Group items tagged

"Reading and writing is a core skill that pervades all other school subjects. With the focus we see on STEM-related products, it is good to see so many emerging products with their sights on literacy too. Here are a handful of notable tools for literacy education."

Video-gaming is a common pastime among adolescents, particularly adolescent males in industrialized nations. Despite widespread suggestions that video-gaming negatively affects academic achievement, the evidence is inconclusive.

"Abstract: This paper explores how personal web technologies (PWTs) can be used by learners and the relationship between PWTs and connectivist learning principles. Descriptions and applications of several technologies including social bookmarking tools, personal publishing platforms, and aggregators are also included. With these tools, individuals can create and manage personal learning environments (PLEs) and personal learning networks (PLNs), which have the potential to become powerful resources for academic, professional, and personal development. "

Core Reading

Abstract AER 56 explores national and international policy priorities for building students' innovation capabilities through information and communication technologies (ICT) in Australian schools. Section 1 sets out the Australian policy context for digital education and highlights some of the emerging challenges. It provides an overview of two Australian school education policy priorities: that of how to meaningfully include technologies into teaching and learning; and how to build innovation capabilities in students. Section 2 critically examines the education and economic policy contexts for digital education in Australia, their intersections with international economic priorities, and the role of commercial technologies markets in schools. Section 3 discusses those Australian education policy priorities that focus on how students build both their discipline-based knowledge and general capabilities, such as creativity and innovation, using technologies. Section 4 provides some insights into how students currently use technologies for learning and communicating with each other inside and outside of school, and reflects upon what are the implications of these practices for students and policy implementation in schools. In Section 5 the discussion focuses on the physical and human characteristics required by all stakeholders to enable learning with technologies in 21st century schools. Section 6 challenges existing policy approaches to technology-use in schools, and argues for more open approaches to the deployment and use of technologies and digital resources in schools.

Section 4 of this reference is a required core reading.

Required core reading

Connectivism should not be con fused with constructivism. George Siemens advances a theory of learning that is consistent with the needs of the twenty first century. His theory takes into account trends in learning, the use of technology and networks, and the diminishing half-life of knowledge. It combines relevant elements of many learning theories, social structures, and technology to create a powerful theoretical construct for learning in the digital age.

This is the link to the week 5 reading (part 2).