VIDEO | The Educational Landscape in 50 Years — from the evoLLLution.com by The Khan Academy

Excerpt:

In this video, Salman Khan, founder of the Khan Academy, a not-for-profit online education provider, shares his thoughts on what the educational landscape will look like in 50 years. By 2060, Khan predicts three major shifts in education: a change to the classroom model, a change to the credential model and a change in the role of the instructor.

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KhanAcademy-EducationIn60Years-March2013

From DSC:
THIS is what it could look like if students OWNED their own learning and could pursue their own passions! — A powerful piece!
Well worth your time if you are involved with — or concerned about — education in any way, shape, or form.

The video starts off with this troubling/deep assertion by a student (which I’m sure varies in actuality across the board):

  • “It’s crazy that…in a system that is meant to teach…and to help the youth, there is NO voice from the youth at all.”

 

IfStudentsDesignedTheirOwnSchools-March2013

 

From DSC:
A few radical — but powerful ideas — to help students OWN their own learning (something that they will need for the rest of their lives):

  • More choice, more control
  • Research what you want to research — “The most important thing about your question is that you ACTUALLY  WANT to know the answer.”
  • Students pursue their own passions — be that an interest in music, art, science, aviation, or in another discipline.
  • Student present their findings to each other — which involves more of a team-based approach (i.e. peer pressure in a positive way here, strongly encouraging each other to do their best work so as not to let others down)
  • Peer evaluation
  • No quizzes
  • No grades
  • Often no adults in the room; if adults are there, they are acting more as guides and facilitators
  • Multiple types of “assignments”/activities — some individualistic, some group work, some long-term

A couple of questions kept running through the back of my mind:

  • Did they hand select these particular students for this program?
  • If so, what were the predominant characteristics of those students?

 

 

With that said, this is a very powerful piece — well worth your time to check out.

 

 

From DSC:
The worlds of K-12, higher education, and corporate training/development are all seeking solid solutions to the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) or the Bring Your Own Technology (BYOT) solution.  (The way I see it, it would sure be helpful it Apple worked with the other relevant vendors to establish better wireless networking protocols.)  Anyway, below are some items on this topic:


 

How to BYOT for Learning? – from shift2future.com by Brian Kuhn

Responding to the “Shift to the Future” — from seanrtech.blogspot.com by Sean Robinson

BYOD: 7 reasons to leave them to their own devices — from Donald Clark Plan B

Ten reasons the iPad is an awesome tool for classrooms and education — from isource.com with thanks to Krista Spahr, Senior Instructional Designer at Calvin College, for this resource

The 4 easiest ways to mirror the iPad (comparison chart) — from edudemic.com by Seth Hansen; working off of a similar posting from Tony Vincent 

Strategies for taking flight with BYOT  — from byotnetwork.com

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

The Partnership for 21st Century Skills identified 4 critical areas of learning for students that include creativity, critical thinking, communication and collaboration.  In Forsyth County Schools, we’ve been working hard with parents, teachers and students to embrace learning with student-owned technologies; something we call Bring Your Own Technology (BYOT).  What we know for sure is that BYOT is really more like Bring Your Own Learning because we’ve discovered that it is NOT about the technology – it IS about the learning.

 


From DSC:
This aligns well with Alan November’s replacing “one-to-one” with “one-to-world.”

But whether we use the acronomyns BYOD, BYOT or BYOL (or whatever), it’s all about students being able to contribute content (hopefully that they created) and participate in the discussions.

 

A piece of the Next Generation Smart Classroom -- Daniel Christian -- June 2012

From June 2012

 

Vision of a Next Gen Smart Classroom from March 2010

 From October 2009:
Building off of Steelcase’s media:scape product line

Defiance-FirstVideoGameTVShow-Feb2013

 

Excerpt:

It’s not unusual for a science fiction television show to spin off a video game. What is unusual is linking the show and the game together on an ongoing basis, with plot elements and characters from each crossing over to the other. In April, gaming company Trion Worlds and the Syfy cable television channel will unveil Defiance, the first such crossover massively multiplayer online game (MMO) and TV show.

