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"A new task force to ensure our universities become the first choice across the world for on-line distance learning was announced today by Higher Education Minister, David Lammy.The task force chaired by Lynne Brindley, the Chief Executive of the British Library will advise on a wider strategy to build on our past and present successes and ensure we do not lose pace on increased demand in expanding and new markets.It will be backed by a new Open Learning Innovation Fund aimed at helping universities build on their existing world class reputations to access and engage future markets that are expected to value around £15bn in the future. This is a competitive match funding initiative, with up to £10m from HEFCE and therefore worth up to £20m in total, aims to encourage universities to work collaboratively with each other and the private and third sectors, to bid for money to develop projects to help transform the way people can get a degree." Thanx to cris Sharing this! Awesome, seeing public investment in the right direction!

Take the simplicity of Twitter, add some features such as sending attachments, redesign the software to appeal to teachers and students, what you end up with is Edmondo.com, a young site that is rapidly gaining converts in the education community. It is a great example of using digital tools to organize a student's day-to-day workflow. Edmodo provides a way for teachers and students to share notes, links, and files. Teachers have the ability to send alerts, events, and assignments to students. Privacy is the biggest drawback to using traditional web 2.0 tools in a k-12 classroom setting.  (Has Twitter been around long enough to be called traditional?) Edmondo promotes itself as "a private communication platform for teachers and students." I'm not a teacher, so I'll defer to the views of someone who is. Mark Warner is a primary teacher in the U.K. who runs the successful www.TeachingIdeas.co.uk and blogs on MrWarner.com.  He and his students (ages nine and ten) just recently started using the site, and they think it's great.

An e-Journal from the EINet: "Impact: Journal of Applied Research in Workplace E-learning A publication of the E-learning Network of Australasia (ElNet) *** Inaugural issue published! *** Editor-in-Chief: Mark J.W. Lee Impact has been established to address the paucity of research publication avenues with a particular emphasis on e-learning in organisational and workplace settings. It publishes both refereed and non-refereed contributions from both researchers and practitioners relating to the design, implementation, evaluation and management of workplace e-learning across a range of sectors and industries. One special issue will be published in the journal's first year of operation (2009). This will increase to two issues in 2010, followed by quarterly publication in 2011 and subsequent years. Articles in the first (inaugural) issue will be freely available electronically to the general public as soon as they are published; thereafter, the journal will adopt a delayed open access model, whereby issues published within the last six months will be restricted to viewing by paid subscribers, including financial members of ElNet, while all other content is accessible free-of-charge. Users are required to complete the free registration process in order to view the open access content on this site." So far the published intro! I recommend a view at the Editorial Board. Thanx to http://www.elearning4.de/2009/12/21/pdf-inaugural-issue-journal-of-applied-research-in-workplace-e-learning/ and @elearnity to pint this out in his blog.

Are you ready to lead a revolution at your school or in your district? Leadership Day 2009. Intro: The Professional Networked Learning Collaborative Back in 2002 in his book Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution Howard Rheingold predicted that, "The 'killer apps' of tomorrow's mobile infocom industry won't be hardware devices or software program but social practices. The most far reaching changes will come, as they often do, from the kinds of relationships, enterprises, communities, and markets that the infrastructure makes possible." The prediction, as we now know, was spot dead on. The technology has transformed our relationships, how we are able to collaborate, how we now define communities, what constitutes a network, and what kinds of work we are able to do. According to Deborah Ancona and Henrik Bresman, authors of X-Teams, "…team effectiveness is not just a matter of managing well around the conference table. Success also depends on team's reaching out across their borders to find needed information and expertise."It is this intersection of collaboration and technology that has now allowed us to create and leverage a new form of boundary crossing Professional Learning Community. It's called a Professional Networked Learning Collaborative.

