love of learning

Don’t raise a hoop jumper [Eichholz]

On 04/15/2015, in education, education reform, entrepreneurship, ideas, innovation, K-12 related, love of learning, motivation, parents/guardians, participation, passions, by Daniel Christian

Don’t raise a hoop jumper — from by Terri Eichholz

Excerpt:

Yesterday, a dad forwarded this fabulous post from the TED blog. It includes the video of Jane Andraka’s TEDx talk. If that name sounds a bit familiar, but you can’t quite place it, Mrs. Andraka is the mother of two successful young men. One of them is Jack Andraka, a teenager who developed an early-detection test for pancreatic cancer. The other son, Luke, won an international science fair and the MIT Think Award.

Mrs. Andraka speaks about how she helped her sons find their passions, and the responsibility that all parents have to do so. In the Q&A included in the blog post, she says the following,

I saw all these kids who had made themselves into little hoop-jumpers. All of a sudden, for seniors in high school in October, it’s, “Oh, jeez, I need to join some clubs and get my grades up, and then I’ll go to Harvard.” And then whining, “Well, I got all ‘A’s, and I joined Model U.N.” But that’s just not what it’s about. You have to make your own self remarkable. Make them say, “Wow, this couldn’t be any other child.” Don’t be like everybody else.

Also see:

8 characteristics of future schools [Crockett]

On 02/27/2015, in 21st century, assessment, collaboration, creativity, future, ideas, K-12 related, learning ecosystem, love of learning, new media literacies, teachers, by Daniel Christian

8 characteristics of future schools — from globaldigitalcitizen.org by Ross Crockett; with thanks to Tom D’Amico (@TDOttawa) for his scoop on this

Excerpts:

The best piece of classroom technology available still is, and always will be, a teacher with a love of learning. The way forward with technology in our future schools is remembering that it is a tool to augment the powerful human connections that are so much of a part of great teaching and effective learning. Global Digital Citizenship can help us make this happen.

Let’s Dream Brighter
Imagine future schools in which students are totally engaged in a class, totally immersed in working together to solve real world problems. Imagine that they are self-driven and that they are coming up with amazing ideas on the spot. Imagine that they are concerned with each other’s well-being as part of a team and that their concerns reache far beyond the classroom to others all over the globe. Even further, they may interact daily with those people.

While this may describe a vision of the future schools we are envisioning, you might be surprised that some of these things are already happening!

…

1. Will they even be called ‘schools’ in the future?
2. What would problem solving look like in the future?
3. What would information look like in the future?
4. What would creativity look like in the future?
5. What would media look like in the future?
6. What would collaboration look like in the future?
7. What would citizenship look like in the future?
8. What does assessment look like in the future?

A related item back from 2013:

A glimpse into the future of learning: An infographic — from knowledgeworks.org

A vision for radically personalized learning | Katherine Prince | TEDxColumbus

Description:

Could we transform today’s outmoded education system to a vibrant learning ecosystem that puts learners at the center and enables many right combinations of learning resources, experiences, and supports to help each child succeed? Creating personalized learning for all young people will require a paradigm shift in education and a deep commitment to providing each student with the right experiences at the right time.

As Senior Director of Strategic Foresight at KnowledgeWorks, Katherine Prince leads the organization’s work on the future of learning. Since 2007, she has helped a wide range of education stakeholders translate KnowledgeWorks’ future forecasts into forward-looking visions and develop strategies for bringing those visions to life. She also writes about what trends shaping the future of learning could mean for the learning ecosystem.

Team-based content creation/delivery is pulling ahead of the pack!