 

From DSC:

Transmedia.

Multimedia.

Interactivity.

Participation.

Gamification.

Sounds like there must be something here for the next gen of learners — and learning from the living room.

 

 

Also see:

From DSC:
As a team of us have been charged with putting together a new collaborative workspace/conference room, I’ve been thinking about some ideas for a new type of interface as well as some new types of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) to be used in group collaboration/web-based collaboration.  I was thinking it would be good to not only display files from various devices but also to be able to share files/URLs/other resources with each other.  (Some type of storage device that processes files — and scans them for viruses would be needed in addition to a large display or an interactive multitouch surface/wall.)

People within the same room could contribute files/items to a variety of “areas” — and so could others who joined in via the Internet.  Here’s what I had wanted to be able to do and I had pictured in my mind:

 

New-types-of-collaboration--DChristian-2-1-13

 

ADDITIONAL NOTES:
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  • People could select which files/URLs/resources that they wanted to contribute
    .
  • People could select which files/URLs/resources that they wanted to download to their own devices (during and after the meeting)
    .
  • Could be powerful in the next generation of our Smart Classrooms as well as in corporate training/learning spaces
    .
  • Could be powerful in the what I’m envisioning in “Learning from the Living [Class] Room”
    .
  • Could be powerful in conference room situations
    .

 

 It’s very similar to what Tidebreak has created/envisioned in their product lines.
Check out their innovative work/products/concepts!

 


Transforming learning spaces: 3 big ideas — from Tidebreak


 

 

Also see:

 

Tidebreak-Jan2013

 

 

Can you apply Google’s 20% time in the classroom? — from guardian.co.uk/teacher-network by Stuart Spendlow
Google offers its engineers 20% of their timetable to work on their own projects. Keen to see if it could work for education, Stuart Spendlow introduced the idea to his own classroom

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Pupils cooking

20% time developed a class of intrinsically motivated learners who strive to
make themselves proud without any fear whatsoever of making mistakes,
says Stuart Spendlow.
Photograph: Paul Doyle/Alamy

7th graders publish their own textbook — from learninginhand.com by Tony Vincent

 

 

Also see:

  • Readz launches to provide publishers DIY solution to optimize content for tablets — from betakit.com by Humayun Khan
    .
  • 7 outstanding free books for your iPad — from educatorstechnology.com
    Excerpt:
    Below is a list of some excellent books for your iPad. I have curated this list over  the last couple of months and I kept adding to it every time I stumble upon a resource somewhere online.I don’t know if you like reading books on your iPad or not but let me tell you this: having at least a couple of titles installed on your iPad would really be of great help particularly in those moments when you are stuck somewhere and have nothing to do but waiting. Reading is a habit ( luckily a good one ) that we can ACQUIRE  by force of habituation at least in the eyes of Skinnerian theory.The more you read , the fluent you get at reading and the more used your mind becomes to the act of reading.  Check out these books I selected for you. All of them are free and require iBooks. Enjoy.

 

Addendum on 1/22/13:

Specialty classroom technologies — from centerdigitaled.com

  • Kristy Chapman | Special Education Director | Union County | Board of Education, GA
  • Kyle Li | Full-time Game & Learning Instructor | School of Art, Media, and Technology | Parsons, The Newschool for Design, NY
  • Moses A. Ojeda | Principal (I.A.) | Thomas A. Edison Career & Technical Education High School, NY
  • Denise Spence | Magnet Lead Technology Teacher | Academy for Technology Excellence | Academy for Digital Excellence | Academy for Game Design and Programming Excellence | Dunbar High School, FL

Session was moderated by Tom Ryan, Ph.D. | Sr. Fellow, Center for Digital Education | Former CIO, Albuquerque Public Schools

