student-related

State of Student Success and Trends in Higher Education — from instructure.com
2020 Global Research Study and Trends

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

In the following report, we’ve identified six leading trends for student success and engagement in today’s world:

Career readiness is the number one priority for students.
Institutions need to think beyond the lecture.
Faculty-student engagement is critical.
Online learning needs to be intentionally designed.
Socioeconomic disparities impact engagement.
Democratisation of education begins with equitable access.

Here is a helpful app to help teachers create green screen videos [educatorstechnology.com]

On 10/24/2020, in A/V -- audio/visual, digital audio, digital learning, digital video, productivity / tips and tricks, remote teaching and learning, student teaching/teacher education, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, tools, by Daniel Christian

Here is a helpful app to help teachers create green screen videos — from educatorstechnology.com

Excerpt:

If you are looking for a good green screen app to use in your teaching and with your students in class, Do Ink is definitely one of the first options you should consider. Green Screen by Do Ink allows you to easily create beautiful videos and visual presentations incorporating a wide variety of multimedia materials. As a teacher, you can use it to design tutorials, step-by-step guides, explainers, visual illustrations, presentations, posters, and many more.

Reflections on “The State of AI in Higher Education” [Schaffhauser]

On 10/24/2020, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, adjunct faculty, Alternatives, assistive technologies, business side of he, career development, change, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, colleges, community colleges, competency-based learning/education, computer science, curriculum, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, distance education, education technology, emerging technologies, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, generational differences, global / globalization, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, learner profiles, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, lifelong learning, marketplaces, more voice more choice more control, new business models, online learning, online media, online tutoring, pace of change, passions, personalized/customized learning, platforms, professional development, reinvent, society, staying relevant, student-related, surviving, technologies for your home, traditional / tradition, training / L&D, TVs, universities, workplace, by Daniel Christian

The State of AI in Higher Education — from campustechnology.com by Dian Schaffhauser
Both industry and higher ed experts see opportunities and risk, hype and reality with AI for teaching and learning.

Excerpts:

Kurt VanLehn, the chair for effective education in STEM in the School of Computing, Informatics and Decision Systems Engineering at Arizona State University, knows how challenging it can be people to come up with examples of effective AI in education. Why? “Because learning is complicated.”
…
Nuno Fernandes, president and CEO of Ilumno, an ed tech company in Latin America, isn’t ready to count adaptive learning out yet, if only because adaptivity has worked in other industries, such as social platforms like Netflix and Amazon, to identify what could work best for the user, based on previous activities and preferred formats of curriculum.

As Ilumno’s Fernandes asserted, AI won’t “substitute for faculty in any of our lifetimes. What it will do is give us tools to work better and to complement what is being done by humans.”

From DSC:
The article is a very balanced one. On one hand, it urges caution and points out that learning is messy and complex. On the other hand, it points out some beneficial applications of AI that already exist in language learning and in matching alumni with students for mentorship-related reasons.

From my perspective, I think AI-based systems will be used to help us scan job descriptions to see what the marketplace needs and is calling for. Such a system would be a major step forward in at least pointing out the existing hiring trends, needed skillsets, job openings, and more — and to do so in REAL-TIME!

Colleges, universities, and alternatives to traditional higher education could use this information to be far more responsive to the needs of the workplace. Then, such systems could match what the workplace needs with courses, microlearning-based feeds, apprenticeships, and other sources of learning that would help people learn those in-demand skills.

That in and of itself is HUGE. Again, HUGE. Given the need for people to reinvent themselves — and to do so quickly and affordably — that is incredibly beneficial.

Also, I do think there will be cloud-based learner profiles…data that each of us control and say who has access to it. Credentials will be stored there, for example. AI-based systems can scan such profiles and our desired career goals and suggest possible matches.

We can change our career goals. We don’t have to be locked into a particular track or tracks. We can reinvent ourselves. In fact, many of us will have to.

