Educational Technology

by Mind/Shift KQED

Teachers who have been frustrated over blocked access to YouTube educational videos in school can take heart. YouTube is rolling out a pilot a program with schools that will redirect all YouTube links to educational content on YouTube.com/education. In addition, comments will be disabled and related videos will only be educational, both of which are a source of anxiety around exposing kids to inappropriate content. Each school and district has a different kind of filtering system, but this workaround allows schools that block YouTube at the domain level to access it through YouTube.com/education, according to Angela Lin, head of YouTube Edu.

http://mindshift.kqed.org/2011/10/youtube-launches-new-education-site-with-school-access/

By Kristy Kirkup, LF Press

A second Ontario school has replaced its Wi-Fi with landlines in response to health advisories issued by the World Health Organization (WHO). Wayside Academy, a Peterborough, Ont., private school, removed its wireless Internet following a recent classification from the WHO’s cancer arm. In May, it classified radiation emitted by all wireless devices – including baby monitors and wireless Internet systems – as possibly carcinogenic. “We realize the science is not conclusive at this point, but we decided to err on the side of caution and shut it off,” principal Adam Parker said. Wayside Academy teaches classes to 50 students of all grades but doesn’t promote the use of technology like laptops and cellphones at school.

http://www.lfpress.com/news/canada/2011/10/12/18815856.html

by Steve Kolowich, Inside Higher Ed

In a move that could shake the e-learning industry, the company today unveiled a new learning management system that colleges will be able to use for free, without having to pay any of the licensing or maintenance costs normally associated with the technology. Pearson’s new platform, called OpenClass, is only in beta phase; the company does not expect to take over the LMS market overnight. But by moving to turn the learning management platform into a free commodity — like campus e-mail has become for many institutions — Pearson is striking at the foundation of an industry that currently bills colleges for hundreds of millions per year.

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/10/13/pearson_announces_free_learning_management_system

By Catherine Groux, US News

More The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) recently released a report that highlights the increasingly large role online education plays in colleges and universities across the country. According to the report, between 2000 and 2008, the percentage of undergraduate students who took at least one web-based class increased from 8% to 20%. In this time, the number of students who were enrolled in 100% online degree programs rose from 2% to 4%.

http://www.usnewsuniversitydirectory.com/articles/online-educations-importance-confirmed-by-release_11805.aspx

by College of Charleston Scene

College of Charleston students’ comments on how they feel about online coursework, online quizzes/tests, and our online learning tool called OAKS where professors post homework, notes, and quizzes/tests.

http://youtu.be/1_AzV3e18q4

 by Best Colleges Online

While many know online education only from how it’s being used in online colleges and universities, a growing number of students take Internet-based courses much earlier in their academic careers. Schools, starting at the elementary level, are making online education part of the curriculum. Many now offer a wide variety of online options for students who have special needs, want to work ahead or are struggling to catch up. Even if you’re not aware of it, it’s likely that online education programs are coming to a high school near you. In fact, many in your area might already offer access to a variety of online educational resources. Here, we’ve collected some of the most common ways these schools push learning into the digital realm, with many employing more than one – or even all. As online education evolves, it’s likely that communities will see more and more students taking advantage of these programs, necessitating even more innovations and strategies.

http://www.bestcollegesonline.com/blog/2011/10/11/10-online-ed-trends-coming-to-a-high-school-near-you/

By Laura Devaney, eSchool News

Educators must figure out how to use digital technology to engage and instruct students. Education policy in the United States should change and adapt to digital technologies that make personalized learning a reality, agreed a number of panelists during an Oct. 6 Brookings Institution discussion. Greater access to high-quality education is much-needed, said Darrell West, a Brookings Institution senior fellow and the panel moderator, during “Educational Technology: Revolutionizing Personalized Learning and Student Assessment.” “Technology innovation represents an important part of that overall puzzle,” he said. “Technology has the potential to improve education by personalizing learning, enabling different forms of student assessment, and making class time more flexible.”

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2011/10/07/panel-examines-ed-tech-personalized-learning/

By Meris Stansbury, eSchool News

Government, industry launch nationwide call to innovators to create ‘digital badges’ that can verify digital skills. TopCoder, an adviser for the MacArthur Foundation’s competition, currently has a badge system for its community members that validates skills and competencies. How can schools accurately measure and categorize a student’s 21st-century skills? The MacArthur Foundation hopes to solve this problem with a new competition that calls on participants to create what is known as a “digital badge.” Digital badges and the digital badge system would, advocates say, help define the skills and knowledge students pick up in an informal way, such as through internships, online courses, open courseware, competitions, and much more. Mozilla, which is partnering with the MacArthur Foundation to announce the $2 million Digital Media and Learning Competition, said the badge system “will let you gather badges from any site on the internet, combining them into a story about what you know and what you’ve achieved. … This sort of badge collection may eventually become a central part of [one’s] online reputation, helping you get a job, find collaborators, and build prestige.”

