Personal Learning Environment | iTeachU Information Fluency provides a model for educational activities; the Personal Learning Environment (PLE) is the place where those activities happen. Just as learning activities and their products map to the three areas that comprise Information Fluency, those activities and their products can be mapped to different tools and resources. About the “PLE” Personal The PLE is personal because the people, applications, tools, resources, and services are chosen to match our individual, idiosyncratic needs. Learning Many have given up on the call to rename the PLE to the Personal Living Environment. Environment In practice, the PLE is an environment, not a network. Visualizing the PLE Visualizing the PLE has become something of a pastime for education technology geeks. Similarly, Martin Weller clusters tools and services around himself, clustered by (primary) function: Even this kind of visualization can grow complicated rather quickly, such as this example by Jared Stein: Parts of the PLE (for me)
More Than 30 Google+ Tools, Extensions, Tutorials and Other Resources The Google+ honeymoon might be over but many people are still active on the site. As Google+ has some shortcomings, lacking features and usability flaws, there are now numerous tools to deal with these issues. I’ve compiled a list of the most promising ones. I haven’t tested all the tools, just a few, so please report issues in the comments. I have chosen only those that seemed to make sense and have been recommended by other publishers or social media friends of mine. Web Tools and Resources Google+ Statistics – Google+ statistics shows not only who the most popular users and posts on Google+ are; it also discloses the percentage of women on Google+. Firefox and Chrome Extensions There are lots of Chrome and Firefox extensions for Google+ now. G++ for Google Plus (Firefox/Chrome) – this extension adds Facebook and Twitter to your Google+ interface. Tutorials and Solutions Tools Lists Misc. Do you already use these or other Google+ tools? * CC image by Toby Bochan.
6 Types of Blended Learning Blended Learning is not so much an innovation as it is a natural by-product of the digital domain creeping into physical boundaries. As digital and social media become more and more prevalent in the life of learners, it was only a matter of time before learning became “blended” by necessity. That said, there’s a bit more to Blended and “Hybrid” Learning than throwing in a little digital learning. 6 Types of Blended Learning Face-to-face DriverRotationFlexOnline LabSelf-BlendOnline Driver The following infographic takes a different approach to the concept, labeling it “Disruptive,” and even offering an interesting matrix. The Definition Of Blended Learning The Definition Of Blended Learning by TeachThought Staff Blended education. That alone is one of the major benefits of blended learning. Defining hybrid or blended education is a trickier task than one might think–opinions vary wildly on the matter. That does not mean a professor can simply start a chat room or upload lecture videos and say he is leading a hybrid classroom. Blended Learning In Action In the course of higher education, blended or hybrid learning is a snazzy, yet relatively new tool, and not all professors use it the same way. For instance, most professors in blended classrooms use some version of a course management system application to connect with students online. Even if all professors used the same platform, however, they could each integrate them into their classrooms differently. How Hybrid Classrooms Are Redefining Education “Flipping” defies these conventions. Can blended learning–whatever the application–truly transform education as we know it? Is There A Catch?
Google Chrome Can Now Talk Back to You You can now talk to your computer, kind of like you would a person — that is, if you're running Google's Chrome browser . The conversational search abilities that Google showed off last week at its I/O developer conference are now live. Although Chrome's voice search , which allows users to search for things just by speaking, has been around for a while, the update now lets your computer speak back to you. For example, if you asked, "Who is the prime minister of Canada?", Chrome will say out loud, "The prime minister of Canada is Stephen Harper." In theory, conversational search also lets you ask natural-language follow-up questions to Chrome such as, "Where does he live?" In practice, though, it's not nearly this seamless. The same is true today. However, for single-question searches that have clear right answers, conversational search works pretty well. Have you tried Chrome conversational search? Image by Pete Pachal, Mashable
L'apprentissage inversé : avancée ou régression ? Si vous fréquentez les sites américains de pédagogie, vous aurez sans doute été surpris de constater l'engouement des enseignants pour le « flipped learning », que l'on traduit par "apprentissage inversé". La tendance est lourde et les articles sur le sujet attirent de nombreuses visites et presque autant de commentaires. C'est la Khan Academy, un site qui offre des milliers de leçons gratuitement en vidéo, qui a déclenché le mouvement. L'expression "flipped learning" est due à deux professeurs de sciences, Jonathan Bergmann et Aaron Sams, qui ont utilisé cette méthode d'enseignement dès 2006. Rappelons les grandes lignes de ce principe d'apprentissage : L'arrivée en fanfare de l'apprentissage inversé a fait l'effet d'une bombe dans une Amérique qui cherche désespérément à renouveler ses modèles pédagogiques. Les enseignants aiment l'apprentissage inversé. Aux États-Unis, la création de Salman Khan s'attire beaucoup de commentaires élogieux. Une méthode vraiment nouvelle ?
How to Collect Student Files with Dropbox | K-5 Computer Lab Collect Student Assignments and Files with Dropbox and FileStork Dropbox is a free online file storage service that students can use to upload assignments and other digital files to the teacher's Dropbox account. Students do not need an email account or a Dropbox account. Teachers can use the basic free Dropbox account to collect and store up to 2GB of data. June 16, 2012 - UPDATE!! Unfortunately, This tutorial will no longer work as one of the companies, "FileStork" has closed their website as of June 15, 2012. How It Works: 1) You place an upload link on your website, blog, wiki, bookmark site, etc.. 2) Students click the link and are presented with a file upload form. 3) Students upload their file. 4) You collect the uploaded files from your Dropbox account. Get Started: You will use these two free services: Dropbox for up 2GB of free file storage. Filestork for you to create upload links and for students to send files to your Dropbox. 1) Go to Dropbox. 2) Go to Filestork.
