Tapping into the Internet and using several iPads as video cameras, Sandel, the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Government, connected his Harvard students in Sanders Theatre on Friday with students in Japan, China, Brazil, and India for a wide-ranging discussion that explored the complicated question of the ethics of solidarity and the dilemmas associated with patriotism, membership, and collective responsibility.
"Reforms" have disappointed for two reasons. First, no one has yet discovered transformative
changes in curriculum or pedagogy, especially for inner-city schools, that are "scalable"
The larger cause of failure is almost unmentionable: shrunken student motivation.
"Motivation is weak because more students don't like school, don't work hard and don't do well." Also see Tom Friedman in the NYTimes referring to this article and concluding that "right now the Hindus and Confucians have more Protestant ethics than we do, and as long as that is the case we'll be No. 11!"
A NPO called Common Sense Media is working with HGSE. They have launched a new web-based interactive tool for 3-5h grade to encourage responsible online behavior
"This is our second Sputnik moment. At a time when women hold only 24 percent of STEM jobs and blacks and Hispanics also fare poorly in these fields, we better get this argument about diversity of talent right or else it's going to be a very expensive moment, indeed."
I like the ethic and attiude that this article promotes. I have seen this gap for a long time and I have heard the meritocracy argument as well. The fact is that people who benefit from a system want to believe that they inherently earned their spot due to superior intellect, personality, etc. It is difficult to believe that you are a member of an organization because others feel you belong there and your presence reinforces the establishd culture of power.
"We should be teaching kids how to handle content online, how to use it appropriately at school, and giving them the tools they need to be good digital citizens, to act ethically and to protect their privacy," said Deborah Caldwell-Stone, deputy director for the American Library Association's office for intellectual freedom.
For years observers have predicted a coming wave of e-textbooks. But so far it just hasn't happened. One explanation for the delay is that while music fans were eager to try a new, more portable form of entertainment, students tend to be more conservative when choosing required materials for their studies. For a real disruption in the textbook market, students may have to be forced to change.
saying that e-textbooks should be required reading and that colleges should be the ones charging for them
Here's the new plan: Colleges require students to pay a course-materials fee, which would be used to buy e-books for all of them (whatever text the professor recommends, just as in the old model).
they're far cheaper to produce than printed texts
publishers could eliminate the used-book market and reduce incentives for students to illegally download copies as well
When students pay more for new textbooks than tuition in a year, then something's wrong
Tricky issues remain, though. What if a professor wrote the textbook assigned for his or her class? Is it ethical to force students to buy it, even at a reduced rate? And what if students feel they are better off on their own, where they have the option of sharing or borrowing a book at no cost?
In music, the Internet reduced album sales as more people bought only the individual songs they wanted. For textbooks, that may mean letting students (or brokers at colleges) buy only the chapters they want. Or only supplementary materials like instructional videos and interactive homework problems, all delivered online.
And that really would be the end of the textbook as we know it.
I would be for this. I could not believe a place so big on recycling (Harvard) murdered so many trees with the printing of course packs.
I like this idea if you could get the material from other sources than just the school (say the author or publisher directly or something like Amazon). Otherwise, there is no opportunity for competition or bargaining.
Tecahers must now learn how to craft assignments which do not lend themselves easily to cheating. Dealing with network security issues is probably the easier task of the two.
In order to get around the clunkiness of the LMS my school uses I am always looking for tools like this one. The problem with doing this is that sometimes they cost money, they usually expose students to advertising (which I think is an ethical issue when you're dealing with a captured audience), and they all require a time commitment to familiarize myself and my students. I'm not sure what it is about systems like Blackboard (which charges incredible amounts of money) that hamper its visual appeal and design for intuitive use.