Group items tagged

LitReactor is a new web site offering writing classes, workshops and social networking, but only a small portion of it's content is free. 

Connected to a few class discussions (including one in HT 500 about multitasking)... *potential for greater/more diversity in discussion/participation than in person *what do we mean when we say "multi-task"? *weighty topics/140 characters Somebody's got to create something worth tweeting

Yesterday afternoon, some of us were at a talk by Prof. Alex Pentland I found several of the topics tie back to our class discussion. In particular, his thoughts that only the individual should have ownership over personal data and others may seek permission to access it was, I felt appropriate. Of course for young students it appears more complicated. I am considering reading his papers ( at least the non technical parts :) His ideas can impact learning in the class room too ! Please share your thoughts !

Per our discussion in class about crowdsourcing, here is an article about the work of MIT Media Lab Director Joi Ito using crowdsourcing to create maps of radiation after the disaster in Fukushima in Japan

Ok... maybe the tie in to education is not immediately obvious. Mostly, I just think this is so cool that I had to post it. But think for a moment about carpool, soccer practice, and sports as a starter. No longer does a kid's participation in extracurricular activities require them to get a ride from mom. Go a little further... field trips, classes that are only offered at the charter school across town, on-site science explorations. How many more kids could venture out of their neighborhood for educational opportunities? There was a time 20 years ago I never would have believed that elementary school children would be carrying their own phone, but now will they all get their own car in 2nd grade??

A complete list of free online courses offered by Stanford, Coursera, MIT and Harvard led edX (MITx + Harvardx + BerkeleyX), and Udacity

I've heard of 3D printers before. I thought it would be interesting to try out in schools. For example, if students were designing towns to learn volume and surface area. This could help with spatial learning, which is essential to understanding math. I don't know how feasible this it though...

Hi Irina, Yes! Nothing like seeing your ideas take a concrete shape. Looks like the cost of these printers is comparable to that of SmartBoards, so it may be feasible to try them out in classrooms pretty soon. That said, unless the projects are well integrated into the curriculum, they will end up as another fancy toy.

Harvey and I had a conversation about these last week - Harvey spoke of the way that these printers could open up opportunities for those who can visualize their creations in their heads, but have trouble putting those ideas in tangible form. We spoke of the potential in art and design.

A history class created Facebook Timelines for Magellan's voyage, fashion 1950-present, and 20th century inventions.

Excellent talks

What 100 Experts Think About The Future Of Learning

As Mary Jo said in class today, the lack of collaboration between teachers and developers is a hugely frustrating. The Shared Learning Collaborative is an organization that tries to bring the groups together for "camps" that tap the skills of both around big problems in education. This weekend, there's a Codeathon/Tagathon in Cambridge aimed at increasing the volume of properly meta-tagged content in the Learning Registry. Could be interesting to check out.

This conference addresses a very real gap - I really hope that more opportunities like this one bring people together that share the common goal, but are coming at it from such different perspectives. Thanks, Hannah!

related to our discussion in class about international edtech trends

This speaks to the issues we have discussed in class about people who have naive ideas about protecting children from digital threats

The University of Texas system just decided to join the edX movement, with a $5 million dollar contribution. Gov. Rick Perry is trying to cap costs for a college education in Texas, so he approves of the measure...UT also seems closer than other schools to allowing students to get actual credit for the courses, as the article mentions they are considering tiered payments for classes.

STEM search engine that prevents the fear of math - related to failure/motivation research for those of us in Dock's class 

I think it's curious that you're having universities like Antioch and others that are including MOOC courses as for credit options without any kind of evaluation or data on the actual efficacy of MOOCs, let alone specific classes.

My understanding of the pilot program is that students will still have faculty-led components, though, so it's not purely MOOC. It's more like a blended-learning environment that uses the MOOC as the digital part. So the students will have Antioch exams and homework sets, discussions, etc. If they are satisfied with the efficacy after the pilot, then they will expand the model.

MOOCs ongoing push to college credit

Berklee College of Music, often ahead of the curve in utilizing technology in music education is on board to offer four MOOC's through Coursera.

Good read to get a pulse on an online course at Coursera. Students registered online 11,800; students registered in in-person class 20. Only three weeks into the course and student feedback has been very positive.

For the business-type folks in the class, McGraw-Hill just sold its Education division to a private equity company. They think that education will continue to be a good investment.

Yeah, I thought it was weird. I looked into that--I think the sale is to a different "Apollo" group. UPhoenix is something like "Apollo Group" whereas McGraw Hill sold their division to "Apollo Global Management". I think they are different entities, but it is hard to tell. If they are the same organization, it is definitely a weird sign of shifting investments.

Cole, you're absolutely right, I missed that Apollo Global Mgmt is a VC firm.