K-12 related

Analysis: Teachers’ out-of-pocket supply expenses highest in California, Michigan [Jacobson]

On 08/24/2019, in education, K-12 related, Michigan, teachers, United States, by Daniel Christian

Analysis: Teachers’ out-of-pocket supply expenses highest in California, Michigan — from educationdive.com by Linda Jacobson

Dive brief:

At $664, California teachers spend more of their own money on supplies for their classrooms than their colleagues in any other states, closely followed by teachers in Michigan, who spend $628 for which they are not reimbursed by their school districts, according to an analysis by the Economic Policy Institute.
Nationally, teachers spend an average of $459, with those in North Dakota spending the least at $327. The state-by-state data is drawn from the National Center for Education Statistics’ 2011–12 Schools and Staffing Survey and adjusted for inflation.
The data also shows teachers in high-poverty schools spend more of their own money on supplies for their students than those in low-poverty schools, and that this amount has increased over time, from $481 in 2011-12 to $523 in the 2015-16 school year.

Google brings AI to studying with Socratic — from zdnet.com by Stephanie Condon
Ahead of the new school year, Google is re-launching a mobile learning app it acquired last year.

Excerpt:

Google this week started rolling out a revamped version of a mobile learning app, called Socratic, that the tech giant acquired last year. The updated app, with new machine learning-powered features, coincides with the start of the school year, as well as other Google for Education initiatives.

Socratic aims to help both high school and university students in their studies outside of the classroom. If students need help answering a study question, they can now use the Socratic app to ask a question with their voice, or to take a picture of a question in their study materials. The app will then find relevant material from across the web.

Also see:

The School of Tomorrow Will Revolve Around AI — from datafloq.com
Excerpt:
We live in exponential times, and merely having a digital strategy focused on continuous innovation is no longer enough to thrive in a constantly changing world. To transform an organisation and contribute to building a secure and rewarding networked society, collaboration among employees, customers, business units and even things is increasingly becoming key.Especially with the availability of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, organisations now, more than ever before, need to focus on bringing together the different stakeholders to co-create the future. Big data empowers customers and employees, the Internet of Things will create vast amounts of data and connects all devices, while artificial intelligence creates new human-machine interactions. In today’s world, every organisation is a data organisation, and AI is required to make sense of it all.

Addendum on 8/23/19

Google: Gmail’s new AI spelling, grammar checks help you avoid email blunders — from zdnet.com by Liam Tung
Gmail on G Suite gains new AI-assisted spellcheck and grammar features.

6 basic Youtube tips everyone should know — from hongkiat.com by Kelvon Yeezy

Example tips:

1. Share video starting at a specific point . <– A brief insert from DSC: This is especially helpful to teachers, trainers, and professors
If you want to share a YouTube video in a way that it starts from a certain point, you can do so in a couple of simple steps.

Just pause the video at the point from where you want the other user to start watching it and right-click on the video screen. A menu will appear from which you can choose Copy video URL at the current time. The copied link will open the video starting from that specific time.

4. More accurate video search
There are millions of videos on Youtube. So trying to find that specific Youtube video you want to watch is an adventure in itself. In this quest, you might find yourself crawling through dozens of pages hoping to find the video you actually want to watch.

If you don’t want to go through all this hassle, then simply add allintitle: before the keywords you are using to search for the video. This basically gives you only those videos that include the chosen keywords.

Not easy being a parent these days…

On 08/19/2019, in change, generational differences, internet, K-12 related, parents/guardians, platforms, relationships, society, student-related, technology (general), tools, Uncategorized, youth, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
After reviewing the item below — and after trying to limit the screen time of our youngest daughter these days — I am again reflecting on how difficult it is to raise kids today. I’m not going to get on the technology bashing train, but I’m just going to say that — at least in this area of life — my parents had it much easier! 🙂 It’s not easy to cut off the kids’ access to the Internet these days…as the article below illustrates!

Teen goes viral for tweeting from LG smart fridge after mom confiscates all electronics — from cbsnews.com by Caitlin O’Kane

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Dorothy said she was boiling rice one night and was too preoccupied by her phone, so the stove burst into flames. “So my mom took all my tech so i’d pay more attention to my surroundings,” she said.

Then she explained that both the DS and Wii allow image share, so she could send images from those devices to Twitter, adding messages.

Sometime after finding her DS, it was taken again, so Dorothy started tweeting from yet another connected device: her fridge. “My mom uses it to google recipes for baking so I just googled Twitter,” she told CBS News.

