Neuroscience has shown that our brains are plastic and that education, gaming and the use of technology can change our brains' connectivity, function and structure. (1, 2) But learning is more than just biology - it is affected by our learning environment and the people with whom and from whom we learn. So how do you take what neuroscience reveals about the plastic, learning brain and combine it with educational research, expertise and common sense? Klevar, in association with Flinders University, are offering you the chance to explore this with Dr Paul Howard-Jones of the University of Bristol, researcher and author of "Introducing Neuroeducational Research: Neuroscience, Education and the Brain from Contexts to Practice".

This teacher's kids want to use pop music they love for a project.  Their teacher wants them to do so legally and with respect, so he's trying to contact the artist directly.  To get her attention (the artist is Taylor Swift), he's asking all his Twitter PLN to re-tweet his open letter to Taylor Swift to her Twitter account, so her mentions column will be filled with the RT of his letter.  If you Tweet, please copy and paste this into Twitter:RT @thenerdyteacher An Open Letter to @TaylorSwift13 - http://bit.ly/gV6uaH

After weeks of discussion in the blogosphere over whether what happened in Tunisia was a "Twitter revolution," and whether social media also helped trigger the current anti-government uprising in Egypt, author Malcolm Gladwell says "Surely the least interesting fact about them is that some of the protesters may (or may not) have at one point or another employed some of the tools of the new media to communicate with one another. Please. People protested and brought down governments before Facebook was invented. They did it before the Internet came along."

Last week Erik Qualmann posted a list of "All Star Social Media" players in his ClickZ column. Being included in such a list with the likes of Chris Brogan and Scott Monty was humbling to say the least.  Erik qualified the list by saying they were mostly people he knew and he welcomed suggestions.  I noticed few women were mentioned and knowing there are so many power players, I decided to create a list of my own featuring women that I think "rock" the social web.

* Print a diary of your tweets. * Archive your tweets on your computer. * Add tweets & twitpics to your holiday photos. * Surprise your friends with their tweet journal. * New: Save/print keyword searches on twitter.com

The online satirist impersonating Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has revealed he is a senior Telstra staffer named Leslie Nassar.