Cookie Monster, Elmo and friends are about to hit a new digital learning curve.
Sesame Workshop, the not-for-profit org that produces “Sesame Street,” and tech giant IBM have entered into a partnership to develop new personalized educational products and platforms for preschool-age kids — with the goal of transforming the ways children learn and teachers teach.
Under the three-year agreement, Sesame Workshop and Big Blue will design interactive educational experiences for use in homes and schools that adapt to the learning preferences and aptitude levels of individual preschoolers.
For now, the organizations are treating the project as an R&D investment. IBM and Sesame Street will deploy engineers, educators and researchers to work side-by-side in classrooms and in their own labs and learning facilities. Later this year, they plan to test and share prototypes with leading teachers, academics, researchers, technologists, gamers, performers and media execs to solicit feedback and brainstorm ways in which cognitive computing can best help preschoolers learn.
From DSC: This will be an important experiment to watch. If it shows promise, it could help parents, pre-school teachers, and the pre-schoolers themselves. Then, the trajectory could make its way to helping early elementary students, to middle school students, to high school students and beyond.
If successful, this is exactly the sort of thing that I could see as one of the key ingredients in the Learning from the [Class] Room vision. Teachers, parents, coaches, etc. will still be critical. But these type of tools and technologies could be running in the background within a blended learning environment — one that can operate at a distance if need be.
The proverb goes hindsight is 20/20, which essentially means you can make better decisions later on when you have become more knowledgeable about the world. But wouldn’t it be nice to be able to make good decisions from the outset when you’re still young? The following tips were compiled for young engineers and interestingly, most of these suggestions revolve around lifelong learning. Experienced engineers weighed in and added their voice to help create this top 15 list of the best tips for young engineers.
It is not a secret that science and engineering professions are occupied mainly by men with only about 20% taken by females. The number of women on executive boards is also extremely low. In order to succeed, both female and male minds are needed for any kind of jobs, especially in science-related industries. Let’s see what initiatives already exist in order to bring more girls and women into STEM!
MakerBot is excited to inspire the next generation of astronauts and Starfleet cadets by supporting the Star Trek Replicator Challenge, a 3D printing challenge developed by Future Engineers for the ASME Foundation, NASA and Star Trek. Participants in the challenge must create a digital model of a non-edible, food-related item for astronauts to 3D print in the year 2050. The Star Trek Replicator Challenge is the third in a series of ‘Future Engineers’ challenges aimed to educate students K-12 about 3D printing and engineering design.
Staring at a blank page can be daunting. Add a reluctant writer to the mix, and what should be a great opportunity for personal expression becomes a personal nightmare. These 4 apps will strengthen students’ writing skills and turn written composition from a chore into an engaging learning activity.
Below is a collection of some very good iPad apps to use with your kids and young learners to help them develop their reading fluency. The apps provide a wide variety of reading materials that include interactive stories, engaging activities and games, quizzes and many more. And because reading is a composite skill, using these apps will also enable kids to practice a number of key subskills related to reading including: pronunciation, vocabulary, phonics, word recognition, and spelling. Check them out and share with us your feedback. Enjoy.
Microsoft has announced beta testing of Minecraft: Education Edition, which is the company’s education-focused suite for Minecraft that integrates tools for teachers and students to help them use the game more effectively in the classroom.
The education-centered offshoot of was first revealed in January of this year. This May, a closed beta of the game will involve more than 100 schools in 30 countries, reports Pradeep of MS Power User. By June, any school will be able to access the Education Edition for free as long as teachers have a fully updated operating system and an Office 365 Education account. Eventually, Microsoft plans to charge $5 per user each year.
Minecraft: Education Edition is specifically tailored to teach the skills that Minecraft cultivates – namely collaboration, navigation, social skills, and empathy.
