Measuring Networked (or Social) Learning « Daretoshare
Networked learning can't be assessed the same way as traditional, formal learning (or if it can, we wouldn't measure the real value that way). So what do you measure? This is a starting point.
Blog posts
Building a Drag-and-Drop Jigsaw Puzzle - Part 1
Free files & directions for creating a drag & drop puzzle activity in Flash. Use your own images.
Half an Hour: Blogs in Education
Overview of the benefits and uses of blogs in education
Only for MY Kid
1998 article by Alfie Kohn on barriers to progressive changes in education, with some proposals for better approaches for working with parents to help them see the benefits
McClaren, who looks back on what happened from his new
post several states away, says he made "two fatal assumptions" when he
started: "I thought if it was good for kids, everyone would embrace it,
and I thought all adults wanted all kids to be successful. That's not
true. The people who receive status from their kids' performing well in
school didn't like that other kids' performance might be raised to the
level of their own kids'."
10 Simple and Impressive Design Techniques | How-To | Smashing Magazine
Contrast, gradients, color, letter spacing, anti-aliasing, imperfection, blur, alignment, trim fat. Examples for each.
Educational Technology and Life » Blog Archive » Google Docs Does Not Violate CIPA (or COPPA*)
Google Docs and legal issues--good reading for US teachers who want to use Google Docs with their students, especially those with students younger than 14
accesselearning Tutorial: Overview
Free online tutorial for making online learning accessible, in 10 parts
Making Online Learning Accessible - A Resource Guide
Presentation with numerous resources for e-learning accessibility, plus tips for instructors
Innovate: A Learning Theory for 21st-Century Students
The author calls this a new learning theory combining behaviorism & cognitivism. I see a new instructional design model that combines elements from a number of different sources, but I'm not sure I see a new learning theory. The model seems very complex; how long would you have to work with this before you internalized all the separate parts of the model?
Student results were better using this model. However, the control group was tested before doing a roleplaying game and the experimental groups did the game prior to testing. This could just show that roleplaying helps students understand characters in the Aeneid. Free registration required.
With its inclusion of <a href="javascript:open_win('extra.php?id=3158',650,750,0,0,0,0,0,1,1,0,5,'extra');">game elements</a>, which foster attention, memory, and motivation, SCCS provides a bridge between behaviorist and cognitivist learning theories.
SCCS learning theory focuses on the formation of <a href="javascript:open_win('extra.php?id=3011',650,775,0,0,0,0,0,1,1,0,5,'extra');">schemata</a> in the process of learning, particularly <a href="javascript:open_win('extra.php?id=3206',600,625,0,0,0,0,0,1,1,0,5,'extra');">social-connectedness</a> and <a href="javascript:open_win('extra.php?id=3207',600,375,0,0,0,0,0,1,1,0,5,'extra');">cognitive-connectedness</a> schemata.
Students engage their social-connectedness schema in a set of behaviors that I describe as “link, lurk, and lunge”: Students <em>link</em> up with others who have the knowledge they need; they <em>lurk</em>, watching others who know how do to what they want to do; and they<em> lunge</em>, jumping in to try new things often without seeking guidance beforehand (Brown 2000).
The cognitive-connectedness schema structures a student's ability and desire to know how what they are learning connects to a larger picture.
WAVE - Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool
Check website accessibility with a free tool from WebAIM. You can enter a URL, upload a file, or paste HTML code. There's also a Firefox toolbar that lets you check content that is password protected etc.
Cynthia Calongne’s Presentations on SlideShare
Slideshare presentations by Cynthia Calogne from CTU, who does lots of Second Life work
Inside Higher Ed: The Impact of Dropping the SAT
Want to improve diversity at a college without spending a lot of money? Drop the requirement for SAT or ACT as part of admissions.
These models suggest that any move away from the SAT or ACT in competitive colleges results in significant gains in ethnic and economic diversity. But the gains are greater for colleges that drop testing entirely, as opposed to just making it optional.
The findings appear to confirm what SAT critics have said for years: that reliance on the SAT in college admissions favors applicants who are white and/or wealthier than other applicants.
Donald Clark Plan B: Brilliant 35 studies in media and learning
Great summary of research points on our perceptions of media with implications for using media effectively for learning. For example, audio quality matters a lot, but video quality can be low and still effective. Large, wide screens are preferred over higher quality images on smaller screens.
