Zicherman argues that video games make kids better problem-solvers.

'DU The Math' (http://www.duthemath.com/) is an educational game and this competition touts prizes and pop stars. Interestingly, the reporter asks important questions, such as : But is competition between students the best way for educational gaming to increase its penetration into formal K-12 education? Or would game makers be better served to focus gaming on competition between the student and him or herself, especially for players who are struggling to keep pace with class and feel left behind?

The American School Counselor Association has released a guide to help school counselors make sense of the Facebook platform and its on-campus impact. In thinking about technology and EMF, we have yet to discuss cyberwellness issues. Presumably, one's engagement would be decreased if one felt unsafe.

Article and video on Singapore's new 'one-stop centre' for teachers to collaborate on projects using infocomm technology. Another way to diffuse innovations?

Describes how Singapore publishers are pushing into the e-book market for education, including the development of e-assessment apps.

This is a link to a forum discussion page where concerned Singaporean parents discuss whether or not to give monetary rewards to their children for A grades. It also features an article which interviews Prof Richard Ryan (or Ryan & Deci). Interesting to see parents grapple with this and try to come to terms with research evidence..

(Restricted access article, posted here.) The article talks about re-organizing classrooms and schedules in order to cater to the needs of the 21st century classroom.
At a time when new technology is constantly revolutionizing the way we live, what can be said about our schools? How can we accept that in 2012, school classrooms have not progressed much since an era that had no telephones or televisions, let alone computers. The truth seems inconceivable. We should be skeptical of the assumption that children can be well trained and prepared for their futures while still using the tools of yesterday.

Children nowadays are familiar with laptops, iPads, and interactive video games from an early age. Good or bad, technology is here, changing our methods of communication and thinking. Schools should not ignore this evolution. The aim here is not to get rid of books and pencils, but to make the most of technical advances in order to provide teachers with access to new, efficient, educational tools, for example, electronic whiteboards that enable teachers to engage students with interactive features.

Outside of the classroom, the Internet has begun to allow parents to keep track of their child's work. Lessons posted online not only allow students, but also their parents, to access materials, their marks, absences and late arrivals throughout the term. This is especially convenient for separated or divorced parents, and parents who work unusual hours.

Yet, despite major changes in society since the beginning of the 20th century, the furniture and classroom layout in our schools has barely changed.A study financed by a regional government in Germany in partnership with the Social Security Fund found that 48 percent of 11-14 year olds already exhibit posture problems. This comparative study, carried out from 2000 to 2004 by Dr. Breithecker, a specialist in ergonomics and head of posture and exercise of the German Ministry of Health, proves the unquestionable benefits of ergonomic workspaces in schools. While office furniture for adults, who have already developed back pain and bad posture, are invested with technology, such as special foams, fabrics, options for adjustments, why not invest well-designed furniture and workspaces for children in order to help prevent these problems developing in the first place.

Likewise a study conducted by the French government offers an alarming picture of the evolution of obesity in France. In 2009, 14 percent of the population was obese and 32 percent was overweight, compared to 8 percent who were obese and 30 percent overweight in 1997. These numbers must be met with proactive change in the way that children learn to replenish their bodies. Since the lunch break is short it is important to maximize this time so that students can refuel both their minds and bodies. Schools should provide opportunities for students to enjoy their meals, to taste the textures of food and to sample new flavors, not simply satiate hunger. As pilot programs in Europe and the United States have shown, providing fresh produce and naturally flavored foods in school canteens isn't as difficult or expensive as skeptics believe. Moreover, why not introduce simple cooking classes during the lunch break so that students can learn from an early age how to prepare healthy meals for themselves.

We should not skimp on investing in our children's health, because early investments in their lives will save money in the long run.

Meanwhile, trials are under way in both France and Germany of experimental schools that give more freedom and greater responsibility to students.

At the start of the year, students establish their own rules, including schedules, meals, and discipline. Everyday a list of activities is proposed and each student chooses his or her timetable. A student-run disciplinary committee reviews disputes and a "court" punishes students for violations to community rules. The teaching staff supervises everything. It is interesting that the students often proctor harsher punishments on themselves than the teachers would. The academic results speak for themselves, as student performance in the diplome national du brevet, are as high as or even higher than in traditional schools.