High school students take note: here’s a cool tool in the form of an app. The free app runs on iOS and Android and just got launched last month pulling almost 5 out of 5 stars after several thousand reviews. For the 20 million college-bound students and 30 million parents, we know you’re drowning in a sea of data scattered all over for the more than 4,000 U.S. colleges and universities. So, Schoold is like Zillow for college hunting – or perhaps match.com for students and universities. It’s a one-stop-shop for everything you need to know, want to know, and have to line up.
Reading comprehension is a matter of decoding, reading speed, and critical thinking about the text, all of which can improve with tiered practice. (See 50 apps for struggling readers.)
So below, in an order of general complexity, are 15 apps for improved reading comprehension, ranging from word and sentence fluency, to recall, to critical thinking skills, to reading speed.
By the nature of reading and literacy progress, most are indeed for K-5 and SLP, but the latter apps, especially Reading Trainer, Compare Twist, and Enchanted Dictionary, can be used through high school in the right context. Let us know on our facebook page what we missed.
The 5 best new 3D tools for April— from creativebloq.com by Rob Redman
We select the best new tools for 3D and VFX artists this month.
Excerpt:
This time of year can often be a quiet one for those of us working in 3D art and visual effects, with developers gearing up for the events season and new releases being a bit thin on the ground.
However there are a few notable updates and newcomers, so have a read below to see what could help you improve your work or help you be more efficient.
By William J. Hussar, National Center for Education Statistics
and Tabitha M. Bailey, IHS Global Inc.
Description:
This publication provides projections for key education statistics. It includes statistics on enrollment, graduates, teachers, and expenditures in elementary and secondary schools, and enrollment and earned degrees conferred expenditures of degree-granting institutions. For the Nation, the tables, figures, and text contain data on enrollment, teachers, graduates, and expenditures for the past 14 years and projections to the year 2023. For the 50 States and the District of Columbia, the tables, figures, and text contain data on projections of public elementary and secondary enrollment and public high school graduates to the year 2023. In addition, the report includes a methodology section describing models and assumptions used to develop national and state-level projections.
An idea/question from DSC: Looking at the article below, I wonder…“Why can’t the ‘One Day University‘ come directly into your living room — 24×7?”
This is why I’m so excited about the “The Living [Class] Room” vision. Because it is through that vision that people of all ages — and from all over the world — will be able to constantly learn, grow, and reinvent themselves (if need be) throughout their lifetimes. They’ll be able to access and share content, communicate and discuss/debate with one another, form communities of practice, go through digital learning playlists (likeLynda.com’s Learning Paths) and more. All from devices that represent the convergence of the television, the telephone, and the computer (and likely converging with the types of devices that are only now coming into view, such as Microsoft’s Hololens).
You won’t just be limited to going back to college for a day — you’ll be able to do that 24×7 for as many days of the year as you want to.
Then when some sophisticated technologies are integrated into this type of platform — such as artificial intelligence, cloud-based learner profiles, algorithms, and the ability to setup exchanges for learning materials — we’ll get some things that will blow our minds in the not too distant future! Heutagogy on steroids!
Have you ever thought about how nice it would be if you could go back to college, just for the sake of learning something new, in a field you don’t know much about, with no tests, homework or studying to worry about? And you won’t need to take the SAT or the ACT to be accepted? You can, at least for a day, with something called One Day University, the brainchild of a man named Steve Schragis, who about a decade ago brought his daughter to Bard College as a freshman and thought that he wanted to stay.
One Day University now financially partners with dozens of newspapers — including The Washington Post — and a few other organizations to bring lectures to people around the country. The vast majority of the attendees are over the age 50 and interested in continuing education, and One Day University offers them only those professors identified by college students as fascinating. As Schragis says, it doesn’t matter if you are famous; you have to be a great teacher. For example, Schragis says that since Bill Gates has never shown to be one, he can’t teach at One Day University.
…
We bring together these professors, usually four at at a time, to cities across the country to create “The Perfect Day of College.” Of course we leave out the homework, exams, and studying! Best if there’s real variety, both male and female profs, four different schools, four different subjects, four different styles, etc. There’s no one single way to be a great professor. We like to show multiple ways to our students.