Take a tour of Google Earth with speakers of 50 different indigenous languages — from fastcompany.com by Melissa Locker

Excerpt:

After the United Nations declared 2019 the International Year of Indigenous Languages, Google decided to help draw attention to the indigenous languages spoken around the globe and perhaps help preserve some of the endangered ones too. To that end, the company recently launched its first audio-driven collection, a new Google Earth tour complete with audio recordings from more than 50 indigenous language speakers from around the world.

This online learning thing…it just keeps getting bigger.

On 08/14/2019, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, internet, K-12 related, online learning, online media, online tutoring, student-related, teachers, teaching online, web-based collaboration, youth, by Daniel Christian

Disrupting Education. The Rise Of K-12 Online And The Entrepreneurial Opportunities — from forbes.com by Bernhard Schroeder

Excerpt:

Online learning, once reserved for higher education, is now a growing trend among K-12 students nationwide. Over 2.7 million students across the United States are taking part in digital learning, and many students in grades K-12 are getting a high-quality education online through a full-time online public school.

Also related/see:

Is Online Learning the Electric Car of Higher Ed? — from insidehighered.com by Joshua Kim
Will colleges and universities follow the same path as GM and VW?

Online learning has the potential to be both high quality and significantly less expensive than its residential counterpart.

Some basic HTML tips for when your LMS makes you nuts — from busynessgirl.com by Maria Andersen

Excerpt:

HTML stands for HyperText Markup Language; it is the computer code of web pages.

Many editors in blogs, wikis, online learning systems like Canvas, Brightspace, Moodle, and Blackboard have WYSIWYG editors. WYSIWYG stands for “what you see is what you get.”

Most digital editors have an icon panel at the top with standard formatting tools. The location of the tools varies slightly from platform to platform (a few examples from common Learning Management Systems, or LMS’s, are below).

In most online editors, there is an option to switch back and forth from WYSIWYG to HTML. When you are trying to get a page to look just right and it’s not behaving, you might need to go make a few simple tweaks to the HTML. Just knowing that there is HTML code behind each page, and the basics of how it works will be helpful to figuring out why formatting is not “sticking” properly in the WYSIWYG editor.

You can go to PracticeBoard to practice some of the HTML in this post.

Why teaching is still the best job in the world [Paul Moss]

On 08/09/2019, in 21st century, adjunct faculty, collaboration, colleges, communications, community colleges, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, faculty/staff, higher education, K-12 related, learning ecosystem, pedagogy, society, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, technology (general), by Daniel Christian

Why teaching is still the best job in the world — from teachthought.com by Paul Moss

Excerpt:

…introducing students to new technologies and ways of presenting, curating, and collaborating with others with what they know is truly exciting and truly invigorating. Modern teachers are actually pioneering pedagogy, and can and will be able to hold their heads up high in the future when we look back and see how learning in this day and age took a radical but enormously beneficial turn for the better.

Engaging students in greater collaboration, and instilling initiative in curation and the promotion of information leads to truly independent learning, and setting up such learning environments is an opportunity that all teachers now have before them. There are few more gratifying feelings that being needed.

Alexa Skill Blueprints Publishing Now Available in Australia and New Zealand – Create and Publish a Skill, No Coding Required— from developer.amazon.com by James Ang

Excerpt:

We are excited to announce that now anyone can create and publish an Alexa skill on the Australian Alexa Skills Store using Alexa Skill Blueprints. Skill Blueprints enable you to create and share customised Alexa skills simply by filling in the blanks to one of the dozens of easy-to-use templates, with no coding required. Now you can publish skills created using Alexa Skill Blueprints to the Alexa Skills Store in Australia for customers to discover and use. We have also built new Skill Blueprints specifically for content creators, bloggers, and organisations so they can reach anyone with an Alexa-enabled device.
…
Create Fun Learning Tools
Whether you are a parent helping your child study or want to teach something you’re passionate about, Blueprints are easy tools to create new ways to learn. Use the Quiz, Flashcards, Facts, and Listening Quiz Blueprints to help teach new concepts, retain information, and prepare for the next exam. Add your content into the Skill Blueprint template without the need for any coding and make learning fun for everyone.

Per Jacob Strom at HeraldPR.com:

KreatAR, a subsidiary of The Glimpse Group, is helping change the way students and teachers are using augmented reality technology with PostReality, to help make learning more interactive with poster boards.

