Group items tagged

"Students, while they may be savvy smart-phone, tablet, and/or computer users, may not be prepared for the particular challenge of college level learning in the online environment. Colleges can easily include these resources in existing online courses and learning environments."

"At rOpenSci we are creating packages that allow access to data repositories through the R statistical programming environment that is already a familiar part of the workflow of many scientists. Our tools not only facilitate drawing data into an environment where it can readily be manipulated, but also one in which those analyses and methods can be easily shared, replicated, and extended by other researchers."

"The findings of this study indicated that when teachers described their successful practices, they often linked them to their changing roles and new representation of their "selves" within an online environment. Their portrayal of the teacher self, both built on a plethora of previous experiences and reformed with the affordances and limitations of the online environment, went through a process whereby teachers were constantly challenged to make themselves heard, known, and felt by their students. This study showed that it was critical to listen to teachers' voices and give them a participatory role in the creation and use of their knowledge and experience in order to form their online teacher personas. As a result, programs that prepare faculty to teach online may need to encourage teachers to reflect on their past experiences, assumptions, and beliefs toward learning and teaching and transform their perspectives by engaging in pedagogical inquiry and problem solving."

"Intellectual skills, in contrast, have to do with a person's ways of reasoning, hypothesizing, exploring, understanding, and, in general, making sense of the world.  Every child is, by nature, an intellectual being--a curious, sense-making person, who is continuously seeking to understand his or her physical and social environments.  Each child is born with such skills and develops them further, in his or her own ways, through observing, exploring, playing, and questioning.  Attempts to teach intellectual skills directly inevitably fail, because each child must develop them in his or her own way, through his or her own self-initiated activities.  But adults can influence that development through the environments they provide.  "

"The Science through Technology Enhanced Play project (STEP) engages 6-8 year old students in a series of playful inquiry activities situated within a Augmented Reality environment. Tested at two schools and across two very different science topics-states of matter and the complex system of honey bee pollination-we have pioneered a new way for young students to engage in scientific inquiry and modeling in developmentally appropriate ways that breaks the mold of one-student-one computer. The big idea of STEP is to engage young children in an activity they are experts at, socio-dramatic play, in such a way that play becomes a form of scientific modeling and collective inquiry."

Excellent! Sharing with faculty colleagues.

"The Science of Online Discussions Our working knowledge regarding distance education suggests that productive discussions are essential to learning in an asynchronous online environment. Online discussions effectively take the place of face-to-face classroom discussion. It has even been suggested that, if well facilitated, online discussions may allow for more in-depth and thoughtful learning than is possible in a face-to-face setting (Hawkes, 2006). Gao, Wang, and Sun (2009) contend that in a productive online discussion, it is essential for participants to embrace the following four dispositions:"

It's a bit insane to me this was a conversation but it's one that ought to happen much more. Are we practicing what we preach? "One of my undergrads came up to me and said, 'You know, Professor, your ideas about games as models for learning environments are really interesting, but I'm curious, why don't you teach your class following those ideas?'" Mr. Fishman says. "And I thought, Well, that's a really excellent question."

"The Formation by Design Project is a learner-centered and evidence-centered approach to reinventing our institutions around whole person development and doing so in ways that are thoroughly responsive to the emerging learning ecosystem that characterizes this moment in history-the increasingly data-rich environment that, while enabling personalization and customization of learning, at the same time risks de-centering and dis-empowering learners. The Project engages internal and external stakeholders in a process of defining, designing, and measuring formation of the individual within the context of higher education." h/t Shelly Fowler

The primary audience for this book is college faculty and graduate students interested in quality teaching in blended learning environments. The secondary audience is education technology professionals, instructional designers, teaching and learning developers, and instructional aides - all those involved in the design and development of the media and materials for blended learning.

The Kress Foundation funded research to help clarify perceptions on digital scholarship and art history! I can only imagine the creative community being equally aghast and confused about earth art, conceptual art and performance art (among others). Wild to think about. We keep marching forward. "The findings reveal disagreements in the art history community about the value of digital research, teaching, and scholarship. Those who believe in the potential of digital art history feel it will open up new avenues of inquiry and scholarship, allow greater access to art historical information, provide broader dissemination of scholarly research, and enhance undergraduate and graduate teaching. Those who are skeptical doubt that new forms of art historical scholarship will emerge from the digital environment. They remain unconvinced that digital art history will offer new research opportunities or that it will allow them to conduct their research in new and different ways."

"As we venture into the 21st century, we as a society, are faced with more innovation and challenge than ever before. We now live in an interconnected world, where the Internet and global communications are simultaneously uniting and isolating us as a society. How do we raise critical thinkers to best face the challenges that face our modern society? What changes in education methods should be implemented to  create a better learning environment for these budding minds? "

"But imagine for a moment that you didn't have to rely on maps to navigate the unknown-that your memory, instincts, and knowledge of the environment sufficed. This is the art of Polynesian wayfinding." The metaphor breaks down but I think it's close to navigation vs maps . . . skills & understanding vs step by step. One is a path to freedom- the other a kind of shackle masquerading . . .

The following pages give you suggestions for when and how to use music during your teaching or training. With these techniques, you, the teacher, can orchestrate a classroom environment that is rich and resonant-- and provide learners with a symphony of learning opportunities and a sound education!

"Medium does a lot of things well. Its easy-to-use interface for composing blog posts creates a clean, distraction-free environment for the reader. But one thing it doesn't do well is audio. Music, radio shows, and podcasts aren't a featured part of the product. London-based developer Roman Mittermayr put together MediumSounds so he could mash together what he liked about the Medium design with the musical content he posts to SoundCloud. His creation adds a missing element to what Medium offers - a way for sound to be a main feature, not just an embedded part of the post."

"In this seven-part series, TIME looks back over the past 12 months to identify some of the ways of seeing-whether conceptually, aesthetically or through dissemination-that have grabbed our attention and been influential in maintaining photography's relevance in an ever shifting environment, media landscape, and culture now ruled by images."

"Distributed cognition is a theory of mind that argues that cognition does not occur exclusively in individual brains but is distributed across an environment - an interlocking system consisting of tools, persons, and specific knowledge and tasks. One of the insights of this approach was to recognize that the deep interconnections of these cognitive ecologies have a profound impact on how people use and understand tools. As Edwin Hutchins puts it, a tool that is "easy to use" is simply a tool that fits into a particular cognitive ecology."

"Product designer Eben Bayer reveals his recipe for a new, fungus-based packaging material that protects fragile stuff like furniture, plasma screens - and the environment."

"Stephen Downes, a co-creator of the first Connectivist learning environments, offers an even more radical framing: he argues that the content is a MacGuffin, the plot device in a Hitchcock movie that starts the story but ultimately proves unimportant. "