35 psychological studies into the human reaction to media all point towards the simple proposition that people react towards media socially even though, at a conscious level, they believe it is not reasonable to do so. They can't help it. In short, people think that computers are people, which makes e-learning work.
As long as a media technology is consistent with social and physical rules, we will accept it. Read that last part again, 'as long as a media technology is consistent with social and physical rules'. If the media technology fails to conform to these human expectations - we will very much not accept it.
The Bamboo Project Blog: Twitter Hating
I've resisted Twitter, and it's nice to see some balance in the discussion. Even if you love Twitter, check out the videos for some laughs.
Role Models in Educational Technology on Ada Lovelace Day | Janet Clarey
Extensive list of women in educational technology, including many bloggers. A number of new names for me here.
Share Best Practices - Patterns : eLearning Technology
Instead of calling them "best practices" maybe they should be "better patterns"; there isn't just one way to do things. We can try to reproduce patterns or create variations on a theme. For problem solving and critical thinking, this is probably a more accurate description of what we do than "best practices."
AG09 - IDZone: Graphic Resources
Graphics and graphic design resources for instructional designers
Mega Drop-Down Navigation Menus Work Well (Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox)
Recommendations for drop-down navigation menus with big menus grouped with structure
The WebFooted Booklady: The Animoto English Project
Introduction to a high school English project using Animoto
The WebFooted Booklady: It's A Wrap
Review of a high school Animoto project with details on some of the issues students had with account sign-ups, organizing files, and using non-CC-licensed images.
Donald Clark Plan B: Amazing learning styles research
I agree with the commenters who suggested this post would have been better on April 1, but it's a nice test of information literacy and common sense for people to read it now. How many teachers, trainers, and administrators do you think you could fool with this fake research?
Colorblind Web Page Filter
Enter a URL, see what the webpage looks like for multiple kinds of colorblindness. Easy to switch from one filter to another to see different variations.
How to Choose the Right Color Scheme for your e-Learning Project. | LearningChange, Intl - Performance Improvement, Facilitation Training, e-Learning + Instructional Design
Basic tips for color as a communication tool in e-learning
Whatever You Do, Don’t Drop Practice | Tom Werner
Summary of research which compared courses with the same content but with specific elements of Gagne's instructional events removed. The strongest correlation with student performance and satisfaction was with practice with feedback. (This is an old post, but it's moved since I originally bookmarked it.)
The only instructional element that really matters is practice with feedback.
pivote.info
A "virtual learning authoring system for virtual worlds" that allows you to create learning activities that are stored independently of the virtual world. Supports Second Life & OpenSim now, could work in other worlds in the future
In the Middle of the Curve: Wendy W - Knowledge Gardener
Tony Karrer suggested we might be known as "management consultants" in the future, but I like Wendy's "Knowledge Gardener" much better
Thinking about the tools I'm building and the programs I'm developing - that seems more akin to the way I want my job to evolve. As a "knowledge gardener."
So I've decided that my next 5 years will be spent as a "knowledge gardener." Helping people get the information they need. Encouraging people within my organization to talk to each other and share what they know. Facilitating learning when they need and want it (preferrably in much smaller chunks than they are getting now).
VoiceThread as a Digital Portfolio | Teaching Sagittarian
Step by step how one teacher used VoiceThread to create digital portfolios for student-led conferences. One nice touch is that ESL students could use both English and their native language, since after all they were communicating with family members who might have trouble understanding English. Two examples are included, plus reflections on what the teacher learned from the project.
Handbook of Emerging Technologies for Learning - Emerging Technologies for Learning
George Siemens and Peter Tittenberger have created this wiki handbook for educators who want to incorporate technology into learning. Looks at how and why change is happening in education and how technology can help meet the educational needs of a changing world.
Link & Learn Taxes, linking volunteers to quality e-learning
Example of (theoretically) accessible e-learning Section 508 created for the IRS. Publicly available. Lots of little errors though; spaces in alt tags, paragraph tags with formatting instead of header styles, etc. Given as an example in a discussion in a LinkedIn group.
sciencegeekgirl » The burden of proof: What does education research really tell us?
Looking at the resistance to change in education even when research supports certain strategies (like active learning). Educators resist using new teaching methods when they don't feel the research matches up with their personal experience. Education research isn't the same as pure scientific research in a lab where everything can be controlled, but if there is some repeatability in multiple contexts, isn't that educational research onto something?