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If you are not familiar with the 21st Century Fluency project, have a look. When I received this week's newsletter, there was a lot of alignment with the conversation we had in Monday's lecture.

http://www.fluency21.com/perspectives/LNE_perspective.pdf This is a great intro to the thinking these guys are doing. Their breakdown of the 5 fluencies is probably one of the most actionable representations of what everyone is calling 21st century skills.

interspersing online lectures with short tests improved student performance.

Thought provoking analysis of higher ed finances, and the prospects for emerging technology models to help "fix" the broken business model. By William Bowen, former President of Princeton and the Mellon Foundation.

I found this to be an Interesting approach/take on video based learning/lecturing , anyone has any information on where the MIT blossoms project is headed or its potential impact?

Hi Komal, I work for the PI of Blossoms, Prof Richard Larson (but not on Blossoms). Send me an e-mail if you have some specific questions and I can put you two in contact, or we can chat sometime about it. I know you are working on video-distribution for your research synthesis, sorry it never occured to me that Blossoms might be on your radar screen!

Hi Komal, sorry for the late response--the Diigo notification went to my Spam box so I didn't see that you had responded. Let me ask Prof. Larson those things and get back to you.

Interesting article with cons and pros of effects of technology on students attention. I know good teachers are competing more and more for kids attention. But I also wonder if students waning abilities to think deeply and critically have as much to do with flaws in our education system/schooling as use of tech.

Susan, I agree with your comment that waning attention have as much to do with flaws in our education system/schooling as use of tech. There's no reason to assume that kids 30 years ago were any more attentive during class or lecture. They simply had far fewer options on where to place their attention. I wonder if traditional classroom where equipped with as many distractions as one can find online how it would effect children's behavior and attention span?

If you start watching at the 30-minute mark, you can get a peek at how he uses technology in the design of his course and to shape participation during class. At the 34:00 minute mark he is describing a jigsaw reading activity, similar to the study groups we are often encouraged to form. You won't believe where he and his students go with this. I love his statement, "There are no natives here." So true. I can't find the other video where he shows his collaborative notetaking platform that he uses in a 200-student class, but it's very cool. That's where I got the idea for some kind of wiki or google doc that might allow us to manage lecture notes and the backchannel.

A quantity of possibilities exist for lecturers searching with regard to on-line graduate programs. On the net move on courses can be used for continuing schooling (CEUs), in-service credit rating, or perhaps move on credit.

Technology is playing an increasingly prominent role in America's schools. These days, computer games teach math skills and lectures are given at home via YouTube while class time is reserved for practicing the material, in what has become known as a flipped classroom. I WOULD JUST FALL TO SLEEP IN ONE OF THESE SCHOOLS! It is a shame that people allow their biases to hinder children. People running away from the present and future --- it is like that very bad M. Night Shyamalan movie ---> THE VILLAGE. COMPUTERS are like the imaginary demon! In truth, the demon only lives within the mind of people stuck in time.

Good article highlighting the tension created by Idaho's push to incorporate online-learning and computers into state education. 

Great article James! THey show the full range of teachers' reachtion to top down directives. I wonder what their reaction would be if the directive was NOT about technology but rather a requirement to customize instruction. Customization is too hard to do as an individual teacher. You would have to rely on technology to get it done. I love the teacher who insists that she teaches kids "how to think" by using her lecture style. Oh Boy!

This conference is happening this weekend. The website lists various means of hearing the lectures and discussions that will happen.

The Foundation for Learning Equality is working to get content to the 65% of the world who live without internet. Currently their only project involves offlining Khan Academy lectures and loading them on SD cards which can be loaded onto Raspberry Pi servers and sent along with e-readers to anywhere in the world. To me, this seems like an incredible opportunity to simultaneously address quality and access issues in remote parts of the world, though I don't think Khan Academy's content is necessarily the best. As a technological innovation, however, I think there is a real possibility to scale this, insofar as there are on-the-ground resources in each location facilitating the learning on the e-readers. Does anybody have any critique or insight to curb my excitement?

Faculty claim that their MOOC experiences actually will also change their classroom lectures.

After reading this I wonder what other resources there are online for learning all those things that I have found difficult to master in my life.

A great read and resource that came up through another one of my classes. The Harvard Business School grad makes free online videos that explore math and science concepts. Bill Gates is a big fan.

Indian college classrooms have not integrated technology into learning and teaching, so private companies - teaching the skills needed to perform in their specific career paths - are taking the lead, showing that universities need to catch up.

Interesting article about how technology is changing the way we define and share intellectual property. Is a professor's lecture the property of the professor, the University or neither? Does a student "own" the notes he takes in class?

Flipping the classroom continues to get a lot of press

Khan Academy's influence 

David Walter Banks/Luceo for Education Week Susan Kramer watched her packed 10th grade biology class weave through rows of desks, pretending to be proteins and picking up plastic-bead "carbohydrates" and goofy "phosphate" hats as they navigated their "cell." As they went, they explained how the cell's interior system works.