Most popular classes are history, psychology, music, politics, and film. Least favorite are math and science.
We know the shelf-life of skills are getting shorter and shorter. So whether it’s to brush up on new skills or it’s to stay on top of evolving ones, Lynda.com can help you stay ahead of the latest technologies.
We first launched support for 360-degree videos back in March 2015. From musicians to athletes to brands, creators have done some incredible things with this technology. Now, they’ll be able to do even more to bring fans directly into their world, with 360-degree live streaming. And after years of live streaming Coachella for fans around the world who can’t attend the festival, this year we’re bringing you the festival like never before by live streaming select artist performances in 360 degrees this weekend. Starting today, we’re also launching spatial audio for on-demand YouTube videos. Just as watching a concert in 360 degrees can give you an unmatched immersive experience, spatial audio allows you to listen along as you do in real life, where depth, distance and intensity all play a role. Try out this playlist on your Android device.
CWRU was among the first in higher education to begin working with HoloLens, back in 2014. They’ve since discovered new ways the tech could help transform education. One of their current focuses is changing how students experience medical-science courses.
“This is a curriculum that hasn’t drastically changed in more than 100 years, because there simply hasn’t been another way,” says Mark Griswold, the faculty director for HoloLens at CWRU. “The mixed-reality of the HoloLens has the potential to revolutionize this education by bringing 3D content into the real world.”
“Imagine a physics class where you’re able to show how friction works. Imagine being able to experience gravity on Mars — by moving around virtually,” he says. “VR can make science, technology and art come alive.”
VR will soon become an open canvas for educators to create learning experiences. Eventually, fitting VR into the curriculum will be limited only by an instructor’s imagination and budget, says Christopher Sessums, the program director of research and evaluation at Johns Hopkins School of Education.
Burleson and and co-author Armanda Lewis imagine such technology in a year 2041 Holodeck, which Burleson’s NYU-X Lab is currently developing in prototype form, in collaboration with colleagues at NYU Courant, Tandon, Steinhardt, and Tisch.
“The “Holodeck” will support a broad range of transdisciplinary collaborations, integrated education, research, and innovation by providing a networked software/hardware infrastructure that can synthesize visual, audio, physical, social, and societal components,” said Burleson.
It’s intended as a model for the future of cyberlearning experience, integrating visual, audio, and physical (haptics, objects, real-time fabrication) components, with shared computation, integrated distributed data, immersive visualization, and social interaction to make possible large-scale synthesis of learning, research, and innovation.
…British television presenter Diane-Louise Jordan will guide students on a tour through Shakespeare’s hometown of Stratford-upon-Avon, including his childhood home and school; and the bard’s view of London, including the famous Globe Theatre where his plays were performed. (Shakespeare actually died April 23, which this year falls on a Saturday.)
Also see:
You can register to see the recording on that page as well.
Film Students To Compete in Virtual Reality Production Contest — from campustechnology.com by Michael Hart One of the first ever competitions involving virtual reality production will challenge college film students to create their own 360-degree films.
HBO and Discovery Communications announced today that they are partnering with 3D-graphics startup OTOY — both companies taking equity stakes. The partnership marks an effort by the two networks to evolve entertainment experiences beyond two dimensional television. Virtual reality, augmented reality, and even holograms were all highlighted as areas OTOY would help its traditional media partners explore.
TV knows it must push toward virtual and augmented reality
Apple was granted a patent today for a type of live interactive augmented reality (AR) video to be used in future iOS devices, indicating the company may soon enter the AR/VR game. The patent does not appear to be directly related to an AR/VR headset, but is certainly a step in that direction.
The patent describes Apple’s planned augmented reality technology as layered, live AR video that users can interact with via touchscreen. In the live video, objects can be identified and an information layer can be generated for them.
“In some implementations,” the patent text notes, “the information layer can include annotations made by a user through the touch sensitive surface.”
Virtual & Augmented Reality: Blooloop’s Guide to VR and AR — from blooloop.com Visitor attractions are racing to embrace Virtual and Augmented Reality technologies. But what are the potential opportunities and possible pitfalls of VR and AR?
