Bookshare memberships are for students who are blind, have low vision, have such learning disabilities as severe dyslexia, or have a disability such as cerebral palsy that could keep them from holding a book. Such students have what are collectively called print disabilities—a distinct departure from saying “learning disabilities,” said David Rose, the chief education officer at the Center for Applied Special Technology, or CAST, in Wakefield, Mass.
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Using the phrase “print disability” said Mr. Rose, “is co-locating the problem. Print is part of the problem.” His nonprofit organization works on expanding learning opportunities for all individuals, especially those with disabilities, through a set of principles called “universal design for learning.”
“We can convey that information in a whole host of ways now. In that world, you go, ‘Print is not very good for a lot of kids,’ ” he said.
Erin Connors on 25 Sep 12Arizona State University is using data mining to collect information on their students and help guide them to the "most appropriate major". also, in class, using data collection methods, teachers collect information to be used in assessment Ex: "Ms. Galayda can monitor their progress. In her cubicle on a recent Monday, she sees the intimacies of students' study routines - or lack of them - from the last activity they worked on to how many tries they made at each end-of-lesson quiz. For one crammer, the system registers 57 attempts on multiple quizzes in seven days. Pulling back to the big picture, a chart shows 15 students falling behind (in red) and 17 on schedule (in green)."
Maria Anaya on 26 Sep 12wow this is kind of bothersome on some levels and kinda amazing on other levels. While I can see the benefit of understanding where and how a student is more likely to succeed, I think there are some potential dangers with such a system. There is the what I would imagine the psychological effect of such a program and I am thinking particularly about STEM fields where women are already way under-represented and often self conscious about their performance, do you really also need a system telling you you shouldn't be majoring in that as well cause you're not performing at that point....or what about a student who really wants to be an engineer but maybe hasn't been fully prepared with the appropriate math courses in high school, would he or she be filtered into another major? I understand using such a system as a means to target help for example if a student could get an assessment of where they currently are, where they want to go and how to get there....