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2011/10/11/digital-badges-could-help-measure-21st-century-skills/

By Tom Simonite, Technology Review

Two startups in San Francisco are betting that one of Google’s most ignominious failures will be their ticket to success. They’re launching software that implements key ideas from Google Wave, a complex communication tool that the company launched in 2009; at the time, Google claimed it would displace e-mail, but the project was quietly shuttered 16 months later after few people adopted it. Wave was a complex combination of wiki, e-mail client, instant-messaging application, and more. The most technologically impressive thing about it was the way it enabled people to work on the same document, or “Wave,” simultaneously, and see the changes made by other people happening live around their own edits. This is the experience that two new startups, Stypi and LiveLoop, are betting can be a success after all.

http://www.technologyreview.com/web/38804/?p1=A2

by David Einstein, San Francisco Chronicle

Right now, one of the hottest companies on the Internet is Dropbox (dropbox.com). It lets you share stuff with people as if you had direct access to their computers. Here’s how it works: When you sign up for Dropbox (it’s free) and download the small Dropbox program, a Dropbox folder appears on your computer. When you add a document, image or other file to the folder, it automatically syncs with your Dropbox account online, so you have it in two places. Now comes the sharing part. First, get your studnets or other committee members to sign up for Dropbox and download the program. Then go to Dropbox.com and designate a new or existing folder for sharing. Once you add other members to the folder, it will appear in their Dropbox just as it does in yours, and any changes to the contents of the folder will appear to everyone instantaneously.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/10/09/BUVJ1LDR0T.DTL

by the Oklahoma Daily

Put aside your images of rainy days with a good mystery novel and think about textbooks — these are some of the most expensive books available. They are a constant drain on student budgets and can be a serious chiropractic nightmare. But an e-book version would diminish both the price tag and the weight, as well as being conveniently available from anywhere on a tablet, e-reader or smartphone. Retailers can offer e-books at a lower price because they cut out the cost of production, shipping and stocking. Many textbooks are currently available online or in e-book format, and some students already have started using them instead of physical books. But availability, especially of the most expensive science texts, is still limited. OU could do a lot more to encourage the suppliers it buys from to create online versions of their texts. The university bookstore could even devote resources to helping students find e-book versions of their required textbooks.

http://www.oudaily.com/news/2011/oct/10/editorial-turn-page-e-books/

by Our Stance, Central Florida Future

Many distance education courses take the form of online classes. This carries many benefits of its own. For example, according to the Online Education Database, tuition at online schools is typically much lower than that of a traditional school. Students will likely not have to worry about textbook costs because most programs do not require them, according to the OED. It also lists several other benefits to online classes.Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair advocated for the expansion of distance education as one answer to the current struggles of higher education. Salman Khan, founder of a collection of online tutorials called Khan Academy, spoke to the same point. Many distance education courses take the form of online classes. This carries many benefits of its own. For example, according to the Online Education Database, tuition at online schools is typically much lower than that of a traditional school. Students will likely not have to worry about textbook costs because most programs do not require them, according to the OED. It also lists several other benefits to online classes.

http://www.centralfloridafuture.com/opinion/reform-learning-to-adapt-to-change-1.2649134

By Trip Gabriel and Matt Richtel – New York Times News Service

Amid a classroom-based software boom estimated at $2.2 billion a year, debate continues to rage over the effectiveness of technology on learning, and how best to measure it. But it is hard to tell that from technology companies’ promotional materials. Many companies ignore well-regarded independent studies that test their products’ effectiveness — Carnegie’s website, for example, makes no mention of the 2010 review, by the Education Department’s What Works Clearinghouse, which analyzed 24 studies of Cognitive Tutor’s effectiveness, but found only four of those met high research standards. Some firms misrepresent research by cherry-picking results, and promote surveys or limited case studies that lack the scientific rigor required by the clearinghouse and other authorities. And school officials, confronted with complicated and sometimes conflicting research, often buy products based on personal impressions, marketing hype or faith in technology for its own sake.

http://www.bendbulletin.com/article/20111010/NEWS0107/110100354/

By BARBARA KERR, Kansas City Star

Steve Jobs is gone, and we will not see another like him if we continue current educational policies. Innovation — the invention of new products, services and technologies — will not result from current educational policies. Most schools ignore the needs of creative students like Jobs to learn rapidly, to focus on their interests and to engage in real-world projects. These were the conclusions of the National Science Board’s recent report “Preparing the Next Generation of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math Innovators.”