On 11/04/2014, in A/V -- audio/visual, collaboration, communications, creativity, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital video, education, education technology, educational games / serious games, higher education, immersion, innovation, interactivity, learning ecosystem, love of learning, media/film, Michigan, multimedia, online learning, participation, play, psychology, real-world assignments, relationships, religion, social learning / networks, social media, society, sociology, story, storytelling, student-related, surviving, teaching & learning, transmedia, universities, usability, user experience (UX), user interface design, using teams, web-based collaboration, by Daniel Christian

Last week I attended the 20th Annual Online Learning Consortium International Conference. While there, I was inspired by an excellent presentation entitled, “A Disruptive Innovation: MSU’s Surviving the Coming Zombie Apocalypse – Are You Ready to Survive a New Way of Learning?“ The four team members from Michigan State University included:

Glenn R. Stutzky | Course Instructor
Keesa V. Muhammad | Instructional Designer
Christopher Irvin | Instructional Designer
Hailey Mooney | Course Librarian

Check out the intro clip on the website about the course:

From the description for the presentation:

This session highlights MSU’s award winning, groundbreaking online course that fuses social theory, filmmaking, social media, and viral marketing while students survive an apocalyptic event. http://zombie.msu.edu/

MSU created and used powerful digital storytelling and multimedia to overlay real, experiential, immersive learning. Important content was relayed, but in a way that drew upon your emotions, your ability to solve problems and navigate in a world where you didn’t have all of the information, your ability to work with others, and more.

“This innovative course integrates current research and science on catastrophes and human behavior together with the idea of a zombie apocalypse. In doing so, we actively engage with students as they think about the nature, scope, and impact of catastrophic events on individuals, families, societies, civilizations, and the Earth itself.”

“Our innovative approach to teaching and learning features: students as active participants, the instructor becomes the facilitator, storytelling replaces lectures, zombies become the catalyst of teaching, a “zombrarian” (librarian) drives research, and the students emerge as digital storytellers as a way of assessing their own learning.”

Others outside MUS have found out about the course and have requested access to it. As a result of this, they’ve opened it up to non-credit seeking participants and now various people from police forces, Centers for Disease Control, and others are able to take the course. To make this learning experience even more accessible, the cost has been greatly reduced: from $1600+ to just $500. (So this talented team is not only offering powerful pedagogies, but also significant monetary contributions to the university as well.)

For me, the key thing here is that this course represents what I believe is the direction that’s starting to really pull ahead of the pack and, if done well, will likely crush most of the other directions/approaches. And that is the use of teams to create, deliver, teach, and assess content – i.e., team-based learning approaches.

So many of the sessions involved professional development for professors and teachers – and much of this is appropriate. However, in the majority of cases, individual efforts aren’t enough anymore. Few people can bring to the table what a talented, experienced group of specialists are able to bring. Individual efforts aren’t able to compete with team-based content creation and delivery anymore — and this is especially true online, whereby multiple disciplines are immediately invoked once content hits the digital realm.

In this case, the team was composed of:

The professor
Two Instructional Designers
and a librarian

The team:

Developed websites
Designed their own logo
Marketed the course w/ a zombie walking around campus w/ brochures and a walking billboard
Used a Twitter stream
Used a tool called Pensu for their students’ individual journals
Made extensive use of YouTube and digital storytelling
Coined a new acronym called MOLIE – multimedia online learning immersive experience
Used game-like features, such as the development of a code that was found which revealed key information (which was optional, but was very helpful to those who figured it out). The team made it so that the course ended differently for each group, depending upon what the teams’ decisions were through the weeks
Used some 3D apps to make movies more realistic and to create new environments
Continually presented new clues for students to investigate. Each team had a Team Leader that posted their team’s decisions on YouTube.

They encouraged us to:
THINK BIG! Get as creative as you can, and only pull back if the “suits” make you! Step outside the box! Take risks! “If an idea has life, water it. Others will check it out and get involved.”

In their case, the idea originated with an innovative, risk-taking professor willing to experiment – and who started the presentation with the following soliloquy:

Syllabi are EVIL

Syllabi are EVIL and they must die!
Listen to me closely and I’ll tell you why.
Just want students to know what is known?
See what’s been seen?
Go – where we’ve been going?
Then the Syllabus is your friend,
cuz you know exactly where you’ll end.
But if you want to go somewhere new,
see colors beyond Red, Green, and Blue.
Then take out your Syllabus and tear-it-in-half,
now uncertainty has become your path.
Be not afraid because you’ll find,
the most amazing things from Creative Minds,
who have been set free to FLY,
once untethered from the Syllabi.