Resources

 

Example slides:

 

Converge-1-17-13FullSteamAhead

 

Converge-1-17-13-2

 

 

Converge-1-17-13-3

 

 

Converge-1-17-13-4

 

Converge-1-17-13-5

 

Converge-1-17-13-6

 

Converge-1-17-13-9

 

Converge-1-17-13-10

 

Converge-1-17-13-12

 

Converge-1-17-13-13

 

Converge-1-17-13-14

From DSC:
In this series of periodic postings re: experimentation (see here and here), this week’s Consumers Electronics Show prompts me to think about different types of experiments, prompting such questions as:
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  • When will we see more educationally-related second screen apps?
    .
  • How might this type of setup dovetail with MOOCs provided by institutions of higher education? With MOOCs offered by the corporate world?
    .
  • What sorts of technologies will weave their way into what could be offered here?
    (The following possibilities come to my mind: Artificial Intelligence (AI), learning agents, recommendation engines, course or topic playlists, web-based learner profiles, data mining/analytics, videoconferencing, educational gaming, virtual tutoring, BYOD, and/or cloud-based computing. Other…?)
    .
  • Will Internet-enabled marketplaces and exchanges — between learners and teachers — become commonplace?
    .
  • Will technologies involved with endeavors like IBM’s Watson or with Knewton be deployed in this kind of convergent environment? If so, what sorts of doors/job opportunities/new skillsets would that open up or require?
    .

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The Living [Class] Room -- by Daniel Christian -- July 2012 -- a second device used in conjunction with a Smart/Connected TV

 

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Some relevant items on this include:

Flingo reveals Samba, a first of its kind dual interactive TV and second screen platform — from pandodaily.com byasdf

Excerpt:

This week at CES in Las Vegas (the Consumer Electronics Show), San Francisco-based Flingo will release the latest version of its platform, dubbed Samba, aimed at changing this. Samba will make four-year-old Flingo one of the first to offer a combined Interactive TV and Second Screen experience.

“We saw a surge of Smart TV and tablet adoption in 2012, but realized that a seamless TV experience across all screens was missing,” says Flingo co-founder and CEO Ashwin Navin, formerly of BitTorrent. “Samba will blur the lines between linear television and the Web.”

Flingo is unique in that it uses video, not audio to identify what content is being viewed…

Samba offers viewers the ability to actively engage with programming in real-time through their primary screen. This can take the form of polls, social conversations, recommendations, or consumption of related media. In the case of Second Screens, aka internet-connected laptops, tablets, and smartphones used simultaneously while watching TV, the company can offer an even wider array of complementary content and engagement, such as aggregated social feeds relating to live programming or an ability to watch past episodes of a live show. This can all be delivered across multiple screens, in concert.

 

Also see:

Smart TV Alliance adds Panasonic and IBM to its fold, lays bare new SDK features -- Sean Buckley

 

Also see:

 

samsung smart tv ces 2013

 

Kevin Smith/Business Insider

 

More tangentially, but still relevant:

  • McGraw-Hill to debut adaptive e-book for students — from blogs.wsj.com by Shalini Ramachandran
    Excerpt:

    The SmartBook…works like this: All readers essentially see the same textbook as they read for the first five minutes. But as a reader answers review questions placed throughout the chapter, different passages become highlighted to point the reader to where he or she should focus attention.

 

Looks like a very interesting set of tools/technologies out at livefyre.com — a piece of which is subtitled, the “Web’s first Engagement Management System.”
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  • How might this set of technologies/functionalities affect what’s possible with MOOCs?
    .
  • Could universities and colleges use something like this to talk to their constituencies?
    .
  • As the computer, the telephone, and the television continue to converge, what educationally-related opportunities might be possible here?

 

http://www.livefyre.com/

 

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http://www.livefyre.com/

 

15 audience, student, classroom response systems — from etale.org by Bernard Bull

Tagged with:  

“Mom! Check out what I did at school today!”

