Group items tagged

educational videogame interest growing

It seems the privacy issue is never ending and becoming even more of a topic as changes that are supposed to better control privacy make settings even more complicated.  

Lots of pomp and circumstance about new initiatives -- but how much funding and political clout is really behind them.

Are you speaking of Digital Promise? It reminds me of whatworks.ed.gov but it looks like it might be designed better. I don't believe whatworks.ed.gov ever got much traction.

Interesting comments on Sherry Turkle's new book "Alone Together", a criticism on the pervasiveness of social media

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

Good share, Diana. This article is particularly interesting for the issues it chooses to raise and the way in which various arguments are presented. One quote struck me, "We have Smart Boards in every classroom but not enough money to buy copy paper, pencils and hand sanitizer," said Nicole Cates, a co-president of the Parent Teacher Organization at Kyrene de la Colina, an elementary school. "You don't go buy a new outfit when you don't have enough dinner to eat." But she loves the fact that her two children, a fourth-grader and first-grader, are learning technology, including PowerPoint and educational games (Page 5)". How can we work to harmonize these two? This reminds me an article I read in the Boston Globe this morning regarding teachers going out-of-pocket to equip their classrooms with enough supplies for an increasing number of students. The article suggests that budget cuts that make this necessary save teacher positions. There has to be a better way. http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2011/09/05/budgets_cut_teachers_dig_deeper_for_supplies/

Tying into discussions this week about bringing access to mobile devices to all via non-prohibitive costs, while still reaching a set of bare-minmum technical specs for actual use: India's "$35 tablet" has been a pipedream in the tech blog-o-sphere for awhile now, but it's finally available (though for a price of roughly $60). Still though, as an actual Android color touch tablet, with WiFi and cellular data capability - I'm curious to see how it's received and if it's adopted in any sort of large scale

I had heard months ago that India was creating this, but was not going to offer it commercially - rather, just for its own country. Just like the Little Professor (Prof Dede) calculator, when tablets get this affordable, educational systems can afford classroom sets of them and then use them regularly. But to Prof Dede's point - can they do everything that more expensive tablets can do? Or better yet - do they HAVE to?

I think this is what they're aiming to do - all classrooms/students across the country having this particular tablet. They won't be able to do everything today's expensive tablets can do, but I think they'll still be able too to do plenty. This $35 tablet's specs are comparable to the mobile devices we had here in the US in 2008/2009. Even back then, we were able to web browse, check email, use social networking (sharing pics and video too), watching streaming online video, and play basic 2D games. But even beyond those basic features, I think this tablet will be able to do more than we expect from something at this price point and basic hardware, for 2 reasons: 1. Wide-spread adoption of a single hardware. If this thing truly does become THE tablet for India's students, it will have such a massive userbase that software developers and designers who create educational software will have to cater to it. They will have to study this tablet and learn the ins-and-outs of its hardware in order to deliver content for it. "Underpowered" hardware is able to deliver experiences well beyond what would normally be expected from it when developers are able to optimize heavily for that particular set of components. This is why software for Apple's iPhone and iPad, and games for video game consoles (xbox, PS3, wii) are so polished. For the consoles especially, all the users have the same exact hardware, with the same features and components. Developers are able to create software that is very specialized for that hardware- opposed to spending their resources and time making sure the software works on a wide variety of hardware (like in the PC world). With this development style in mind, and with a fixed hardware model remaining widely used in the market for many years- the resultant software is very polished and goes beyond what users expect from it. This is why today's game consoles, which have been around since 2005/6, produce visuals that are still really impressive and sta

In light of our conversation of mobile learning, this article provides insight as to the stationary nature of the use of mobile technology. Shadow Cities - a game that prizes 'on the go', 'real world' scenarios within the game, found that most people play mobile games in the spaces where they spend the majority of their time - especially the home, which means mobile games compete with traditional gaming devices. Anyway, some food for thought...

Jennifer, Thanks for sharing this. In this push for mobile, I guess it makes sense if you step back and realize that most of the gaming systems that people started using (PS3, Xbox, Wii) were not built for mobility or portability and perhaps they haven't realized they can "transfer" the gaming experience to anyWHERE? Or maybe it is that gamers are creatures of habit? or superstition (like baseball players who don't shave their face throughout the playoffs so as to not mess with the karma or mojo?) and don't want to upset the environment that they consider the best for their particular performance of the game? The commercial that Prof Dede showed with the Augmented Reality spin and where Shadow Cities is headed really is a whole new way of approaching gaming and I wonder if the same type of gamers who are traditionalists (sit at home and play) would be interested in this new type of mobile gaming or if it might just open up a whole new set of gamers - who despise the sedentary nature of traditional gaming systems - and push them to get involved?

Speaking of crowdsourcing - how about outsourcing grading to the students themselves?  

What is lost and gained when schools save money by purchasing netbooks rather than laptops?

Was just going to post this also. The Acer mentioned though is one of the absolute cheapest notebooks one can get. Not sure that it was the best comparison. There are some netbooks that have amazing battery life (8+ hours) in the sub $350 range. If the article's point is about resource intensive apps like video, it should also clearly point out that the acer's battery will die out well before a similarly priced netbook from samsung.

Networks such as IEarn and ePals are facilitating youth-to-youth exchanges and breaking down cultural barriers worldwide.

modified xboses are in greater demand since the ban from microsoft's online gaming community. (modifying xbox allows playing banned games and games/movies of other regions)

web 2.0 is a means of fostering collaboration skills

Article about a Chicago high school's new digital library that encourages kids to produce and remix media. Certainly an intriguing idea, but I am reminded of the attention we must pay to the latest 'fads' with new digital media - will this library be outdated by the time this district's elementary school children reach high school? Still, wicked cool stuff and definitely moving in the right direction in getting media literacy into schools!

I know that some of us in our other classes have been discussing iPads and their use in the education space, and I dug this up from my archives as some of what teachers and admins have to say about buying and using the iPad in their schools.

Bridget, The potential for iPad may realize even more with the availability of online textbooks, which may include videos. The availability of various apps will influence the proliferation of iPad. Upside - novelty, excitement, and no back breaking bag packs, downside- penmanship may suffer and teachers may have to do some extra homework! http://thejournal.com/articles/2011/07/11/putting-the-ipad-to-work-in-elementary-classrooms.aspx

Maung - I actually attended Gagliolo's session at ISTE this summer as I, too, am a proponent of this new technology, but as you point out, this means "extra homework" for the teacher. And most teachers I know are already strapped for time and professional development and are not interested in a new device that is "one more thing" they have to learn and use in an overwhelming standards based curriculum environment. The only way (in my opinion) that we can get teachers to embrace this new technology is to have it do something MORE efficiently and easily than something THEY ALREADY do. It cannot be an add-on. It has to replace something overtasking from their plate.

""As much as we are here to serve the teachers, it is the students who ultimately benefit from the integration of technology in the classrooms," she said. "Students who once felt that they had to 'power down' to go to class, are now experiencing 21st century skills and styles of learning - because their teachers are better able to utilize the tools of the digital age.""

It will be interesting to see the specific initiatives that come out of this new "Harvard wide" initiative.  I wonder if anyone at HGSE is involved with the planning and application of best practices

"New technologies have transformed the way students interact with the world, with information, and knowledge," said Dean of Harvard College Evelynn M. Hammonds.

Harvard Recieved $40 million from Rita E. and Gustave Hauser to support excellence and innovation in teaching and learning.