education - Learning Ecosystems

Michigan flags 112 low-performing schools for intensive intervention — from mlive.com by Matthew Miller

Excerpt:

“These are the urban high minority districts, right? So they were the ones that had the highest death rates, the highest case rates, the highest income and economic hits because of the pandemic,” she said. “We know that all of this goes into what we label as school quality even though it’s about so much more than the school or the district.”

The full list is here >>

From DSC:
I surely hope that what’s going on in the image below isn’t what’s going on within the state of Michigan (as well as other states) — but I have my fears/concerns in that regard. Though admittedly, my focus here isn’t so much about the financial pictures, but rather it has to do with the straight-jacketing of the teachers and students by legislators in Lansing (and other state capitals). If I were to redraw this image, I would have legislators in (far-away) Lansing seated in comfortable chairs and offices while frazzled/overworked educators are straight-jacketed in the classrooms.

We have too many standardized tests and too many one-size-fits-all methods of “doing school” that aren’t coming from the people on the front lines. Those same people, given the right environment, could unleash a far greater amount of joy, wonder, relevance, creativity, and counsel — for themselves as well as for their students.
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The ‘Digital Equity’ Students Need to Learn May Not Come Without Community Outreach — from edsurge.com by Daniel Mollenkamp

Excerpt:

And that means, more than ever, getting an education requires access to fast, reliable internet. But while the infrastructure to make sure that everyone can use the internet has improved in the last couple of years, the process isn’t complete.

If we want to keep the digital divide from growing, experts say, it’ll mean districts thinking about themselves as just one part of the larger community composed of families, nonprofits, businesses—all of them potential partners in expanding internet access for students.

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Missing an Opportunity: Ed Dept. Criticized by GAO for Teacher Shortage Strategy — from the74million.org by Marianna McMurdock
In recent report, GAO finds key recruitment, retention challenges impacting the profession, and why current federal strategy lacks teeth to succeed

Excerpt:

The challenge of cost of entry into the profession and concerns of return on investment, the GAO report found, is also significantly straining the country’s supply of teachers. Compounding the financial reality, many candidates fear being overworked and mistreated.

“The COVID-19 pandemic laid bare teachers’ discontent with aspects of their jobs, including a lack of support for their safety and value as professionals and an increasingly disrespectful and demanding workplace culture—and exacerbated teacher shortages nationwide,” the GAO stated, pulling data from focus groups held throughout the pandemic.

Global Education Market to reach $10 Trillion by 2030 — from holoniq.com

Excerpt:

The global education market is set to reach at least $10T by 2030 as population growth in developing markets fuels a massive expansion and technology drives unprecedented re-skilling and up-skilling in developed economies. The next decade will see an additional 350 million post secondary graduates and nearly 800 million more K12 graduates than today. Asia and Africa are the driving force behind the expansion. The world needs to add 1.5 million teachers per year on average, approaching 100 million in total in order to keep pace with the unprecedented changes ahead in education around the world.

New Report from Global Google Research Project Considers the ‘Future of Education’ [Kuykendall]

On 12/06/2022, in education, future, Google, K-12 related, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, trends, United States, youth, by Daniel Christian

New Report from Global Google Research Project Considers the ‘Future of Education’ — from thejournal.com by Kristal Kuykendall
Global Trends and ‘Preparing for the Future’ Highlighted in First of Three Reports

As we march towards a radically different future, what should the role of education be and how might it look? To begin to answer this question, we collaborated with research partner Canvas8 to conduct a global study in 24 countries that synthesizes insights from 94 educational experts, two years of peer-reviewed academic literature, and a media narrative analysis across the education sector.

Excerpts:

Google for Education has released the first report from a massive, two-year study considering the role of education in a “radically different future,” and what that might look like.

Part 1 of Google’s Future of Education report focuses on big-picture themes seen as most likely to impact education and the future workforce in the coming years and decades.
…
Parts two and three of the Future of Education project will be released in the coming months, said Magiera, who was a K–12 classroom teacher for a decade in New York City and Chicago before working as a district leader, a chief information officer, and as an advisor for the Obama administration’s ed tech planning efforts. Part two will focus on “evolving how we teach and learn” and part three will be about “reimagining the learning ecosystems and the spaces,” she said.

