Educational Technology

by Associated Press

Eastern Illinois University says it is adding new online classes for students transferring to the Charleston school. Eastern Illinois officials announced Monday the classes in psychology, recreation administration and family and consumer sciences are geared in particular to students who will transfer from community colleges. The classes are intended to make it easier for students to attend Eastern Illinois. Rita Pearson is the director of transfer relations at the school. She said almost 40 percent of EIU’s students are transfers. She noted many of them have families and full-time jobs and will benefit from anything that can make it easier for them to be students.

http://www.wics.com/template/inews_wire/wires.regional.il/20f08795-wics.com.shtml

By Katie Lepi, Edudemic

Earlier this year, a study was completed that aimed to understand how teachers use technology in their classrooms, and to identify some best practices for all to benefit from. As most of you well know, many teachers have to approach classroom technology from different angles. Some have to follow a specific set of rules from their school or district, including what devices and software to use. Some have great support from their school. Others have none at all, and if they want to integrate classroom technology, it is 100% up to them. But where ever you’re coming at it from, a few best practices can help a lot. The handy infographic below takes a look at some of the more important data points from that study.

http://www.edudemic.com/technology-in-their-classrooms/

By Katie Lepi, Edudemic

More courses in STEM subjects, teaching more students how to code, and getting more girls and women into traditionally male professions (ie, the STEM subjects) are all big topics these days. The main issue that all of these things address is that as our world develops technologically and becomes more tech dependent, we will need more students trained in disciplines that can support that, and currently, there is a huge skills gap. The handy infographic below takes a look at how to unlock the code to student success, and addresses computer science specifically, and how few schools teach computer science courses at all.

http://www.edudemic.com/computer-science/

by Tori Wieldt, Oracle

This course introduces Java developers to the world of embedded devices and the Internet of Things (IoT). Embedded controllers are already a part of our lives. Meters read electric and water usage and send the readings to a central office. Electronic thermostats turn on the heat and air conditioning as required. Java Embedded leverages your experience with Java to open the world of the Internet of Things by providing direct access to electronic sensors and mechanical devices.

https://blogs.oracle.com/java/entry/oracle_massive_open_online_course1

by Romain Bertrand, EdSurge

How to get students to value and care about the work they do online. If students don’t care about the quality of work they produce online, everything they do online loses its value: the websites or apps they use, the data collected. Nothing can be utilized with fidelity if students are half present when they are online. That’s why while giving a tour of our learning labs at Ranson IB Middle School, I was struck by an extremely important question I don’t get asked very often. One of the teachers asked me, “How do you build the culture around Blended Learning so that students will put as much care in the work they do online as they put in the one they do in class?”

https://www.edsurge.com/n/2014-05-15-eight-ways-to-build-blended-learning-class-culture

by Sarah Garland, Huffington Post

Instead of investing in new and better technology, more than two thirds of school districts are cutting back on regular maintenance and replacement of equipment because of budget troubles, according to a survey by the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN), a professional organization of school technology leaders, published in March. The survey, of 600 school district technology chiefs from around the country, also found that nearly half said their funding was inadequate to support existing equipment or to bring in new technologies.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/16/schools-scale-back-technology_n_5340711.html

by Melissa Burns, Edutopia

All K-12 educators know how students are complaining about the piles of homework they get. If you ask for their opinion, teachers will tell you that they don’t assign more homework than students can handle, but they do have trouble convincing them to pay attention to even the simplest assignments. All students complain when they need to write an essay. Some will fail to deliver it, and others will deliver what educators hate the most — a plagiarized paper. You can never be sure whether or not a student has worked on an assignment all by him- or herself, but at least you can be sure that the content is unique. There are many modern tools that help you discover copied sentences and paragraphs, so your job is to make students understand that they should start thinking with their own heads. Using other people’s words as their own won’t take them anywhere.

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/online-tools-to-combat-plagiarism-melissa-burns

By Greg Kulowiec, Edudemic

Providing timely and effective feedback on student work is a critical component to any classroom. As students increasingly operate and create in a digital environment, emerging tools provide unique new opportunities for teachers to provide feedback on both written work and video projects. Here are some technologies that will help you.

http://www.edudemic.com/providing-feedback-student-writing-video/

by Jennifer Sayre, Edutopia

Across the nation, students are leaving their home school districts to attend online schools. These schools have something that public school districts simply don’t and won’t have: ad campaigns. To their credit, most of the advertising is pretty effective. It lures students away from their home schools with the promise of engaging, self-paced lessons in environments that are safe and supportive. Whether or not all of those claims are true is up for debate.

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/communication-building-relationships-online-programs-jennifer-sayre

by Common Sense Media

Common Sense Media’s service Graphite, which offers independent ratings and reviews of learning apps and websites, has compiled this list of its top apps that help students create digital media. For complete reviews, and for each app’s “Learning Rating,” visit the Graphite website.

http://thejournal.com/articles/2014/05/15/7-fantastic-apps-for-making-media.aspx

By Lisa Johnson, Edudemic

Selecting apps and planning projects in a BYOD can be a formidable endeavor. What device does Gavin have? Does this website work on Caroline’s iPad? Is there a comparable collage or cartoon application on Hayden’s device? “Device Agnostic” tools can alleviate the stress that is associated with student performance tasks in a BYOD. “A device-agnostic mobile application (app), for example, is compatible with most operating systems and may also work on different types of devices, including notebooks, tablet PCs and smartphones.” – Margaret Rouse

http://www.edudemic.com/5-tools-device-agnostic-classroom/

By Tanya Roscorla, Center for Digital Ed

Picture this: A world flooded with a sea of data from every connected device on the planet — devices found in and on human bodies, in homes, around communities, in products, and in the natural environment. And these devices on the Internet of Things are sharing information constantly with the promise of making people’s lives better. But the government, corporations and criminals can all tap into these data streams and use what they find for evil, if they so choose. And that tension comes through loud and clear in a report on the Internet of Things that includes opinions from more than 1,600 experts.