If you’re a parent, don’t you love to hear the excitement in your son’s or daughter’s voice when they bring home something from school that really peaked their interest? Their passions?

I woke up last night with several ideas and thoughts on how technology could help students become — and stay — engaged, while passing over more control and choice to the students in order for them to pursue their own interests and passions. The idea would enable students to efficiently gain some exposure to a variety of things to see if those things were interesting to them — perhaps opening a way for a future internship or, eventually, a career.

The device I pictured in my mind was the sort of device that I saw a while back out at Double Robotics and/or at Suitable Technologies:

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doublerobotics dot com -- wheels for your iPad

 

 

Remote presence system called Beam -- from Suitable Technologies - September 2012

 

The thoughts centered on implementing a growing network of such remote-controlled, mobile, videoconferencing-based sorts of devices, that were hooked up to voice translation engines.  Students could control such devices to pursue things that they wanted to know more about, such as:

  • Touring the Louvre in Paris
  • Being backstage at a Broadway musical or checking out a live performance of Macbeth
  • Watching a filming of a National Geographic Special in the Fiji Islands
  • Attending an IEEE International Conference in Taiwan
  • Attending an Educause Conference or a Sloan C event to get further knowledge about how to maximize your time studying online or within a hybrid environment
  • Touring The Exploratorium in San Francisco
  • Touring the Museum of Science & Industry in Chicago
  • Being a fly on the wall during a Senate hearing/debate
  • Seeing how changes are made in the assembly lines at a Ford plant
  • Or perhaps, when a student wheels their device to a particular area — such as the front row of a conference, the signal automatically switches to the main speaker/event (keynote speakers, panel, etc. via machine-to-machine communications)
  • Inviting guest speakers into a class: pastors, authors, poets, composers, etc.
  • Work with local/virtual teams on how to heighten public awareness re: a project that deals with sustainability
  • Virtually head to another country to immerse themselves in another country’s language — and, vice versa, help them learn the students’ native languages

For accountability — as well as for setting aside intentional time to process the information — students would update their own blogs about what they experienced, heard, and saw.  They would need to include at least one image, along with the text they write about their experience.  Or perhaps a brief/edited piece of digital video or audio of some of the statements that they heard that really resonated with them, or that they had further questions on.  The default setting on such postings would be to be kept private, but if the teacher and the student felt that a posting could/should be made public, a quick setting could be checked to publish it out there for others to see/experience.

Real world. Engaging. Passing over more choice and control to the students so that they can pursue what they are passionate about.

 

 

 

 

Also see the following items from Genius:

  • The New Consumer Agenda:
    From authentic collaboration to small indulgences … what consumers want in 2013 and beyond, and how brands are responding.
  • Marketing Trends 2013+:
    From black marketing to crowd creatives, brand gaming to urban formats, solomo and diffusion … what will be big in marketing in 2013

 

Additional notes from DSC:

  • With thanks going out to Mr. Jim Woods (@hyperinnovation) on twitter for this resource
  • The wave-related graphics above are very appropriate for our times — and I’d rather be surfing the waves then being crushed by them!

 

 

Over the top: the new war for TV is just beginning [Patel]

Over the top: the new war for TV is just beginning  -- from The Verge by Nilay Patel -- November 12 2012

 

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 Future of TV

 

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The Living [Class] Room -- by Daniel Christian -- July 2012 -- a second device used in conjunction with a Smart/Connected TV

 

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From DSC:
I’m beginning to wonder if many of us will be moving off of Moodle, Sakai, Bb Learn, Desire2Learn, etc. to platforms and ecosystems that are being created by Apple, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft.  Rockstar professors on “primetime” — or anytime. If that happens, you can be sure there will be teams of specialists creating and delivering the content and learning experiences.

 

 
© 2025 | Daniel Christian