Reimagining Learning Ecosystems -- by Google for Education

‘Press Play’ Isn’t a Teaching Strategy: Why Educators Need New Methods for Video — from edsurge.com by Reed Dickson

Excerpt:

As I prepared to teach my first educational videography course earlier this year, I found that we lacked a common vocabulary for talking about how we design learning with video in mind. Since then, I’ve been advancing the term “video paratext” to reflect the myriad ways that we design educational guidance, prompts, activities or interactive elements to surround or be included within a video.

I pulled the word “paratext” from the field of poetry translation because, personally, I love the “paratext” that precedes or follows a poem—or even interrupts it. At poetry readings in particular, I lean into the words that a poet shares before or after reading each poem. Paratext helps me connect with and make sense of the poem.

Likewise, I ask educators to consider how to help students connect with videos through various prompts and activities that surround, or are included within, the video.” Might such “paratext” inspire students to take a closer look at a video they’ve watched, the way I might want to reread a poem to see how it works or what it means?

Resources for Teachers of Psychology — from teachpsych.org; with thanks to Christine Renner for this resource

Excerpt:

The Society for the Teaching of Psychology (STP) curates and distributes teaching and advising materials to all teachers of psychology (e.g., 4-year instructors, 2-year instructors, and high-school teachers). The resources available below are documents that can pertain to any aspect of teaching. (NOTE: Syllabi have their own listings under Project Syllabus.)

Instructors have generously shared classroom activities, annotated bibliographies, film guides, lab manuals, advising aids, textbook compendiums, and much more. Notations indicate those that developed from Instructional Resource Awards.

Strategies for Teaching Quantitative Concepts Online — from facultyecommons.com

Excerpt:

Collaborative learning is particularly helpful in statistics education. Technology can facilitate and promote collaborative exploration and inquiry allowing students to generate their own knowledge of a concept or new method in a constructivist learning environment. Group interactions have an important role in questioning and critiquing individual perspectives in a mutually supportive fashion so that a clear understanding of statistical concepts energy and knowledge of statistical ideas develops. Research has shown that it is important to discuss the output and results with the students and require them to provide explanations and justifications for the conclusions they draw from the output and to be able to communicate their conclusions effectively.

Worksheet to WOW: 10 ways to upgrade your worksheet — from ditchthattextbook.com by Matt Miller

Excerpt:

Can we turn a worksheet into a “WOW” experience?

We’re about to find out! Here are 10 ways your classroom technology can help transform your worksheet to “WOW” …

Which Blended Learning Model Should I Use? — from catlintucker.com by Dr. Catlin Tucker

Excerpts:

I get this question all the time in coaching and training sessions! First, let’s be clear about the definition of blended learning.

Blended learning is the combination of active, engaged learning online with active, engaged learning offline to provide students with more control over the time, place, pace, and path of their learning.

Creating Classroom Camaraderie to Promote Learning: 3 Strategies — from scholarlyteacher.com by Donna Downs

Key Statement: Intentionally developing a welcoming classroom environment increases student engagement and cultivates meaningful classroom relationships.

Keywords: engagement, motivation, relationship

Although researchers suggest flipped classrooms, engaging humor, and online polling, I have found taking a more personal approach to engagement to be successful, specifically the following three guidelines: show your human side, share your professional experiences and wisdom, and admit your mistakes.

Somewhat related:

How to Receive Feedback With a Growth Mindset — from neuroleadership.com by the NeuroLeadership Institute

Excerpt:

A growth mindset can help us view feedback as a good thing, which ultimately makes performance reviews more effective. After all, we want to learn, grow, and improve our skills. People with a fixed mindset view criticism as an attack on their self-worth. Growth mindset, by contrast, leaves room for the possibility that we all have blind spots — and that your manager may have valuable insights on how you can hone your skills. Feedback, in other words, isn’t personal. A manager may critique our performance, but a growth mindset helps keep us from tying our performance to our identity.