DC: Note to self (while watching a creative master at Adobe Max tonight) pic.twitter.com/6nlCcuZpto

— Daniel Christian (he/him) (@dchristian5) October 22, 2020

Many students complain that online-based learning doesn’t engage them. Well, check this idea out! [Christian]

On 10/22/2020, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, 3D, A/V -- audio/visual, active learning, adjunct faculty, Adobe, Apple, architecture, art, attention, biology, business side of he, career development, collaboration, colleges, communications, communities of practice, community colleges, competency-based learning/education, computer science, content development, aggregation, repositories, creativity, Daniel S. Christian, design, digital audio, digital learning, digital photography, digital storytelling, digital video, distance education, drama/theater, economics, education, education technology, educational games / serious games, engagement / engaging students, engineering, entrepreneurship, experimentation, face-to-face, faculty/staff, future, game-changing environment, geography / geology, global / globalization, graphics, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, immersion, innovation, instructional design, interaction design, interactivity, interface design, journalism, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, liberal arts, love of learning, maker movement, mathematics, media/film, Michigan, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, multimedia, music, online learning, online media, participation, passions, photography, platforms, project-based learning, reinvent, research, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, United States, universities, vision/possibilities, writing, XR - extended reality, by Daniel Christian

From DSC…by the way, another title for this blog could have been:

WIN-WIN situations all around! The Theatre Departments out there could collaborate with other depts/disciplines to develop highly engaging, digitally-based learning experiences!

The future of drama and the theatre — as well as opera, symphonies, and more — will likely include a significant virtual/digital component to them. While it’s too early to say that theatre needs to completely reinvent itself and move “the stage” completely online, below is an idea that creates a variety of WIN-WIN situations for actors, actresses, stage designers, digital audio/video editors, fine artists, graphic designers, programmers, writers, journalists, web designers, and many others as well — including the relevant faculty members!

A new world of creative, engaging, active learning could open up if those involved with the Theatre Department could work collaboratively with students/faculty members from other disciplines. And in the end, the learning experiences and content developed would be highly engaging — and perhaps even profitable for the institutions themselves!

[DC: I only slightly edited the above image from the Theatre Department at WMU]

Though the integration of acting with online-based learning materials is not a new idea, this post encourages a far more significant interdisciplinary collaboration between the Theatre Department and other departments/disciplines.

Consider a “Dealing with Bias in Journalism” type of topic, per a class in the Digital Media and Journalism Major.

Students from the Theatre Department work collaboratively with the students from the most appropriate class(es?) from the Communications Department to write the script, as per the faculty members’ 30,000-foot instructions (not 1000-foot level/detailed instructions)
Writing the script would entail skills involved with research, collaboration, persuasion, creativity, communication, writing, and more
The Theatre students would ultimately act out the script — backed up by those learning about sound design, stage design, lighting design, costume design, etc.
Example scene: A woman is sitting around the kitchen table, eating breakfast and reading a posting — aloud — from a website that includes some serious bias in it that offends the reader. She threatens to cancel her subscription, contact the editor, and more. She calls out to her partner why she’s so mad about the article.
Perhaps there could be two or more before/after scenes, given some changes in the way the article was written.
Once the scenes were shot, the digital video editors, programmers, web designers, and more could take that material and work with the faculty members to integrate those materials into an engaging, interactive, branching type of learning experience.
From there, the finished product would be deployed by the relevant faculty members.

[DC: Above images from the Theatre Department at WMU]

Colleges and universities could share content with each other and/or charge others for their products/content/learning experiences. In the future, I could easily see a marketplace for buying and selling such engaging content. This could create a needed new source of revenue — especially given that those large auditoriums and theaters are likely not bringing in as much revenue as they typically do.

Colleges and universities could also try to reach out to local acting groups to get them involved and continue to create feeders into the world of work.