http://www.kansascity.com/2011/10/09/3197331/as-i-see-it-we-are-failing-at.html

By Tanya Roscorla, Converge

Blog posts and Twitter conversations have sparked passionate discussions about interactive whiteboards in the classroom over the past few weeks. Some educators say they’re a waste of money that could have been used on personal computing devices. “I understand the arguments against these things,” said Doug Johnson, director of media and technology at Mankato Area Public Schools in Minnesota. “They are an investment, and if the proper training and the proper use isn’t expected of them, they are expensive computer screens. But isn’t that true of any technology?”

http://www.convergemag.com/classtech/How-3-Districts-and-Schools-Support-Educators-with-Interactive-Whiteboards.html

By David Sarno, Los Angeles Times

As family and close friends planned for a private funeral for Steve Jobs, the technology world was left pondering whether one of its most innovative periods might have come to an end. For the last 30 years, the story of personal technology has in many ways been the story of Jobs and his successes: from the first popular home computer to the machine on which the Web was invented — and now iPods, iPhones and iPads, the most talked about, written about and imitated devices anywhere. All of them were the brainchildren of Jobs, a technologist whose relentless perfectionism and long experience helped set the technology agenda for decades. But now that consumer technology has lost the figure who had plotted its course for so long, will his absence leave the industry without a clear direction?

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-jobs-next-20111008,0,4304511.story

By DNLee, Scientific American blog

Lady Ada Lovelace was a contemporary and colleague of Charles Babbage, he innovator of the programmable computer, which was referred to as the Analytical Engine in 1842. Ms. Ada Lovelace was intrigued by his ideas and her published notes included an algorithm to be processed by the machine. As a result, she is regarded as the World’s First Computer Programmer and an inspiration to women interested in Science, Technology, Engineering, an Mathematics (STEM). Ada Lovelace Day is a worldwide celebration of her contribution to STEM and society as well as an opportunity to celebrate other women who inspire us all!

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/urban-scientist/2011/10/07/celebrating-ada-lovelace-day/

by Doug Lederman, Inside Higher Ed

The meeting’s underlying thesis — that as state funds erode, public colleges and universities must use technology to create more innovative and sustainable business models — is oft stated, and many leaders of public higher education embrace it. But delivered by a messenger like Academic Partnerships, given its clear interest in promoting such a trend, the theme of the meeting produced skepticism on the part of many attendees — although most said they came in with eyes open. “A lot of us did” come to the meeting suspicious about the motivations of the sponsors, said Muriel Howard, president of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, who said she debated whether to come. She chose to, she said, because of the importance of the topic and the fact that public college leaders (to judge by, among other things, the views they expressed in Inside Higher Ed’s survey of college presidents last spring) seem to be recognizing the need to make better use of technology to deliver instruction.

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/10/07/future_of_state_universities_conference_promotes_online_learning

By Tanya Roscorla, Converge

This month, Indiana University made agreements with a software company and five publishers that influence the economic terms for the future of e-textbooks. Instead of having a book disappear after 120 to 180 days, students access their eTexts as long as they attend the university. Instead of paying 60 to 85 percent of the retail price of a physical textbook, they pay 35 percent or less through a technology fee.

http://www.convergemag.com/classtech/Indiana-U-Helps-Shape-Economic-Terms-of-eText-Transition.html

By Tanya Roscorla, Converge

By virtualizing desktops, the Brooklyn college will cut back on lost instruction time and provide students with tools to build e-portfolios and take assessments. “It’s making technology transparent and focusing more and using more of the class time in actually imparting the education rather than challenging them with setting up computers and logging in and bringing in the carts,” said Asif Hussain, CIO. For its virtualization and other technology initiatives, the college earned first place in the large college category of the Digital Community Colleges Survey, conducted by the Center for Digital Education.

http://www.convergemag.com/infrastructure/Kingsborough-Community-College-Adds-Collaboration-Tools-to-Classrooms.html

By Tanya Roscorla, Converge

While much of the research on iPads in education to date has focused on how students and faculty use the device, Abilene Christian University is shifting toward examining how the tablets affect student learning. Through the ACU Connected initiative, the university has studied mobile devices in the classroom for the past three years. And now that the iPad has been out for more than a year, the university is studying how mobility can integrate with pedagogy, said Scott Hamm, instructional designer and director of mobile learning research for the Adams Center for Teaching and Learning at the university.

http://www.convergemag.com/classtech/iPad-Studies-Abilene-Christian.html