'Grit' Is More Important Than IQ. SmartBlog on Education - Making learning viral - SmartBrief, Inc. SmartBlogs SmartBlogs. This post begins in a place that’s far away from, well, just about everything. We’re traveling to place called Zuni Pueblo in northern New Mexico. Zuni is miles away from McDonald’s, Wal-Mart and many other corporate flagships that permeate our society. For example, it’s a 45-minute drive down a one-lane road just to find a grocery store.
After arriving at this remote destination, I decided some exercise was in order. I popped on my bike shoes and headed to the Zuni Wellness Center for a biking class. The studio was about half full, and most people were already on their exercise bikes when I arrived. Within moments, a tanned, inked instructor with a long black braid entered the room.
He played “Gangnam Style.” Everyone in the room cheered in response, and the class was instantly in motion. Clearly some ideas are viral. But viral ideas should be much more than funny music videos or cat pictures. 1. A learning experience that’s participatory invites people to join and contribute. 2. 3. For the love of learning. The passion gap. Photo credits: positiveimperative.com “Nothing great in the World has been accomplished without passion.” — Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, German philosopher, 1832 I recently spoke at the Dell Innovation in Education Panel at the Texas Association of School Administrators 2013 Conference in Austin. When we were invited to sum up at the end, I realized that one guest had not been invited to the table: Passion.
I was the first to interject this word, saying that “passion should not be the number one thing on the agenda, it IS the agenda.” The #TASA13 hashtag on Twitter, which had been moving moderately, exploded, with several dozen tweets supporting my statement. At any other conference in any other industry, passion is on the lips of nearly every participant, but at some education conferences, you are far more likely to hear the words “assessment,” “standardize,” “common core” and “pedagogy” than you are to hear the word “passion.” Why does passion matter? The lesson you never got taught in school: How to learn! | Neurobonkers.
A paper published in Psychological Science in the Public Interest evaluated ten techniques for improving learning, ranging from mnemonics to highlighting and came to some surprising conclusions. The report is quite a heavy document so I’ve summarised the techniques below based on the conclusions of the report regarding effectiveness of each technique. Be aware that everyone thinks they have their own style of learning (they don't, according to the latest research), and the evidence suggests that just because a technique works or does not work for other people does not necessarily mean it will or won’t work well for you.
If you want to know how to revise or learn most effectively you will still want to experiment on yourself a little with each technique before writing any of them off. Elaborative Interrogation (Rating = moderate) A method involving creating explanations for why stated facts are true. An example of elaborative interrogation for the above paragraph could be: Reference: Manifesto for education change. (This article is a compilation of tweets – feel free to add your comments and questions and advance the conversation.) Imagine Learning Manifesto for education change #edchat #education #cpchat The world is changing rapidly. Regrettably, education is not keeping pace with change. We need to re-think education. Toffler said 21st C learning is about learning, unlearning & relearning.
So true. Governments are rarely visionary. With clear shifts to online activity everywhere else, we should expect this to happen in education. Will schools have a role into the future? Physical space is just as important as virtual and/or pedagogic space. Leadership roles should match priorities, not history. I heard it said recently that “schools are not mortgage paying institutions”. Engaged learning cultures need to be stronger than any other culture a child experiences. Schools need to be located in new spaces avoiding/rejecting the ‘one box per batch’ classroom model. Learning is life; life is learning. The 8 Most Damaging Excuses People Make For Their Unhappiness. Video: Creative Leadership: Invention & Innovation, Chic Thompson. 7 Habits of Highly Effective Tech-leading Principals.
Leadership | In Print 7 Habits of Highly Effective Tech-leading Principals By Jennifer Demski06/07/12 Patrick Larkin, principal of Burlington High School in Burlington, MA, started a 1-to-1 iPad initiative in the fall of 2012. The conventional wisdom in education is that any school reform--be it curriculum, instruction, assessment, or teacher professionalism--is most likely to take hold in schools that have strong leadership. "The role of the principal is one of facilitation and modeling behavior," remarks Robert Farrace, senior director of communications and development with the National Association of Secondary School Principals. T.H.E. We then spoke with three highly effective technology leaders among the ranks of principals to see how these habits have led to the successful implementation of educational technology in their schools. 1. The Expert's Perspective: Robert Farrace: "Guiding the culture of the school is one of the most important things that a principal has to do.
