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Collaboration is key to establishing an effective learning environment. The teacher and the students share the responsibility of creating an environment where optimal learning can take place. Students are often unaware how their behaviors do or don't contribute to learning. Teachers may not be aware how they need to modify their own behavior to meet their students' needs. Teachers and students need to work together in identifying the characteristics of an effective learning environment and then in making their shared vision of the classroom a reality.

Author Bernard Luskin indicates that most of today's literature refers to the physical changes in technology but as we learn more about human behavior and how people learn, it will dramatically impact the way we teach globally. The author provides 'key takeaways' from the article which all relate to media literacy. He explains that this new 'exploding' environment will impact the future of learning for all levels of education as the media, learning psychology, technologies become popular tools for learning. As we learn more from research and studies about media and how it relates to human behavior, it will increase the effectiveness of the ways technology is used in education. The author states that the 'big "E" is for "exciting, energetic, engaging, extended learning". He explains that E learning has and will continue to grow as a key in media literacy and the way people learn, study, individual behavior in society, and products that are produced. This interest in technology, media, communications and how humans learn has actually developed a new field of study, Media Psychology. The author supports the need for people to enter this field and recommends that we learn what e-learning is about and go beyond the electronic gizmos and gadgets.

The exploding new media and communications environment has implications for the future of both K-12 and adult learning as media, technology, and learning psychology increasingly become tools for learning in and outside the classroom. The new research area of media studies, i.e., the study of media effects, includes media psychology because an understanding of human behavior is vital to the effective use of technology in education.

An Interesting article that focuses mainly on good Communication practices for online courses. However, having good "communication tools" is simply good practice in any learning environment. Having the right tools and using them in the right learning environment promotes Higher Order Thinking, building these skills is essential to success.

Offers strategies for creating and managing project-based learning environments. Emphasizes active learning environments based on authentic tasks, inquiry and feedback.

"Kurt Wootton, co-author of A Reason to Read. "In my view, the repetition must not come before allowing students to participate in the creative tasks, but rather repeated practice walks side-by-side with the creative process."" I find this statement to "hit the nail on the head" as the debate between rote memory and creative "aha" moments continue. The analogy of the musician practicing for hours playing scales as well as note for note renditions of other's work is appropriate to this discussion. The book, "Outliers",by Malcolm Gladwell, addresses the 10,000 hour rule. To paraphrase; To become world class at anything, it takes 10,000 hours of focused practice. The author's examples range from Bill Gates to The Beatles. When two sides are set up as an US vs THEM debate, it misses the oppoprtunity to combine perfect practice with creative inspiration. Putting together a perfect meal is based on proper choices of various food combinations. Putting together a perfect learning environment is very similar in that a combination of repetitive learning and creative opportunity helps the learning as well as creative process.

"Kurt Wootton, co-author of A Reason to Read. "In my view, the repetition must not come before allowing students to participate in the creative tasks, but rather repeated practice walks side-by-side with the creative process."" I find this statement to "hit the nail on the head" as the debate between rote memory and creative "aha" moments continue. The analogy of the musician practicing for hours playing scales as well as note for note renditions of other's work is appropriate to this discussion. The book, "Outliers",by Malcolm Gladwell, addresses the 10,000 hour rule. To paraphrase; To become world class at anything, it takes 10,000 hours of focused practice. The author's examples range from Bill Gates to The Beatles. When two sides are set up as an US vs THEM debate, it misses the oppoprtunity to combine perfect practice with creative inspiration. Putting together a perfect meal is based on proper choices of various food combinations. Putting together a perfect learning environment is very similar in that a combination of repetitive learning and creative opportunity helps the learning as well as creative process.

This is an academic paper examining the reasons why an online learning group should 'move ... from cohort to community.' (abstract), and how students resources and strategies may be managed to accomplish this. The paper asserts that students in a distance learning situation are isolated from each other and the teacher, therefore it is of vital importance that the cohort needs to create a sense of community rather than simply exist alone in the virtual learning room. The article quotes Vygotsky's social development theory of 1978, Selznik's seven elements of community: history, identity, mutuality, plurality, autonomy, participation, and integration (1996), and how the author's of the article modified the characteristics to conform more with current online learning theory. I found this article particularly relevant to the current situation I find myself in. Even though I am happy in my own space and don't need the close interaction with others, I can see that it is important to push myself forward in the sense of gleaning the most benefit from the course and those many intelligent people out there. This is difficult for me because I find the time necessary to maintain so many contacts, and actually have something worthwhile to say and share goes against my slow, ponderous thinking and non-gregarious nature!

Author -Dan Ponterfract proposes a new Model for education in which student collaboration is the "default behavior". Learning is done " at any point in time, through any medium, and at any location", and curriculum focuses on the "community of learning". This article presents educators with the ABCs necessary to transform our system into a 21st century learning environment.

As more and more students learn in a virtual classroom, teachers need more facilitation skills that work in an online learning environment. This article provides teachers with some practical online facilitating strategies and how to use many features to keep students engaged in learning.

