proprietary online platform developed to apply pedagogical practices that have been studied and vetted by one of the world’s foremost psychologists, a former Harvard dean named Stephen M. Kosslyn, who joined Minerva in 2012.
Group items matching
in title, tags, annotations or url
1More
48More
The Future of College? - The Atlantic - 29 views
-
Minerva class extended no refuge for the timid, nor privilege for the garrulous. Within seconds, every student had to provide an answer, and Bonabeau displayed our choices so that we could be called upon to defend them.
- ...45 more annotations...
-
subjecting us to pop quizzes, cold calls, and pedagogical tactics that during an in-the-flesh seminar would have taken precious minutes of class time to arrange.
-
felt decidedly unlike a normal classroom. For one thing, it was exhausting: a continuous period of forced engagement, with no relief in the form of time when my attention could flag
-
One educational psychologist, Ludy Benjamin, likens lectures to Velveeta cheese—something lots of people consume but no one considers either delicious or nourishing.)
-
adically remake one of the most sclerotic sectors of the U.S. economy, one so shielded from the need for improvement that its biggest innovation in the past 30 years has been to double its costs and hire more administrators at higher salaries.
-
Lectures, Kosslyn says, are cost-effective but pedagogically unsound. “A great way to teach, but a terrible way to learn.”
-
Minerva boast is that it will strip the university experience down to the aspects that are shown to contribute directly to student learning. Lectures, gone. Tenure, gone. Gothic architecture, football, ivy crawling up the walls—gone, gone, gone.
-
“Your cash cow is the lecture, and the lecture is over,” he told a gathering of deans. “The lecture model ... will be obliterated.”
-
One imagines tumbleweeds rolling through abandoned quads and wrecking balls smashing through the windows of classrooms left empty by students who have plugged into new online platforms.
-
Liberal-arts education is about developing the intellectual capacity of the individual, and learning to be a productive member of society. And you cannot do that without a curriculum.”
-
“The freshman year [as taught at traditional schools] should not exist,” Nelson says, suggesting that MOOCs can teach the basics. “Do your freshman year at home.”) Instead, Minerva’s first-year classes are designed to inculcate what Nelson calls “habits of mind” and “foundational concepts,” which are the basis for all sound systematic thought. In a science class, for example, students should develop a deep understanding of the need for controlled experiments. In a humanities class, they need to learn the classical techniques of rhetoric and develop basic persuasive skills. The curriculum then builds from that foundation.
-
Subsidies, Nelson says, encourage universities to enroll even students who aren’t likely to thrive, and to raise tuition, since federal money is pegged to costs.
-
We have numerous sound, reproducible experiments that tell us how people learn, and what teachers can do to improve learning.” Some of the studies are ancient, by the standards of scientific research—and yet their lessons are almost wholly ignored.
-
ask a student to explain a concept she has been studying, the very act of articulating it seems to lodge it in her memory. Forcing students to guess the answer to a problem, and to discuss their answers in small groups, seems to make them understand the problem better—even if they guess wrong.
-
e traditional concept of “cognitive styles”—visual versus aural learners, those who learn by doing versus those who learn by studying—is muddled and wrong.
-
pedagogical best practices Kosslyn has identified have been programmed into the Minerva platform so that they are easy for professors to apply. They are not only easy, in fact, but also compulsory, and professors will be trained intensively in how to use the platform.
-
a pop quiz at the beginning of a class and (if the students are warned in advance) another one at a random moment later in the class greatly increases the durability of what is learned.
-
he could have alerted colleagues to best practices, but they most likely would have ignored them. “The classroom time is theirs, and it is sacrosanct,
-
Minerva’s model, Nelson says, will flourish in part because it will exploit free online content, rather than trying to compete with it, as traditional universities do.
-
certain functions of universities have simply become less relevant as information has become more ubiquitous
-
MOOCs will continue to get better, until eventually no one will pay Duke or Johns Hopkins for the possibility of a good lecture, when Coursera offers a reliably great one, with hundreds of thousands of five-star ratings, for free.
-
It took deep concentration,” he said. “It’s not some lecture class where you can just click ‘record’ on your tape.”
-
part of the process of education happens not just through good pedagogy but by having students in places where they see the scholars working and plying their trades.”
-
“hydraulic metaphor” of education—the idea that the main task of education is to increase the flow of knowledge into the student—an “old fallacy.”
-
I remembered what I was like as a teenager headed off to college, so ignorant of what college was and what it could be, and so reliant on the college itself to provide what I’d need in order to get a good education.