More importantly, students emerge from these schools with greater independence and self-confidence. While it's still too early to advocate the adoption of this system, it would no doubt be useful to integrate certain approaches in all schools.

But above all, today's rapidly changing world requires that schools employ technological tools to improve the overall quality of students' lives and the quality of their learning. We must feed children's natural curiosity and hunger for exploration by providing them a broader vision of the world. Therefore let us employ current technologies and adopt scientific findings to improve our schools.

The aforementioned proposals for this change will lead to more effective learning, characterized by more participation and independence in our children, who will in time become the problem-solvers of tomorrow.

(Restricted access, article posted here) Some food for thought: if kids are 'learning in snippets of time', does this mean that deep learning is being compromised?
Australian schools are getting into the business of commissioning apps for Apple iPads and other mobile devices and their uses seem limitless.



West Moreton Anglican College at Ipswich is already up to version two of its iPad app and an Android version is imminent.



It lists daily news items, student timetables, upcoming assessments, and a portal to private subscriptions such as WorldBook Online and ProQuest Online, and direct searches to the University of Queensland library.



It's part of the college's digital rollout that includes 640 iPads for year 7-12 students -- a $480,000 investment paid partly by the National Secondary Schools Computer Fund and the college itself.



Tricia O'Keeffe, the college's director of technology and information services, says parents can digitally sign student permission notes using the SignMyPad app on their child's iPad.



The college plans to further develop the app as a portal to its information system being developed with the help of IT solutions company Data 3.



Lesson plans, student worksheets, course details, parent notices and course resources are being digitised.



Soon students waiting at, say, a bus stop can access the school app to read school material or start a worksheet. It's as if Gen Z is being trained to make the best of idle minutes for short learning bursts.



``Kids are learning in snippets of time,'' says O'Keeffe, a former IT professional who once worked at Data 3.



Students at West Moreton will soon submit assignments online and when they leave, there's a plan to store a portfolio of their work in secure cloud storage, with their permission.



There's also a plan to extend the app so that teachers using iPads at home can peruse a list of their day's tasks, including any substitute lessons they have been assigned at the last moment, and a downloadable file of the lesson plan.



West Moreton is just one of a number of schools with iPhone and iPad apps.



Gold Coast-based Digistorm Education, which developed the West Moreton iPad app, says it plans to roll out another eight in the next two to four weeks, having forged a partnership with Independent Schools Queensland. It has already completed an app for Kings Christian College, also on the coast.



Digistorm business development manager Chris Lang says apps allow a school to push a notification to a parent's smartphone in about 30 seconds.



Apps are also being adapted for Android and eventually Windows 8 devices.



Digistorm, a local outfit, faces competition from global provider Blackboard Mobile, which has already been embraced by St Hilda's School on the Gold Coast, on Digistorm's home turf.



App development for schools and universities are a huge market internationally.

(Restricted access article, so I'm posting it here.) I found what was said about 'engaging online learning experiences' very insightful: "It must be a well ordered, curated experience that understands what the user aims to achieve and what the user has to do. There needs to be milestones and rewards. Secondly, it needs a social layer to get students talking about a lesson together, using tools such as Facebook and Twitter if needs be."


If you wanted to learn something new 20 years ago, you signed up for a course at an educational institution, found a teacher or visited a library or bookshop.



Today, the internet has made access to knowledge more widely available than ever before. From anywhere in the world one can learn maths at the hugely popular Khan Academy; explore cutting-edge ideas with industry leaders at technology, entertainment and design talks, or download a course from some of the world's leading universities at iTunes U, Apple's higher education knowledge platform. In short, technology has brought the world's experts into our living rooms and on to our mobile devices.



E-learning might be freed from the high production costs and lack of digital penetration that hampered its growth in the 1990s but there is still a long way to go, according to Doug Richard, founder of School for Start Ups, which offers online courses for people starting a business.



"In the past two years there has been a vast improvement in online teaching material," he says. "Minimally edited lectures from Stanford and MIT universities have proved wildly popular on YouTube, for example, and prestigious universities have realised that despite giving away their 'treasure', applications to college have not crashed.



"But there is still lots to be done. Many online courses are dire. It is easy to sign up but equally easy not to have the discipline to complete the course in the privacy of your own home."



