Academic and Emerging Technology

adaptive learning platform

Dreambox allows instructors to create systems that will adapt material for students depending on their performance. 

Knewton is an adaptive learning platform designed for education, with students progress in subjects as the primary goal. 

University of Washington tool built on Kuali to help students plan their academic careers. 

An open source financial suit for universities. The suit has student, financial, HR, Library and other systems that can be used. 

Open source student academic planning software

Open source student academic planning software

An article of the future potential of web literacy

This is a tool to create ad hoc twitter style backchannel rooms. Only people with the link can join the room. Rooms auto expire from 2 hours to one year.

Here is a sample contract that can be adapted for your classes. Contracts are very useful to inform students of your expectations and to have something to refer back to for those problem students that think nothing applies to them. 

An article about using students blogs in class. 

An article about peer-to-peer feedback in the classroom

Why wait for a formal workshop environment to start improving your teaching craft, when there are so many opportunities to build your network and learn new skills on your own? We've compiled a list of the best resources for do-it-yourself PD to get you started.

Edutopia's tech integration review explores some of the vast body of research out there and helps you navigate useful results.

Video about using Moodle in MFL courses

This article shows how to engage students and improve learning and comprehension of subject material, without the traditional lecture.  I will need a little latitude with this article and the assignment of social media in the classroom. This article does not focus on the use of social media but explains how systems can be used to prime students prior to coming to class and at the same time inform the instructor what areas students are having difficulties with at the time.  This is great because instructors and students do not have to go over information that has already been learned. Social media can be the vehicles used for this type of communication. 

Here are some great resources to get you inspired about teaching the 21 century learner

An article about using Web 2.0 tools in  language classrooms