-
it is designed to convey not just information, as most MOOCs seem to, but whole mental tool kits that help students become morethoughtful citizens.
-
for all the high-minded talk of liberal education— of lighting fires and raising thoughtful citizens—is really just a credential, or an entry point to an old-boys network that gets you your first job and your first lunch with the machers at your alumni club.
-
Its seminar platform will challenge professors to stop thinking they’re using technology just because they lecture with PowerPoint.
-
professors and students increasingly separated geographically, mediated through technology that alters the nature of the student-teacher relationship
-
The idea that college will in two decades look exactly as it does today increasingly sounds like the forlorn, fingers-crossed hope of a higher-education dinosaur that retirement comes before extinction.
1More
Crumbles - 90 views
-
Lifehacker: Sure, you can record a video or send email to say what's on your mind. That's boring. A new web site lets cartoon and movie characters speak on your behalf. The site takes clips from TV and movies and creates a short video with a different clip for each word. If they don't have a clip for the word you pick, Crumbles uses a computerized voice. It's a little silly, but pretty fun. . .
1More
The Reading & Writing Project - 6 views
-
Visit any school affiliated with the TCRWP and you'll immediately see why the organization is a success. Pull your chair alongside and listen to the children's memoirs and essays, lean-in and listen to their literature circles and read aloud conversations and you'll glimpse why this work has captured the hearts and minds of thousands of educators the world over.
39More
Role and Function of Theory in Online Education Development and Delivery - 3 views
-
According to Bonk and Reynolds (1997), to promote higher-order thinking on the Web, online learning must create challenging activities that enable learners to link new information to old, acquire meaningful knowledge, and use their metacognitive abilities; hence, it is the instructional strategy and not the technology tha
-
According to Bonk and Reynolds (1997), to promote higher-order thinking on the Web, online learning must create challenging activities that enable learners to link new information to old, acquire meaningful knowledge, and use their metacognitive abilities; hence, it is the instructional strategy and not the technology that influences the quality of learning.
-
However, it is not the computer per se that makes students learn, but the design of the real-life models and simulations, and the students' interaction with those models and simulations. The computer is merely the vehicle that provides the processing capability and delivers the instruction to learners (Clark, 2001).
- ...35 more annotations...
-
Online learning allows for flexibility of access, from anywhere and usually at anytime—essentially, it allows participants to collapse time and space (Cole, 2000)—however, the learning materials must be designed properly to engage the learner and promote learning.
-
Cognitive psychology claims that learning involves the use of memory, motivation, and thinking, and that reflection plays an important part in learning.
-
The development of effective online learning materials should be based on proven and sound learning theories.
-
Early computer learning systems were designed based on a behaviorist approach to learning. The behaviorist school of thought, influenced by Thorndike (1913), Pavlov (1927), and Skinner (1974), postulates that learning is a change in observable behavior caused by external stimuli in the environment (Skinner, 1974).
-
Therefore, before any learning materials are developed, educators must, tacitly or explicitly, know the principles of learning and how students learn.
-
Constructivist theorists claim that learners interpret information and the world according to their personal reality, and that they learn by observation, processing, and interpretation, and then personalize the information into personal knowledge (Cooper, 1993; Wilson, 1997).
-
The design of online learning materials can include principles from all three. According to Ertmer and Newby (1993), the three schools of thought can in fact be used as a taxonomy for learning. Behaviorists' strategies can be used to teach the “what” (facts), cognitive strategies can be used to teach the “how” (processes and principles), and constructivist strategies can be used to teach the “why” (higher level thinking that promotes personal meaning and situated and contextual learning).
-
The behaviorist school sees the mind as a “black box,” in the sense that a response to a stimulus can be observed quantitatively, totally ignoring the effect of thought processes occurring in the mind.
-
Learners should be told the explicit outcomes of the learning so that they can set expectations and can judge for themselves whether or not they have achieved the outcome of the online lesson. 2. Learners must be tested to determine whether or not they have achieved the learning outcome. Online testing or other forms of testing and assessment should be integrated into the learning sequence to check the learner's achievement level and to provide appropriate feedback. 3. Learning materials must be sequenced appropriately to promote learning. The sequencing could take the form of simple to complex, known to unknown, and knowledge to application. 4. Learners must be provided with feedback so that they can monitor how they are doing and take corrective action if required.
-
Cognitivists see learning as an internal process that involves memory, thinking, reflection, abstraction, motivation, and meta-cognition.
