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Ivan Beeckmans

C. M. Rubin: The Global Search for Education: What Will Finland Do Next? - 2 views

  • I think that the U.S. school system would benefit from a dual system in high school where young people who are interested in doing or making things with their hands, for instance, could have high quality vocational programs or schools that would equip them with the skills they need to find jobs or employ themselves.
  • First, curriculum in vocational schools was adjusted closer to the standards of academic high school.
  • Second, a significant proportion of vocational studies was shifted to real work places where students are able to learn in practice the knowledge and skills they need in their future jobs.
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  • Third, vocational and academic high schools were required to design and provide instruction that enabled students more flexibility and choice.
  • One scenario is that schools will race after technology and align core instructional operations to rely on digital and other technological solutions.
  • A second scenario views schools merely as places for facilitation of study and checking of achievement.
  • A third scenario would be to elevate schools as places for social learning and developmental skills. Cooperative learning, problem solving and cultivating the habits of mind would be at the heart of school life.
  • First, I am not saying that Finland has the best education system in the world and that others should imitate what we have done.
  • Second, I make it very clear that the Finnish school system cannot be transferred anywhere else in the world.
  • There are some concrete lessons that American educators and policymakers could learn from Finland.
  • First, a universal standard for financing schools, so that resources are channeled to schools according to real needs
  • Second, a universal standard for time allocation in schools, allowing pupils to have a proper recess between classes and a balanced curriculum among academic learning, the arts and physical education.
  • Third, a universal standard for teacher preparation that follows standards in other top professions.
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    Some interesting comments of regarding the future of schools...if that is what we continue to call them.
Katy Vance

Educational Leadership:Technology-Rich Learning:Our Brains Extended - 0 views

  • When my 2nd grader needs to know the meaning of a word, I tell him to use my iPhone to ask Siri, an artificial intelligence program that's always happy to look it up for him. Siri, in turn, uses the free online program Wolfram Alpha, one of the most powerful data analysis tools in the world. If you enter into the Siri (or Wolfram Alpha) search box, by text or voice, "arable land in world divided by world population," in less than a second the phone or computer will find the relevant data; do the calculations; provide the answer—in square miles, acres, square feet, and hectares per person—and cite you its sources.
  • The only way to do almost all science today is with technology. No human can handle or analyze the volumes of data we now have and need. Ditto for the social sciences. The research study of the past focusing on 10 graduate students has been replaced by sample sizes of millions online around the world. Being perfect at language translation, spelling, and grammar is becoming less important for humans as machines begin to understand context and can access almost every translation ever done. Those who laugh at the mistakes that machines make today will no longer be laughing in a few short years.
  • call the process of envisioning such technically enhanced possibilities imag-u-cation. It's something every teacher and class should spend some time doing.
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  • With YouTube, for example, students can post their ideas to the world and get rapid global feedback. With tools like Twitter and its cousins, they can follow firsthand details of events unfolding anywhere in the world, from revolutions to natural disasters. With mashups and related techniques, they can combine sophisticated data sources in powerful new ways. One school group I know of created a Second Life model of Los Angeles, using the database of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to show each plane flying in its actual spot! With Skype-like tools, students can connect with experts and peers around the world in real time.
  • Effective Thinking, which would include creative and critical thinking as well as portions of math, science, logic, persuasion, and even storytelling; Effective Action, which would include entrepreneurship, goal setting, planning, persistence, project management, and feedback; and Effective Relationships, which would include emotional intelligence, teamwork, ethics, and more.
  • Instead of today's focus on pre-established subject matter, with thinking skills presented randomly, haphazardly, and inconsistently, the student and teacher focus would always be on thinking in its various forms and on being an effective thinker, using examples from math, science, social studies, and language arts.
  • These would range from small projects in earlier years ("I made this app or this website") to larger projects ("I collaborated with a class in another country to publish a bilingual novel"; "I started a successful company") to participation in later years in huge, distributed projects around the world ("Using Galaxy Zoo, I discovered a new, habitable planet").
  • Producing effective letters, reports, and essays was an intellectual need of our past. Working effectively in virtual communities, communicating effectively through video, and controlling complex technologies are what students need to be successful in the future. Thinking, acting, relating, and accomplishing—in the technological and fast-changing context of the future—are where we should focus our students' attention.
  • No longer is the unenhanced brain the wisest thing on the planet. Students who don't have technology's powerful new capabilities at their command at every turn are not better 21st century humans but lesser ones.
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    You think of technology as a tool," one high school student told me. "We think of it as a foundation; it underlies everything we do."
Chrissy Hellyer

Why You Should Care About and Defend Your Privacy - 0 views

  • Privacy is dead, right? Facebook knows everything about you, and the world is still turning.
  • Making the case that information about you, your demographics, your behaviors and habits—all information you may think has little to no value—is valuable to the people looking for it is one important step in explaining why this is all important.
  • The fact is, your data is worth real, tangible money to the companies that offer you free services (in Facebook's case, you're worth just shy of $5 per year) and the companies they do business with, even if they're not asking you to open your wallet.P
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  • what data is requested of them, how much of the requested information is required for the service they want to use, and how their data is eventually used. The survey notes that even young people are concerned about their privacy, the ones often written off as part of a generation that's willing to share everything online.
  • people are still quite concerned with their privacy. The baseline for privacy has simply changed.
  • Rainey says that even those who dismiss privacy concerns become concerned when confronted with the depth of information they've revealed, and when shown how that information is used once they give it up.
  • "They just want control over what information they give up,
  • what they agree to, and what information is made public versus kept private in the databases and annals of the companies and organizations that get to see it."
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