ALT Lab

"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."

"Why wipe the slate clean? Why erase such knowledge? Why not use it as a foundation to build upon?"

"Robots may replace me as a journalist, but English teachers can rest assured that machines have a long way to go to before being able to offer quality feedback. "

Boom!

"Teaching at the university level is not a practice of communicating or transferring information but awakening in students a desire to think by revealing to them the questionability of things."

"For example, Jaclyn is the underlying reason that I've had something of a change of heart about online classes. While I've been making a substantial contribution to my daughter's tuition and living expenses, Jaclyn decided in her sophomore year to get a job so that she could afford to move off campus and live a little better than she would if she stayed in the dorms. In the process, she took some online classes that fit her work schedule better than the traditional courses. Before my daughter started college, I couldn't see much reason for students at a bricks-and-mortar college to take online classes. Now I realize why those courses make so much sense for students who work - either out of necessity or by choice. It was Jaclyn who made it very clear to me that some online courses are much better than others. Good online classes have taught her much more than bad survey courses in the traditional format with 400 students in them. Her experiences were what inspired me to create what I hope will be a quality online class of my own."

Nice application of network analysis to literary/film studies.

Fun with Twitter and video!

"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."

"Yet on the level of thinking of our Silicon Valley overlords, aspects of my cognitive abilities that are absolutely central to my educational success are taken to have literally no value at all. In educational research, perhaps the greatest danger lies in thinking "that which I cannot measure is not real." The disruption fetishists have amplified this danger, now evincing the attitude "teaching that cannot be said to lead to the immediate acquisition of rote, mechanical skills has no value." But absolutely every aspect of my educational journey - as a student, as a teacher, and as a researcher - demonstrates the folly of this approach to learning." True I think but echoed to greater and lesser extend by the educational system which helped create those who run Silicon Valley. h/t Dan Meyer