Glenn Stutzky
Premiered at the 2014
Online Learning Consortium International Conference
October 29, 2014

“The number of infected in Michigan has reached critical mass.” CSM Quintero #sw290 pic.twitter.com/F6m8ZaoRyG

— MSU Zombie (@MSUZombies) June 19, 2014

They started with something that wasn’t polished, but it’s been an iterative approach over the semesters…and they continue to build on it.

I congratulated the team there — and do so again here. Excellent, wonderful work!

By the way, what would a creative movie-like trailer look like for your course?

iBeacons give visitors to the Palmer Museum of Art a customized experience [Jacobs]

On 10/27/2014, in Apple, art, creativity, Daniel S. Christian, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, interactivity, love of learning, machine-to-machine communications, Near Field Communication (NFC), personalized/customized learning, play, by Daniel Christian

iBeacons give visitors to the Palmer Museum of Art a customized experience — from news.psu.edu by Katie Jacobs

Excerpt:

Soon, there will be new, high-tech additions to the Palmer Museum’s galleries — small electronic devices that will be stuck to walls behind paintings, hidden under shelves or concealed in corners. You won’t be able to see them, but your mobile devices will.

The devices ares iBeacons, small transmitters created by Apple that communicate with nearby smartphones. If a visitor has the correct mobile app installed, content will be automatically sent to the phone with more information about the nearby artwork.

…

“Sometimes I’ll lead tours with visitors and focus on the works of art I think are particularly fascinating,” says Kletchka. “I thought it would be wonderful if everyone could have that experience here — they can learn more about the objects they are interested in on their own terms.”

DanielChristian-Combining-Digital-Physical-Worlds-Oct2014

Google leads $542 million funding of mysterious AR firm Magic Leap [Kastrenakes & Popper]

On 10/22/2014, in A/V -- audio/visual, Augmented Reality (AR), education technology, educational games / serious games, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, future, Google, innovation, love of learning, vendors, by Daniel Christian

Google leads $542 million funding of mysterious augmented reality firm Magic Leap — from theverge.com by Jacob Kastrenakes and Ben Popper

Excerpt:

Google is leading a huge $542 million round of funding for the secretive startup Magic Leap, which is said to be working on augmented reality glasses that can create digital objects that appear to exist in the world around you. Though little is known about what Magic Leap is working on, Google is placing a big bet on it: in addition to the funding, Android and Chrome leader Sundar Pichai will join Magic Leap’s board, as will Google’s corporate development vice-president Don Harrison. The funding is also coming directly from Google itself — not from an investment arm like Google Ventures — all suggesting this is a strategic move to align the two companies and eventually partner when the tech is more mature down the road.

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Magic Leap also says that it may “positively transform the process of education.”

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Also see:

The growth mindset is sooooo key for us/our students to accept & live by

On 08/20/2014, in career development, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, higher education, ideas, K-12 related, learning, learning ecosystem, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, lifelong learning, love of learning, professional development, reinvent, training / L&D, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Also see:

Sal Khan talks with Stanford Professor Carol Dweck about her research on the Growth Mindset
.
What is mindset — by Carol Dweck

Excerpt:

In a fixed mindset, people believe their basic qualities, like their intelligence or talent, are simply fixed traits. They spend their time documenting their intelligence or talent instead of developing them. They also believe that talent alone creates success—without effort. They’re wrong.

In a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment. Virtually all great people have had these qualities.

Teaching a growth mindset creates motivation and productivity in the worlds of business, education, and sports. It enhances relationships.

From DSC:
This belief that we can grow and learn is critically important — for people of all ages. Let’s help folks stay encouraged and keep trying! Keep failing! Keep trying! You’ll/we’ll get it!

California school integrates play with learning — from pbs.org

Excerpts:

STUDENT: I really like school now. Like, I’m actually psyched to come.

