Middle College National Consortium

Excellent tips on designing learning interactions with relevant and potentially risky on the job challenges as the subject matter

Excellent article on creating online learning environments that embody autonomy, mastery, and purpose. Purpose has three elements: opportunity for user to contribute to training, opportunity to influence others, and opportunity to be recognized for their efforts.

By David T. Conley, published in Office of Community College Research and Leadership (OCCRL) - Illinois, Update Newsletter, spring 2009, 20(2). This article was one of the assigned readings for MCNC's Principals and Directors meeting, Feb 2010.

Website of Daniel T. Willingham, professor of psychology at the University of Virginia. In 2009, Willingham authored Why Students Don't Like School and writes extensively on applications of cognitive psychology to K-12 education.

By Daniel T. Willingham, in American Educator, spring 2009, pp 4-13. Excerpted from his book, Why Don't Students Like School, published by John Wiley & Sons, 2009. This article was one of the assigned readings for MCNC's Principals and Directors meeting, Feb 2010.

By David T. Conley, published by Jossey-Bass, 2005. From summary: Describes many of the problems facing ill prepared college-bound students and outlines potential actions that should enable more students to go on to postsecondary education and do well in entry-level college courses.

This is a site where users can create educational trivia and quiz games, and share them.

Definition from Wikipedia. Bloom's taxonomy is essentially the classification of learning objectives that educators set for students.

By Pranav Mistry. Posted on YouTube. This tool, a "wearable gestural interface" connects the physical world with the digital world of information. For more, see http://pranavmistry.misutori.com/projects/sixthsense/

By Ian Jukes and Anita Dosaj, The InfoSavvy Group, Sept 2006. Jukes and Dosaj look at the challenges of digital immigrants (e.g. adults) effectively teaching digital natives (today's kids).

In the forum (Table 4: Thinkers) there is a PDF of an earlier version of this resouce (2004).

By Malcolm Gladwell, published Little Brown, 2000. Gladwell looks at why major changes seem to happen so suddenly. His "tipping point" is the moment when "social epidemics... take off, when they reach their critical mass...."

Rick Maupin quoted: "The nature of modern culture is such that many new ideas are constantly being introduced from a wide variety of sources, ranging from trend-setting teens and twenty-somethings in the nation's metropolitan centers to new product offerings from established corporations. Some of these achieve a measure of steady, consistent success, some fail, and some take off on an upward trajectory of exponential popularity and influence."

By John Dewey, published in 1921.

Ed Ingman posted that Dewey's idea of "the end in mind" is relevant to Conley's work on college readiness.

Educator Madeline Hunter developed the Instructional Theory into Practice, or ITIP model for teaching. This web page, from the education department of Hope College (MI) outlines the model.

Researched by Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod, Jeff Brenman, there are numerous versions of this video on the web. This is the version used for the MCNC principals and directors meeting, Feb 2010.

By Amanda Ripley in The Atlantic, January/February 2010. This article looks at effective teaching in several ways: it profiles several highly effective teachers, and also discusses over ten years of data about effective teaching that the organization Teach for America is preparing to release.

Published in Spectrum > Mobile Learning, Libraries, And Technologies, March 12, 2009. "MLE-Moodle is an out-of-the-box mobile Learning (mLearning) system, designed for mobile phones." With MCNC in particular, we've discussed how it might be helpful to be able to engage students/faculty/administrators in Polilogue via mobile phone in addition to computer.

This bookmark provides examples of online professional development course offerings. "EdTech Leaders Online (ETLO) is a nationally recognized online professional development program developed by the Center for Online Professional Education (COPE) at Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC)."

Provides examples of competitors' ePD

By Benedict Carey in the Health section, The New York Times, September 6, 2010. The author shares findings that contradict common knowledge about study habits. Techniques that have had proven success in studies are alternating study environments, mixing content, spacing study sessions and self-testing.

"A comprehensive introduction to using technology in all K-12 classrooms."

By Kevin Carey in Democracy: A Journal of Ideas, Issue #15, Winter 2010. In this editorial, Carey (policy director of think tank Education Sector) argues that colleges are not fulfilling their mission to students: costs are rising and students are not learning (or even graduating). He argues for transparency and studies of the effectiveness of teaching and learning, and warns of the education-related lobbies that keep the rest of us in the dark about higher education.