Other tags/categories could include:

MOOCs
Learning from the Living[Class]Room
Multimedia / digital literacy — tools from Adobe, Apple, and others.
Passions, participation, engagement, attention.
XR: Creating immersive, Virtual Reality (VR)-based experiences
Learning Experience Design
Interaction Design
Interface Design
…and more

Also see:

What improv taught me about failure: As a teacher and academic — from scholarlyteacher.com by Katharine Hubbard

In improv, the only way to “fail” is to overthink and not have fun, which reframed what failure was on a grand scale and made me start looking at academia through the same lens. What I learned about failure through improv comes back to those same two core concepts: have fun and stop overthinking.
…
Students are more engaged when the professor is having fun with the materials (Keller, Hoy, Goetz, & Frenzel, 2016), and teaching is more enjoyable when we are having fun ourselves.

On-demand recordings available for the 11th Annual ASU+GSV Summit

On 10/19/2020, in 24x7x365 access, active learning, adjunct faculty, adult learning, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, business side of he, change, colleges, communities of practice, community colleges, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, credentialing, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital video, distance education, education, education reform, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, experimentation, face-to-face, faculty/staff, game-changing environment, global / globalization, higher education, ideas, innovation, instructional design, K-12 related, law schools, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, multimedia, new business models, new media literacies, online learning, pedagogy, personalized/customized learning, platforms, productivity / tips and tricks, professional development, remote teaching and learning, society, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, technologies for your home, technology (general), traditional / tradition, training / L&D, trends, United States, universities, vendors, vision/possibilities, workplace, XR - extended reality, by Daniel Christian

Richard Mayer Has Spent Decades On Educational Research. Here are His Pandemic Teaching Tips. — from edsurge.com by Jeff Young

Excerpt:

EdSurge recently reached out to Mayer, who is a professor of psychology at the University of California at Santa Barbara, to get his thoughts on the lessons his research reveals that can guide teachers and professors.
…
One finding is that students learn better if they see a video of the professor actually working out a math problem or concept on a whiteboard, than if they see a video of the same professor standing next to a whiteboard where the problem has already been worked out.

New benchmarking tool for higher ed seeks to address workplace soft skills gap — from chieflearningofficer.com by Elizabeth Loutfi
Quality Assurance Commons’ new Employability Self-Assessment will support higher education programs as they develop proficiency in teaching eight 21st century soft skills critical to today’s employers.

Excerpt:

A new assessment tool created for higher education institutions to track and measure the career success of their graduates was launched this week by nonprofit organization Quality Assurance Commons. The tool, which is called the Employability Self-Assessment, helps institutions identify the key skills employers want in candidates in the current and post-pandemic workplace.

The ESA has already been piloted at 20 colleges and universities and is being implemented at eight higher education institutions in the Connecticut State Colleges & Universities System, according to a company press release.

According to the report, the top three missing soft skills reported by employers were problem solving, critical thinking, innovation and creativity; ability to deal with complexity and ambiguity; and communication.

From DSC:
Hmmm…do our current ways of doing things get students to that point? Are the ways in which we structure our educational systems facilitating the development of those skills? Apparently not. What needs to change? For me, it’s offering “More choice. More control.” to the students. And watch the energy, curiosity, and enjoyment of learning greatly increase.

Connectivity gap persists for at least 300K California students [De La Rosa]

On 10/18/2020, in dangers of the status quo, distance education, education, education reform, education technology, K-12 related, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, online learning, parents/guardians, political science, society, student-related, surviving, technologies for your home, technology (general), telecommunications, United States, youth, by Daniel Christian

Connectivity gap persists for at least 300K California students — from educationdive.com by Shawna De La Rosa

Dive Brief:

California school districts are required to provide both devices and high-speed internet connection to any student learning from home, but between 300,000 and 1 million remain disconnected, EdSource reports. A backlog of computer orders and weak broadband infrastructure in remote areas are contributing factors.
At a state assembly education committee hearing Wednesday, California education leaders, teachers and lawmakers discussed how to close the digital divide. Though most households have enough broadband to handle some video calls, many family networks don’t have the strength for multiple students to be connected at once.
Nationwide, approximately one-third of households with annual incomes under $30,000 and with children under 18 don’t have high-speed internet connection at home, impacting roughly 9.7 million students, according to a Pew Research Center report. A quarter of teens within that socio-economic bracket lack access to a computer at home.