STUDENT: It just makes me feel good.

STUDENT: I wake up every morning and I’m just like, yes.

APRIL BROWN: These students have been taking part in a new experiment in educational innovation known as the PlayMaker School. PlayMaker is, thus far, only for sixth graders who attend the private K-12 New Roads school in Santa Monica, California. You won’t find desks, seating charts or even a normal grading system in their classroom.

…

APRIL BROWN: And, if nothing else, they have figured out how to make kids like Isaac Prevatt look forward to school.

ISAAC PREVATT, Student: At my old school, I dreaded it every single day. I really just didn’t like it. You know, I would fake stomach aches. I have not faked any sicknesses this year.

From DSC:
Tony Wagner’s recent keynote mentions the importance of play, passion, and purpose in education. There’s engagement here. There’s focus here. There might even be a love of learning here — but at least a liking to learn and a stronger sense of actually enjoying learning about something.

I have it that we need to create learning environments and pedagogies that cultivate situations whereby students at least like to learn.

Why?

Because most of us are now required to be lifelong learners in order to remain marketable. (I could also address the love of learning for its own sake, as there’s huge value just in that as well.)

If a student drops out of high school or if they make it through college but end up hating school, those negative experiences that they associate with learning may prove to be obstacles to overcome for them. They may not want to go back to a learning environment again. They may have a “bad taste in their mouth” about education/learning. Becoming a lifelong learner may sound more like a prison sentence to them.

So I celebrate the above approach and experimentation with pedagogy. Hearing the excitement in the students’ voices and words is simply excellent. (I wonder if we’re hearing that sort of excitement from them taking all of these standardized tests…?)

I could also relate to the part of the video where one of the teachers said that the students were very uncomfortable with this type of learning environment — that they just wanted to be told what to do. Where’s my test?! I just want to be told what to do and to take tests.

Many of our students may not like open/unanswered questions or “less structured” activities and learning environments. But such experimentation could easily help them with their creativity and with developing more innovative thinking. The work world won’t always tell them each step to take on something; the “tests” will be found in how they can problem solve and if they can think critically, innovatively.

With thanks to Jim Lerman for his Scoop on this.

.

Also see:

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Beautiful Learning Spaces — from Egor Bogomolov on Pinterest

On 04/14/2014, in learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning spaces, library / librarians, lifelong learning, love of learning, smart classrooms, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
Egor’s curated collections also include collaborative work spaces, libraries, other.

DIY and IDEO Inspire the Next Generation of Innovators — from IDEO.com

The ultimate summer camp. The perfect snack for a picky eater? Why are we designing things for our kids when only they can truly know what they want? DIY and IDEO ask kids to tackle these challenges and more, to develop their inner innovator. Bonus: they get a Scout-style patch for their efforts.

DIY is a place for kids to go online to learn new skills and meet others who share their interests. Kids take photos or videos of the stuff they make, assemble personal portfolios on the site, and ultimately build their creative confidence.

IDEO is proud to have collaborated with DIY to launch the “Innovator” skill: 12 challenges that help kids understand people, identify problems, and create novel solutions. We hope these challenges help inspire a new generation of design thinkers. Posted: March 21, 2014

From DSC:
A brief review of this site turns up several interesting things:

Students can explore areas, disciplines, topics that they are passionate about — or they might discover some things that turn into a passion for them; this could be hugely helpful as students see “what’s out there” for them to head towards (career-wise).
Students can submit their own creations
The format of the site is very visual, enticing…drawing one in to see what’s behind each area and to see what other students have contributed
It employs social learning
It employs badging — students can earn badges on their way to mastering a topic
Students can build their own portfolios and show those portfolios to the world!

Some recent postings on their blog:

7 items re: Learning Ecosystems, most from Ecosystem 2014 [The eLearning Guild]

On 03/22/2014, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, learning, learning ecosystem, lifelong learning, love of learning, strategy, training / L&D, workplace, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
Several items have recently been written concerning learning ecosystems, prompted in large part by the Ecosystem 2014 Conference.