So what are the requirements for an engaging online learning experience? "It must be a well ordered, curated experience that understands what the user aims to achieve and what the user has to do. There needs to be milestones and rewards," Richard says. "Secondly, it needs a social layer to get students talking about a lesson together, using tools such as Facebook and Twitter if needs be."



These are features that the California-based Khan Academy has mastered, offering hundreds of bite-sized lessons in maths that clearly map a student's progression and deliver graded feedback. "Khan has a gift of explaining things well," says Helen Sutcliffe, a PhD history student at the university of Leeds, who has become hooked on the website.



"I have always been an arts and humanities student, where everything's up for debate and there is no correct answer. Khan Academy gives me the certainty of a right or wrong response and the chance to learn maths as an adult."



According to Richard, there is still plenty of scope for e-learning to develop, particularly in the areas of business and personal coaching. The biggest challenge, he says, is persuading people to pay for content when they are used to accessing it for free.



That is a tricky proposition for the commercial sector given the likes of the University of Oxford, which has had more than 15 million downloads of audio and video material from its iTunes U site since its launch in October 2008, reaching a worldwide audience of 185 countries. The university now offers a growing library of free tutorial series on, among others, Shakespeare, ethics and business.



Carolyne Culver, head of strategic communications at Oxford, says: "The platform is not just for undergraduates and postgraduates; it has a whole spectrum of users, from students considering attending the university to retired people.



"For example we are encouraging more schoolteachers to get involved by offering a wide range of multimedia project material."



The site recently saw a surge in activity when it flagged up its literary and philosophy lectures about love on its Facebook page on Valentine's Day. The professors who recorded these online talks have been deluged with fan mail. Despite their newfound popularity, however, Culver insists that the university cannot replicate a "true Oxford education" online because iTunes U lacks the live physical interaction with tutors.



But at primary and secondary schools, electronic one-to-one tuition is offering new hope for children excluded from classrooms.



Nina Obraztsova, a language teaching assistant, started Periplus Education, a live online teaching platform, two years ago when she was struck by how many children with a variety of special needs were being removed from the mainstream. "The individual attention that these students receive is of paramount importance. Our main aim is to integrate them back into classroom teaching."



Obraztsova found that when the pupils were isolated they did not have the same urge to disrupt a lesson. Sophisticated software allows the children face-to-face interaction with teachers (with parental consent). Each student has a portal where they can complete assignments.



Periplus employs about 50 UK qualified teachers. Many of them enjoy the freedom of teaching from home.


"Learning online is going to play a big part in the future of education," Obraztsova says. "The way forward is a balance between inspirational, personalised teaching online, which is ideal for theory, and getting together for more practical collaborative subjects such as science."


Global study is still in its early days.

(Restricted access only to subscribers, so I'm posting the article here. This is possibly the new face of tutoring,)
When finding a local tutor to come in and help her daughter Mith with her English GCSE course proved difficult, Inpa Nesarajah arranged for an online teacher.



"Mith is in the top set at school and does well in most subjects but she was finding English hard," Nesarajah says. "I think she felt she didn't know what to write. She got a C for one assessment and asked me for help."



Progress with the online tutor was rapid. After just four or five hour-long lessons Mith, 15, had boosted her performances enough to earn an A in her next school assessment.



"Mith arranges the time for a lesson with her tutor. Then she goes online and calls the teacher using Skype," Nesarajah says. "The tutor says that if she ever has a problem she should send an e-mail. Her improvement has been very fast and we will keep on with the tutor so long as my daughter thinks it is useful."



Online tutoring for GCSE and A level examinations is a growing area, although agencies offering both faceto-face and online tutoring say that the distance learning option is still second choice for most parents, who prefer personal contact.



There are, however, advantages to the online route. It tends to be cheaper and no time is wasted in travelling to the tutor's home or, alternatively, the parent does not have to pay the tutor for expenses and time spent travelling to the child's home.



Mylene Curtis, managing director of Fleet Tutors, established as a home tutoring service 35 years ago, says that online is now the fastest growing sector. "In London, online tutoring costs from £32 an hour compared with £43 for face-to-face teaching. The big advantage of online contact is that it accelerates learning. An assignment can be marked and returned within a day, or queries dealt with by e-mail. With face-to-face tutoring using paper, it can take two weeks to get feedback.