From DSC: Let’s take some of the same powerful concepts (as mentioned below) into the living room; then let’s talk about learning-related applications.
MightyTV, which has raised more than $2 million in venture funding to date, launched today with a former Google exec at the helm. The startup’s technology incorporates machine learning with computer-generated recommendations in what is being touted as a “major step up” from other static list-making apps.
…
In this age of Roku and Apple TV, viewers can choose what to watch via the apps they’ve downloaded. MightyTV curates those programs — shows, movies and YouTube videos — into one app without constantly switching between Amazon, HBO, Netflix or Hulu.
…
Among the features included on MightyTV are:
* A Tinder-like interface that allows users to swipe through content, allowing the service to learn what you’d like to watch * An organizer tool that lists content via price range * A discovery tool to see what friends are watching * Allows for group viewings and binge watching
From DSC: What if your Apple TV could provide these sorts of functionalities for services and applications that are meant for K-12 education, higher education, and/or corporate training and development?
Instead of Amazon, HBO, Netflix or Hulu — what if the interface would present you with a series of learning modules, MOOCs, and/or courses from colleges and universities that had strong programs in the area(s) that you wanted to learn about?
That is, what if a tvOS-based system could learn more about you and what you are trying to learn about? It could draw upon IBM Watson-like functionality to provide you with a constantly morphing, up-to-date recommendation list of modules that you should look at. Think microlearning. Reinventing oneself. Responding to the exponential pace of change. Pursuing one’s passions. More choice/more control. Lifelong learning. Staying relevant. Surviving.
…all from a convenient, accessible room in your home…your living room.
A cloud-based marketplace…matching learners with providers.
Now tie those concepts in with where LinkedIn.com and Lynda.com are going and how people will get jobs in the future.
April 12, 2016 — Mountain View, CA—BlueJeans Network, the global leader in cloud-based video communication services, today unveiled the Enterprise Video Cloud, a comprehensive platform built for today’s globally distributed, modern workforce with video communications at the core. New global research shows that 85% of employees are already using video in the workplace and 72% believe that video will transform the way they communicate at work.
“There is a transformation happening among business today – face-to-face video is quickly rising as the preferred communications medium, offering new opportunities for deeper personal relations and outreach, as well as for improved internal and external collaboration,” said Krish Ramakrishnan, CEO of BlueJeans. “Once people experience the power of video, they ‘hang-up’ on traditional conference calling. We are seeing this happen with the emergence of video cultures that power the most innovative cultures—from Facebook and Netflix to Viacom and Del Monte.”
From DSC: I wonder if we’ll see video communication vendors such asBlueJeans orThe Video Call Centermerge with vendors likeBluescape,Mezzanine, orT1Vwith their collaboration tools. If so, some serious collaboration could all happen…again, right from within your living room!
A survey of the collegiate educational-technology expectations of 1,300 middle and high school students from 49 states was captured by Barnes and Noble. The survey, Getting to Know Gen Z, includes feedback on the students’ expectations for higher education.
“These initial insights are a springboard for colleges and universities to begin understanding the mindset of Gen Z as they prepare for their future, focusing specifically on their aspirations, college expectations and use of educational technology for their academic journey ahead,” states the survey’s introduction.
Like the millennials before them, Generation Z grew up as digital natives, with devices a fixture in the learning experience. According to the survey results, these students want “engaging, interactive learning experiences” and want to be “empowered to make their own decisions.” In addition, the students “expect technology to play an instrumental role in their educational experience.”
From DSC: First of all, I’d like to thank D. Frank Smith for the solid article and for addressing the topic of students’ expectations. These messages were echoed in what I heard a few days ago at the MVU Online Learning Symposium, a conference focused on the K-12 space.
I want to quote and elaborate on one of the items from the report (as mentioned in the article):
“There is a need for user-friendly tools that empower faculty to design the kinds of compelling resources that will comprise the next wave of instructional resources and materials,” the report states.