Ecosystem 2014 – General Impressions — from in-the-middle-of-the-curve.blogspot.com by Wendy Wickham

Excerpt:

Because a Learning Ecosystem is an evolving thing. Like a forest or any other organic system.
This is NOT a “build once, maintain for eternity” thing.

The Ever-Changing Ecosystem — from in-the-middle-of-the-curve.blogspot.com by Wendy Wickham

Excerpt:

Brian Chapman led an introductory talk with his views on Learning Ecosystems and what they are.

…

What Brian hinted at, yet what jumped out at me when he showed Xerox’s Learning Ecosystem example, was that the Learning Ecosystem can (and should) encompass ALL of the tools of the workplace where people collaborate, find information, communicate.

…

This assumption that trainers need a “special” environment is where folks are going wrong.
This is why I have been hearing so much noise about LMSs and Talent Management Systems being “the ecosystem.’ No no no no no….

They are a part. And a small part.

On Ecosystems and Learning Strategy — from learningjournal.wordpress.com by Catherine Lombardozzi

Excerpt:

The eLearning Guild is hosting an important series of conversations this week at Ecosystem 2014. Learning solutions have been expanding way beyond traditional L&D outputs for years now, and learning professionals are working to figure out the best ways to strategize more robust recommendations that include performance support, informal learning, social learning, experiential learning, developmental programs and more. These strategies present a variety of challenges in terms of design, curation, and technology, and many of us are working on how to best bring everything together in support of performance and capability development.

…

Learning Ecosystem Defined
I appreciate that several of the speakers seem to converge on a definition of a learning ecosystem (or performance ecosystem) as a combination of people, content, process, and technology to enable learning. I also agree that a metaphor that suggests life and growth is important – we “grow” an ecosystem (more organic), we don’t “build” it (suggests something more technical).

#LSCon day 1, Leapfrogging serious lean agile innovation performance ecosystems for 90% — from kasperspiro.com by Kasper Spiro

Excerpt:

Ecosystem
This year there is a second conference next to Learning solutions: Ecosystems 2014. It is more on a strategic level. You have to have a special upgrade in order to attend the sessions, build the guild was kind enough to allow me to party crash a session. The session I attended was about ecosystems and was presented by Lance Dublin. For him the term ecosystem was also new, so he took us on a journey to discover it with him. I got from it that an ecosystem is a living and ever changing thing that enables and facilitates learning. It should contain four elements: Process, people, Technology and content. So it is not an architecture (that is part of the ecosystem) but the whole thing. The reason we have to thing about this is the increasing speed of things, our old ways (LMS learning with courses) do not work anymore. We need something that delivers Performance at the speed of need. He gave s an impressive list of opportunities/changes, developments that should be part of an ecosystem: Mobile, Moocs, Cloud, social learning, serious games, Big data, personalization and much more. He also defined the goal of an ecosystem: Performance.

My recap of day 2 at #LSCon Big data, tools and the learning eco system — from by Kasper Spiro

Excerpt:

Learning performance analysis. Aligning the eco system with the business.

…

They had a lot more on the ecosystem, but I will keep that for later. I will end this session description with: You have to cultivate dynamic learners that can learn at the speed of change. Love that.

Additional thoughts from DSC:
When I was looking to create some graphics for this Learning Ecosystems blog, I was searching for a graphic that attempted to illustrate interconnecting nodes. In my interpretation of a learning ecosystem, such nodes could be people, experiences, content, tools, processes, and other items that help us to learn and grow. I wanted the graphic to speak to something that was living…ever changing. So I used this:

But here’s another example of a potential graphic that I just ran across and modified a bit (per an item from Gerd Leonhard):

Balance, boundaries, & limits may be required; gaming brings its plusses & minuses

On 02/01/2014, in 21st century, attention, educational games / serious games, engagement / engaging students, interaction design, interactivity, K-12 related, love of learning, participation, psychology, the downsides of how people use tech, by Daniel Christian

Some items/resources regarding gaming/video games as it pertains to education:

