A New Way For Students To Share Notes & Learn Together For students with disabilities, some colleges and universities offer a note-taking service that includes collecting notes from the professor, a teaching assistant, or a fellow student. There are other students that might need to review classmates’ notes, however. A student athlete with an injury A student that wants to improve his note-taking skills and could use a model to follow Study group members that need a central repository for notes and a way to merge those notes together. Whatever the reason, Studyers.com , a website that claims to be “the easiest way to take notes on lessons,” wants to be their cloud-based alternative to the traditional notebook. The site is currently in the alpha stage, so access is restricted at this time. The Studyers Home Page Users can share the lessons with other users, and print the lessons to hard copy if they want. The lessons interface includes a text box, a drawpad, and a graph creator. The Lesson Interface We’re keeping an eye on this site.
Educational Technology Bill of Rights for Students The following are what I believe are the rights of all student to have with regards to using technology as an educational tool, written as a student to their teacher: 1) I have the right to use my own technology at school. I should not be forced to leave my new technology at home to use (in most cases) out-of-date school technology. If I can afford it, let me use it -- you don’t need to buy me one. If I cannot afford it, please help me get one -- I don’t mind working for it. 2) I have the right to access the school’s WiFi. 3) I have the right to submit digital artifacts that prove my understanding of a subject, regardless of whether or not my teacher knows what they are. 4) I have the right to cite Wikipedia as one of the sources that I use to research a subject. 5) I have the right to access social media at school. 6) I have the right to be taught by teachers who know how to manage the use technology in their classrooms. 8) I have the right to be accessed with technology. About Brad
Aggregate, Curate and Create Your Own Textbook One of the latest buzz words in social media is curation. Some media analysts ponder whether the content curator might be the next big social media job of the future. The job of curator has spread across the digital media world and may already have replaced “editor” and “publisher” in the minds of marketers and social media mavens. What are the implications of curation in education? We are seeing more and more publishers jumping into the digital textbook market but so far the digital editions are mere pdf versions of the hardcover versions. The Journal’s article: 5K-12 Ed Tech Trends for 2012 includes going ‘Beyond the Digital Textbook’ as one of the trends, with the premise of adding interactivity to digital versions of textbooks. Several concerns about Apple’s new enterprise have been voiced in the blogosphere. Is there an option for a free, relevant course companion? Creating Your Own Digital Textbook THE PROCESS The process of creating your digital textbook involves three steps: Tools
Rubrics for Assessment Learn more about our Online Courses, Online Certificate Programs, and Graduate Degree A collection of rubrics for assessing portfolios, group work/cooperative learning, concept map, research process/ report, PowerPoint, oral presentation, web page, blog, wiki, and other social media projects. Quick Links to Rubrics Social Media Project Rubrics Wiki RubricCriteria for assessing individual and group Wiki contributions. Blog RubricAssess individual blog entries, including comments on peers' blogs. Twitter RubricAssess learning during social networking instructional assignments. Discussion, Teamwork, and Group Work Rubrics Online Discussion Board RubricAssessing ability to share perspectives, refine thoughts through the writing process, and participate in meaningful discussionPrimary Grade Self-Evaluation Teamwork Rubric (PDF)Features of a sandwich to graphically show the criteria PowerPoint and Podcast Rubrics A+ PowerPoint Rubric Joan Vandervelde's rubric provides 10 performance categories
Why Digital Learning will Liberate Teachers I spend a lot of time writing about how digital learning can transform our education system into a student-centric one. In my last blog, I wrote about why parents—of all stripes—matter for digital learning and make it fundamentally different from past “reform” movements. Digital learning should similarly be a game changer for teachers. Teachers will be critical to our nation’s future in a world of digital learning. Of course, teachers’ jobs will also be quite different from the way they look today—and if we do this right, they should not just be different, but they should also be a whole lot better, as it liberates them in many exciting ways. Today, teachers spend a significant amount of time engaged in what we call “monolithic” activities—one-size-fits-all, standardized activities that are designed to reach the mythical middle of a class of students. In a world where digital learning becomes the platform for our education system, however, this whole notion should turn around.
How and Why to Make Your Digital Publications Matter I don’t have the metrics, but I’ll stake my professional reputation on the following statement: In the last one or two years, there has been a seachange in how even the most traditional academic, nonprofit, or corporation values, respects, and “counts” relevant, professional online publication and interactivity. The keywords are “relevant” and “professional” and how you present your digital contributions is not only key to your success, but also itself contributes to the larger culture of peer learning. This year, as I’ve been on leave and been on what is turning into a never-ending lecture tour (sixty events and counting!), I am constantly being approached, whether at corporations, nonprofits, educational institutions, or academic and professional institutions, about how and why to make online publications count. So, here are some ad hoc hints about how to make your online publications relevant and professional. Give your online publications a separate category on your resume or vita.
Museum Box Homepage Can Khan Move the Bell Curve to the Right? It was goal-setting day in Rich Julian’s 5th-grade class at Covington Elementary School in Los Altos, California, when I visited last fall, and Julian was asking each of his 29 students to list three math goals for the week. To become proficient at dividing a one-place number into a three-place number, a girl with blue-painted fingernails wrote in her math journal. To become proficient in multiplying decimals, wrote a dark-haired boy. No two youngsters seemed to have quite the same math goals because, of course, no two youngsters are quite alike when it comes to learning. For the next 45 minutes, Julian met individually with his 5th graders to refine their goals. As youngsters completed one lesson, an online “knowledge map” helped them plot their next step: finish the module on adding decimals, for example, and the map suggests moving next to place values, or to rounding whole numbers, or to any of four other options. But just as powerful are the data kids have on themselves. Khan’s Rise
How To Make An ePub File For The iPad, Nook, Kobo & More As editor of the MakeUseOf Manuals project, I’ve been thinking about this a great deal lately, searching the web for the best tools to create ePubs with. I’ve not learned everything yet, but I’ve got a basic outline in place. If you’re looking to create ePub files you’ve come to the right place. What ePubs Are The ePub format is an open standard used in many different devices to display books, newspapers and magazines. This format, unlike PDFs, is designed to flow; that is, content is not laid out on set pages with a set layout. Devices that use ePub files include: The iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch, via iBooks.Android devices, via FBreaderThe NookSony ReadersThe Kobo ReaderAny Windows, Mac or Linux machines, via a number of programs.Many more devices If you want your book to work on as many devices as possible, it’s critical that you learn how to create ePub files. Exporting from InDesign, Pages & Open Office Pages is great, but it’s Mac only and costs money. Creating From Scratch Or Editing