Most likely, even if such tools were developed, the end goal from the quote above won’t happen. Why? Because:
Most faculty simply don’t have the time — they are being overrun with all sorts of other demands on their time (committees, task forces, advising, special projects, keeping up with the changes in their disciplines, etc.)
Even with user-friendly tools, one still needs a variety of skill sets to create engaging, sophisticated content and learning environments. Creating “the next wave of instructional resources and materials” is waaaaaay beyond the skillsets of any one person!!! Numerous skills will be required to create the kinds of learning materials that we can expect to see in the future:
Information architecture
Instructional design
Interaction design
Videography and creating/working with multiple kinds of media
Programming/coding
Responsive web design and knowing how best to design content for multiple kinds of devices
User experience design
Graphic design
Game design
Knowledge of copyrights
Expertise in accessibility-related items
The ability to most effectively write for blended and/or online-based approaches
Knowing how to capture and use learning analytics/data
Keeping up with advancements in human computer interfaces (HCI)
Staying current with learning space design
How best to deliver personalized learning
and much more!
This is why I continue to assert that we need a much more team-based approach to creating our learning environments.The problem is, very few people are listening to this advice.
How can I say this?
Because I continue to hear people discussing how important professional development is and how much support is needed for faculty members. I continue to see quotes, like the above one, that puts the onus solely on the backs of our faculty members. Conferences are packed full with this type of approach.
Let’s get rid of that approach — it’s not working! Or at least not nearly to the degree that students need it to. There may be a small percentage of faculty members who have the time and skills to pull some things off here, but even they will run into some walls eventually (depending upon the level of sophistication being pursued). None of us can do it all.
But for the most part, years have gone by and not much has changed. Rather, we need to figure out how we could use teams to create and deliver content. That would be a much wiser use of our energies and time. This perspective is not meant to dog faculty members — it’s just recognizing realities:
One person simply can’t do it all anymore.
Tools don’t exist that can pull all of the necessary pieces together.
Even if such tools existed, they won’t be able to keep pace w/ the exponential rate of technological changes that we’re currently experiencing — and will likely continue to experience over the next 10-20 years.
If we’re going to insist on faculty members creating the next wave of instructional materials and resources, then faculty members better look out — they don’t know what’s about to hit them. Forget about having families. Forget about having a life outside of creating/delivering content. And find a way to create a 50-60 hour work DAY (not week) — cause that’s how much time one will need to achieve any where’s close to mastery in all the prerequisite areas.
From DSC: Yesterday, I attended the Michigan Virtual University (MVU) Online Learning Symposiumon the campus of Michigan State University. I would like to send a shout out to MVU for putting this event together and to MSU for hosting a solid event, as well as to all of the speakers and presenters throughout the day.
Some key points/themes:
Online-based learning within K-12 in Michigan continues to increase:
Over 91,000 Michigan K-12 students took one or more virtual courses during the 2014-15 school year. This number is up over 15,000 students compared to the number reported last year (increase of 20%).
Michigan K-12 students accounted for approximately 446,000 virtual course enrollments in 2014-15, surpassing the 2013-14 figure by more than 126,000 enrollments (increase of 40%).
A side note from DSC: Given this growth in online learning in the K-12 space…
Given the emphasis in K-12 to provide more CHOICE to students…
Given the emphasis to turn over the ownership of learning to students…….those colleges and universities who will carry on these students’ educations must realize that the K-12 student is changing…their expectations are changing. They want MORE CHOICE. MORE CONTROL. If you only offer a face-to-face delivery approach, that likely won’t cut it in the future.
Technology will continue to play a strategic role in the quest to provide greater degrees of personalization as well as provide the data to aid in learning success
An insert, dated 4/14/16 from: We’re already seeing such changing expectations, as identified in the following article from 4/11/16:
“What Gen Z Thinks About Ed Tech in College” — edtechmagazine.com A report on digital natives sheds light on their learning preferences.
