By Richard Chang, Campus Technology
Google has recently released a brand new version of Google Earth for both Chrome and Android. This new version has come with a slew of nifty features teachers can use for educational purposes with students in class. Linked below is a quick overview of the most fascinating features.
Share on FacebookBy Dhawal Shah, EdSurge
As MOOC providers focussed on finding a business model, they started putting certain aspects of the experience behind a paywall, hoping to get more people to pay. MOOCs went from free to free to audit (nevermind that the concept of auditing a class is completely foreign in most parts of the world). Free certificates were the first items to be shifted from free to pay. Then the graded assignments were put behind paywall. Now all the major MOOC providers have (or will soon have) some courses that are completely paid (even the videos). This shift to a freemium model, with more and more chances to up-sell, seems to be working for the providers, with the top three players earning more than $100 million combined last year. Each provider has a different model, and that can be really confusing to students. So here’s a summary of what free means for the four biggest MOOC players.
https://www.edsurge.com/news/2017-04-20-moocs-started-out-completely-free-where-are-they-now
Share on FacebookBy Ruth Reynard, Campus Technology
As with every new “technology” that has entered society since the advent of the quill and the printing press, there are immediate interests and innovations pursued by early adopters, innovators, scientists and end users. In most cases, the technology is used for a while and then educators begin to look at the potential benefits for learning and instruction. Usually that happens when we realize the technology is popular and the younger generations are enthralled with using it — and therefore it is “here to stay.” As educators, we then begin to look at how the technology is impacting the way students think and process information — and how we can integrate the technology in the teaching and learning process.That model is an apt description of the state of virtual reality (VR) technology in education. As VR increasingly goes mainstream, there are various points of view on its current effectiveness in teaching and learning — and its potential use moving forward.
https://campustechnology.com/articles/2017/04/26/the-impact-of-virtual-reality-on-learning.aspx
Share on Facebookby Wylie Wong, EdTech
As technology drives new career paths, colleges pivot to help students get ready. At Indiana University avid gamers are enrolled in the university’s Bachelor of Science in Game Design program, established in 2015. To prepare them, IU invested in state-of-the-art classrooms and labs featuring high-end gaming PCs, virtual reality headsets and specialized software that let students design and build their own games. Anthony P. Carnevale, director of Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce, says that advances in technology tend to shape higher education programs in two ways: first, through traditional degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). Second, among a broader set of majors (e.g., healthcare, business and education), institutions are incorporating technology into curricula to ensure students have the necessary tech skills to meet employers’ needs.
Share on Facebookby Pat Donachie, Education Dive
Colleges and universities are increasingly investing in creating new degrees, as well as purchasing new hardware and software, in order to offer students more choices as they enter a workforce increasingly dependent on STEM knowledge, according to Ed Tech: Focus on Higher Ed. Institutions are finding that cybersecurity skills are increasingly in demand, with San Diego State University seeing Homeland Security master’s degree students double in the past year. College educators will also need to keep pace with the changes coming to classrooms, and Georgetown has responded by creating a masters of arts in Learning and Design that will prep instructors on careers in educational technology and learning analytics.
Share on Facebookby Tara García Mathewson, Education Dive
Some faculty at the University of Cincinnati have been using lecture capture technology since 2009, but the capabilities of the old technology are just a shadow of what faculty can do now. Instead of just documenting what happens in the classroom, faculty are now using next-generation, interactive tools that increase student engagement and bring new resources to both students and educators. Nelson Vincent, vice president for technology and chief information officer at the University of Cincinnati, said the exploding technology use on campuses today can historically be drawn back to student demand. At the University of Cincinnati, it’s more than that.
http://www.educationdive.com/news/next-gen-lecture-capture-can-transform-classrooms/440998/
Share on FacebookBy Joshua Kim, Inside Higher Ed
How is digital thinking changing the analog campus? The first thing to get straight is that digital thinking is not the same as educational technology or online learning. Digital thinking is not delivery method or a set of technologies. Rather, digital thinking is a way of understanding the world. 3 things happen when you bring a digital mindset to a traditional analog institution.
https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/technology-and-learning/digital-thinking-and-analog-campus
Share on FacebookBy Cher Zevala, IOT Evolution World
One area that is seeing a great deal of change due to big data is online learning. As online learning has become an integral part of the overall educational system, administrators, curriculum designers, and instructors have all sought to make the experience as meaningful and engaging as possible. More than ever before, students are looking for programs that will meet their specific needs and allow them to have a more personalized experience, and data is an important part of making that happen. Students looking for the best online MBA program are likely to be more concerned with how the curriculum can be customized to their own needs than with other factors.