See:

Also see:

How to do strategic planning like a futurist — from hbr.org by Amy Webb

Excerpt:

Nice, linear timelines offer a certain amount of assurance: that events can be preordained, chaos can be contained, and success can be plotted and guaranteed. Of course, the real world we all inhabit is a lot messier. Regulatory actions or natural disasters are wholly outside of your control, while other factors — workforce development, operations, new product ideas — are subject to layers of decisions made throughout your organization. As all those variables collide, they shape the horizon.
…
Chief strategy officers and those responsible for choosing the direction of their organizations are often asked to facilitate “visioning” meetings. This helps teams brainstorm ideas, but it isn’t a substitute for critical thinking about the future. Neither are the one-, three-, or five-year strategic plans that have become a staple within most organizations, though they are useful for addressing short-term operational goals. Deep uncertainty merits deep questions, and the answers aren’t necessarily tied to a fixed date in the future. Where do you want to have impact? What it will take to achieve success? How will the organization evolve to meet challenges on the horizon? These are the kinds of deep, foundational questions that are best addressed with long-term planning.

DSC: Holy smokes!!! How might this be applied to education/learning/training in the 21st century!?!

On 07/30/2019, in 21st century, 3D, A/V -- audio/visual, adult learning, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, assistive technologies, business, change, colleges, communications, communities of practice, community colleges, computer science, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, cost of getting a degree, Cost of legal services - including access, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, disruption, education, education technology, elearning, emerging technologies, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, global / globalization, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, IT in HE, K-12 related, languages and translation, law schools, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, Microsoft, Mixed Reality (MR), multimedia, new business models, online learning, online media, online tutoring, presentations, social learning / networks, society, teaching & learning, teaching online, technologies for your home, tools, training / L&D, user experience (UX), vendors, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, virtual tutoring, vision/possibilities, voice recognition / voice enabled interfaces, web-based collaboration, webinars, workplace, XR - extended reality, by Daniel Christian

DC: Holy smokes!!! How might this be applied to education/learning/training in the 21st century!?!

“What if neither distance nor language mattered? What if technology could help you be anywhere you need to be and speak any language? Using AI technology and holographic experiences this is possible, and it is revolutionary.”

Also see:

Microsoft has a wild hologram that translates HoloLens keynotes into Japanese — from theverge.com by Tom Warren
Azure and HoloLens combine for a hint at the future

Excerpt:

Microsoft has created a hologram that will transform someone into a digital speaker of another language. The software giant unveiled the technology during a keynote at the Microsoft Inspire partner conference [on 7/17/19] in Las Vegas. Microsoft recently scanned Julia White, a company executive for Azure, at a Mixed Reality capture studio to transform her into an exact hologram replica.

The digital version appeared onstage to translate the keynote into Japanese. Microsoft has used its Azure AI technologies and neural text-to-speech to make this possible. It works by taking recordings of White’s voice, in order to create a personalized voice signature, to make it sound like she’s speaking Japanese.

DC: Why can’t more learning spaces look like this!?!

On 07/25/2019, in art, education, education reform, innovation, K-12 related, learning, learning ecosystem, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, learning spaces, love of learning, maker movement, more voice more choice more control, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
In reviewing some of the learning spaces I ran across out at inventionlandinstitute.com/innovation-labs…

…I wondered…why can’t more learning spaces look like this!?!

Product announcements summary from Instructure’s annual conference – “InstCon 2019” — from community.canvaslms.com by Renee Carney

Excerpt:

Trouble remembering all of the great product announcements throughout InstructureCon? We’ve got ya covered! Here’s the annual summary of announcements and resources.

Pearson moves away from print textbooks [Kelly]

On 07/17/2019, in 24x7x365 access, adjunct faculty, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, bots, Bring your own device (BYOD), change, changing business models, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, CMS/LMS, colleges, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, data related items, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), e-readers, education, education technology, faculty/staff, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), instructional design, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, IT in HE, K-12 related, learning, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, microlearning, mobile learning, multimedia, new business models, online learning, online media, online tutoring, personalized/customized learning, platforms, publishing, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, textbooks, tools, United States, universities, vendors, by Daniel Christian

Pearson moves away from print textbooks — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly

Excerpt:

All of Pearson’s 1,500 higher education textbooks in the U.S. will now be “digital first.” The company announced its big shift away from print today, calling the new approach a “product as a service model and a generational business shift to be much more like apps, professional software or the gaming industry.”

The digital format will allow Pearson to update textbooks on an ongoing basis, taking into account new developments in the field of study, new technologies, data analytics and efficacy research, the company said in a news announcement. The switch to digital will also lower the cost for students: The average e-book price will be $40, or $79 for a “full suite of digital learning tools.”

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