"The best system is probably a mix of online and face-to-face. Online is fluid and flexible. An e-mail sent to fix up a five-minute chat can help the child to sort out a problem quickly."



Most online tutoring services promise that tutors are graduates in the subjects they teach, although some also use undergraduates.



Luke Redding, head of Home Tutoring Online, says: "GCSE tuition is often used to help teenagers who are living abroad, but planning to return to the UK for university."



Tracey Cosgrove, who is currently living abroad, used the firm to help her son with his maths A level. "Our son told us he was having problems with the speed at which maths was being taught at his international school," she says. "The tutoring meant he could learn at his own pace with confidence, and we were able to employ a native English speaker who understood what was required in the A level, something which would have been difficult to achieve locally."



Internet learning is often used by British teenagers who live abroad but plan to go to university in the UK.

A valiant effort to make the best use of a 'bare bones' classroom.

Emotion-sensing computer software that responds to students' cognitive and emotional states, including frustration and boredom. This tool seems to address all the issues we've been talking about in T545! Could this be the tool that replaces teachers?!

Scientists recorded readers' eye movements when they were reading to monitor when they were 'spacing' out. Perhaps this could be used as a diagnostic tool for teachers?

Access to the site is by subscription only, so I am including the article below:
Social networking has created an underclass of prospective employees who lack basic skills needed to join the workforce, the head of Britain's largest recruitment company has warned.



Peter Searle, 49, Adecco's UK chief executive, said that employers were struggling to fill vacancies because school leavers were unable to work in a team, turn up on time or communicate with colleagues. The education system was failing to equip people with the skills that businesses want, he said.



"We have instances in offices where people would rather sit at their desk and send e-mails to each other [sitting] next door than walk around and have a conversation," he said in an interview with The Times.



"They have no respect for their manager. They don't ask them for advice because it isn't their social background to do that. All the things that we think of as normal, they aren't prepared for."



He says that heavy use of Twitter and Facebook could be isolating because relationships with others were all through a machine.


"They only know how to interact with short 'text speak' to save themselves time, so they start using text speak in conversations," he said. As a result, some businesses have had to send new employees on training courses to "de-text" their speech.


"They come out of school and want to get a job, but the people who are interviewing them are saying [their] personal social skills [and their] technical abilities are not suited to the way things work in industry."



For the past year, Adecco has been running Unlocking Britain's Potential, a project that seeks to identify ways of creating a more skilled workforce, which Mr Searle believes is crucial for the UK's long-term economic growth.



In a report, the project argues that businesses must foster closer links with schools to address unemployment, which has reached a near-record 22 per cent among those aged 16 to 24.



"We have a generation of people who are sitting at home who are fundamentally bored [and] who need something to motivate them," Mr Searle said.



He floated the idea of more teachers being seconded to businesses and for an "employment experience" programme to be developed to give pupils a taste of what to expect from their working lives. The recession had thrown the skills gap between what the education system is providing, and what businesses want, into sharp focus, he said.

"The market has changed fundamentally," he said. "Previously, there was still a need to take people because the demand was so high, so our clients - businesses - were absorbing people who might have been of lower skill and then spending the money to fill those people in.



"Now the market is saying: 'Actually, I need you to be running tomorrow because I'm going to go bust otherwise.' There are no large environments, even [in] engineering, where you can just hang up your brain as you go inside and go through the day and get paid for it."



Adecco and other recruitment firms have a responsibility to help the workforce adapt to the needs of the UK economy, he said. "We can't just be a company which puts people into jobs; we have to be a company that actually plays a part in changing the labour environment."

Access to the site is by subscription only, so I am including the article here:
A solar-powered iPad described as a "school in a box" has been developed by the Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology (IADT) to help teachers use digital technology to educate the poor in sub-Saharan Africa, writes Gabrielle Monaghan.


The iPad 2 is pre-loaded with a school curriculum, a projector and speakers, packaged into a box that looks like a carry-on suitcase.

The solar panels will power the portable education tool in classrooms where there is no electricity. The college says up to 90% of rural schools in parts of Africa have no power.

The first shipment of the "school in a box" left for Africa last week. The Cape Peninsula University of Technology bought 15 of the iPads for three schools in rural South Africa. It will work with the IADT to train teachers in how to use the equipment.