Understanding the Overlap Between UDL and Digital Accessibility — from boia.org

Excerpt:

Implementing UDL with a Focus on Accessibility
UDL is a proven methodology that benefits all students, but when instructors embrace universal design, they need to consider how their decisions will affect students with disabilities.

Some key considerations to keep in mind:

Instructional materials should not require a certain type of sensory perception.
A presentation that includes images should have accurate alternative text (also called alt text) for those images.
Transcripts and captions should be provided for all audio content.
Color alone should not be used to convey information, since some students may not perceive color (or have different cultural understandings of colors).
Student presentations should also follow accessibility guidelines. This increases the student’s workload, but it’s an excellent opportunity to teach the importance of accessibility.

How High School Should Change for an Era of AI and Robots — from edsurge.com by Jeffrey R. Young

Excerpt:

In other words, we have for the last century and a half in the knowledge economy been educating our students to become repositories of information—whether they’re lawyers or doctors [or engineers] and so forth. And then somebody pays them a great deal of money to extract some of that knowledge from their heads. What’s happening now is that’s being reposited in algorithms increasingly, and that’s only going to be more the case going forward, so that the most intelligent, capable medical diagnostician, I predict, will be a computer somewhere in the next 20 years.

What is the role of the doctor then? The doctor’s role is to be a knowledgeable interpreter of that algorithmic diagnosis—to check it, to make sure that there wasn’t a snafu, and to make sure that there is no social bias in the outcome. And also to help interpret that into a regimen for treatment and healing on the part of the patient in a human-connected, empathic way.

And [at Iowa Big], one of the very first questions that one of her teachers asked her was, ‘What makes you mad?’
…
The systems that we have for public education are becoming more rigidified, not more experimental and resilient. And they’re becoming increasingly non-functional. And I believe they’re going to face some sort of systemic collapse.

And here are several other items from the education space:

All Teacher Shortages Are Local, New Research Finds — from the74million.org by Kevin Mahnken
In a study released [on 12/1/22], researchers show that teacher vacancy levels vary drastically between schools in the same communities

Excerpt:

K-12 teacher shortages — one of the most disputed questions in education policy today — are an undeniable reality in some communities, a newly released study indicates. But they are also a hyper-local phenomenon, the authors write, with fully staffed schools existing in close proximity to those that struggle to hire and retain teachers.

The paper, circulated Thursday through Brown University’s Annenberg Institute for School Reform, uses a combination of survey responses and statewide administrative records from Tennessee to create a framework for identifying how and where teacher shortages emerge.

Why Are Americans Fleeing Public Schools? — from washingtonpost.com by John D. Harden and Steven Johnson
Seven parents on choosing private education for their kids

Excerpt:

The pandemic transformed the landscape of K-12 education. Some parents withdrew their kids from public school and placed them into private or home schools. Their reasons varied: Many preferred private schools that offered in-person instruction; others distrusted public schools’ pandemic precautions.

It’s not clear whether those trends will stick, and the factors are complex. So far, data show that since 2019, private enrollment is up, public enrollment is down and home schooling has become more popular. Families flocked to private and home schools at the greatest rate in a decade, according to American Community Survey estimates from the U.S. Census. The government projects that K-12 public school enrollment — already facing demographic pressures — will drop further to about 46 million students by fall 2030, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, reversing decades of growth.

Education is key to tackle prevalent challenges. I’m excited to join the European Education Summit in Brussels today to share insight on future-proofing our education systems. #EduSummitEU pic.twitter.com/4H9ZO45HT9

— Eva Keiffenheim (@Evti) December 1, 2022

Mississippi microschools are expanding education options for families — from spn.org by Kerry McDonald

Excerpt:

When Stephanie Harper decided to open Harper Learning Academy in Byram, Mississippi in August, her goal was to create a small, personalized educational setting in which her daughter would thrive. Conventional classroom environments weren’t a good match for Harper’s child. They also weren’t working well for the daughter of Harper’s colleague, Tekeeta Funchess. Harper and Funchess had been longtime teachers in the Jackson Public Schools before they left their jobs to provide educational consulting services to public school districts through the firm Harper founded in 2016.

