10 Principles of Learning Experience Design — from stylelearn.com by Alexander Salas

Excerpts:

Learning Experience Design (LXD) is the creative and intentional process of designing learning experiences for lasting results.

Here are the basic principles of LXD and how they contribute to highly effective learning. Their order is not hierarchical.

 

Recording of “The Future of Education Collaborative for Higher Education” on 8/12/21 — this event was sponsored by Instructure and AWS

From DSC:
One of the most interesting items for me in this was to hear how one university is allowing students to drive the Request For Proposal (RFP) process – giving students much more VOICE. Staff and faculty are consultants but students have the final say! Wow! 

Also, I agree with the idea that the market will drive changes within higher education. But for that to occur more significantly:

  • Employers need to hire more people from a variety of backgrounds and that come into their interviews with a greater variety of credentials.
  • The accrediting agencies involved with higher ed are going to need to become more innovative and flexible.
  • And the elephant in the room for me is that faculty members are going to have to come to the realization that those organizations/courses of the future that will thrive and have the most impact will be much more team-based and will be based upon what the market needs (i.e., better alignment is needed between the corporate/business world and the world of higher education). For far too long, the faculty member has been the sole person at the table….the person holding the steering wheel…the person in control of everything that gets presented and how it gets presented….the person who decides what they want to teach (vs. what the market actually needs) and how they want to teach it.

Finally, I bet AWS and Zoom could have said a LOT more than they actually said.

#learningfromthelivingclassroom

 

First Day of Class: 5 Edtech Tools That Can Make it More Engaging — from techlearning.com by Erik Ofgang

Excerpt:

For younger students, a great way to have students learn more about one another and let their creativity shine is to have them create an “About me” page using Book Creator. This can include a short bio and photo. Students can also add audio and video components to their page, providing an opportunity for more of their personality to shine. Ultimately, the various student’s pages can be combined into one ebook about the class.

…I find PronounceNames.com to be a life saver. The site has recordings of proper pronunciations for more than 100,000 names. 

 
 

From DSC:
As I was traveling down one of the local roads the other day, the thought reoccurred to me …that driving along a road is such an apt metaphor for this idea of using the terms “learning objectives” and “learning outcomes.”

I’m going down the same road.

I can look ahead to see where I want to go. But that doesn’t mean that I’m for sure going to get there. That’s where I’m heading and I hope that I will get there, but several things will need to go right.

OR…I can look in the rearview mirror of my car and see where I’ve already been….what’s already taken place. I’ve already passed such and such a point (or points).

I can see where I've been by looking in the rearview mirror -- or I can look ahead to see what I'm traveling towards

That is, I can’t talk about learning outcomes if I’m just getting on the road. At that point, I can talk about where I hope to go (i.e., my learning objectives), but I can’t talk about my learning outcomes until I’ve been traveling for a while.

Where this gets muddy/tricky is when we discuss entire programs. Then the term “learning outcomes” is often used. I get that — it makes sense at that level of things. But if we are talking about an individual course as seen in Canvas, Moodle, Blackboard Learn, etc…then it makes more sense to me to continue to use the phrase “Learning Objectives.”

 

There’s a New Wave of AI Research Coming to Transform Education — from edsurge.com by Nadia Tamez-Robledo

Preparing for Students’ Second Act
With a focus on adult learners, the AI Institute for Adult Learning and Online Education, or ALOE, will look to improve online education for the more than 100 million American workers who will need to “reskill” over the next 10 years.

It will also learn from the massive amounts of data generated by online students that isn’t accessible in traditional in-person classes.

 

A Robust and Timely Discussion of a New Kind of Homeschooling — from educationnext.org by Michael B. Horn
Hybrid approach combines at-home learning with school attendance

Excerpt:

Hybrid Homeschooling: A Guide to the Future of Education
by Michael Q. McShane
Rowman & Littlefield, 2021, $60; 142 pages.

As reviewed by Michael B. Horn

Hybrid learning and homeschooling have become prominent models over the past school year as millions more students learned from home, whether part or full time, during the coronavirus pandemic.

Against that backdrop, Mike McShane’s new book, Hybrid Homeschooling, would seem both topical and timely.

McShane’s book is instead a treatment of a strand of homeschooling that has received relatively little attention: “hybrid homeschooling,” which he defines as “a school that for some part of the week educates children in a traditional brick-and-mortar building and for some other part of the week has children educated at home.”

Also relevant/see:

  • What Is Modern Homeschooling In 2021? — from elearningindustry.com by Dariya Lopukhina
    The COVID-19 pandemic saw over 300 million students all over the world become homeschooled according to Thinkimpact. 
 

What Is Instructional Scaffolding? — from edtechreview.in by Saniya Khan

Excerpt:

Scaffolding is a bridge used to build on what the students already know to get to something they do not know. If the scaffold is properly administered, it will act as a facilitator, not an enabler” (Benson, 1997).

The process of Scaffolding is based on Lev Vygotsky’s concept of the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). This is the distance between what children can do by themselves and the next learning when they can be helped to achieve with competent assistance. Vygotsky said, “children who can perform their tasks at a particular cognitive level in cooperation and collaboration with others and with adults will be able to perform at a higher level. And this difference between the two levels is the child’s Zone of Proximal Development”. He defined scaffolding instruction as the “role of teachers and others in supporting the learner’s development and providing support structures to get to the next stage or level.”