6 Tips for the Successful Online Teacher. Distance Learning | In Print Page 2 of 2 6 Tips for the Successful Online Teacher For better or worse, fully online instruction can never provide the level of control they crave. To a great extent, online education operates on the honor system. You never know who is really doing the work on the other end of the wire. There is no combination of tightly timed tests, double-password protection systems, or retina-scanning identification gizmos that can change this reality.
The knee-jerk reaction to this observation is to point out that students cheat in regular classroom courses, too. If you are confident that you can make a compelling case to your students about the satisfaction and benefits that derive from completing their courses legitimately, you have a future in online education. 4. 5. Most of my graduate courses require that I make about 16 hours of technology-demonstration movies. And most of this work has to be done before the course even gets under way. 6. About the Author. Six Lingering Obstacles to Using Technology in Schools.
Big Ideas Digital Tools Flickr:Marygrove College Library Though educators are finding smart ways to integrate technology and learning, the road has been and continues to be challenging on multiple fronts. The NMC Horizon Report: 2012 K-12 Edition, a collaboration between the New Media Consortium, the Consortium for School Networking, and the International Society for Technology in Education, takes the birds-eye view and encapsulates some of the significant challenges that must still be addressed and offers the following assessment.
Behind the challenges listed here is also a pervasive sense that local and organizational constraints are likely the most important factors in any decision to adopt — or not to adopt — a given technology. Even K-12 institutions that are eager to adopt new technologies may be constrained by school policies, the lack of necessary human resources, and the financial wherewithal to realize their ideas. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Related Explore: CoSN, ISTE, NMC Horizon Report. 7 Habits of Highly Effective Tech-leading Principals. Leadership | In Print Page 5 of 7 7 Habits of Highly Effective Tech-leading Principals 5. Locate and Provide Adequate Resources The Expert's Perspective: Farrace: "Nobody should be going to the board of ed saying we're going to get iPads for every student. "That has to include 1-to-1, and that has to include connective technologies, the ability to collaborate with people across time and space.
"It really is about the learning. "Unfortunately, finding the funding for these initiatives is really, really hard. The Habit in Action: Funding Burlington High's iPad initiative required that Larkin "think different. " He decided that he no longer needed to worry about maintaining computer labs for word processing and research because students would be able to do that anywhere in the building with their iPads. Sheninger's Personal Learning Network has been key to providing his teachers with adequate resources.
The cost of technology downtime in the classroom is more than you think. Free online calculator lets educators estimate the price of unreliable classroom A/V systems By Dennis Carter, Assistant Editor Read more by Denny Carter Unproductive meeting time accounts for around $37 billion in yearly waste. Talk of the weather, for many in higher education, is the clearest sign that time and money are being wasted while faculty members and students wait for IT staff to hustle to their lecture hall and fix a projector, or computer, or microphone. David Siedell, senior IT director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School , said that like the private sector, colleges can lose hundreds of hours of scheduled work time thanks at least in part to technical difficulties. Many professors and instructors have vamped while IT staffers scrambled to fix problems with wires and web connections, Siedell said, but it’s when the conversation turns to the wind, rain, and sun that educators know their class time is circling the drain.
The New Platform for Learning. I have to confess my wife and two children think it's pretty funny that I have been invited to talk about technology at a cutting-edge conference for innovators and entrepreneurs. It's an understatement to say that I grew up in a technologically-challenged household. We didn't even have a TV when I was a kid. We were not what you would call "early-adopters. " But I've changed—we all know what happens to dinosaurs—and the reason I've changed is that I've seen the tremendous transformational potential of technology in education.
Technology is making us so much more efficient. Technology offers children the opportunity to work at their own pace, pursue their own interests and passions, and provides access to more information through a cell phone than I could find as a child in an entire library. Technology enables working adults to learn on their own schedule. Technology is replacing the paper and pencil, the textbook, the chalk board and the globe in the corner of the room. Thank you. Welcome to the Post Textbook World: Ten Elements. A friend asked about Jay Mathew’s post on textbooks.