Excerpt:
A survey of the collegiate educational-technology expectations of 1.300 middle and high school students from 49 states was captured by Barnes and Noble. The survey, Getting to Know Gen Z, includes feedback on the students’ expectations for higher education.
“These initial insights are a springboard for colleges and universities to begin understanding the mindset of Gen Z as they prepare for their future, focusing specifically on their aspirations, college expectations and use of educational technology for their academic journey ahead,” states the survey’s introduction.
Like the millennials before them, Generation Z grew up as digital natives, with devices a fixture in the learning experience. According to the survey results, these students want “engaging, interactive learning experiences” and want to be “empowered to make their own decisions.” In addition, the students “expect technology to play an instrumental role in their educational experience.”
Keynotes/speakers (with some notes on their presentations included):
Buddy Berry Superintendent of Eminence Independent Schools Eminence, Kentucky
Woven throughout all we do is the concept of Surprise and Delight. We want each student, staff, and stakeholder to be continually amazed and engaged each and every day. We want to create and foster an environment where creativity and customer service abound in all aspects of our school. Whether great or small, the element of “Surprise and Delight” is the essence of our organization.
Buddy gave an emotional, powerful keynote address — even while cooking up a delicious dish.
The aromas spread throughout the room, even if only a handful of people were actually going to eat the dish (a lesson is in there for education reform as well). Buddy thinks outside the box and wants those in the Eminence Independent School system to start thinking differentlyas well. He seeks to have their schools surprise and delight students — awesome! As an example of this, he wouldn’t accept no to some things re: providing WiFi to their students. So he had their buses outfitted with WiFi, then saw to it that those buses were parked overnight in the areas where their students didn’t have access to WiFi. Students within 100 yards of those buses now have WiFi.
As a result of a tragic accident involving one of his former football players, Buddy is truly driven to change the world. He thinks big.He is on a mission, backed up by vast amounts of energy and determination.
Mentioned Governor Snyder’s recently introduced 21st Century Education Commission, created to prepare students for the global economy (see the full text of Executive Order 2016-6) which states that “the Commission shall act in an advisory capacity to the Governor and the state of Michigan, and shall do all of the following:”
Analyze top performing states and nations to determine how their systems of education (structure, governance, funding, and accountability) have led to academic and career success for students pre-school through career credentialing/post-secondary education.
Determine, for top performing states and nations, the similarities and differences between their demographic, cultural and economic realities and Michigan’s demographic, cultural, and economic realities.
Based on this analysis of top performing states and nations, identify the structural (configuration of schools,) governance, funding, and accountability enablers and inhibitors impacting the academic success and career preparedness for Michigan students and residents, including distinct demographic and geographic variances as appropriate.
Recommend changes to restructure, as necessary, the configuration, governance, funding, and accountability of Michigan’s education system to significantly improve student achievement and career preparedness, and ensure the high quality of all education options available to parents and students.
Prioritize the Commission’s recommendations for implementation. . (The report/recommendations are due by 11/30/16.)
Asserted that students should lead/own their own learning — that students set and pursue their own goals (From DSC: I love that goal, as it will serve the students well in their futures; lifelong learning is now required and each of us has to own our own learning.)
Suggested that teacher preparation programs should be more akin to what medical schools do — and have student teachers work with kids earlier on in the process; be able to learn something, then immediately apply it. Teacher prep programs need to become more nimble. (From DSC: In another panel, it was asked what teacher preparation programs are doing to train future teachers on how to teach online…? A solid, necessary question — at least for the foreseeable future.)
Joe Freidhoff Vice President of Research, Policy & Professional Learning, MVU
Joe shared numerous pieces of data from the report that he authored:
Over 91,000 Michigan K-12 students took one or more virtual courses during the 2014-15 school year. This number is up over 15,000 students compared to the number reported last year (increase of 20%). Three out of four students taking virtual courses came from the Local virtual learner subset, 15% came from cyber schools, and 10% from MVS
Michigan K-12 students accounted for approximately 446,000 virtual course enrollments in 2014-15, surpassing the 2013-14 figure by more than 126,000 enrollments (increase of 40%). High school grade levels continued to account for the largest number of enrollments, though the elementary grade levels showed the largest year-over-year percentage increases. The Local virtual learner subset accounted for 63% of the virtual enrollments.
