Nutty method of teacher evaluation

National Teaching Plan

In case you haven't already seen this.  While don't deny higher education needs attention, I personal wish there'd be far more attention paid to lower education and regressive education (my own term for, redressing and improving the education of all U.S. citizens).  We are in the process of destroying our country and our world.  Education as at the very heart of any solution.

Is this a bad thing? After all, we let English evolve and how can this evolution continue if we demand uniformity with the past? Personally, I'd love to see a well-informed engineering of architectural aspects of English--even the engineering of an "International English" for business that is simplified for all the world's people to learn.

I've long suspected as much. We hear so much about how women's issue need addressing (and that's true) but let's not also neglect male issues... as much as us males don't like to even think they exist.

Math anxiety is contagious.. a surprisingly lot of behaviors and beliefs tend to be..

This might be a good thing for education... Grants, money.. possibly very soon.

Granted (no pun intended), the funds are seriously not there. I bet private contributions will be substantial.

Using the right tools, anyone can create 3D computer games starting in say 30 minutes or so. Try downloading and running Alice at http://alice.org/ to see what I mean. This article discusses the use of game creation for educational purposes. I think you could greatly expand upon this to include a very broad mix of different subject matter. It requires imagination but in making games, imagination is what it's all about.

How many teachers are this enthusiastic, well-prepared, or facilitated? What principles are responsible for the inspirational power of this presentation? Should inspiration be part of education?

This is about games to improve employee work.

This is about using online games to engage employees in work. This is very much the core of what I was talking about, except for education. For those more knowledgeable about software design: my thoughts so far were on using Google's V8 Javascript engine and a 3D engine, such as Ogre3D, perhaps wrapped by QT or SDL. The worlds would be managed on the server but code for each object type shipped to the clients and run, sychronized there. Everything would be an "object"--even a world itself (a container object). Each object would comprise of four code modules plus its media files (3D models, sounds, etc.): Affector -- this receives sensory input then filters and translates that to the object's internal properties. Intrinsor -- this is the object's behavioral programming. For example, it can be the functions of an espresso machine object or the AI and/or user-interface connector of an animate object, etc. Mitigator -- this is the code that controls the internal environment of any objects contained within this object. It mitigates the effects of contained objects to the affects of others. For example, a world object, a boat, a house, or a bag. The physics, weather, and such will depend on what they are contained within. The mitigator may also initiate effects to contained objects. Effector -- this provides the API for action attempts to the Intrinsor. It then filters and translates the action attempts to the objects actual action attempts that are read by this object's containor. (Yes--I mispelled some words above intentionally) This design provides a framework for a persistent world of decent individual performance. The V8 engine compiles to fast machine code (and caches). Only very minimal data need be communicated over the network. Objects can run in parallel precisely the same, so if a client fails the system continues. Updates of virtually any kind can be made on-the-fly without stopping the game. New object types will be relatively easy to b

Not the best example but the problem, I can attest, is very real. In general from my experience, exams tend to be tailored for a superficial memorization of facts such that any comprehenisve understanding is penalized severely. My guess is that about 40% of questions, on average, are like this. I learned very much the hard way that understanding a subject better is at some point detrimental to passing an exam on it. The key is to learn what expected answers are and learning to let technical truths go. In other words, to dumb ones understanding down for the sake of passing. I have grumbled to myself about this on most exams I've even taken, short of those I truly knew little about.

In my view, our society has become suicidal in a number of ways, such as fructose in everything. I wonder if our ever poorer health contributes to psychological issues such as these..

Nothing more powerfully engages students than video games. It's just be very difficult finding ways to exploit this for educational purposes without destroying that affect in the process. My own best idea on the holy grail of a truly addictive game useful for very general and comprehensive educational purposes is an RTS game from an FPS perspective beginning the neolithic times, in a persistent world. A student would begin as a primitive man and gradually work his way toward inventing all the technologies of the modern world in building his civilization. He'd invent each tool by learning the physics and usefulness of it. Then he could add it to the village he founds to expand it. The village and eventual civilization would be, along with its annals, would be a e-portfolio (why the world needs to be persistent, not starting fresh each time the student logs on--he must always be building upon the foundations already established). The student would design the economic system, etc. and his "subjects" would follow the rules he stipulates. He could trade with the villages of others for items he might need to get ahead but cannot produce them himself until he learns the principles behind the technology. The population might be given needs also for entertainment, thus poetry, etc. for a more pacified people. Many ideas can be added within this framework. It's a student's own world in which he can feel safe and for which he should develop more interest as it continue to operation even when he is offline (to increase engagement). And being multiplayer can also provide the social aspect and teamwork for shared goals.... like say, building a trading route and defending it from bandits, investing materials for construction of a dam and irrigation... etc. I have a basic design to build the infrastructure for this. There wouldn't by chance be any grants out there that might apply?

I realized while writing this that it would be difficult to for education professionals to understand this concept. I should have known Shirey would get it. After so much experience in software, one starts to see two personality types--those who design software from a philosophical perspective and those who do so from an immediate, practical point of view. The philosophicals enjoy designing and writing new kinds of software. They are also the kind of people who tend to enjoy RTS games. The immediates struggle trying to write software from scratch, except for where they understand some pre-known framework for writing software of the particular class. They are more often relegated to debugging and tweaking software. These people tend to prefer FPS games. Systems administrators tend to fall more into this category, as well. It's a good complement, I think. I design and they maintain. Philosophicals tend not to be such good maintainers. Immediates tend to make good systems administrators, too. What this all suggests to me is that the only way non-philosophicals (the particular type I mean--don't use the term too generally) are unlikely to "get" the concept until the can see and use it. I would love to be proven wrong. I designed a framework that I think would make building it not so difficult or time consuming. But yes, building content is a chore. Therefore, the way I designed the framework is to allow run-time additions and modifications. That is, you can start simple and gradually add content over time. I think this makes sense in any case because as knowledge changes, so should educational content. Educational methods may also evolve. So I think it is very important that the mechanism for adding and editing be as easy to use as possible. This is where you want the input of non-software engineers.....even non-gamers.

iphone integrated into curriculum?

5 use cases for wave..

Comics...

Somehow, I can relate to this. My wife is often upset at me because I read interesting things and tell her all about it. Sometimes, just to be nice--she pretends to listen. Or, I read or talk to her while she sleeps. This all helps me articulate. I find my most creative works of writing when I am writing email to someone... Some people I write to a lot--pages and pages and I highly doubt they read it. But this really helps me to articulate.

Don't we start higher education with generally larger classes and work toward smaller ones? I am not sure, how much starting with smaller classes applies to higher ed.. but it's something to think differently about.

The holy grail of education, at least for software designers, remains a highly addictive game that teaches effectively, at its core.

Seems a level-headed and thoughtful look at what might make for successful social networking..