It was a message on Twitter from one of our administrators: @schinker ok now what? He had signed up for a Twitter account because he wants to connect to the community. He realizes that there’s a conversation happening online, using (but not about) social media tools. How is education changing? How are schools adapting to meet new challenges and increased demands with fewer resources? He wants … Continue reading OK, Now What?
And, in the blink of an eye, a week is gone. Two weeks. Still, the thoughts pile up. Scribbled notes on paper napkins, open browser tabs with pages I mean to read and comment on. A draft email. An unfinished conversation. We’re at the point in the Change MOOC that I’ve lost track of which week it is. There are a lot of unfinished thoughts about … Continue reading Building Blocks
I’m finally getting to the point with this MOOC stuff where I can reflect and react. This week’s topic, facilitated by Allison Littlejohn, was Collective Learning. She makes the argument that problem solving and collaboration are necessary for learning and life. In the United States, we’ve seen innovation save us over and over again as each generation has worked to overcome the challenges of growing … Continue reading Collective Learning
I’ve been familiar with the concept of MOOCs since Dave Cormier started talking about them a few years ago. The concept is pretty simple. Course materials are posted publicly online. Anyone can participate. Facilitators provide materials in a number of different formats to start the conversation. These might include journal articles, blog posts, videos, or other things. Participants react to this material through the media … Continue reading Relearning Learning
It’s an anniversary of sorts. Tonight, the EdTechWeekly crew is celebrating show #200. That’s two hundred Sunday nights spent talking about educational technology, new tools and resources, approaches and strategies and policies, and whatever else comes up. The webcast started five years ago this month as an experiment. The hosts participate in an audio conference and talk about educational technology. That conversation is streamed live … Continue reading EdTech Talking
I forgot that there are two kinds of online courses. I’ve always been interested in the potential of online environments to mediate discussions that are deeper and wider than those possible in a classroom. When you can put more than 30 people in a discussion, extend it beyond 45 minutes, and give everyone an equal opportunity to contribute, there’s a tremendous potential for valuable interaction. … Continue reading The Wrong Way
Google Plus is here! This is the tool that’s going to revolutionize education. It’s a collaborative platform with none of the social baggage of that evil Facebook. It allows people to easily organize their friends into circles, so you can keep your professional, personal, and academic lives separate from one another. The image sharing features are very nice, especially when coupled with the mobile phone … Continue reading The New Shiny
I’m a product of public schools. From the time I started Kindergarten to the time I finished graduate school, I only attended public schools. We live in a democratic society founded on the ideal of self-governance. In order for that to work, we have to have an educated, informed citizenry. The only way to do that is by educating the population. All of the population. … Continue reading You Can’t Have My Kids
I don’t complain about money. Give me the resources that are allocated for technology, and I’ll do as much as I can with them. If you give me $100 per student, per year, I’ll put it to good use. If you give me $10, I’ll do what I can with it to provide useful resources. It’s well above my pay grade to decide that technology … Continue reading Less with Less
I received an interesting email recently from a state agency that focuses on educational technology use in the schools. I was complaining that a survey tool they’re currently using lacks many of the features of its predecessor. This seems to be a trend with this particular agency this year. They’re introducing a number of new tools that are significant downgrades to the tools they’re replacing. … Continue reading Open Source
One of the many fields experiencing transformational change in this digital revolution is that of the journalist. As citizens, we struggle with the information firehose. We work to teach our students how to filter information, how to assess the reliability of sources, how to efficiently locate the really useful stuff. But journalists — good journalists — have to do this with much more data much … Continue reading The New Journalism
My wife is a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution. This is an organization that celebrates American heritage, promotes patriotism and the teaching of American history, and works to preserve artifacts and places of historical note. To be a member, you have to prove that you’re a descendant of someone who helped further the cause of American independence. I refer to it as … Continue reading The New Divide
Taste of Tech 