Virtual enrollment patterns suggest that Michigan schools tend to enroll higher performing students in MVS courses, but rarely use MVS for lower performing students. In contrast, when Local schools provide their own virtual solution, they primarily enroll students who have failed several courses taken in the traditional classroom environment.
As in past years, virtual enrollments were heaviest in the core subject areas, led by English Language and Literature (20%) and Mathematics (17%).
Once again, males and females each accounted for roughly half of the virtual enrollments, and there was almost no difference in the percentage of males and females enrolling in core subjects.
Over half (51%) of schools with virtual enrollments had 100 or more virtual enrollments in the 2014-15 school year, though the second most likely scenario was that they had less than 10 (19%). This “all” or “very few” phenomenon continues the trend observed over the past four years, despite the number of schools with virtual enrollments growing from 654 in 2010-11 to over 1,072 in 2014-15.
Professional Development would be ideally experiential, sustained; and staffed by people who have actually done things. Those people would ideally be available to coach/support others.
Support is key, as not everyone is highly proficient in using/applying technology.
edupaths.org
EduPaths is a professional development portal for ALL Michigan Educators. EduPaths courses are aligned with school improvement framework, multi tiered systems of support, and designed to expand understanding on a wide variety of topics. Courses are available online and are completely self-paced. They are intended to help educators to personalize their own learning plan any time and any place. Another feature of EduPaths are the strategic partnerships with statewide educational organizations. Our goal is to “Help Educators Navigate their Professional Growth” through providing content and connecting content from our statewide partners.
LearnPort.org Michigan LearnPort® provides online learning solutions for educators and the educational community. Through Michigan LearnPort, you can access high quality courses and resources, meet professional development requirements, earn State Continuing Education Clock Hours and more.
mischooldata.org MI School Data is the State of Michigan’s official public portal for education data to help citizens, educators and policy makers make informed decisions that can lead to improved success for our students. The site offers multiple levels and views for statewide, intermediate school district, district, school, and college level information. Data are presented in graphs, charts, trend lines and downloadable spreadsheets to support meaningful evaluation and decision making.
The culture of a community will be key in determining what happens with that community’s educational system.
Several of the sessions dealt with the topic of quality, and some of the organizations/tools mentioned there include:
I’m often asked about the set up I use to film my videos. Here’s a 360 spherical photo that I’ve annotated. Feel free to scroll and zoom around to check out my setup.
We have now been Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) for three years, and boy, do the students bring it. They bring it all! We have iPads, Surface, iPhones, Droids, Chromebooks, Macs, and PC laptops. Here’s my current thinking.
Music is for everyone. So this year for Music In Our Schools month, we wanted to make learning music a bit more accessible to everyone by using technology that’s open to everyone: the web. Chrome Music Lab is a collection of experiments that let anyone, at any age, explore how music works. They’re collaborations between musicians and coders, all built with the freely available Web Audio API. These experiments are just a start. Check out each experiment to find open-source code you can use to build your own.
I love the School Report scheme that the BBC run via Newsround. We all remember the Newsrounds of our youth. For me it was John Craven who made me watch it whenever it was on. It was this report I saw recently on eight things teachers should learn, which got me thinking about eight things I thought teachers should learn about edtech.
My work sees me regularly helping teachers learn different things related to the use of technology and so in this post, I’m going to talk about the eight things I think teachers should learn with #edtech to help support their use of technology to enhance learning in the classroom.
As we move toward interacting more with students who have an individualized education program (IEP) indicating that they need additional time on tests and quizzes or just need to deal with life issues, it is imperative that the learning management system (LMS) depended upon by an instructor and student alike be properly configured for such accommodations. Canvas and Moodle are currently two of the most popular learning management systems, and both offer the ability to make adjustments to quiz functions within the course without compromising the overall structure of the course. In this article, we will examine how to do so and offer some tips on situations where they are relevant.
