Online Learning Update

by Eric Westervelt, NPR

The basic idea is that if you’re close to succeeding at something, you’ll try until you succeed. That is, if a system — a game or anything else — gives you sense of even partial accomplishment, you will do almost anything to get to that goal. A Japanese neuroscientist once said something along the lines of, “If you think you’ll be able to catch the bus, you’ll run for it.” Translating that to classwork, if you give someone enough success with something and a sense they can go all the way, that is incredibly attractive, and they’ll do almost anything to get all the way.

http://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2015/06/01/408540387/exploding-myths-about-learning-through-gaming

By Ian Quillen, US News

Education master’s and certification programs are among the most popular in online graduate education. In fact, two out of every nine online graduate students are specializing in education, according to a 2014 survey by Aslanian Market Research and The Learning House Inc., which provides custom-built online courses and other services to higher education clients. While that might suggest the road to an education degree or certification is relatively straightforward, experts say educators who pursue those credentials still face challenges. Linked below are four of those potential obstacles, combined with examples of how some students have overcome them.

http://www.usnews.com/education/online-education/articles/2015/06/01/4-challenges-of-pursuing-an-online-graduate-degree-in-education

by eCampusNews

Online portfolios help students showcase their learning experiences and skills. Career-minded Purdue University Calumet students intent on impressing prospective employers with the fruits of their Purdue education will be able to do so in a more accessible manner using a new resource that goes beyond the traditional résumé. Purdue Calumet announced in mid-May that it has contracted with educational service provider Seelio to help students showcase their academic accomplishments and provide immediate access to projects and publications via multimedia online portfolios. Essentially, students will be able to use their portfolio to readily demonstrate successful hands-on learning.

http://www.ecampusnews.com/technologies/online-learning-portfolio-764/

By Sandy Fitzgerald, Newsmax

Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush, the oldest son of likely GOP presidential candidate Jeb Bush, is teaching an online class on the history of his state and how it relates to character. Bush considered by many to be the heir apparent to the Bush political dynasty, will stream the 30-minute lesson Friday on YouTube, reports Politico. The lesson focuses on the how the character of Texas’ first settlers reflects on lessons that apply in today’s world.

http://www.newsmax.com/US/Bush-Class-course-Online/2015/05/28/id/647291/

by Raymond Wong, Mashable

Google is partnering with Udacity to offer the first Android Developer nanodegree, senior vice president Sundar Pichai announced on stage at the Google I/O developers conference on Thursday. The Android nanodegree will cost $200 per month; the course will take six to nine months to complete. Enrolled students will be taught Android-related development skills, including how to build apps that integrate with Google’s services and how to use Material Design.

http://mashable.com/2015/05/28/google-udacity-android-nanodegree/

By Joshua Lim, The Columbus Dispatch

Research has found that students are just as likely to cheat in online courses as they would in live courses. An Ohio State student’s entrepreneurial approach to academics cost almost two dozen fellow students some money — and academic discipline. An investigation by the university’s Committee on Academic Misconduct found that an unidentified student completed online course work for 23 other classmates in exchange for payment. All of the students were punished — some with expulsion, for paying what is an unknown amount of money for the cheating.

http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2015/05/29/cheating-in-online-course-raises-questions.html

By Daniel Perez, El Paso Times

Online education is gaining in popularity at UTEP and across the country. A 2014 study by the U.S. Department of Education showed that approximately 26 percent of the country’s 21.2 million college students took all or part of their course materials online. The most recent data from UTEP’s Center for Institutional Evaluation, Research and Planning show that 9,219 students enrolled in the campus’ 630 fully online courses during the 2013-14 academic year compared to 4,419 students who took 319 online courses four years earlier. “Some of our military students, for example, are deployed and log into the courses from Afghanistan,” Smith said. “UTEP Connect online programs allow working adults to earn a degree and an invaluable credential for promotion or advancement in the workforce.”

http://www.elpasotimes.com/business/ci_28221252/uteps-online-degree-plans-connect-professionals

by Tim Dodd, AFR

by The Southern

It always good to get a head start. That’s case for five graduating seniors in Southern Illinois this spring. Christopher senior Courtney Young and four seniors from Vienna High School  recently graduated from their respective high schools while also getting a degree from a community college. Overall, Vienna’s Class of 2015 completed nearly 2,000 credit hours toward college degrees through the dual credit/enrollment partnership with the local community colleges. These hours have been earned not only through dual credit offerings at the high school, but also by students attending classes at the college, both online and at the colleges’ campuses.

http://thesouthern.com/news/local/high-school-students-graduate-with-dual-degrees/article_7926305f-7daa-5080-b5d1-53f5ec0f750b.html

By Sam Dean, the Verge

Like its vastly more successful digital cousins — C++, HTML, Python — Esperanto is an artificial language, designed to have perfectly regular grammar, with none of the messy exceptions of natural tongues. But it is supremely easy to learn, like a puzzle piece formed to fit into the human brain. The internet, though, has been a mixed blessing for Esperanto. While providing a place for Esperantists to convene without the hassle of traveling to conventions or local club meetings, some Esperantists believe those meatspace meet ups were what held the community together. The Esperanto Society of New York has 214 members on Facebook, but only eight of them showed up for the meeting. The shift to the web, meanwhile, has been haphazard, consisting mostly of message boards, listservs, and scattered blogs. A website called Lernu! — Esperanto for the imperative “learn!” — is the center of the Esperanto internet, with online classes and an active forum.

http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/29/8672371/learn-esperanto-language-duolingo-app-origin-history

by ADAM LUSHER, the Independent

Newly launched by a pair of San Francisco technology entrepreneurs, it promises “the best online education in the world, from the best people in the world”. You can learn writing with James Patterson, best- selling author of the Alex Cross detective novels. Coming soon are photography with Annie Leibovitz and performance with pop star Usher. And most eye-popping of all there is “Dustin Hoffman teaches acting”: “In his first ever online class, the two-time Academy Award-winning star of The Graduate, Tootsie and Rain Man teaches you everything he’s learned during his 50-year career.”