As they worked together, they realized their daughters were experiencing similar challenges in standard school settings. “We’re mothers with children who learn differently who are trying to improve the system but realized that the system wasn’t working for our children,” said Harper, who is a certified teacher with a Ph.D. in education. They also suspected it wasn’t working for many other children as well.

Resources for Computer Science Education Week (December 5-11, 2022)

On 12/01/2022, in career development, computer science, education, human-computer interaction (HCI), K-12 related, programming, STEAM-related, vendors, youth, by Daniel Christian

Resources for Computer Science Education Week (December 5-11, 2022) — with thanks to Mark Adams for these resources

Per Mark, here are a few resources that are intended to show students how computers can become part of their outside interests as well as in their future careers.

Educating Engineers

A Guide to STEM Activities for Kids
https://educatingengineers.com/resources/stem-activities-for-kids/#Holiday_STEM_Activities_for_Kids

Maryville University

What Is Computer Science? An Introduction to a Limitless Industry
https://online.maryville.edu/online-bachelors-degrees/computer-science/resources/what-is-computer-science/
Online Math Tools for Students
https://online.maryville.edu/blog/math-tools-and-resources-for-students/

Fullstack Academy

How Much Do Coders Make? Salary Potential & Career Outlook
https://www.fullstackacademy.com/blog/how-much-do-coders-make

Also see:

Homeschooling high school with interest-led learning — from raisinglifelonglearners.com by Colleen Kessler

Excerpt:

There is a misconception that interest-led learning is not appropriate for a high school education in your homeschool. The good news is that all the same benefits of interest-led learning still apply in the middle and high school years.
…
Think of an interest-led homeschool as one that functions more as a college than a high school. Just as a college student declares a major and the bulk of their study is in that topic area with supplemental general education, your interest-led high school can function the same way.

Allowing interests to guide the educational path you take in your high school has tremendous benefits including:

- Less resistance
- Less learner anxiety
- Increased self-confidence in learning
- More in-depth studies in topics of interest
- Self-motivated learning that can be applied in later college and career settings

“10 Must Read Books for Learning Designers” [Garg] + “10 must-read tech books for 2023” [Sanders]

On 11/29/2022, in adjunct faculty, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning, Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, colleges, community colleges, computer science, corporate universities / corporate training, data mining, education, emerging technologies, ethics, faculty, future, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), instructional design, K-12 related, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, learning theories, memory, Microsoft, pedagogy, personalized/customized learning, productivity / tips and tricks, research, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, technology (general), training / L&D, universities, by Daniel Christian

10 Must Read Books for Learning Designers — from linkedin.com by Amit Garg

Excerpt:

From the 45+ #books that I’ve read in last 2 years here are my top 10 recommendations for #learningdesigners or anyone in #learninganddevelopment

Speaking of recommended books (but from a more technical perspective this time), also see:

10 must-read tech books for 2023 — from enterprisersproject.com by Katie Sanders (Editorial Team)
Get new thinking on the technologies of tomorrow – from AI to cloud and edge – and the related challenges for leaders

Empty Classrooms, Abandoned Kids: Inside America’s Great Teacher Resignation [Walton & Pollock]

On 11/29/2022, in career development, Design Thinking, education, education reform, K-12 related, staying relevant, student-related, teachers, UK, United States, youth, by Daniel Christian

Empty Classrooms, Abandoned Kids: Inside America’s Great Teacher Resignation— from nytimes.com; video by Agnes Walton and Nic Pollock

Excerpt:

A survey of National Education Association members at the beginning of the year revealed an unsettling truth: More than half of the respondents said they were looking for a way out. That’s an astounding number of unhappy teachers. If they all quit, it would leave millions of students in the lurch.

But were these just empty threats? At the start of this school year, we spoke to over 50 educators in almost 20 states to find out. The picture they painted was far bleaker than we could have imagined: Empty classrooms, kids in crisis, and teachers who can’t survive another day on the job — that’s the reality of American education today.