Bypassing the Textbook: Video Games Transform Social Studies Curriculcum

Teaching With Digital Games: a Video Case Study and Teacher Q&A with the Joan Ganz Cooney Center and Lisa Parisi

State Senate bill encourages learning via video games — from Murrow News Service by Matt Benoit

Higher Education Is a Massively Multiplayer Game — from educause

BETT 2014: Exploring the classroom of the future
From 3D gesture control to augmented reality textbooks, the classroom of the future will be more connected that ever before

Jane McGonigal.com

Learning Games Network

The 10 Biggest Trends in Ed Tech

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Play to Learn: 100- Great sites on gamification — from top5onlinecolleges.org/gamification by Emily Newton

Learning at Home: Families’ Educational Media Use in America — from joanganzcooneycenter.org by Victoria Rideout, January 24, 2014

Do Games Have a Future in Education?— from learndash.com by Justin Ferriman

Excerpt:

With the growing popularity in gamification and game-based learning, more and more conversations are being held about the viability of games in the educational sector (particularly K-12). Many are wondering to what extent should K-12 education use gamification in their learning.

The simple answer is that there really isn’t an exact answer. I think that using game theory in learning environments can prove useful (it’s been done in some capacity for years), but relying too much on it to drive home a lesson, or to teach the content, can be a mistake.

6 Lessons from the Trenches of Digital Learning Game Design at #ASTDTK14

However, excessive amounts of game playing can lead to addictions. This is a real concern. Consider the items below.

Video Game Addiction No Fun –– from WebMd.com
Compulsive video gaming is a modern-day psychological disorder that experts tell WebMD is becoming more and more popular.

How to stop video game addiction?

Video game addiction.org

End a Video Game Addiction

Avoid Video Game Addiction

Online gaming addiction in children and adolescents:
A review of empirical research
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Online gaming addiction similar to alcoholism, gaming industry should pay for treatment, says new S Korea proposal

How to prevent and deal with video game addiction — from shelbycounselingassociates.org

Bottom line: Balance, boundaries, and limits will likely be needed here — at least in some/certain cases.

Addendum on 2/3/14:

Gamification in the Classroom — from seriousgames.msu.edu by Lissy Torres
Excerpt:
MSU’s meaningful play faculty and students came together on Wednesday to listen to Scott Nicholson, a game designer and board game enthusiast, give a talk on gamification. Nicholson currently teaches at Syracuse University, where he employs gamification in big ways through his undergraduate courses. But before we go into that, let’s have some more on the man himself.

Classrooms & learning spaces of the future

On 02/01/2014, in 21st century, A/V -- audio/visual, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, blended learning, Daniel S. Christian, education, education technology, educational games / serious games, experimentation, heutagogy, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), hybrid learning, immersion, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, interactivity, internet, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, learning spaces, love of learning, machine-to-machine communications, maker movement, mirroring and/or multiple devices, mobile learning, mobile technologies, more voice more choice more control, Near Field Communication (NFC), online learning, play, second screen apps, smart classrooms, smart/connected TV, student-related, tablets, technology (general), telecommunications, telepresence, trends, user experience (UX), videoconferencing, virtual field trips, virtual K-12 schools, vision/possibilities, web-based collaboration, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
I see the following items in the classrooms/learning spaces/”learning hubs” of the future:

iBeacon-like technology, quickly connecting the physical world with the online world (i.e. keep an eye on the Internet of Things/Everything in the classroom); this may take place via wearable technology or via some other means of triggering events
Remote presence
Access to Artifical Intelligence (AI)-based resources
Greatly enhanced Human Computer Interactions (HCI) such as gesture-based interactions as well as voice and facial recognition
Interactive walls
BYOD baked into almost everything (requiring a robust networking infrastructure)
More makerspaces (see below for examples)
Tables and chairs (all furniture really) are on wheels to facilitate room configuration changes
Setups that facilitate collaborative/group work

Below are some other recent items on this topic:

To Inspire Learning, Architects Reimagine Learning Spaces — from MindShift by Allison Arieff

MakerLab_web

Excerpt:

As K–12 schools refocus on team-based, interdisciplinary learning, they are moving away from standardized, teach-to-test programs that assume a one-size-fits-all approach to teaching. Instead, there is a growing awareness that students learn in a variety of ways, and the differences should be supported. The students often learn better by doing it themselves, so teachers are there to facilitate, not just to instruct. Technology is there as a tool and resource, not as a visual aid or talking head.

