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Education technology: Your cheat sheet to 10 fads, trends, and WTFs. It’s been a most-frenzied spring of conferences in the new hotbed of startup and investor tech opportunity, education technology.

Education technology: Your cheat sheet to 10 fads, trends, and WTFs

And “frenzied” isn’t too strong of a description. At one point in early May, three different edtech conferences overlapped in the San Francisco Bay Area in the same week: NewSchools Venture Fund’s invitation-only NewSchools Summit, the Software and Information Industry Association’s annual Education Industry Summit, and the U.S. Office of Education Technology’s Future Ready Summit. Coming on the heels of other high-elevation edtech events with record crowds (Austin’s festival-like SXSWedu in March, and Scottsdale’s Burning-Man-for-investors ASU+GSV Summit in April), it’s no wonder attendees are all left gasping as the seasonal climb nears its end. It makes no difference if one is in industry, policy, funding or teaching, or focuses on K-12 schools, higher education, or lifelong learning. It’s with the confused part that I may be able to help. The result? Trends. 5 Top Trends in Education Technology 2015. Pressure continues to increase on education budgets around the globe.

5 Top Trends in Education Technology 2015

Yet despite this fact, the education sector is continuing to increase its investment in technology related to learning. Ed tech funding jumped 55 percent in 2014 with no signs of slowing down, according to CB Insights. A report from Global Industry Analysts (GIA) predicts that the global e-learning market will reach $107 billion in 2015, propelled by technological advancements and demand for additional skills. With that in mind, here are five top trends in ed tech to keep on your radar screen in 2015 and beyond: Online corporate learning.

In contrast to the academic Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) that are still struggling to find the best path to a reliable revenue stream, businesses focused on corporate e-learning have found a business model that works--and works well. Skills measurement. Alternative learning styles. Online competency-based training. Technology for Education - Teaching Excellence & Educational Innovation. Office of Educational Technology. Educational Technology and Mobile Learning: google docs. Technology Integration Matrix. The 100 Best Web 2.0 Classroom Tools Chosen By You. The Wordle of this list! (Click image to enlarge) One of the most popular posts on Edudemic in 2010 was The 35 Best Web 2.0 Classroom Tools Chosen By You and I felt it might be time for an update to that list for 2011.

In order to put together a list of the best Web 2.0 classroom tools, I polled my Twitter followers, Facebook fans (are they still called fans? Likes?) A Very Useful Tool to Create Educational Animated Videos on Google Drive. December 21, 2014 PowToon is a very powerful web app which you can use on Google Drive to create beautiful animated videos and presentations.

A Very Useful Tool to Create Educational Animated Videos on Google Drive

PowToon provides you with all the necessary animation tools you’ll need to immediately begin creating your own professional-looking animated explainer videos and animated presentations. It has an easy to use interface with pre-designed templates and a variety of style libraries to choose from. The videos you create in PowToon can also be easily converted into animated presentations with each slide representing a scene in the storyline of your presentation.

To create your videos, simply drag and drop characters and props then assign them animations. Using the the export button, you will be able download your animated videos to your computer or share them on popular social media outlets like YouTube and Facebook. 13 Ways to Use Socrative as a Formative Assessment. Socrative is a smart, student response system that empowers teachers to collect data from their students via smartphones, laptops, and tablets.

13 Ways to Use Socrative as a Formative Assessment

I find Socrative to be the most useful SMS app because students can use it on any platform with internet service, rather than phones with text messaging services. I let my students use Socrative with my laptops and iPod Touches in the classroom. It is a great way for teachers to assess students and collect immediate feedback. Its so Simple Teachers login through their device and select an activity which controls the flow of questions and games. Quick and Easy Assessment Student responses are visually represented for multiple choice, true/false and Short Answer questions. Socrative was created by a group of teachersIts interative and engagingIt provides immediate feedback via formative assessmentsIt is paperlessIt saves time when grading assignmentsStudents can use Socratic on any device, on any platform. Why Technology Alone Won't Fix Schools. For about a month in the spring of 2013, I spent my mornings at Lakeside School, a private school in Seattle whose students are the scions of the Pacific Northwest elite.

Why Technology Alone Won't Fix Schools

The beautiful red-brick campus looks like an Ivy League college and costs almost as much to attend. The school boasts Bill Gates among its alumni, and its students come from the families of Amazon and Microsoft executives. Unsurprisingly, there is no dearth of technology: Teachers post assignments on the school’s intranet; classes communicate by email; and every student carries a laptop (required) and a smartphone (not). In this context, what do parents do when they think their children need an extra boost? I was there as a substitute tutor for students spanning the academic spectrum.