http://www.centerdigitaled.com/news/Where-the-Internet-of-Things-Could-Take-Society-by-2025-.html

By Tanya Roscorla, Center for Digital Education

Picture this: A world flooded with a sea of data from every connected device on the planet — devices found in and on human bodies, in homes, around communities, in products, and in the natural environment. And these devices on the Internet of Things are sharing information constantly with the promise of making people’s lives better.

http://www.centerdigitaled.com/news/Where-the-Internet-of-Things-Could-Take-Society-by-2025-.html

by Nick DeSantis, Chronicle of Higher Ed

The Kansas Board of Regents unanimously approved a revised social-media policy that allows leaders of the state’s public colleges to punish or fire employees whose postings are found to be improper, the Lawrence Journal-World reported. The changes include statements that support academic freedom and free-speech rights. The board’s first version of the policy, approved in December, sparked an uproar among faculty members, and faculty leaders raised concerns that the revised document did not go far enough to resolve their concerns.

http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/kansas-board-adopts-revised-policy-allowing-discipline-for-improper-social-media-use/77807

By GARY DINGES , Austin American-Statesman

With summer break just around the corner, parents are scrambling to find ways to keep children occupied the next three months. One new offering this year is Brain Chase, a six-week online academic challenge created by an Austin couple, Allan and Heather Staker. Designed for second- through eighth-graders, Brain Chase is built to resemble a global treasure hunt. The goal, Allan Staker said, is to make summertime learning fun, rather than a chore. The Stakers said their experiences with their own five children helped shape the program, which came together in less than a year.

http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/bea48b74c0d2448593975d9f02138c32/TX–Academic-Challenge

By David Nagel, Campus Technology

Three multi-institutional projects are advancing their efforts to develop the architectures that may underlie the Internet of the future. Through a $15 million from the National Science Foundation, the projects will move their development work into the limited test phase. The projects had been awarded three-year, $8 million grants back in 2010 to begin work on building a “more trustworthy and robust Internet.” With the new funding, the work done to date will be tested in real-world settings, which follow on some limited pilot tests.  CMU is leading one NSF grant, called Deployment-Driven Evaluation and Evolution of the eXpressive Internet Architecture (XIA).  Partners with CMU on the XIA project include Boston University, the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Duke University.

http://campustechnology.com/articles/2014/05/13/multi-institutional-projects-to-test-future-internet-architectures.aspx

By Katie Lepi, Edudemic

Technology has its pros and cons, especially in the classroom. Students have a vast number of resources and search engines at their fingertips, but you might also find that they’re more easily distracted. The handy infographic below takes a look at the concept of a ‘student cyborg’ and how technology is facilitating education. Defining a cyborg as “a person whose physiological functioning is aided by or dependent upon a mechanical or electronic device”, the graphic elaborates on the idea that students and teachers – we have tons of technology at our fingertips – are more dependent on technology, but it facilitates their learning in a positive way

http://www.edudemic.com/student-cyborg-infographic/

By Robert Strazzarino, Edudemic

Implementing software and on-campus technology is the best way for colleges to stand out in the crowded educational landscape, and this doesn’t just include automated student scheduling and streamlined registration processes. We’re talking about positively affecting students’ lives every single day. Institutions are constantly finding unique ways to serve their students better. One South Carolina college is using social media to help new students find a compatible roommate. Dozens of universities have technology that allows students to check for vacant laundry machines online, and students in cold climates are staying warm by tracking campus shuttles from their phones. Here are a few off-the-wall ideas any institution can use to mix technology with daily student life, improve the learning experience, and drive its competitive advantage.

http://www.edudemic.com/missing-mark-higher-education-technology-dont-meet/

by Maurice Ellias, Edutopia

The end of the school year can feel like the final few miles of a marathon. Not only does your body not want to go on, your mind wants to be elsewhere. It’s not helped by the fact that the dreaded tests are over. Feeling burned out is quite common. In one of my previous blog posts, I drew upon the work of expert Cary Cherniss, whose book, Beyond Burnout, gives great guidance about factors most likely to lead to teacher burnout and some ways to detect and prevent it. But the end of the year is different. Detection is not the issue. Neither is prevention. You are at mile 23 and your lungs are bursting, your legs are cramping, your mind is in a jumble, and you just want say, “Beam me up, Scotty.” Yet, just as the marathoners make it to the finish line, so can you. Here are five ideas that work.

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/end-of-year-burnout-how-to-finish-stride-maurice-elias

by Marcus Conyers & Donna Wilson, Edutopia

The images that form in your mind as you read — we call them “brain movies” — can be more exciting and memorable than a Hollywood film. More to the point for teachers, guiding your students to visualize as they read is an engaging and enjoyable way to boost comprehension and retention. Learning to create brain movies can help students make sense of complex nonfiction subject matter and “see” the characters, setting, and action in stories. Teachers who use our strategy tell us their students seem to have more fun — and success — as they read. These anecdotes are supported by research showing that students who are taught to develop mental imagery of text do better than control groups on tests of comprehension and recall.

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/brain-movies-visualize-reading-comprehension-donna-wilson