Blended Learning at GrayHarriman.com What is Blended LearningWhy use Blended Learning?How does one create Blended Learning?What medium can be used in Blended Learning? What is Blended Learning? 1. 2. Why use Blended Learning? 1. 2. 3. 4. How does one design Blended Learning? To design blended training, the instructional designers start by analyzing the training or course objectives and braking them down into the smallest possible pedagogically (for children) or andragogically (for adults) appropriate chunks (learning object). After the course or training has been chunked, the best approach to deliver each segment of instruction (learning object) is identified. The course is then aggregated by grouping the instruction logically while taking into account the medium of delivery. What medium can be used in Blended Learning? The medium is not limited to technology and can include: Here is a table that categorizes the type of learning that may be used: What are the challenges of Blended Learning? Blended Learning Resources:
Evaluating What Works in Blended Learning Blended learning—the mix of virtual education and face-to-face instruction—is evolving quickly in schools across the country, generating a variety of different models. This special report, the second in an ongoing series on virtual education, examines several of those approaches and aims to identify what is working and where improvements are needed. Read Evaluating What Works in Blended Learning as a free digital edition—online or on your mobile device. But more research is needed to determine the effectiveness of the evolving models, and to identify which ones work best for which types of students. October 23, 2012 - Education Week Students in a Grand Rapids, Mich., innovation program blend virtual education and real-world experiences to prepare for college and careers. The latest evolution in Riverside, Calif., is a program for middle schoolers that requires them to attend school three hours a day, three days a week, and do the rest of their learning online at home.
Ruth Clark Claims “Games Don’t Teach” Ruth Clark posted at ASTD an article titled “Why Games Don’t Teach.” It’s a deliberately provocative title, meant to draw attention and cause controversy. A more accurate title would be “Some Games Aren’t Effective at Making People Remember Content,” but that’s a lot less likely to grab attention. Before I continue, I want to say that I enjoyed her book, eLearning and the Science of Instruction, and I have found some of the research there valuable. However, I think Clark didn’t do a very careful review of the literature before writing her post, and I don’t think that one study is enough for her to make such a broad claim dismissing games for learning. According to Ruth Clark, you didn’t learn anything playing Oregon Trail, Carmen Sandiego or Lemonade Stand Let’s look at her summary of the research: The goal of the research was to compare learning efficiency and effectiveness from a narrative game to a slide presentation of the content. For the brain, play is learning and learning is play.
Noodle in Moodle: Adding free Resources from @LSIS_updates Welcome to Moodlenews.com A resource site for all Moodle-related news, tutorials, video, course content information and original resources. If you're new here, you may want to subscribe: RSS feed| Weekly Email Newsletter | Moodle News Twitter Thanks for visiting! NLN is a collection of learning objectives and resources available on the web which are now maintained by the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS) and were created with funding from the UK’s Skills Funding Agency. The NLN Materials are small, flexible ‘bite-sized’ episodes of learning. As a bonus, there’s a Moodle resource integration which you can add to make it very easy to add these resources to a Moodle classroom. Grab the module files and read more about NLN at Adding a new nln resource is very simple, once installed, this is the basic process: 1. 2. 3. 4. Hat tip to Moodlefacts.nl for first showing this cool resource.
The Challenge Of Blended Learning: Why EdTech Is Still In Its Infancy Why EdTech Is Still In Its Infancy first appeared on forbes.com and wiredacademic.com “The technology is five years behind where it needs to be.” It was the complaint of yet another school trying to build a blended-learning model that utilizes multiple providers. “The software content providers are proprietary. So went the grumbling from another blended-learning school. What strikes me as most noteworthy about these comments, however, is just how un-noteworthy this state of the industry is in any industry. At the outset of any industry, the technology tends to be immature and not yet good enough for the majority of users. As Clayton Christensen and Michael Raynor observe in The Innovator’s Solution, “by definition, these products are proprietary because each company will develop its own interdependent design to optimize performance in a different way.” But as an industry matures, the technology improves. As this happens, customers begin to prioritize new dimensions of performance.
'Blended learning' win win situation: Column By all rights, Wendy Chaves' Algebra II class should be a zoo. She's charged with teaching nearly 50 teenagers at a time at the Alliance Tennenbaum Family Technology High School in Los Angeles. Yet Chaves has never felt more effective. "I don't have to worry about classroom management," she reports. "The kids are engaged." Why? This "blended learning" model — combining in-person teaching and online learning — is being tried in a small but growing number of innovative schools nationwide, such as those in the Mooresville School District in North Carolina, Carpe Diem charter schools in Arizona and Indianapolis, and several district schools in Oakland. Rewards of teaching Many teachers would like to have that impact. Teaching remains a rewarding career, but there are challenges. In an era when technology personalizes everything, it's strange that public education still operates on the assembly line model. Shrinking class sizes is one path to this ideal, but it's not the only way.