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Some interesting videos with James Paul Gee et al. discussing issues related to video games and learning. Videos are under 5 minutes each.

Some interesting videos with James Paul Gee et al. discussing issues related to video games and learning. Videos are under 5 minutes each. What do you think about what they have to say?

What if, instead of seeing school the way we've known it, we saw it for what our children dreamed it might be: a big, delicious video game?

NSTA's Science Teacher must have known we just spent the class with Paul Horowitz. Jan Mokros (TERC) is an author here

"One teacher commented, "It's hard to manage the class when students become 'click happy' without really understanding what they're doing." However, requiring students to verbally explain and justify their reasoning before proceeding to the next screen was an effective solution."

Paul Horwitz's Evolution Readiness program is highlighted

"Innovation and technology will not be centered around a piece of technology," Paul Kim, assistant dean and CTO at Stanford School of Education, "suggesting instead that educational reformers should focus on content and promoting self-initiated learning."

In US alone, 4 million K-12 students are enrolled online. Annual conference on online (and blended) learning in Indianapolis on November 9-11, by the International Association for K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL). Online learning is seen as the solution to allowing greater access to diverse resources curriculum, especially when many schools face serious financial crisis. Expect to hear from experts and educators, such as, such as Gene Wilhoit, Executive Director of the Council of Chief State School Officers; Paul Peterson of Harvard University; Michael Horn, author of Disrupting Class; Steve Midgley of the U.S. Department of Education; and iNACOL president Susan Patrick. Full program details are available at www.virtualschoolsymposium.org.

Fantastic piece on transforming higher education--love his framework.

Games as constant assessment, and textbooks as tools for problem-solving

One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) implementation in Australia seems to bring positive results. In remote, largely indigenous northwest Queensland, Doomadgee, 3rd grade students' numeracy improved from 31 per cent last year to a staggering 95 per cent in 2011.

To what extent should videogames be used in classrooms, and what is the research support for this?

Note the author characterizes the National Educational Technology Plan as a "manifesto." Quoting this article, "... in March, Arne Duncan, the secretary of education, released a draft National Educational Technology Plan that reads a bit like a manifesto for change, proposing among other things that the full force of technology be leveraged to meet "aggressive goals" and "grand" challenges, including increasing the percentage of the population that graduates from college to 60 percent from 39 percent in the next 10 years. What it takes to get there, the report suggests, is a "new kind of R.& D."

A bunch of especially interesting quotes toward the end: "This concept is something that Will Wright, who is best known for designing the Sims game franchise...refers to as 'failure-based learning,' in which failure is brief, surmountable, often exciting and therefore not scary... According to Ntiedo Etuk, the chief executive of Tabula Digita...children who persist in playing a game are demonstrating a valuable educational ideal.... 'They'll fail until they win.' He adds: 'Failure in an academic environment is depressing. Failure in a video game is pleasant. It's completely aspirational.' It is also, says James Paul Gee, antithetical to the governing reality of today's public schools. 'If you think about kids in school - especially in our testing regime - both the teacher and the student think that failure will lead to disaster,' he says. 'That's pretty much a guarantee that you'll never get to truly deep learning.'"

Definitely want to read some of the books mentioned in this Q&A.

I love these animations made for the Met Costume Institute show 4 years ago. They so clearly uncover how these garments were made.