Coetail

The notion that the central problem in American education is lack of teacher motivation is ludicrous.

blog writing has become a basic requirement in everything from M.B.A. to literature courses. On its face, who could disagree with the transformation? Why not replace a staid writing exercise with a medium that gives the writer the immediacy of an audience, a feeling of relevancy, instant feedback from classmates or readers, and a practical connection to contemporary communications? Pointedly, why punish with a paper when a blog is, relatively, fun?

Because, say defenders of rigorous writing, the brief, sometimes personally expressive blog post fails sorely to teach key aspects of thinking and writing. They argue that the old format was less about how Sherman got to the sea and more about how the writer organized the points, fashioned an argument, showed grasp of substance and proof of its origin. Its rigidity wasn’t punishment but pedagogy.

Their guidance counselor was their adviser, consulting with them when the group flagged in energy or encountered an obstacle. Though they sought advice from English, math and science teachers, they were responsible for monitoring one another’s work and giving one another feedback. There were no grades, but at the end of the semester, the students wrote evaluations of their classmates.

The students also designed their own curriculum, deciding to split their September-to-January term into two halves.

each of them focused on specific mathematical topics, from quadratic equations to the numbers behind poker

increasingly digital literacy is vital for learning itself.

It goes beyond IT skills, a complete culture change is required to live fully within the modern digital society, from understanding how to communicate ideas effectively in a range of media to managing digital reputation and history.

it's easy to overstate the digital competence of today's undergraduate students and even postgraduate researchers.

Present Tense and Future Tensions"

 The third digital divide is about education.  It is about those students who are using technology to connect and communicate with others to tackle meaningful problems and those students for whom technology still means making, saving and accessing documents.

but unless you get buy in from your whole school community then you’re going to be up against it.

it is about getting the infrastructure in place

And this does not only mean things like wireless: it includes the intellectual, pedagogical infrastructure that brings with it an understanding of both the benefits and pitfalls of bringing these devices into the classroom

But both are missing the point: the global demand for learning and scholarship is not being met by the contemporary publishing industry. It cannot be, not with the current business models and the prices. The users of library.nu - these barbarians at the gate of the publishing industry and the university - are legion.

They are a global market engaged in what we in the elite institutions of the world are otherwise telling them to do all the time: educate yourself; become scholars and thinkers; read and think for yourselves; bring civilisation, development and modernity to your people.

Library.nu was making that learning possible where publishers have not

Dive into Scamworld, home of the modern day 'get rich quick' scam that has overtaken the internet. Learn how a network of pitchmen harnessed the internet to build the ultimate pyramid scheme.