Share on Facebookby Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate
Students have made portfolios for classrooms of various kinds for many reasons over the last few decades. In the past, the teacher was the only person other than the student really to see their portfolio, unless it is posted in a display somewhere in the classroom. Now, there is an easy way to create and share portfolios electronically in a classroom. These e-portfolios are becoming more and more popular, and they have created a paradigm shift in education recently. E-portfolios are becoming the perfect way to collect, share, collaborate, and grade assignments in most classrooms.
http://www.thetechedvocate.org/use-e-portfolios-classroom/
Share on FacebookBy Richard Chang, Campus Technology
A new web program by Google allows users to explore the world in virtual reality (VR) by just speaking the name of a place. Speak to Go is activated by a user’s voice. When a user says the name of a place, Google Street View imagery pops up on one’s phone or web browser. For example, Richard Byrne, who writes the blog Free Technology for Teachers, recently spoke the word “Maine,” and was taken to Acadia National Park in Maine. Had he been more specific and said “Portland, Maine,” he would have seen imagery of Portland, he said. Speak to Go is designed to be used with smartphones inside of VR headsets, such as the Google Cardboard.
Share on Facebookby Randal Mason, Huffington Post
In the two years since a devastating earthquake damaged or destroyed over 35,000 classrooms, Nepal struggles to get its education system back on track. But while the country has made impressive strides in improving enrollment rates for primary school students, learning outcomes at all levels remain weak. In such a challenging environment, educators like Baman Kumar Ghimire are turning to technology to innovate. A teacher at Motherland Higher Secondary School in Pokhara, Nepal, Ghimire travels to classrooms across the country to promote MOOCs (massive open online courses). In a country where over 25% of the population lives below the poverty line, such free online classes are an invaluable educational resource, once people know how to access them.
Share on FacebookBy John Huetter, RDN
Seeking to expand its body shop network ahead of the potentially blockbuster Model 3, Tesla informed its certified collision repairers last week that it would replace its in-house training and welding requirements for curriculum held online and administered by I-CAR, respectively. “Building on the past 5 years of experience, we have been able to evaluate and dramatically simplify training, and will no longer require instructor led, onsite training,” Tesla wrote in an email to its certified shops obtained by Repairer Driven News. “We have developed online training as a more time and cost effective way to train your technicians to be approved for Tesla repairs. Online training offers many benefits not possible solely with instructor led training, such as unlimited reviewing of procedures, more frequent class offerings and updates for the network, and less time to train our whole technician population vs cycling everyone through constrained class rooms.
Share on FacebookBy Adrian Kingsley-Hughes, ZD Net
Microsoft is expected to unveil Windows 10 Cloud next month, and leaked specs suggest that it is being positioned as a competitor to Google’s Chromebook platform. The performance comparisons suggest that Windows 10 Cloud systems would have battery performance figures identical to that of a generic Chromebook, and boot and login times in the same ballpark. The wording also makes it clear that these devices are aimed at the education market, and perhaps are designed to pave the way for more affordable versions of the Surface Book. On paper at least, the spec is impressive. Doubly so because we’re talking about Windows here, and not Google’s Chromebook platform, which was designed from the ground-up to be fast and lightweight.
Share on FacebookBy Danny Palmer, ZD Net
The start of 2017 saw a sudden decline in the distribution of Locky, to such an extent that another form of ransomware — Cerber — has usurped Locky’s dominance. But after being all but written off, Locky is staging a comeback. Cybersecurity researchers at Cisco Talos have observed a surge in emails distributing Locky, with over 35 thousand emails sent in just a few hours. This surge in distribution is being attributed to the Necurs botnet, which until recently focused on spamming pump-and-dump stockmarket scams. This time, however, the Locky campaign is harnessing an infection technique associated with the Dridex botnet, in an effort to boost the chance of compromising targets.
