record the most basic of student interactions and activity, but we've barely scratched the surface in enabling universities to analyze data on an institutional level," says Pugliese. "However, new developments in analytical technologies will provide educators with the ability to measure interactions within the ever-popular collaborative tools present in today's LMS environments. Moving beyond simple traffic reporting to more comprehensive online behaviour analysis will be critical to make more effective intervention decisions."  

The request came in by e-mail around 2 in the afternoon. It was from a previous customer, and she had urgent business. I quote her message here verbatim (if I had to put up with it, so should you): "You did me business ethics propsal for me I need propsal got approved pls can you will write me paper?"

You wish to play all or part of a movie or piece of music, show a picture or image, or post articles for downloading from your online course Web site. How can you do this?

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. - On the eve of a pivotal academic year in Vishal Singh's life, he faces a stark choice on his bedroom desk: book or computer?

It is often difficult to explain what Creative Commons licensing is to students and teachers - this short film does a pretty good job of presenting the facts. I do think there is a need for more high quality resources to help teach licensing of digital content and especially resources to communicate what it all means to young student. What do you think?

The problem is that to have a Google Docs account, you need an email address.  You need it to verify your Google Docs account.  Most elementary and some middle school students don't have email addresses and their parents may not want them to have one.  Mailcatch.com is a disposable email address service.  You create an email address by just using it.  Then you go to mailcatch.com and retrieve any emails sent to it.  In a few hours, the email disappears.  You can't send email from it and you can return to it to get recovery password emails.