I thought the rear view mirror critique of a process to pick better textbooks read more like a 1982, not a 2012 discussion – and certainly not the 2015 conversation we should be having. We’re heading for a post-textbook world (PTW), lots of school live there already. I spend all of my time thinking about and working in this brave new slightly chaotic world. In the PTW, there is still value in organization, curation, and narration, but that will increasingly happen across digital object libraries, not texts.
Textbooks continue to exist largely because school boards attempt to use their adoption to maintain (some illusion of) control over the enacted curriculum. Flat, sequential, one-dimensional content is giving way to adaptive content that precisely calibrate learning experiences. Free-leveled libraries can be found on PowerMyLearning.com as well as Gooru. Electronic texts are a transitory technology. The Poverty Myth Persists. Every time I see a “poverty and education” story I think of the famous line from the New Testament in which Jesus says, “The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want.”
So, with education. Want a convenient scapegoat for our problems? Poverty. It’s there, it’s handy. I sat through an hour meeting of our small school district’s budget committee last week, most of it devoted to bemoaning our fate as a “poor district” (over 60 percent of our kids qualify for free and reduced-price lunch, the standard definition of “poor” for schools) in these recessionary times. Diane Ravitch has been hitting the poverty gong for some time, most recently in Cleveland, where, she says, “the level of urban decay is alarming.” Huh? Poverty is a hard thing. It was this feeling I had while mulling how to react to Sabrina Tavernise’s front-page New York Timesstory from last week, “Education Gap Grows Between Rich and Poor,” a story which generated a great deal of attention. Educational Technology Bill of Rights for Students Part II. Wow! I must of hit a nerve with educators when I wrote my first draft of the Education Technology Bill of Rights for Students last month.
I got a boat load of emails (about 90% positive and 10% negative), and based those emails I would like to add these to the original: 11) I have the right to use the cloud. 12) I have the right to use alternative forms of data entry. 13) I have the right to use apps that cost money. So here are another three, keep the ideas coming. - Brad Flickinger, Bethke Elementary School About Brad Brad Flickinger is a technology integration specialist who teaches technology at Bethke Elementary in Timnath, Colorado and is the founder of SchoolTechnology.org. Powerful new tools in educators' digital arsenal. The Must-Have Guide To Helping Technophobic Educators. The following is the third in a set of 7 ‘ The Future of Education ‘ articles. It is written by Dr. Abir Qasem , an Assistant Professor of Computer Science, and Director of Academic Computing at Bridgewater College and Tanya Gupta who has worked on technology and economic development.
The blogosphere and the mainstream media is filled with success stories of technology’s successful adoption in education. However, many educators complain that when they try to introduce technological innovation on their campuses, they face obstacles. For example, according to Boston.com , there are many schools that are Internet-free. For example, at Tufts, certain areas are kept Internet-free. At Amherst College, students are encouraged to disconnect from technology for at least 15 minutes in order to enjoy relaxing activities, while students at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester participate in a week long silent retreats during which they disconnect from technology.
Dr. José A. Dr. Utah is working on free online textbooks. This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2012, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted. Heavy textbooks weighing down teens' backpacks might soon become a thing of the past in Utah. The State Office of Education has announced that it will develop open textbooks in math, language arts and science — which will be available online, for free — for junior highs and high schools. Once the textbooks are available, schools and students will be encouraged to use them online for free or print them at a cost of about $5 a book or less for schools, said Sydnee Dickson, teaching and learning director at the state office.
That's a big savings compared to a traditional high school science textbook, which can cost about $80 on average, according to the state office. Also, students would be able to access videos and use interactive features when using the books online. lschencker@sltrib.com. Can Khan Move the Bell Curve to the Right? Why Digital Learning will Liberate Teachers. Educational Technology Bill of Rights for Students. How to Create Your Own Textbook — With or Without Apple. We Live in a Mobile World - Room for Debate. This Time Its Personal.
Digital Classrooms: Is The Investment Paying Off? Five Tips for School Leaders. Steve Jobs: 20 Life Lessons. Top 5 Ed Tech predictions for 2012.