And from the UK, see the following:
The word OUCH! comes to my mind here — for this item from the UK and from the above item from the US. The politicians are going to need to back off and let the teachers do their jobs. Or we may not have many people who want to go into teaching anymore. The current situation is not only bad for the teachers, it’s bad for the youth/students.

Learning in the brain — from sites.google.com by Efrat Furst; with thanks to 3-Star Learning Experiences for this resource

Excerpts:

Think of working memory as the reception counter to a huge archive.

To summarize, working memory processing resources are highly limited, and yet meaningful processing is essential for storage in long-term memory. It is therefore important to use these resources effectively when learning. There are many tested and proven effective teaching strategies, but a question that often comes up is when to apply each strategy for the best results?

Learning in the brain- not new, but newly updated:
long-term memory, working memory, interactions, and related strategies –https://t.co/mtxr74egz4 pic.twitter.com/oPC6sUYlXy

— Efrat Furst (@EfratFurst) March 6, 2022

These two articles say it’s time for some new experiments within K-12

On 11/22/2022, in education, education reform, experimentation, innovation, K-12 related, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, pedagogy, United States, using teams, by Daniel Christian

To Combat Learning Loss, Schools Need to Overhaul the Industrial-Age Paradigm — from educationnext.org by Frederick Hess
The decline in academic gains may be steeper, but it’s not a new phenomenon

Excerpt:

Why did movements over the last two decades to raise standards, improve educator quality, upgrade curriculum, enable choice, leverage assessment, instill accountability, and increase funding appear to have such a limited impact on college and career readiness?

One potential answer: Nearly all of these reforms left the basic tenets of the industrial-paradigm classroom intact.

The above article links to:

It’s Time to Rethink the ‘One Teacher, One Classroom’ Model — from edweek.org by Irene Chen & Stephanie Banchero
How to build a happier and more effective teaching force

Excerpt:

The last few years have taken a toll on our teachers. The COVID-19 pandemic, ongoing cultural divisions, and the Uvalde, Texas, massacre all weigh heavily. Morale is at an all-time low. Now is the time to rethink the teaching profession.

Addendum; also relevant/see:

Innovative Models Exchange Offers a Roadmap for Reinventing School — from the74million.org by Jenee Henry Wood & Saya Taniguchi
From college prep & SEL to project-based learning and even overhauling a school, searchable database offers options for educators

Homeschooling High School With Interest-Led Learning — from raisinglifelonglearners.com by Colleen Kessler

Excerpt:

Think of an interest-led homeschool as one that functions more as a college than a high school. Just as a college student declares a major and the bulk of their study is in that topic area with supplemental general education, your interest-led high school can function the same way.

Also relevant/see:

Interest-Led Learning in the Early Years: Preschool and Beyond — from raisinglifelonglearners.com by Colleen Kessler
Interest-Led Homeschooling: Helping Your Child Find Their Interests — from raisinglifelonglearners.com by Colleen Kessler

This approach allows you to help them develop their interests, communicate that you see their interests as valuable, and it gives your child the chance to follow their own paths of interest. It’s an outstanding way to facilitate a self-motivated, self-directed learner and thinker.

Stephen Downes’ reflection on “Every Student Needs a Learning Coach” [McClennen]

On 11/20/2022, in Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning, Canada, digital learning, education, education reform, Europe, experimentation, ideas, innovation, instructional design, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, online learning, personalized/customized learning, productivity / tips and tricks, student-related, teaching & learning, by Daniel Christian

Stephen Downes’ reflection on “Every Student Needs a Learning Coach” — from by Nate McClennen

Excerpt (from Stephen):

The key to making this happen, I think, is to reorganize local schooling to take advantage of online (and increasingly, AI-generated) learning services, allowing in-person educators to adopt this coaching function.

Key points from Nate’s article:

As learning becomes more personalized, learning opportunities expanded and unbounded, and learning science research more robust, an updated and revised advisory role is more important than ever.
Redefining the coaching/mentor/advisor role as the educational landscape shifts is critical to ensure success for every learner.

Also relevant to using AI in education/see:

Ethical guidelines on the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and data in teaching and learning for educators

Learning Ecosystems

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