 

What doors does this type of real-time translation feature open up for learning? [Christian]

From DSC:
For that matter, what does it open up for #JusticeTech? #Legaltech? #A2J? #Telehealth?

 

Learning from the living class room

 

Four Steps to Improve Retention with Schema Theory — from learningsolutionsmag.com by Hannah Hunter

Excerpt:

If you read the word “breakfast”, what comes to mind? Do you think of your favorite breakfast foods? The smell of a cup of coffee? Time spent with family? A quick bite in the car on the way to work?

It is likely that many words, images, and emotions come to mind. This collection of interconnected thoughts and feelings constitute a schema.

What is a schema?
A schema is a mental model stored in long-term memory that the brain uses to organize information. Schemas are built from memories and experiences and are unique to each individual. You have schemas for every topic imaginable: objects, events, people, activities, relationships, and even your concept of self.

Also see:

An entire generation of the workforce is on its way out over the next 5-10 years. And then look who’s coming behind them. A new generation that learns differently than their predecessors, that has different expectations, and that stays in jobs exponentially shorter than their predecessors.

 

Transforming the classroom with augmented learning — from thetechedvocate.org by Matthew Lynch

Excerpt:

Forbes documented the many ways that augmented reality (AR) has come to life in recent years. They list several award-winning apps that use AR. A few are:

  • The “Gatwick Airport Passenger” App, which helps passengers navigate the airport;
  • The “Dulux Visualizer” App, which  lets you virtually scan and paint your room any color you choose;
  • “Envisioned by the Mine” App, which lets you put 3D images of any type of accessory or furnishing in your home that Lowe’s offers;
  • “Sephora Virtual Artist”, which allows you to “put makeup on” without actually touching brush to face;
  • “Accuvein”, which doctors and nurses use to scan a patient’s vein network (it reduces escalations by 45%);
  • And, of course, there are apps like the “BIC DrawyBook App” just for fun.

But what about the classroom? Can we see a future in transforming the classroom with augmented learning?

From DSC:
Along the lines of developing creativity with edtech…

I saw another item recently about Book Creator, something that’s made this blog before. I love that type of tool because it promotes creativity, unleashes a student’s imagination, promotes their artwork and writing/storytelling and their musical or acting abilities, and it develops skills in design and developing multimedia-based artifacts. For teachers, it could be a nice project-based learning exercise. 

I asked our youngest daughter if she would like to use it…we’ll see. You can get a free account that allows you to publish up to 40 books. (Plus there is pricing for schools and districts.)

And who knows…? This type of thing might just produce the next J.K. Rowling or a J.J. Abrams.

Book Creator -- check it out

Book Creator -- check it out

Book Creator -- check it out

 
 

From Skill to Instinct: How Higher Education can Bridge the Gap Between Classroom and Career — from edtechreview.in by Stephen Soulunii

Excerpts:

Higher education has conventionally focused on providing quality education for its students. However, modern students are increasingly attending higher education, not for scholarly pursuits, but to increase their value in an intensely competitive job market.

From DSC:
Funny how that happens when the price of getting a degree has skyrocketed through the years — and then one sees one’s family members struggling with getting out from crushing loads of debt (a process that often can take decades to do).

There is a lot that could be said here, but looking at this article makes me see how misaligned things are these days. The learning objectives that would be put forth from the corporate world don’t match up with the learning objectives as put forth by professors.

No wonder there’s a major disconnect. 

One last quote drives the point home — which swims against the current that many faculty members swim in:

65% of HR professionals believe teamwork and collaboration are the most foundational people skills – and 40% believe these skills are the most lacking in new hires.

 


Also relevant here, this is an excerpt of a piece sent to me by Christina Ioannou:

Skills Union offers accredited cohort-based, active learning courses in partnership with leading universities and employers. Their career-focused content ranges from software engineering and UX/UI design to growth marketing and digital entrepreneurship.

The company announced a US$1.5 million seed investment round, supporting its mission to bridge the global tech skills gap, through university accredited courses that meet the needs of the rapidly growing tech sector. The investment round was led by Online Education Services (OES), part of the Seek group of companies, with notable investors including KDV, Hustle Fund, Koh Boon Hwee, Siu Rui Quek, Ishreth Hassen, Sumardy Ma, Simin Zhou and Anvesh Ramineni.

Skills Union dot com

 

3 innovative ways to integrate Twitter in your teaching [educatorstechnology.com]

Excerpt:

Much ink has been spilled on the use of Twitter in education. A simple search in Google using the phrase ‘Twitter in Education’ returns thousands if hits. My intent in this post is go beyond regurgitating what has already been written in this regard and rather provide you with innovative ways to use Twitter in your instruction.

 

5 Considerations for Class Size in Online Asynchronous Courses — from onlinelearningconsortium.org by Rebecca A. Thomas, Ph.D.

Excerpt:

The following are important considerations related to class sizes in online courses that are part of higher education degree programs. This content is a result of a research study conducted by the Oregon State University Ecampus Research Unit, where I currently work as a Postdoctoral Scholar. We have published this study as an academic article in the inaugural issue of the Northwest eLearning Journal, and presented at the 2021 OLC Innovate conference. While I encourage you to reference the manuscript and presentation to learn more specifically about our research, the following are key take-aways that my team has gained from our analyses, the literature review, and conversations we have had with diverse stakeholder groups related to online class size.

 
© 2024 | Daniel Christian