(Michael Gorman) Welcome to a post that covers those other ten Word Cloud Generators and some are pretty amazing!  While Wordle is the king of Word Cloud Generators here are some other word cloud tools that have some outstanding capabilities that are worth investigation.  Each tool provides a unique way  that can be used in  the classroom to facilitate the creation and study of word clouds. I especially was impressed with a few tools that actually helped students analyze a group of text using more than just the generated cloud, another that allows the user to be creative with the cloud shape, and still another that connects words in the cloud to web pages! Thanks for the visit, and as always please feel free to follow me on Twitter (mjgormans), I will follow back and we can learn from each other. Also, be sure to visit my 21centuryedtech Blog and check out all of the free resources at my 21centuryedtech Wiki! - Have a great week and enjoy the read! - Mike

There's a lot of misinformation out there about legal rights and responsibilities in the digital era. This is especially disconcerting when it comes to information being shared with youth. Kids and teens are bombarded with messages from a myriad of sources that using new technology is high-risk behavior. Downloading music is compared to stealing a bicycle - even though many downloads are lawful. Making videos using short clips from other sources is treated as probably illegal - even though many such videos are also lawful. This misinformation is harmful, because it discourages kids and teens from following their natural inclination to be innovative and inquisitive. The innovators, artists and voters of tomorrow need to know that copyright law restricts many activities but also permits many others. And they need to know the positive steps they can take to protect themselves in the digital sphere. In short, youth don't need more intimidation - what they need is solid, accurate information.

An other awesoem answer about future of education, by da truss. So he told in his Blog: "… and it occurred to me that what I should be looking at when talking about 'Shifting Learning' is the direction we are shifting to in the future, more-so than now. I tried to do as George asked and represent this in something other than words. I spent a couple hours playing with a slide show of images and now I'm just going to salvage the title page to share with you as a frame for what I'll write about. This isn't a crystal ball look into the future, instead it is my perception of some key trends that will have a powerful impact on how learning will be shared in the future." Worth to read many times.

ubercaster + nicecast + shoutcast server april 13, 2009 1:10 pm                 today i got around to dabbling with ubercaster and the ability to bring in skype callers for multi input/source live podcasting. after i got that bit working i then fired up my nicecast shoutcast 50 slot server from tidyhosts and set up some targets for it to capture the audio from. i then gave out my shoutcast url for people with itunes or winamp (pc) to tune into - it went really well and we found that in ubercaster playing music/samples played back to the skype users that were logged into the conversation.

RAFT (Remote Accessible Field Trips) provides the possibility for students to participate in field trips from remote locations. This paper reports on two studies to test the RAFT concept. The first study used video-mediated communication (VMC) to allow students to communicate with experts. The second study tested students' experiences of using off-the-shelf technologies to transfer data while assigned with specific roles. Participants were school students aged 11-18 years. The findings showed RAFT resulted in high levels of interest and was both positive and engaging for students. An increase in student interest in topic (p < 0.05) was reported in the second study. It is argued that these aspects of RAFT are of benefit to students and further developments are discussed.

Rolf Arnold; Peter Faulstich; Wilhelm Mader; Ekkehard Nuissl von Rein; Erhard Schlutz: Research Memorandum on Adult and Continuing Education The growing importance of lifelong learning and adult education appears to be a generally accepted fact. Less well known, on the other hand, are the causes, conditions, forms and types of development in all their variety as well as the changing trends and options for solutions to be observed at different levels. This situation requires broad, intensive and sustained empirical research on adult and continuing education. This Research Memorandum - commissioned by the Section for Adult Education at the German Society for Educational Science (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Erziehungswissenschaft, DGfE) - seeks to identify, structure and label focal areas and questions in order to stimulate a more effective, coordinated division of labor in the field of research. This portrayal of the need for empirical research focuses on five fields of research: adult learning, knowledge structures and skill needs, professional action, institutionalization, system and policy. These fields of research are once again broken down into certain focal areas of research or topical areas. Questions are then proposed in order to elucidate the various research options. These questions are by no means exhaustive. Their purpose, rather, is merely to serve as examples. Overlapping between research fields, topics and issues is not random - it is, rather, an inherent aspect of all these phenomena.

Wikis are an exceptionally useful tool for getting students more involved in curriculum. They're often appealing and fun for students to use, while at the same time ideal for encouraging participation, collaboration, and interaction. Read on to see how you can put wikis to work in your classroom.

"Five years ago, we launched a conference based on a simple idea, and that idea grew into a movement. The original Web 2.0 Conference (now the Web 2.0 Summit ) was designed to restore confidence in an industry that had lost its way after the dotcom bust. The Web was far from done, we argued. In fact, it was on its way to becoming a robust platform for a culture-changing generation of computer applications and services. In our first program, we asked why some companies survived the dotcom bust, while others had failed so miserably. We also studied a burgeoning group of startups and asked why they were growing so quickly. The answers helped us understand the rules of business on this new platform. Chief among our insights was that "the network as platform" means far more than just offering old applications via the network ("software as a service"); it means building applications that literally get better the more people use them, harnessing network effects not only to acquire users, but also to learn from them and build on their contributions. From Google and Amazon to Wikipedia, eBay, and craigslist, we saw that the value was facilitated by the software, but was co-created by and for the community of connected users. Since then, powerful new platforms like YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter have demonstrated that same insight in new ways. Web 2.0 is all about harnessing collective intelligence." Web2.0 aus der Sicht O'Reilly and John Battelle heute. Spannend, wie sie die Entwicklungen bewerten.

