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Don't have the Tweetstream running live on a projection screen. I've tried it both ways-having the Tweetstream run on a screen that everyone can see, versus on students' devices. The former is ultimately distracting for participants, who tend to focus more on the screen than the in-person discussions. Having the backchannel show up on personal devices, on the other hand, adds to the effect of creating another outlet for discussion that does not overpower the face to face setting.

"How does academic achievement vary across the US? While stereotypes and prejudices invariably exist, the only way to the answer that question is with some cold, hard data. Here it is."

Coursera just raised $43m of funding - what potential do investors see in MOOCs? Based on recent Forbes article - do you see MOOCs as replacing parts of traditional higher ed? Will growing numbers of online students reduce hesitation of employers to hire online students? How does this affect institutions being proxies for quality? What applications are there for MOOCs beyond academic programs? (with interesting answer from Michael based on DS106)

Which ultimately does more good-an article or monograph that is read by 20 or 30 people in a very narrow field, or a blog post on a topic of interest to many (such as grading standards or tenure requirements) that is read by 200,000? What if the post spurs hundreds of comments, is debated publicly in faculty lounges and classrooms, and gets picked up by newspapers and Web sites across the country-in other words, it helps to shape the national debate over some hot-button issue? What is it worth then?

"Social collaboration is the reason our business is able to remain connected, agile and profitable in multiple markets. It does this by acting as an unbreakable thread which connects each and every person, 24/7, 365 days a year. The prevalence and value of our social interactions has resulted in all employees regarding the intranet as their 'home base'. Company HQ. The central point from which they start and finish their days, and coordinate their individual tasks. It's also the place where they build real relationships with colleagues in other locations and gain awareness of activities occurring in and around the business."

"I think there may be a certain type of learner that this works for - someone who is highly motivated and purposeful, who is seeking out specific knowledge. And someone who does not require much human interaction - because in spite of the rhetoric about personalization, lectures are inherently impersonal, and videos of lectures are doubly so.   So if the MOOC is ushering in a golden age, democratizing access to knowledge, it seems to have hit a bit of a bump. I think the bump in the road is the learner."

Under the supervision of the instructor - there's the rub. I don't mean a kind of aloof, checking-your-Facebook-while-students-work kind of "supervision" but rather the kind of interactive engagement that a coach might have with his or her players while they practice. The coach doesn't do the exercises for the players, but neither does s/he stand off to the side and let them flail around the entire time. There is interaction between the coach and the player, between different players, and between different groups of players. And through that interaction, questions get answered, others get raised - and things get learned, if it's done right.

"Do you have a computer science degree? Me neither. Up until a few weeks ago, however, everyone thought the now former Yahoo CEO Scott Thompson did. Yes, I said former. Thompson was forced to step down as the head of the internet and search giant after it was found out he did not, as his résumé said, have a computer science degree. "

"The xMOOC path is pretty much in place with EdX. They have a good module-based system for presenting and assessing instructivist knowledge. Add on top of that they have connected to other systems through single sign-on and they are down with APIs… they have a system that is ready to connect with other systems as well as allow learners to move in and out as need with ease. The cMOOC system that sits alongside that? That is another beast. Technology exists to create a learner-centered system (see A Domain of One's Own)…. but how does this scale to possibly tens of thousands of learners?"

"For example, there's a lot of overlap in the processes of reading and the processes used for understanding speech - processes that assign syntactic roles to words. Do we see any evidence that people are having a harder time understanding spoken language? Or does the problem lie in the mental processes that build understanding of larger blocks of language, as when we're comprehending a story? If so, habitual Web users should have a hard time understanding complex narratives not just when they read, but in television and movies. No one should have watched The Sopranos, with its complicated, interweaving plotlines."

"I went out there and asked some experts: What is the WORST blogging advice you have ever heard or read? And more importantly WHY? Because there is a lot of common wisdom out there that is:  just not true. or does not work how you would expect or not for everyone. So without further ado, here are the experts telling you how it really is!"

"(most) individuals use the Internet as the primary text for reading, writing, socializing, and communicating. Think about the last time you were talking with friends and someone couldn't remember a basic fact. How long did it take for someone to pull out a cell phone and search for it online? The Internet has provided for us a common text that individuals globally can use to learn, socialize, and communicate. What does it really mean when we use the Internet in our literacy-based practices? What knowledge, skills, and dispositions do we need to build in our students? The Internet is a literacy issue, not a tech issue"

"At Harvard Business School, we're getting disrupted by online learning," Christensen said recently at the World Business Forum in New York City. "It truly isn't as good, but does this technology, over time, get good enough to meet the needs of our customers? The answer is yes."

"How does knowledge grow? Sometimes it begins with one insight and grows into many branches; other times it grows as a complex and interconnected network. Infographics expert Manuel Lima explores the thousand-year history of mapping data - from languages to dynasties - using trees and networks of information. It's a fascinating history of visualizations, and a look into humanity's urge to map what we know."

"Legitimate research has determined that student evaluations of professors are biased, and so their "customer ratings" aren't fair. Legitimate research also indicates that while professorial popularity and effectiveness do overlap, one does not immediately signify or correlate with the other. Further, most students don't actually view themselves as customers, because they know how education works and actually want to get one."

"publication still wins the biggest prizes in academe. The demand for it is largely unexamined (we want it because everyone else does), and almost entirely unchecked (just look at how much graduate students need to publish just to be considered for a tenure-track job). It's not that teaching doesn't matter, but even many community colleges are looking for publication these days. It's the only credential that crosses institutional boundaries, so it's the easiest one for institutions to brag on."

"Do you know the actual theories of learning? A learning theory is an attempt to describe how people learn, helping us understand this inherently complex process. There's sub-levels of each theory, behavior and other categories … it's complex. But it's worth understanding. This helpful infographic does a solid job of breaking down the basics of learning theories in a visual and understandable format. I personally enjoy the part about connectivism in the digital age. "

The reason is that the top universities do not offer the best teaching and learning experiences. Instead, their faculty members are incentivized heavily to focus on research at the expense of teaching. If a professor seeking tenure at one of these institutions receives a teaching award, it is often said that that professor has just received the kiss of death for her tenure hopes. If students learn at these institutions, it's often not because the teaching is so good, but because the students are so talented that they can absorb anything thrown at them (and it's worth noting that just because a professor is entertaining, does not mean it's a good learning experience).

"Of the various professional development opportunities available, social media reigned supreme as the most popular way for educators to keep themselves up to speed on current issues in the education world. And while the report does note, "Most survey participants were pooled from social media websites, resulting in a sampling bias," other sources of information educators use to stay afloat extend beyond social media--Internet search, blogs, academic/education conferences, and news articles all topped 70% (see graph to the right)."

"Scapple is an easy-to-use tool for getting ideas down as quickly as possible and making connections between them. It isn't exactly mind-mapping software-it's more like a freeform text editor that allows you to make notes anywhere on the page and to connect them using straight dotted lines or arrows. If you've ever scribbled down ideas all over a piece of paper and drawn lines between related thoughts, then you already know what Scapple does."