$1.5M grant jump-starts teacher development — fromeschoolnews.com by Jenna Zwang
Tutor.com, which connects students with live tutors online for tutoring in math, science, social studies, and English, is the largest online tutoring and homework help service available—and, with help from a $1.5 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the company is expanding its horizons to help teachers as well.
.
.
From DSC:
How will these types of technologies affect what we can do with K-12 education/higher education/workplace training and development? I’d say they will open up a world of new applications and opportunities for those who are ready to innovate; and these types of technologies will move the “Forthcoming Walmart of Education” along.
Above item from:
From DSC:
I wish they would be more upfront about their pricing — i.e. how many credits each “course” is. You purchase credits…and then you find out how many credits you will need to get their services. I mainly post this to show the level of innovation occurring out there in the online-based world; and online-based tutoring will only grow.
.
.
Originally saw this at Ewan Mcintosh’s links for 2-24-11
IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies TLT is a scholarly archival journal published quarterly using a delayed open access publication model.
The Web revolution, the popularity of on-line learning, and the broad availability of computers in schools, colleges, universities, workplaces and in other social settings has caused a qualitative change in the field of learning technologies. Both the variety and the complexity of e-learning tools have increased dramatically over the last 10 years. A number of new conferences emerged to provide a forum for researchers and practitioners in the field of learning technologies to discuss their work. Yet, there are very few journals, which embrace the field as a whole and provide a space to publish archival quality papers. The goal of IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies (TLT) is to bridge this gap.TLT covers all advances in learning technologies, including but not limited to the following topics:
IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies
The IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies will publish archival research papers and critical survey papers. Topics within the scope include technology advances in online learning systems; intelligent tutors; educational software applications and games; simulation systems for education and training; collaborative learning tools, devices and interfaces for learning; interactive techniques for learning; tools for formative and summative assessment; ontologies for learning systems; standards and web services that support learning; authoring tools for learning materials; computer support for peer tutoring and learning via discovery or project work or field or lab work; and creation and management of learning objects. A paper must either describe original research or offer a critical review of the state of the art in a particular area. Papers concerned with evaluation of technology are only appropriate if the technology itself is novel or if significant technical insights are provided. In order to best serve the community, the TLT will be published online, using a delayed open-access policy under which paying subscribers and per-article purchasers have access to newly published content, and then 12 months after the publication of each issue, all readers will have access to the content, free of charge.
— originally from Kirsten Winkler’s posting, “Friend or Enemy? Mahalo 4.0 – Learn Anything“
Survey points to radical makeover of traditional education — from free press release center
Online education is booming according to longtime online higher education pioneer, Dr. Fred DiUlus.
Excerpt:
January 23, 2011 (FPRC) — Online education is booming according to longtime online higher education pioneer, Dr. Fred DiUlus. As the founder and CEO of online university builder, Global Academy Online, he has witnessed first-hand the exponential growth of the online education industry. Traditional educators are just now beginning to seriously pull back the layers of opportunity that exist within the virtual world for today’s technologically savvy students.
Many traditionalists have complained over the years about what they perceive as the inadequacy of virtual education. They believe that somehow online education would destroy rigor and academic accomplishment if universities even dared to adopt online protocols in a major way. The father of modern management, the late Peter Drucker, predicted that schools as we know them will cease to exist in a generation replaced by their virtual counterparts.
Skeptics in higher education have long questioned Drucker’s ominous prediction. Global Academy Online’s own statistical research over the past eight years appears to bear out Drucker’s forecast contrary to what others in the field think and perhaps sooner than even Drucker expected. In 2002, the Academy began collecting statistical data from students attending traditional colleges and universities. The results of the eight-year survey are so startling that it now appears proof positive of the inevitability of Drucker’s prophecy.
.
From DSC:
The other day, I created/posted the top graphic below. Take the concepts below — hook them up to engines that use cloud-based learner profiles — and you have some serious potential for powerful, global, ubiquitous learning! A touch-sensitive panel might be interesting here as well.
Come to think of it, add social networking, videoconferencing, and web-based collaboration tools — the power to learn would be quite impressive. Multimedia to the nth degree.
Then add to that online marketplaces for teaching and learning — where you can be both a teacher and a learner at the same time — hmmm…
.
.
From DSC:
Then today, I saw Cisco’s piece on their Videoscape product line! Check it out!
.
.
.
.
.
.
From DSC:
A global push continues to be evident in some of the things that Pearson has been up to in the last year:
.
Addendum on 1-20-11:
The future of the TV is online — from telegraph.co.uk
Your television’s going to get connected, says Matt Warman
.
From DSC:
I post this here — with higher ed included in the tags/categories — because if the trend within K-12 continues (i.e. that of using such technologies as the iPad, digital textbooks, mobile learning devices, etc.), students’ expectations WILL be impacted. When they hit our doorsteps, they will come with their heightened sets of expectations. The question is, will we in higher ed be ready for them?
Cutting the Pay TV Cord, Chapter 5: Unlimited Internet TV — from Phil Leigh
In short, often there is no reason why modern flat panel TV screens cannot function as giant monitors for up-do-date computers.
Thus a growing number of us are attaching computers to our TVs. The trend is especially prevalent for WiFi enabled computers because they can connect over a home network and thence to the Internet. In such configurations computers – commonly dedicated laptops – function as Internet gateways for televisions. They transform TVs into dual function devices normally controlled from a comfortable viewing distance with ordinary TV remote units.
Also see:
Solving the problem of online problem solving – – from FacultyFocus.com by Ellen Smyth
When first visualizing an online mathematics course, I saw a barren, text-only environment where students learned primarily from the textbook and where instructors provided text-based direction, clarification, and assistance. But typing is not teaching and reading is not learning. Students deserve more from online courses than regurgitated textbooks and opportunities to teach themselves. With today’s technology, we can create a rich learning environment.
So if we don’t teach with pure text, what do we teach with? Traditionally, we write, draw, and talk students through the problem-solving process while we encourage students to actively work along with us. Online, we should aspire to sparking the same level of comprehension, achievable using exactly the same techniques – writing, drawing, and talking students through problems.
But how do we write, draw, and talk to students online? Fortunately, we have a wide variety of tools available to help us available to help us do it digitally.
From DSC:
One of the types of tools mentioned were the tablets from Wacom.
Emerging Interactive Ed. Tech: Classmate Assist and Wayang Outpost – Sensors, AI, and Context Awareness for Learning -and Teaching — by Lynn Marentette (emphasis below from DSC)
I’ve been following developments in intelligent tutoring systems for a while, and find it interesting to see how researchers are combining artificial intelligence, learning theory, affective computing, and sensor networks to create applications that might prove to be useful and effective.
The advantage of using intelligent tutoring applications in some cases is that it provides students with additional support and feedback the moment it is needed, something that is difficult for teachers to provide to students in large classrooms. With the increase in use of smartphones and other mobile devices such as the iPad, there is a good chance that this sort of technology will be used to support learning anywhere, anytime.
Although most intelligent tutoring systems are geared for 1-1 computing, I think there are some components that could be tweaked and then transfered to create intelligent “tutoring” systems for collaborative learning. Students like game-based learning, and what could be more fun than playing AND learning with a partner or group of peers? (I plan to revisit the research in this area in an upcoming post.)
Below I’ve highlighted two “intelligent” tutoring systems that incorporate the use of sensors in one form or another to generate information about student learning in a way that simulates what good teachers do every day. The ClassroomAssist application was developed by researchers at Intel, in collaboration with several universities. The Wayang Outpost application was developed by researchers at UMASS, and is aligned with the principles of Universal Design for Learning.