I struggle with audio especially when I'm out of a controlled environment. I often like to make videos on the road at events - usually in a noisy conference hall with high ceilings. This is a less than ideal recording situation. So, I thought I'd round up a bunch of different microphones at work and compare them for you. Matt Pierce, the Training Manager, and I headed to our soundbooth and tested 6 different microphones. We used Audacity to record the audio at 44,100Hz. We tried to have as much consistency as possible, but we had to adjust the audio levels on each microphone. You will see in the screencast what level we recorded at. Also, I made the links a hotspot in the video, so you can click them if you'd like more info about the microphone. The screencast is short - running 1:30.

The presentation will be to debunk some of the myths around the so-called Net Generation by highlighting the lack solid research to support many of the claims. I will present results from research done at BCIT and elsewhere to argue for a more nuanced approach to the use of educational technology to support the needs of this generation of learner.

"Financial Literacy 101: Useful Tools for Recent College Grads June 23rd, 2009 For many just finishing college, the transition between school and the real world can be a tumultuous one. Many grads will be on their own for the first time paying bills, budgeting, and repaying those hefty college loans, not to mention learning to adjust to working a regular job and not having the easily accessible pool of friends nearby. Learning to effectively manage finances can be a process of trial and error but grads can stack the deck in their favor by taking advantage of great online resources that can help them learn and keep track of where every penny of their paychecks is going." Thanx to Felipe Morales

"Again, the mission is not to review or try every single one (that would be madness, I know), but pick one that sounds interesting and see if you can produce something. I have used each tool to produce an example of the original Dominoe story, plus links are provided, where available, to examples by other people. Please share your own examples or thoughts in the discussion area of this wiki." Therefor this wiki starts - and there you will find a lot lot lot of thisngs about Storys and How to embed them in educational scenarios

Student to Student Podcast in iTunes University November 30th, 2009 in Main and PNME2007 and Podcast Tags: PNME 2007 #52: Student to Student Podcast Development on an iTunes University Site iTunes university sites are proliferating the model of course-casting that simply packages what universities do daily into an electronic form. The DePaul iTunes site features a student-based podcast network that emphasizes show content developed by students for students. How this was accomplished and how it adds value to iTunes University development is explored in this presentation. The talk will cover issues of recruiting hosts, developing content, structuring the experience, offering course credit, maintaining quality, and developing audience. Robert will discuss how this enriches the iTunes integration beyond what most universities may be using it for currently. Instructor: Robert Rotenberg of DePaul University

"Fair use is the right, in some circumstances, to quote copyrighted material without asking permission or paying for it. Fair use enables the creation of new culture, and keeps current copyright holders from being private censors. With the Washington College of Law, the Center for Social Media creates tools for creators, teachers, and researchers to better use their fair use rights. Explore your fair use rights by clicking on one of the tabs above. To listen to Center director Pat Aufderheide describe the issues around fair use, click here."

In the Daily Galaxy: "Although It has taken homo sapiens several million years to evolve from the apes, the useful information in our DNA, has probably changed by only a few million bits. So the rate of biological evolution in humans, Stephen Hawking points out in his Life in the Universe lecture,  is about a bit a year. "By contrast," Hawking says, "there are about 50,000 new books published in the English language each year, containing of the order of a hundred billion bits of information. Of course, the great majority of this information is garbage, and no use to any form of life. But, even so, the rate at which useful information can be added is millions, if not billions, higher than with DNA." Thanx to @JulianEdward pointing me to this!

Grom the Webpage: "About The Free Music Archive is an interactive library of high-quality, legal audio downloads.  The Free Music Archive is being directed by WFMU, the most renowned freeform radio station in America.  Radio has always offered the public free access to new music. The Free Music Archive is a continuation of that purpose, designed for the age of the internet." Thanx to @anitsirk to pointing us to this!