-
Online instruction must use strategies to allow learners to attend to the learning materials so that they can be transferred from the senses to the sensory store and then to working memory.
-
Online learning strategies must present the materials and use strategies to enable students to process the materials efficiently.
-
Use advance organizers to activate an existing cognitive structure or to provide the information to incorporate the details of the lesson (Ausubel, 1960).
-
Use pre-instructional questions to set expectations and to activate the learners' existing knowledge structure.
-
Use prerequisite test questions to activate the prerequisite knowledge structure required for learning the new materials.
-
To facilitate deep processing, learners should be asked to generate the information maps during the learning process or as a summary activity after the lesson (Bonk & Reynolds, 1997).
-
The cognitive school recognizes the importance of individual differences, and of including a variety of learning strategies in online instruction to accommodate those differences
-
The Kolb Learning Style Inventory (LSI) (Kolb, 1984) looks at how learners perceive and process information, whereas the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (Myers, 1978) uses dichotomous scales to measure extroversion versus introversion, sensing versus intuition, thinking versus feeling, and judging versus perception. In the following discussion, we consider the Kolb Learning Style Inventory.
-
Attention: Capture the learners' attention at the start of the lesson and maintain it throughout the lesson. The online learning materials must include an activity at the start of the learning session to connect with the learners. Relevance: Inform learners of the importance of the lesson and how taking the lesson could benefit them. Strategies could include describing how learners will benefit from taking the lesson, and how they can use what they learn in real-life situations. This strategy helps to contextualize the learning and make it more meaningful, thereby maintaining interest throughout the learning session. Confidence: Use strategies such as designing for success and informing learners of the lesson expectations. Design for success by sequencing from simple to complex, or known to unknown, and use a competency-based approach where learners are given the opportunity to use different strategies to complete the lesson. Inform learners of the lesson outcome and provide ongoing encouragement to complete the lesson. Satisfaction: Provide feedback on performance and allow learners to apply what they learn in real-life situations. Learners like to know how they are doing, and they like to contextualize what they are learning by applying the information in real life.
-
Online strategies that facilitate the transfer of learning should be used to encourage application in different and real-life situations.
-
it is the individual learner's interpretation and processing of what is received through the senses that creates knowledge.
-
“the process of using a prior interpretation to construe a new or revised interpretation of the meaning of one's experience in order to guide future action” (p. 12).
-
Learning should be an active process. Keeping learners active doing meaningful activities results in high-level processing, which facilitates the creation of personalized meaning. Asking learners to apply the information in a practical situation is an active process, and facilitates personal interpretation and relevance.
-
Collaborative and cooperative learning should be encouraged to facilitate constructivist learning (H
-
When assigning learners for group work, membership should be based on the expertise level and learning style of individual group members, so that individual team members can benefit from one another's strengths.
-
Learning should be made meaningful for learners. The learning materials should include examples that relate to students, so that they can make sense of the information.
-
Learning should be interactive to promote higher-level learning and social presence, and to help develop personal meaning. According to Heinich et al. (2002), learning is the development of new knowledge, skills, and attitudes as the learner interacts with information and the environment. Interaction is also critical to creating a sense of presence and a sense of community for online learners, and to promoting transformational learning (Murphy & Cifuentes, 2001). Learners receive the learning materials through the technology, process the information, and then personalize and contextualize the information.
-
Behaviorist strategies can be used to teach the facts (what); cognitivist strategies to teach the principles and processes (how); and constructivist strategies to teach the real-life and personal applications and contextual learning. There is a shift toward constructive learning, in which learners are given the opportunity to construct their own meaning from the information presented during the online sessions. The use of learning objects to promote flexibility and reuse of online materials to meet the needs of individual learners will become more common in the future. Online learning materials will be designed in small coherent segments, so that they can be redesigned for different learners and different contexts. Finally, online learning will be increasingly diverse to respond to different learning cultures, styles, and motivations.
-
Online instruction occurs when learners use the Web to go through the sequence of instruction, to complete the learning activities, and to achieve learning outcomes and objectives (Ally, 2002; Ritchie & Hoffman, 1997).
"Is Social Media A Fad?" New Video With Mind Blowing Stats | MakeUseOf.com - 97 views
1More
How facts backfire - The Boston Globe - 15 views
-
Recently, a few political scientists have begun to discover a human tendency deeply discouraging to anyone with faith in the power of information. It’s this: Facts don’t necessarily have the power to change our minds. In fact, quite the opposite. In a series of studies in 2005 and 2006, researchers at the University of Michigan found that when misinformed people, particularly political partisans, were exposed to corrected facts in news stories, they rarely changed their minds. In fact, they often became even more strongly set in their beliefs. Facts, they found, were not curing misinformation. Like an underpowered antibiotic, facts could actually make misinformation even stronger.
