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Website that publishes the 'news that did not make it onto mainstream media'. There are pretty cool alternatives to certain news that take on an interesting perspective alternate to mainstream framing and broadcasting.

"Logan Laplante is a 13 year-old boy who was taken out of the education system to be home schooled instead. Not only was he home schooled, but Logan had the ability to tailor his education to his interests and also his style of learning, something traditional education does not offer." I realise this article (and the video on which the article is based) does not fall neatly into any category we've studied yet, though I hope many of you may find it as interesting and inspiring as I have. At core, this is about "hacking" the educational system. As Logan explains, his methods can be applied in mainstream schooling (or indeed for anyone interested in lifelong/lifewide education). There's also the element of "participatory culture" embedded in the production of this video: Logan is sharing his experiences, allowing others to comment and contribute so that he might learn as others are learning from him.

This is a truly amazing talk, I was especially pleased to discover your post since I was just about to share a talk that speaks to many of the same issues! My shared video talks about how schools simply aren't made for boys - for many reasons - and what should be done to reengage them in education. (You can check it out here, if you're interested - https://groups.diigo.com/group/okmooc/content/gaming-could-the-ultimate-tools-to-re-engage-boys-in-education-12782090) The part about "writing about butterflies and rainbows" quite literally made me chuckle, here's why: (from my video) "Boy comes home from school, and he says, "I hate writing." "Why do you hate writing, son? What's wrong with writing?" "Now I have to write what she tells me to write." "Okay, what is she telling you to write?" "Poems. I have to write poems. And little moments in my life. I don't want to write that stuff." :) The boy then goes on to saying "I want to write about video games. I want to write about leveling-up. I want to write about this really interesting world. I want to write about a tornado that comes into our house and blows all the windows out and ruins all the furniture and kills everybody." ...which is one of the main points of "hackschooling" -writing through experiences & interests. Also, speaking from personal experience as someone who also left a diploma behind, I can confirm that leaving a rigid non-functional study environment for an open world of possibility can be the best thing you can ever do. All in all - thumbs up for sharing the talk!

Thanks for sharing - what an inspiring talk. Many of his lessons are just as valuable for adults, who often seem to lose any sense of creativity after settling in to their lives, careers, and relationships. FYI - my wife and I have done some limited homeschooling with one of our kids who really doesn't thrive in traditional school settings. I wish we could have done more, but at the very least I encourage each of our kids to explore other ways to learn to either supplement (or question) what they are learning in school. Traditional education just isn't supportive of creative thinking and creative thinkers.

A teacher is a life long learner, in fact, everyone should be a lifelong learner, but the difference between us ( teachers and educators ) and others is that we have no choice but to be life long learners. We can not stop learning for fear that we might be outrun by our students.

Interesting way to frame teachers' life long learning: "for fear that we might be outrun by our students". The author also tells teachers that they need to lead students, "not lag behind". These ideas bring up interesting questions around self-directed learning and participatory learning environments, which might actually celebrate times when students outrun their teachers by finding new tools and solutions and leading their teachers in different directions.

This is taking the access of quallity participatory online education beyond tertiary level. It will also provide the opportunity for those who have been unable to complete high education to do so.

Teachers are discovering the value of imparting media-literacy skills, from critical analysis of news programs, commercials, and films to basic design and video-production techniques.

This is an excellent video summarizing all the skills and necessity of them in a participatory culture. Everyone is spending more and more time in the multimedia world these days, especially the youth, who can be considered the most vulnerable. An ability to perceive all the information we are getting through a critical lens is profound, as is an ability to dissect and understand the logic of multimedia. Learning the tricks of graphics, cinema, music studies (collectively called "communication studies"), young people learn to understand and create media, find new ways to express themselves efficiently in an ever-changing world and supplement the traditional ("written") curriculum, which is behind the needs of today's man. The point is illustrated nicely by George Lucas, founder of The George Lucas Educational Foundation (GLEF): "Everybody is affected by this, and it should be taught in school." I agree 100%.

Re-thinking communication skills is absolutely essential for all educators, since much of the communication students are faced with during a day comes in the shape of different kinds of media. But the result of this is also that we need to address the fact that not all educators are necessarily equipped to teach about media because it's rarely included in teacher's programs (especially if you were trained twenty or thirty years ago). So the video makes a lot of good points about media-literacy and hopefully our educational systems will make sure that educators are given the tools to include this in their classrooms.

Canadian community activism organization that rallies for open internet, and launched the international organization openmedia.org "OpenMedia.ca works to engage, educate and empower citizens to defend and advance their communication interests, values and rights. Engage: Through online campaigns and participatory events that resonate with everyday people, and civic engagement around media and communications policy in Canada. Educate: Through educational events high school and university presentations and workshops, and online resources.

ZBW Website German National Library of Economics - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics ZBW is the largest library for literature in economics world-wide. This is one great example of "open access" whereby access for data is openly made available to users nationally and internationally. ZBW was is recently honoured by the German Library Association as the 2014 Library of the Year for its "a radically modern library whose customer- and innovation-oriented approach is exemplary for other libraries". Through its Econbiz Open project, ZBW was able to partner and create participatory culture among its partner countries.

I believe that one of the best ways to look for truthful information happens through the specialized free access library Julia.

Site to exchange opinion and ideas dealing with left and civil society and to implement the participatory culture at the political level.

In an age of proliferating media and news sources, who has the power to define reality? When the dominant media declared the existence of WMDs in Iraq, did that make it a fact? Today, the "Social Web" (sometimes known as Web 2.0, groupware, or the participatory web)--epitomized by blogs, viral videos, and YouTube--creates new pathways for truths to emerge and makes possible new tactics for media activism.