National Student Clearinghouse Research Center’s Monthly Update on Higher Education Enrollment — as of October 15, 2020 and as referenced late last week by The Chronicle of Higher Education

From DSC:
The window of opportunity for traditional institutions of higher education to reinvent themselves, become cheaper, and offer more value is beginning to close. The window is still there…but it’s beginning to close.

5 things that show students aren’t the only ones learning during the pandemic — from mlive.com by Melissa Frick

Excerpts:

“Never in my 33 years of teaching did I ever think it would be like this,” the Muskegon High School teacher said of virtual learning, which the district is using this semester to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus.

“It’s a huge learning curve.”

With Michigan K-12 schools back in session for the fall – some virtually, some in-person, and some a mix of both – students aren’t the only ones doing the learning this year. Amid this unprecedented school year, teachers are learning some new things along the way, too.

…
3. Virtual learning has exposed the depth of Michigan’s digital divide
Systemic gaps in technology access among school districts around the state left thousands of students at a disadvantage this year, despite efforts by educators to fulfill short-term connectivity needs during virtual learning.

From DSC:
These are just a couple of reasons that I say that Rome wasn’t built overnight. But it’s great to see that tools are being added to teaching toolboxes and learners’ toolboxes as well:

“It’s easy for them to get onto Zoom now, they can go onto Google Classroom and go into the lesson right along with us,” she said. “I’m surprised at how smooth it’s running now.”

Creating a split-screen music video – The Dos and Don’ts — from global-edtech.com by Levent Erdogan
Levent Erdogan shares his experience producing split-screen music videos.

New Film Addresses Mental Health By Challenging Us To ‘Listen’ To Our Youth Voice — from gettingsmart.com by Michael Niehoff

Also see:

IW Official Guide: World Mental Health Day Supporting the workplace during the pandemic & beyond — from inspiring-workplaces.com by Aimee O’Leary

For World Mental Health Day 2020, we have created a quick guide of 10 top tips for you. It has been compiled from experts around the world on how to support the mental health of your people during these challenging times.

It includes:

How to do your part to break the stigma
How to create functional routines
How to look out for colleagues without being invasive
How to stay connected
and more

Lastly, before reading the guide, reach out to someone you know today, who you have haven’t spoken with in a while and simply ask… How are you, really? It will make a huge difference.

*****************

Addendum on 10/13/20:

As the Pandemic Grinds On, Here Are 5 Big Worries of College Presidents — from chronicle.com by Michael Vasquez

Excerpt:

Campus mental health is the No. 1 worry. The college leaders were asked to select their five top concerns from a list of 19 Covid-related issues. Fifty-three percent of presidents listed student mental health, and 42 percent pointed to faculty and staff mental health as being among their biggest worries. Anxiety, uncertainty, depression, and grief — compounded by the isolation of the pandemic — have exacted an often invisible toll on people who study and work in higher education.

Got science questions? Skype A Scientist can help [Hendricks]

On 10/10/2020, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, adjunct faculty, career development, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, collaboration, colleges, communications, community colleges, digital audio, digital learning, digital video, distance education, engineering, experimentation, faculty/staff, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, instructional design, K-12 related, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, online learning, online tutoring, platforms, presentations, productivity / tips and tricks, science, STEAM-related, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, technologies for your home, television, tools, user experience (UX), vendors, videoconferencing, virtual field trips, virtual tutoring, web-based collaboration, by Daniel Christian

Got science questions? Skype A Scientist can help — from bigthink.com by Scotty Hendricks
A non-profit dedicated to science communication offers to connect learners with over 11,000 scientists.

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