Share on Facebookby Steve Ranger, ZD Net
And now, after almost a decade of furious change, the smartphone is at the height of its powers. It is our constant digital companion, having absorbed the capabilities of the PC, camera, TV, sat-nav, and more along the way. But — to misquote — the screen that shines twice as bright, shines half as long. And the smartphone has shone so very, very brightly.For a while it looked like wearables would be the next big thing, but it is proving just too hard to fit enough processing power and battery life into something like a smartwatch to make it a viable alternative to a phone. And, even if those two problems can be overcome, the screen is never going to be big enough on any wearable for it to be our primary connection to the digital world. That leaves augmented and virtual reality as the prime candidate. However, as smartglasses or mind-reading technology make our relationship with technology even more intimate and difficult to navigate, we may look back on the complications of the smartphone era with something resembling nostalgia.
Share on FacebookBy Jordan Friedman, US News
Among the 298 National Universities ranked in U.S. News’ 2017 Best Colleges, 96 were also ranked in the 2017 Best Online Bachelor’s Programs.No National University ranked higher than No. 50 has a ranked online bachelor’s program. The map linked below shows which National Universities ranked by U.S. News also have a ranked online bachelor’s program. Schools that did not participate in both rankings and unranked programs were not considered for this report. Rank Not Published, or RNP, denotes an institution ranked in the bottom one-fourth of its ranking category. U.S. News calculates a rank for the school but has decided not to publish it.
Share on FacebookBY HEATHER NGOMA, eCampus News
In the digital age, educator discomfort in using some social media can have a direct effect on students’ digital literacy skills. Here are some solutions.Despite clear advantages to advancing digital literacy, institutions often experience considerable roadblocks to implementing digital literacy initiatives. Interestingly, accessibility often isn’t the biggest factor blocking this process—more often than not, it comes down to an educator’s own comfort with social media. Educators with little to no training on how to integrate digital literacy exercises into the classroom run the risk of compromising their students’ development of valuable soft skills that can produce educational and professional career advantages.
http://www.ecampusnews.com/featured/featured-on-ecampus-news/twitter-problem-educators/
Share on Facebookby Autumn A. Arnett, Education Dive
A cross-curricular approach helps promote critical-thinking, problem-solving and creativity, and it will help prepare today’s students for jobs that do not exist, according to the latest installment of an eSchool News series looking at ways to better serve Gen Z students. Ditching the traditional textbook for a series of shorter articles — and using more visual materials like maps, photos and charts to teach the material — is also effective. Online curricula can help promote deeper investigation of a topic and help students make connections between different subjects on their own.
http://www.educationdive.com/news/to-best-serve-todays-students-go-cross-curricular/440551/
Share on Facebookby Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate
Virtual Reality (VR) is changing the way people see the future. As with video games emerging into the classroom in the early 2000s, this new technology will soon be making its way into classrooms as well. Many teachers are receptive to working with this technology, but some of them are not quite aware of the effect VR can have on a classroom environment. It can change the way students learn in the long run.
http://www.thetechedvocate.org/virtual-reality-change-way-students-learn/
Share on Facebookby Hannah Nyren, Ed TechTimes
Picture a big, beautiful college campus: Dorms dotting the landscape, students rushing across the quad. Tools and technology that help enhance classroom instruction — not replace it. These are probably the main aspects of what you think of when you consider a traditional college experience. But it’s 2017. Although those ideas of what a college experience should be like are still alive and well in some schools in the United States, they are no longer the only options for those seeking higher education. With the rise of online schooling and other hybrid, unconventional forms of higher ed, the college experience has changed immensely. To capture a snapshot of this evolution, we had Jake Murray from Boston University’s School of Education sit down with Peter Stokes, the Managing Director of Huron, a consulting group that advises higher ed leaders, amongst others.
Share on FacebookBy Chris Foley, US News
Choosing between online and on-campus education and then selecting a specific program can be tricky if you don’t first determine all of the costs. Many prospective students only consider tuition and fees, what are usually referred to as “direct costs,” or those that college will bill directly to you. But they usually overlook the hidden costs of getting an education – like having to give up a job or moving elsewhere. These are “opportunity costs,” and they can be a major factor when deciding between an online and traditional degree or certificate. Opportunity costs include whatever a student gives up to pursue a degree. If you enroll in an on-campus program, you may have to pass up a promotion or cut down your work hours. Thus, the opportunity costs of a full-time traditional program, especially one requiring you to relocate, can be quite significant – larger than just tuition and fees.
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