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/dustin-hoffmans-online-acting-class-what-its-like-to-learn-from-the-master-10285753.html

By JOSHUA LIM, THE Columbus Dispatch

In a study of 635 undergraduates and graduates from a mid-size university in Appalachia, two researchers at Marshall University in Huntington, W.Va., found that 32.1 percent admitted to cheating in a live class, while 32.7 percent admitted to cheating in an online class at some point while in college. The research also found that students taking online courses were more prone to have someone else give them answers during a test or quiz. To curb online cheating, some universities have partnered with companies that specialize in online-exam monitoring such as ProctorU.

http://www.govtech.com/education/Remote-Proctoring-Programs-Helps-Curb-Cheating-in-Online-Classes.html

by Frederic Lardinois, Tech Crunch

At its I/O developer conference in San Francisco, Google today announced that it has partnered with Udacity to launch a six-course Android development nanodegree. The idea here is to help developers learn how to write apps for Google’s mobile operating system “the right way” up to the point where they could potentially be hired by Google itself. Just like Udacity’s other degree programs, students can watch all of the video content for free, but if they want to get a certificate and access to teaching assistants, they will have to pay a fee, which is $200 per month for this course.

http://techcrunch.com/2015/05/28/google-partners-with-udacity-to-launch-android-development-nanodegree/

By Charles Dull, Evolllution

Think about it like this: Online was never meant to replace traditional education. This changes the way we consider arguments for alternative/new modalities and the selection criteria a student might use, rather than identifying a better modality (the ostensible point of the research). Instead, the research question could become, “What are the benefits of each modality?” We should research effective learning design decoupled from the modality discussion. The question of why the modality was selected, the nature of economic or environmental conditions of the student at the time of selection should be the driving force behind this kind of research. If online is the unique modality that permits a student to attend college, then in this case, online is the better modality.

http://www.evolllution.com/research/comparisons-online-traditional-education-point/

by Clifton Parker, Tomorrow’s Professor

Stanford researchers say that brief online interventions can raise student achievement at low cost.Stanford researchers have found that brief web-based interventions with high school students can produce big results in their schoolwork and their appreciation of a positive, purposeful mindset. “Two interventions, each lasting about 45 minutes and delivered online, raised achievement in a large and diverse group of underperforming students over an academic semester,” wrote Gregory Walton, an assistant professor of psychology at Stanford, along with his colleagues. In the United States, a debate exists over how to raise student achievement, especially among those who struggle in the classroom. Now, the Stanford researchers say that it may be possible, through brief, online interventions, to improve not only the academic achievement of vast numbers of students but their future lives as well – at extremely affordable costs.

http://cgi.stanford.edu/~dept-ctl/cgi-bin/tomprof/enewsletter.php?msgno=1416

by Kevin Palmer, EDUCAUSE Review

CIOs have foundational knowledge they can apply quickly to a new operational role, and some campuses have begun transitioning them to become leaders of enrollment functions. As pervasive as technology has become, enrollment is the lifeline of higher education institutions. Technology truly does have a ripple effect, with the data the campus systems provide helping students plan timely degree attainment, reducing the potential cost.

http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/technology-transcends-departments-cio-vp-enrollment

by Tim Dodd, Financial Review

Twelve new “technologies to watch” will change the face of higher education in the next five years, according to new research. The report, from Open Universities Australia and the not-for-profit New Media Consortium, says that big data, augmented reality, wearable devices and cloud-based apps are among the revolutionary developments that universities are expected to adopt.

http://www.afr.com/technology/apps/education/in-five-years-time-you-wont-recognise-the-university-20150528-ghb734

by the American Council on Education

​In using data to improve student success, higher education is at a transition point, pivoting from harvesting data to learning how to use it strategically in developing interventions—and getting those findings to faculty and students so they can have an impact. Read more in this edition of Quick Hits, our series of briefs on current and emerging topics in the realm of education attainment and innovation.

http://www.acenet.edu/news-room/Pages/Quick-Hits-Predictive-Analytics.aspx

by Nicole Gorman, Education World

According to Michael B. Horn, founder and Executive Director of Education at the Clayon Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation, using diverse methods of research to report findings on the effectiveness of blended learning is important to best understand how the complex mode of personalized learning works. Horn first and foremost argues against focusing on the answer to the question “Does blended learning work,” because he says the different implementations of blended learning will drastically effect the results each time.

http://www.educationworld.com/a_news/opinion-diverse-research-crucial-determining-how-blended-learning-works-1240414545

by Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, Huffington Post

The entire community has a stake in ensuring that people with vision or hearing issues can access learning, just like anyone else. Accessibility means more than just ramps into buildings. It means that every person with a disability can have full access, appreciation, and the ability to contribute to our community – whether it is online or in person.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jennifer-laszlo-mizrahi/making-online-and-elearni_b_7429178.html

by Lucie Lapovsky, Forbes

All will agree that the experience of taking a course on-line versus in a classroom is different and both types should continue to be offered. I predict that the day will soon come when we will not distinguish courses by their teaching modality and employers and others will not ask whether the program was on-line or in person. On-line courses will continue to expand access to education to those without the time or money to attend a traditional on-the-ground class as well as well as to those who prefer this modality.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/lucielapovsky/2015/05/26/online-learning-what-next/