Access to the site is by subscription, so I am including the article here:
T'S a sad day for doodlers. The dog-eared textbook is on its final chapter in Ireland as schools switch to ebooks. More than 50 schools have made the digital switchover, with students reading their course work on Apple iPads and other tablet devices.



The Educational Company of Ireland (Edco), one of the market leaders, has sold digital textbooks to 30 schools nationwide. It expects to agree deals with more than 100 by September, according to Julie Glennon, the publisher's sales and marketing manager.



The 100-year-old Dublinbased publisher has converted 80 of its textbooks for secondary schools into ebooks, costing an average of 35% less than regular books if schools buy them in bulk. If the text needs to be changed, the publisher sends out updates to students' tablets.



Gill & Macmillan, one of Edco's main rivals, has sold digital textbooks to about 20 schools, including 13 Vocational Education Committees in Co Galway that bought netbooks for their 1,000 students. It now has 60 titles in digital flipbook form, according to Dermot O'Dwyer, the firm's chief executive. In this format, students can rent textbooks for €8 a year instead of €25 for the traditional equivalent.



The educational digital market is expected to rise to 5% of all textbooks worldwide this year.

O'Dwyer attributed Irish growth to iPads and other devices becoming a bigger part of the high-technology arsenal of schools that introduced interactive whiteboards last year.
"The secondary schools were given grants last year to install a whiteboard and screen, so that has accelerated demand," O'Dwyer said. "Now that they have the whiteboards, schools want to use them, so publishers are making a big push to sell digital content."
Two of the schools have switched over to digital learning in the past month. Ballinode community college in Sligo will be providing iPads to its first-years in September, as will Colaiste Treasa in Kanturk, Co Cork.
First-years at St Kevin's College in Crumlin have been using iPads since last September, with the help of a grant from the Department of Education. Blake Hodkinson, the Dublin school's principal, estimates St Kevin's is saving 40% a year on books as a result. Parents pay the school €150 a year to rent ebooks and an iPad for their children.
"There are now between 40,000 and 50,000 educational apps," he said. "I'm a geography teacher, so I might use an app to chart the volcanoes around the world for the students. They light up as red dots around the globe. When the earthquake in Japan happened last year, I could show students the strength of the faultlines."
Hodkinson expects his teachers will soon be writing their own interactive digital textbooks, thanks to a new iBook platform. This enables teachers to store any Power-Point presentation, pictures and sounds into a file and pass the result on to students. The only downside Hodkinson has encountered is the cost of repairing broken iPad screens.
Joshua Magee, a 13-year-old student at St Kevin's, is nonchalant about swapping textbooks for the iPad. In his free time, he browses the iPad for free games apps.
"It's the exact same as using books at school, but you don't have to carry them around all the time," he said. "But they do break. The cover of mine is cracked already."

In South Korea and some parts of California, handheld devices have completely replaced printed textbooks. Some educationalists remain sceptical that Ireland can match such growth because of poor broadband connections for rural schools, a lack of government strategy on which devices schools should use, and funding cutbacks. Some schools, such as St Colman's College in Co Mayo, have agreements with local credit unions and Apple to enable parents to get cheaper loans for iPads.
Jackie O'Callaghan, spokeswoman for the National Parents Council Post-Primary, said that the development of digital learning will be unequal in Ireland because of patchy broadband coverage.
"The department has made huge strides in getting broadband into schools, but there are still so many pockets of blackspots," she said. "Before publishers go down the road of an ebook war, we have to get broadband sorted first."
Gareth Cuddy, chief executive of ePub Direct, a new Corkbased company that converts books into digital form, said the government had "no real appetite" to encourage the spread of digital textbooks.
"South Korea spent a couple of billion on e-textbooks and in the United States all school textbooks must be available in digital format," he said.
Cuddy believes Irish libraries need to take a leaf out of their American counterparts' book and increase lending of digital textbooks to schools.

A school district in Maine is researching the use of ipads for early childhood literacy. The report is couched very positively,

This blog was named the best educational wiki of 2011 by Wikispaces. It's a little crowded, but full of interesting links.. For example, the link to http://www.neave.com/bounce/ is a screen full of colourful balls and if the students make noise , the balls bounce (it's meant to be a classroom management too, but could also radically backfire..)

A UK experiment - contrived, but might produce some epiphanies?

What we discussed in class today. The experiment in New York schools.