Group items tagged

using video games to teach cellular biology and molecular science to high school students

Description of NASA-funded programs aimed at enhancing STEM education

"This article examines the ongoing efforts to integrate computer video games in existing traditional CS courses."

"What would digitized classrooms look like, and how could technology improve pupil engagement and mastery of concepts? How might educators scale up successful pilot projects? On October 6, the Center for Technology Innovation at Brookings will host a forum on education technology and its potential to transform the modern American classroom." Looks like it could be a pretty good conversation for students like us to participate in!

This link is taken from a blog about technology in education. From the video, it definitely appears to me that the children are engaged in their work. I have heard of the company valve and their physics game portal. If any of you have personal experience in this domain , please share.

Saw this over the summer and thought it raised some good questions about IEP initiatives, a child's ability to learn technical frameworks without explicit instruction, community engagement, technological innovation in impoverished areas, etc.

Speaking at LIFT 2007, Sugata Mitra talks about his Hole in the Wall project. Young kids in this project figured out how to use a PC on their own -- and then taught other kids. He asks, what else can children teach themselves? Sugata Mitra's "Hole in the Wall" experiments have shown that, in the absence of supervision or formal teaching, children can teach themselves and each other, if they're motivated by curiosity and peer interest.

I thought this was a great video when I watched it. Very interesting experiment. It reminded me of how I know people who learned other languages through their love of music--they just memorized song lyrics and practiced until they figured out the language!

One teacher claims that "The idea is to invert the normal rhythms of school, so that lectures are viewed on the kids' own time and homework is done at school." - Do you agree that this is a good solution? 

I too am intrigued by this "inverting" of time spent in the classroom and at home. My idealized model would be to introduce learners to new material at their own pace out of the classroom (allowing for pausing, note taking, reflecting and/or rewinding) and focus classroom time on face to face guiding and coaching of clusters of students or individual students engaged in applying or exploring the current material. To help facilitate this (and assist with accountability) some brief form of pre-assessment before class or at the start of class could illuminate for student and teacher alike what material has been mastered and what needs more attention. The research report from the TIE Foundations summer reading appears to support this type of hybrid approach. => Marsha Lovett, Oded Meyer, and Candace Thille (2008). The Open Learning Initiative: Measuring the effectiveness of the OLI statistics course in accelerating student learning.

An added benefit of tools such as Khan Academy is the option for reinforcement. In a traditional K-12 school environment students do not have the option to watch a video of their class or spend personalized time reviewing a concept they need more time with during class time due to the required pace of school curriculum. An online learning tool allows a student to watch a lesson as many times as needed and to learn from an expert. Often if a student needs help outside the classroom the only people they turn to is parents, who may or may not know about the content themselves.

Giving all students in a school district iPads could have some really positive results. Having all textbooks combined on a tablet has the potential not just to aid in convenience, but can also allow for students to access more up to date texts. I think that there is also a lot to be said for the potential of an iPad to help engage students in the classroom.

While in theory, the "allow for students to access more up to date texts" is a fantastic purpose for putting content on line and not burning it to a CD or printing the pages, it is the text book adoption laws in each state that publishers battle with every cycle, many of which won't allow for updates or changes to the one they purchase for the length of the adoption.

Here's a little media literacy for our emerging technologies.

A very interesting way to engage individuals on a personal level via video. It startled me the first time around (see :56). I wonder how quickly the novelty of providing subtle dynamic elements to video would wear off, but if done properly, might have a place in a nonformal educational setting for children ... a new type of personalized learning experience. Ah, and I may have altered the web link a bit to make it a bit more appropriate for our class :)

See a need, build something to meet the need, and go from there... StudyBoost is the result of a brother watching his brother and friend try to study for the GMAT without carrying around the book. Born: an IM client that allows for collaboration on questions and answers applicable to the test by both students and teachers - wherever and whenever. For Wiske's class - wouldn't this fit nicely into the CoI and PI models? If so, why wouldn't school embrace this use instead of worrying about inappropriate use of phones in class? Make the lesson or assignment engaging enough - generative enough - to hook and sustain appropriate interaction on the device that 93% of children have ACCESS to? Sounds like a win-win?

For those of you in Professor Wiske's class, this makes our course work all the more relevant. For the purposes of this class, what technologies are effective in providing the tools for teachers and students to engage in quality online education? Certainly a question that, based on these numbers, is only going to grow more complex with time...

Excellent article on Video game model as a learning tool. Useful takeaways for motivation.

Published Online: October 17, 2011 Published in Print: October 19, 2011, as Crafting Your BYOT Policy For the small but passionate minority of school districts that are opening doors to student-owned mobile devices, there's a lot riding on how effective the policy shift turns out to be in improving teaching and learning. I will be looking strongly at this experiment to assist with the charter school district I am putting together.

I can understand a districts hesitance towards the BYOT because of its responsibility for and inability to control the accessing of inappropriate content on such devices. What I would like to see - even if in baby steps (which I know is occurring in small scale all over the country), is the creation and sharing of engaging lessons that encourage this BYOT movement and combat the urge for students to be inappropriate because of the level of motivation the lesson itself provides. And I would also like to see some of the responsibility shift from policy makers to the students for self moderation - they know what is right and wrong in an educational setting - why can't we hold THEM accountable more?

Article addresses policy challenges in implementing BYOT

Math activities based on google maps.This looks like so much fun!

Very creative way to get youngsters engaged in math. As the author says, 'math is everywhere'.

"No one believes that learners don't need teachers. No one believes that engagement can only be found on a gadget. So why make that false distinction?" Perhaps blended learning is the perfect middle way between the two extremes.

Is it only a matter of time before we will see more fulfillment of major aspects of the Wireless EdTech and National Educational Technology Plan mobile recommendations? I HOPE so! When Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty suggested last September that the time had come for electorate to engage in meaningful debate on the issue of handheld media devices in the province's classrooms, the backlash was swift. The public wanted nothing of it.

I am currently working on how to integrate IBM Watson in digital media for learning. I would gladly appreciate to talk anybody in the group who has a similar interest. Nice quote "I think the real impact on learning will start to come in the classroom, if you can imagine intelligent tutors - a system that can truly be interactive with the learner as they're engaging and learning the materials,"