Group items tagged

There is more than just Google, students should know how to use deep web resources and more. Here's a nice listing of academic resources to share with your learning community.

This is an example of a consent form for research for a research student done at the University of Georgia. If you are a researcher, you'll want to check with your university as to the proper way to format and secure permissions, however, as students become researchers, I have questions about securing permission for research. This is an area we need to discuss and understand because students can now be viable, authentic researchers and perhaps may have links to more accurate data collection techniques than researchers. What happens when researchers partner with students to collect data? A whole new world of research is opening up, so research forms are worth collecting.

As I was reading up on inquiry based learning, I found a research paper from 1999 that has been cited almost 500 times. In this paper, you have an overview of inquiry based learning and how the use of technology is an excellent support for inquiry based learning. (They call it TSIL - technology-supported inquiry learning.) This paper talks about the potential and Opportunities. This is a PDF that I'm reading and filing in my personal research cabinet.

As I'm reading on inquiry based learning, I came across another article, I'd like to share. In this article, it discusses how inquiry-based learning projects are driven by students. This very much aligns with the questions we ask on the Flat Classroom and other projects. The one point of meaning that I'm working to understand (and finding different answers depending upon the site) is that some differentiate that students should develop the questions rather than teachers "handing them" the questions. I have a lesson plan I sent through Diigo where the instructor designed a lesson around the question "Can there be giants?" and called in inquiry based. Under this article, it may not be called true inquiry based, and yet, I'm wondering if the question is intriguing and of interest and can be used in a way to teach if it really matters where the question originates.  My class is a mix of student-created inquiries (Freshman project) and project-generated inquiries (Digiteen, Flat Classroom). Interesting. Look forward to reading and understanding more (and sharing with you.) This is another nice article on the topic. Feel free to share yours. "Inquiry-based learning" is one of many terms used to describe educational approaches that are driven more by a learner's questions than by a teacher's lessons. It is inspired by what is sometimes called a constructivist approach to education, which posits that there are many ways of constructing meaning from the building blocks of knowledge and that imparting the skills of "how to learn" is more important than any particular information being presented. Not all inquiry-based learning is constructivist, nor are all constructivist approaches inquiry-based, but the two have similarities and grow from similar philosophies.

Dr. James  Beeghley (Jim as most of us know him) has a presentation on Wednesday at K12 online about how history and social studies should be taught using technology. He talks about early photography and a lot of other very cool thoughts that will certainly challenge the thinking and teaching of history teachers.

Researchers should use Google Scholar Citations. This is like Google Analytics for your paper or article. You can create links to your work, update your profile, add links to coauthors, and then track how often your article is cited. The modern researcher should definitely set this up.

Perhaps the most powerful page in Google Scholar, you can limit your searches to certain fields of study, certain courts of law, certain years. This is a very powerful tool.

Many educational journals like this one have RSS feeds to notify you when new research comes out. If you want to keep up with research, I highly recommend you use an RSS reader. I use Google reader on my computer and Mr. Reader on my ipad (because it integrates with Diigo.)

Video interview with George Siemens about connectivism.

This is an enjoyable interview video w/ George Siemens about connectivism. I love seeing their faces, it makes it more personal

Leadership and taking criticism

Another must read motivational post for those in leadership from Doug Johnson. I love the part where he says this time of year he needs to wear iron underwear b/c everyone seems to want to take a bite out of his a*%! Criticism is so tough to deal with, especially when you feel a lone. This is something I've been taking on the chin lately at our school and sometimes it really makes me want to quit. I think it is because as connected as I am with all of these amazing educators, right now in terms of technology, I don't feel very connected with the teachers at our school, largely because my workload barely gives me time to go to the ladies room! I love this post!

Essays about teaching. Excellent for those who work with teachers.

A set of essays on the nature and nobility of teaching. You can download the text of this on this site.

Take a look at the widgets universe created by the Repositories support project -- you can see the widgets that they have and information. Some of these are particularly interesting -- I recommend taking a look if you are a researcher or grant write as some of these look like something you'll like.

More widgets - demonstrated here on netvibes.

This announcement came in recently: "The University of Northern Colorado is about to launch the Education Innovation Institute. University and government officials will detail plans on Sept. 24 for what is being billed as the "leading authority on education policy research and analysis." UNC has been a leader in the field of education since its founding in 1889 as the State Normal School." I hope that they will blog it, for if they truly want to influence educational innovation, they will share their findings and become part of this amazing grassroots network of educators. Be part of change or be irrelevant.

Nice Blog Post from Edwin Wargo about vision and leadership. I particularly like this phrase about school culture: "No matter how cool the technology tools, culture, I believe, will win the tug-of-war. There still may be a few trailblazers but systemic buy-in is likely to be minimal. I believe culture ensures the sustainability that Michael Fullan talks about."

Nice post about leadership

Jonathan Trenn writes an article on the "fallacy of community" that many of the vendors at NECC should read. Edubloggers / educators/ educational groups of people emerge because we want to. We create a community when we need to and have the passionate desire for a common purpose. However, the word community and social network was so overused at NECC this year as to become a curse word. Used by people told it was important but who may not understand it themselves. This is a great article and strikes a cord with me.

An articlea bout the fallacy of community.

Fascinating Article about how to change people's attitudes.

A classmate in our workshop has created a group for researchers who want to research web 2 -- if you want to join a group, Craig has just retired from the Navy and has a LOT of energy!

A directory that I'm going to join -- it has the goal to be a blogger of all of the edubloggers -- this is where you go to join the directory. Go here to find edubloggers.

International edublogger directory.

The International Edublogger Directory is a great project. If you are an edublogger at any level, please go to this page to add your information.

Policies from various organizations about their Open Access repository material Archiving Policies.

If your organization is working with Open Access Repositor Material -- check out this website where institutions share their policies and register your own. (from Stephen Downes.)

CDW classroom analysis reports finds that students still use technology more outside of class than in class. Only 39% of students say their high school is meeting their technology expectations. It is sad that 73% of faculty say digital content is ESSENTIAL for the 21st-century classroom but only 11% of districts are using it.