[The] Chrome web store is packed full of all kinds of educational apps and extensions some of which are also integrated with Google Drive. For those of you looking for a handy resource of Chrome apps to use with students in class, check out this comprehensive chart. In today’s post we are sharing with you a collection of some practical Chrome extensions to unleash learners creativity. Using these resources, students will be able to engage in a number of creative literacy activities that will allow them to multimodally communicate their thoughts, share their ideas and develop new learning skills.
How do you work technology into the pedagogy, instead of just using something cool? That task can be especially daunting in language arts literacy classrooms where reading and writing skill development is the crux of daily lessons. However, as 1:1 technology initiatives roll out, integrating technology into the classroom is our reality.
With hundreds of sites, apps, Chrome extensions, and platforms available, choosing the right ones can seem overwhelming. As an eighth-grade language arts teacher, I’ve experienced this myself. Following are four tools that can help provide immediate formative assessment data as well as top-of-the-rotation feedback to help students develop personal learning goals.
If, like my school, you’re in a “Chromebook District,” these suggested tools will work well because all integrate perfectly when you sign in with your Google ID, limiting the need for multiple passwords. This saves a lot of student confusion, too.
This giggly play session actually was a serious math lesson about big and small and non-standard measurements. Dreamed up by Richardson and kindergarten teacher Carol Hunt, it aims to get the children to think of animal steps as units of measurement, using them to mark how many it takes each animal to get from a starting line to the target.
Teachers call such melding of art and traditional subjects “art integration,” and it’s a new and increasingly popular way of bringing the arts into the classroom. Instead of art as a stand-alone subject, teachers are using dance, drama and the visual arts to teach a variety of academic subjects in a more engaging way.
Paul Pattison and Luke Minaker knew they were onto something when they got an email from the mother of a nine-year-old who read the first instalment of their interactive story, Weirdwood Manor.
“She wrote that she couldn’t get her son to pick up a book,” said Pattison, technical director of All Play No Work, producer of the iPad app. “She got the app for her son and he went through it in two nights. He finished both books.
“And then because we don’t have book 3 out yet, unprompted by her he went over to the bookshelf and pulled off a paperback and started reading chapter books again.”
From DSC:
I’d like to thank Jenny Zeeff for the reminder on this resource. Though I’ve posted this item before, Jenny reminded me of this set of resources that might be very useful to someone else out there as well.
When you ask Siri what it can search for, it will respond, “I can search by title, people (actor, director, character name, guest star, producer, or writer), ratings (like PG or TV-G), reviews (such as best or worst), dates (like 2012 or the 80s), age (like kid-friendly or teen), seasons, episodes, and studio. And of course, I can search by genre.”
But, what else can Siri do?
…
Siri has a fairly robust search feature with multi-layer filtering.
… While you are watching a movie or TV show, or listening to music, you can get a little extra help from Siri.It’s like having a buddy sitting next to you — but they don’t shush you when you ask a question.
…
You can search for content in the Music app on Apple TV by artist, album, or song title. With a little know-how, you can also turn Siri into your personal deejay.
…
While you may normally look to your smartphone for your weather predictions, Siri can be just as helpful about the conditions around the world as your local weatherman or app. All you have to do is ask.
From DSC: Following this trajectory out a bit into the future — and in light of significant developments that continue to occur with artificial intelligence, the development and use of algorithms, the potential use of web-based learner profiles (think LinkedIn.com/Lynda.com, MOOCs, the use of nanodegrees), second screen-based apps, and the like — one has to wonder:
“What are the ramifications of this for learning-related applications?!”
![The Living [Class] Room -- by Daniel Christian -- July 2012 -- a second device used in conjunction with a Smart/Connected TV](http://danielschristian.com/learning-ecosystems/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/The-Living-Class-Room-Daniel-S-Christian-July-2012.jpg)
/cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/6296959/AltspaceVR_make_a_VR_call.0.png)