3D printers and laser cutters?… it’s the classroom of the future — from standard.co.uk by Miranda Bryant

Rethinking our learning spaces — from rtschuetz.blogspot.com by Robert Schuetz

CC Wikimedia – Thelmadatter

Excerpt:

Heutagogy, unlike pedagogy, focuses on self-directed learning. As learning and education become more heutaogical, shouldn’t our learning spaces accommodate this shift? What are the features and characteristics that define a modern learning space? Notice, that I have not used the word classroom. Several days of researching this topic has challenged my thinking on the concept of classroom. This verbiage has been replaced with terms like; ideation lab, innovation space, maker pods, gamer zone, and learning sector. The concept of specific learning zones is not new.

What to do when your kids find their “passion” [Juliani]

On 01/27/2014, in creativity, Daniel S. Christian, engagement / engaging students, entrepreneurship, experimentation, Google, love of learning, more voice more choice more control, motivation, participation, passions, personalized/customized learning, workplace, by Daniel Christian

what to do when your kids find their “passion” — from teachmama.com by author, teacher, and ‘learning addict’, A.J. Juliani

Excerpt:

As a high school English teacher I was able to answer this question of “What Next?” when I ran a “20% Project” with my students three years ago. The project was simple. It is based on the “20 percent time” Google employees have to work on something other than their job description. It has been well documented, and Google has exponentially grown as a company while giving this 20 percent time.

After we came back from winter break I gave them this handout:

The 20% Project

1. For the rest of the year, 20% of your time in my class will be spent working on something you want to work on.

2. It has to be some type of learning, and you have to document it (journal etc).

3. You’ll present your accomplishments to the class twice (and will not be graded on it).

4. That’s it. Have fun. Find your passion. Explore it. Enjoy learning what you want.

From DSC:

Another example of how we can learn from — and apply things from — each others’ worlds — K-12, higher ed, the corporate world.
Another example how “more choice/more control” impacts intrinsic motivation!
This is the sort of thing that should help kids become more entrepreneurial as well…perhaps even starting their own freelancing gigs!

Transmedia Storytelling: Trends for 2014 [Pratten]

On 01/27/2014, in attention, communities of practice, creativity, digital learning, education technology, educational games / serious games, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, human-computer interaction (HCI), interactivity, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, lifelong learning, love of learning, mobile learning, mobile technologies, more voice more choice more control, multimedia, new business models, new media literacies, online learning, participation, passions, personalized/customized learning, platforms, publishing, second screen apps, smart/connected TV, social learning / networks, social media, storytelling, transmedia, trends, by Daniel Christian

Transmedia Storytelling: Trends for 2014 — from Robert Pratten, CEO at Transmedia Storyteller Ltd on Dec 06, 2013

Excerpt:

From DSC:
Something here for education/learning? With the creativity, innovation, interactivity, participation, and opportunities for more choice/more control being offered here, I would say YES!

Also see:

Simon Staffans: What 2014 holds for cross-platform content — from blog.mipworld.com by Simon Staffans
TV meets gaming; ad-funded transmedia; multiplatform finally valued… the biggest names in transmedia’s predictions for the year

Learning Ecosystems

iBeacons give visitors to the Palmer Museum of Art a customized experience [Jacobs]

Google leads $542 million funding of mysterious AR firm Magic Leap [Kastrenakes & Popper]

Beautiful Learning Spaces — from Egor Bogomolov on Pinterest

7 items re: Learning Ecosystems, most from Ecosystem 2014 [The eLearning Guild]

What to do when your kids find their “passion” [Juliani]

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