Langwitches Blog » Wrapping my Mind Around Digital Portfolios - 49 views
1More
NJ history goes digital for high school students - Daily Targum - University - 46 views
1More
Six ways that artists hack your brain - New Scientist - 73 views
-
Since humankind first put brush to canvas, artists have played with the mind and the senses to create sublime atmospheres and odd impressions. It is only recently, with a blossoming understanding of the way the brain deconstructs images, that neuroscientists and psychologists have finally begun to understand how these tricks work.
14More
shared by Steve Ransom on 13 Oct 10
- No Cached
Digital Age Damaging Learning | Nicholas Carr - 72 views
www.smh.com.au/...-something-20101012-16hhd.html
learning dumb google computer criticalthinking faustianbargain
![](/images/link.gif)
-
excessive use of the internet and other forms of technology diminishes our capacity for deep, meditative thinking, "the brighter the software, the dimmer the user", a counter-revolution may be required.
-
curricula must be developed not only with the potential benefits of technology linked to every learning outcome in mind, but also the costs.
-
available where there is clear utility, to remove it when there is not
- ...5 more annotations...
-
we must be mindful of any cost associated with allowing ourselves to devolve to a more machine-like state.
-
Of greatest importance, however, is the status of our thinking, understanding how we think and the effect new technologies have on our cognitive processes. This debate extends beyond the neuroscience to questions relating to what is worth knowing and what mental functions are worth preserving at their present level of development
-
As a senior high school teacher, one of my greatest bugbears is the reluctance of students to reflect on the information they have collected and plan their essays. Rather, some expect to Google their entire essay, often skipping from one hyperlink to the next until they find something that appears to be relevant, then pasting it into their essay, frequently oblivious to academic honesty and coherence of argument. The ability to discern reliability of sources is also severely lacking
-
A primary role of educators is to foster qualities that are distinctly human: our ability to reflect, reason and imagine
-
In the curricula of tomorrow this may entail identifying topics and tasks that begin with an instruction to turn all electronic devices off.
-
No- it should begin with teachers establishing and negotiating meaningful, interesting, and powerful learning opportunities with access to all available tools. The computer as a learning tool is meant to extend physical human capabilities, not weaken them. It is the low-level, rote tasks that we require that weaken them. It's time to recognize this and wake up. Blaming the technology does little more than preserve the status quo.
-
"A Whole New Mind" book study- DSEP 7831 - 39 views
Half an Hour: An Operating System for the Mind - 0 views
3More
Information-rich and attention-poor - 0 views
-
With almost all of the world's codified knowledge at your fingertips, why should you spend increasingly scarce attention loading up your own mind just in case you may some day need this particular fact or concept? Far better, one might argue, to access efficiently what you need, when you need it. This depends, of course, on building up a sufficient internalized structure of concepts to be able to link with the online store of knowledge. How to teach this is perhaps the greatest challenge and opportunity facing educators in the 21st century.
-
Those of us who are still skeptical might recall that Plato, in the Phaedrus, suggested that writing would “create forgetfulness in the minds of those who learn to use it.”
1More
ASCD Conference Keynote: Sir Ken Robinson on Vimeo - 0 views
8More
shared by Ed Webb on 27 Jul 09
- Cached
How to Wake Up Slumbering Minds - WSJ.com - 2 views
online.wsj.com/...SB124079001063757515.html
bestpractices review cognition styles learning education
![](/images/link.gif)
-
what school requires students to do -- think abstractly -- is in fact not something our brains are designed to be good at or to enjoy
-
it is critical that the task be just difficult enough to hold our interest but not so difficult that we give up in frustration. When this balance is struck, it is actually pleasurable to focus the mind for long periods of time
-
Students are ready to understand knowledge but not create it. For most, that is enough. Attempting a great leap forward is likely to fail.
- ...4 more annotations...
-
students cannot apply generic "critical thinking skills" (another voguish concept) to new material unless they first understand that material
-
Trying to use "reading strategies" -- like searching for the main idea in a passage -- will be futile if you don't know enough facts to fill in what the author has left unsaid.
-
what is being taught in most of the curriculum -- at all levels of schooling -- is information about meaning, and meaning is independent of form
-
At some point, no amount of dancing will help you learn more algebra