Mindamp

Another in Michael Wesch's series of videos.  There's a lot of catching up for academia to do now that we have ubiquitous access to self-publishing tools, online repositories of knowledge, clusters of niche networks and are putting our cognitive surplus to better use than watching TV.  And we are all perennial, life-long students and teachers.  

Is Twitter speech or text or both or neither?

Freedom is a simple productivity application that locks you away from the internet on Mac or Windows computers for up to eight hours at a time."

Tools that helps one to focus. Turn off the distractions.

"About this talk Games are invading the real world -- and the runaway popularity of Farmville and Guitar Hero is just the beginning, says Jesse Schell. At the DICE Summit, he makes a startling prediction: a future where 1-ups and experience points break "out of the box" and into every part of our daily lives. About Jesse Schell Beyond Facebook, beyond consoles and even computer screens, games are becoming the medium for everyday life, says game designer Jesse Schell. Full bio and more links"

Isn't it an amazing talk? It blew me away when I first saw it. And now you can see why it kicked off the gamification movement.

Oh my. I need to think more about this one. It's a paradox with some of the privacy concerns of folks for Gowalla or Four Square versus Jesse's notion that our lives will be constant gaming and surrendering of personal info.

Stavros S. Niarchos Lecture Fiscal Crises and Imperial Collapses: Historical Perspective on Current Predicaments Ninth Annual Niarchos Lecture Niall Ferguson, Harvard University Peterson Institute for International Economics, Washington, DC May 13, 2010 « Previous | Index | Next » Summary 1 of 3 Niall Ferguson, Harvard University, delivered the Peterson Institute's ninth annual Niarchos Lecture on May 13, 2010, on the topic "Fiscal Crises and Imperial Collapses: Historical Perspectives on Current Predicaments." Niall Ferguson is one of the world's leading thinkers and writers on geoeconomic, global systemic, and other key international strategic issues. Time has named him one of the world's 100 most influential people, and two of his books, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons for Global Power (2003) and The War of the World: Twentieth Century Conflict and the Descent of the West (2008) have been converted into television series. His most recent book is the best-selling Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World (2008), from which he has drawn numerous lessons for analyzing and responding to the current global crisis. His earlier The World's Banker: The History of the House of Rothschild won the Wadsworth Prize for Business History.

"Reason and Purpose Learning by Doing Designed to support the digital lives of young people and their capacity for learning, Quest to Learn is a school committed to graduating strong, engaged, literate citizens of a globally networked world. Through an innovative pedagogy that immerses students in differentiated, challenge-based contexts, the school acknowledges design, collaboration, and systems thinking as key literacies of the 21st century. Within an integrated, rigorous Regents-based curriculum students work with teachers to gain the skills necessary to meet these requirements, and even surpass them. On-going evaluation and feedback create opportunities for students to plan, revise, and reflect on their own learning. The overall curriculum is rooted in mathematical practices and the use of smart tools, with an explicit intent to innovate at the level of how students are assessed in context. Most importantly, teachers work with students to build individual and academic competencies and enrich youth identity development within contexts that are relevant and meaningful. The school has been designed to help students to bridge old and new literacies through learning about the world as a set of interconnected systems. Design and complex problem-solving are two big ideas of the school, as is a commitment to deep content learning with a strong focus on learning in rigorous, engaging, and relevant ways. It is a place where digital media meets books and students learn to think like designers, inventors, mathematicians, writers, and more. Q2L brings together teachers with a passion for content, a vision for helping kids to learn best, and a commitment to changing the way students will grow in the world. Quest to Learn has purposely responded not only to the growing evidence that digital media and games offer powerful models for reconsidering how and where young people learn, but also to the belief that access for all students to these opportunities is critical. We beli

Following the links ifrom ted's post in the gamification forum item... I bounced on this school. Always interesting to discover new ways of looking at traditional things...

"Unprecedented communication and information-but also speed, stress, and 24/7 distraction. BARRY BOYCE reports on a group of far-thinking digital leaders who are using mindfulness to humanize the brave new world they have created. "

Soren Gordhamer's book, Wisdom 2.0 is a very good read in t his regard.

"Welcome to the Critical Thinking Compendium! Join Howard Rheingold and other noted educators in creating a world-class resource for teaching critical thinking and Internet literacies."

"Robin Good on curation "

Harvard law professor and author Jonathan Zittrain discusses the unusual and distinctive technologies whose power increases in proportion to the people participating in them, contrasted with other technologies that leverage what the few can impose on the many -- whether a PC virus maker who crashes millions of machines or a law enforcement officer who can use new consumer platforms to spy far easier than before. Filmed at Singularity University, part of the November 2009 Executive Program.

civic technologies - an interesting concept developed by the author of The Future of Intyernet Jonathan Zittrain for Singularity University