Many educators are looking for more outside the box methods to learning and understanding. Many teachers have tried implementing more technology inside the classroom or tried to create a more blended classroom. This article shows another method of instruction that brings higher order of thinking and that is using games to differentiate instruction. Our students have been playing games since they were no more than 2 years old. Why not implement a learning method that they are already accustomed to. This has transformed classroom learning into a more interactive learning style that has shown great success. The articles talks about the importance of moving your lessons to the students strengths so why not lean them towards what they know best? Using games for higher learning is no different then a classroom review. It is no different then a quiz. The only difference is that it is more interactive and it is electronic. This style of high order thinking or critical thinking creates a learning environment that is geared to challenge the students in a way that they want to be challenged.

This article suggests how to use Web 2.0 tools to assess students in the digital age. The article has many useful links. I wish that the examples of the actual rubrics were larger. Overall, I found the article to quite helpful.

How do we assess students' learning in these in Web 2.0 environments? We want to go beyond assessing the mere mechanics of using these tools; unfortunately, most current rubrics for Web 2.0 learning devote only a minuscule amount (usually 16% or less) to actual student academic learning.

This article is about standards-based learning and 21st century skills. How to improve student learning through teacher's decisions and technology. He has a excellent list of rubrics Web 2.0 tools. Some examples "rubrics" are......Wiki/Blog, Images/Photo/Flickr, Video/YouTube,Podcast, Social Bookmarking, Twitter, Videoconferencing, General Assessment: Prensky's 21st century skills, General Assessment: enGauge's 21st century skills, General Assessment: Partnership for 21st century skills. I really liked the links and rubrics and found them very helpful. However the rubrics were small and a little hard to read.

Taking a risk means that failure is an option. Many students may see taking a risk as a negative. If we want students to take risks, we must not only create an environment that encourages students to take risks, but makes risk taking seem like the best option.

This article talks about how to encourage students to take risks in the classroom. These "risks" can range from just questioning to imagining to trying out something new. This is a very important higher order thinking skill that many students have trouble comprehending and acting on because they would rather stick with what they know (or what they think will get them the highest grade). I think the ideas in the article can be applied to high school classrooms as well as college classrooms.

A great article about helping students be more creative by incorporating risk-taking activities in the classroom. Create an environment where taking risks are rewarded. Also start with small risk-taking activities and build up into more complex ones.

What is adaptive learning, and how can it be used in a flipped classroom? A look at adaptive learning in a developmental writing flipped classroom.

"...actual career readiness requires an even more rigorous blend of academic, technical and employability skills, and the ability to apply these skills in authentic environments." Research and support of benefits of online learning for ALL students

eSchool News presents the dilemma with the growing trends in online learning. Communication is key in the classroom and online/virtual teachers must possess the special skills necessary to enhance the learning process in the virtual environment.

Very interesting article. I think a lot of teachers diving into online teaching are not prepared for, or are surprised at, the intense level of communication required. Frequent concise feedback to students is the key. This article does a solid job at communicating this. Thanks for sharing it.

A scientific study of the educational practicality of online education versus conventional face-to-face, brick and mortar environments. Issues of retention as well as escalated drop-out rates for online education are evaluated.

Six technologies that soon could be in your classrooms Game-based learning, personalized learning environments, augmented reality are coming soon, says a new ed-tech report Looking into educational technology's crystal ball for the fourth time, the annual Horizon Report for K-12 education has listed six emerging technologies that schools are likely to adopt in the near future. How much of these are key components to your school?

This article shows how students will be using their creative thinking in order to learn the curriculum. Ideas like game based learning and augmented reality is not only reaching diverse learners but requires a creative mind.

This article just states the importance of these tools and why we should all be using these technologies in our classroom.

An intriguing article delineating several useful methods to bring online classrooms to life. While text and self-teaching methods were the way of the past, we now have a multitude of means to engage the student both visually and audibly via an incredible assortment of tools and resources just brimming with creative potential.

Using online math course as the example, this article provides teachers and students with a lot of technology tools to create a rich online learning and problem-solving environment. With these digital tools, students get more engaged in learning and become more creative thinking. It's a good reference for subject teachers.

This article asks how we teach students the tools to learn how to talk, read, write, and think online. It mentions many of the media literacy tools presented in one of our readings.

Westside High School has extended learning after the school bell has rung. Teachers and parents encourage creativity and productivity to meet the needs of every student in a 24/7 learning environment. Technology is used to promote educational activities that meet students' unique needs. Communication is supported through podcasts, tweets, ipods, ipads, flip cameras and video technologies. Media literacy is enhanced by tech integration.

This article about Blended Learning where some of the course is taken face-to-face and other parts strictly in an online environment - this is a new wave in teaching and another option for increasing information literacy for students at all levels of education from Elementary School to College!

Ben Miller, a teacher at the University of New South Wales, wanted his students to build learning materials for his course. He decided a wiki was the best platform to capture the group's work over the semester. Ben chose to create his wiki on UNSW's Wikispaces Private Label site as it gave his students a university-branded environment for their academic work. Students loved the wiki and after several weeks, were building most of the content for the site - summarizing theories on free speech, arguing their viewpoints, and highlighting censorship cases that they wanted to further explore. The final product was a rich body of knowledge that helped the students prepare for their end-of-year exam. We encourage you to check out this wiki and listen to Ben's discussion about his wiki project.