Can a coding bootcamp replace a four-year degree?

By Tara García Mathewson, Education Dive

The EQUIP experimental sites program may offer a more direct path for alternative programs to go mainstream. Schmidt sees dissonance with the traditional structures of the accreditation system, but he says the company is in talks with traditional colleges and universities about potential partnerships. “Envisioning a program that meets accreditation requirements can be very different than a program that meets the requirements of the marketplace, and we will maintain our focus on what the market requests,” Schmidt said. “If university partners can adapt their focus to ours, we are willing partners.” With exploding demand for software developers, there seems to be room — in the near-term at least — for training programs of all types. Providers like Bloc are aiming to provide additional skills typically found in four-year degrees.

http://www.educationdive.com/news/can-a-coding-bootcamp-replace-a-four-year-degree/410059/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14652

One-stop communication tool for parents and schools

by eSchoolNews

ParentSquare aims to improve communication, organization, and engagement between parents and schools. Parents can access posts, events, photos, files, and a directory on the site. School administrators and teachers can post polls and use two-way messaging via the Web, email, and text messages. For a fee, users can send voice messages via text to parents. In the posts, administrators can see how many parents viewed the post, ask for items, request volunteers, get RSVPs, or even fundraise. Events are integrated right into the school calendar.

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2015/12/21/app-of-the-week-one-stop-communication-tool-for-parents-and-schools/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14634

Teachers: We Want More Control over Ed Tech Decisions

By Dian Schaffhauser, THE Journal

American teachers want much more say over what education technology comes into their classrooms. A survey conducted by a teacher marketplace and an education technology “accelerator” found that while only 38 percent of teachers currently have a role in the decision-making process of ed tech, 63 percent want to be in charge of those decisions. Right now, almost half say those choices are decided by education leaders at the school, district or regional levels. The survey was conducted among 4,300 teachers by TES Global, which runs tes.com, an online community and marketplace for teachers, and the Jefferson Education Accelerator, founded at the University of Virginia’s Curry School of Education to help develop and scale ed tech solutions.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2015/12/16/teachers-we-want-more-control-over-ed-tech-decisions.aspx

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14626

A Learning Transformation Guided by Teachers

by Bridget McCrea, THE Journal

About five years ago, Surrey Schools decided that its days of simply distributing new hardware to its 125 K-12 institutions and hoping it all went to good use were over. Instead, said Director of Instruction Elisa Carlson, “We started asking schools to develop their own site-specific hardware and learning plans. We wanted to know how they were going to use the technology to transform learning.” Concurrently, the district began encouraging teachers to form groups and use a “collaborative inquiry process” to explore key teaching and learning topics. Those groups would then develop the learning plans that the schools submitted to the district. “We got all of the teachers around the table together,” said Carlson. “That allowed us to embed the professional development right [down] to the school level and tie it to the technology.”

https://thejournal.com/articles/2015/12/09/a-learning-transformation-guided-by-teachers.aspx

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14525

Handprints in the Cloud: Exceeding Environmental Footprints

By John Pflueger, Dell

The “handprint” is the positive counterpart to the footprint – the good that arises from our actions and work. The term was coined by Greg Norris of the Harvard School of Public Health who realized that we were only looking at the negative part of the equation and ignoring beneficial by-products. In this sense, he was looking at the bigger picture. As Dr. Norris said, “we can have a net positive impact on the planet if the good that we do, the positive changes we purposefully bring about in our lives, are greater than our footprints.” This net positive handprint is especially evident in what cloud computing can enable. Consider the cloud in all its manifestations: public, private, and hybrid. It connects us to sources of empowering knowledge and enables us to innovate, collaborate, and advance in entirely new ways.

https://powermore.dell.com/business/handprints-in-the-cloud-exceeding-environmental-footprints/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14478

Even With Flipped Classrooms, Teachers Still at Head of The Class

by Jane Swift, Huffington Post

Digital learning–online or classroom-based–is not a revolution in education, it’s the evolution of education. For all the talk of the flipped classroom, digital tools have not turned education on its head. But it does provide teachers with more resources and tools to help students and applies learning in a way that helps these digital natives connect with the subject matter. However, we are seeing the strongest growth in the blended learning model, which keeps the teacher at the front of the classroom. That gives teachers a lot of say over which products succeed and fail. This reality should spur edtech providers to bring teachers into the development process. Even if you win a contract at the district level, you need to show value at the classroom level or you won’t see future growth or long relationships with customers. But if you can engage teachers and add value for them, they will embrace your product and provide advice to make it better.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-swift/even-with-flipped-classro_b_8546074.html

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14340

18-Year-Old Switches To Online Classes To Better Pursue Art

By REBECCA THIELE, WMUK

Geoffrey Simmons is only 18, but he’s already well on his way to becoming a full-time artist. It all started about three years ago when he began collecting glass art. That led to glass blowing classes, which led to spray paint, body paint, digital art, and just about everything else. “I just found all these other mediums and just decided if I’m going to be an artist, I want to be creative in every single area I possibly can,” he says. Eventually Simmons was doing so many art projects that going to school all day was just getting in the way. So he stopped going to class and enrolled in online classes. “I’m definitely not the normal learner – we could just put it that way. So normal school in general wasn’t working out the best anyhow. So once I made that switch and I had found that new passion, I just took off,” he says.

http://wmuk.org/post/18-year-old-switches-online-classes-better-pursue-art

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14263

Students with disabilities enrol online ‘to avoid stigmatisation’

By Chris Havergal, Times Higher Education

Many students with disabilities are attracted to online learning because they feel less stigmatised than they do in the classroom, a study suggests. Researchers at two US universities interviewed students with a range of disabilities taking online or blended programmes and found that more than half said that avoiding stigmatisation was a key reason for signing up. Many of the interviewees, who were enrolled with higher education institutions across the US, highlighted how digital learning made their disabilities “invisible” and “offered the freedom to be viewed as a student without limitations”.

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/students-with-disabilities-enrol-online-to-avoid-stigmatisation

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14257

Penn State Technology Allows Faculty and Students to Build Their Own Textbooks from OER

By David Nagel, Campus Technology

Penn State researchers have been piloting a technology that allows faculty (and students) to build e-textbooks algorithmically using keywords to gather together materials from open resources. The tool, called BBookX, lets users generate textbooks chapter by chapter, adding materials by using keywords to find relevant resources, which can then be culled and organized, even edited by the user. Keywords are used to find an initial set of resources; adding the most relevant resources to a chapter then allows the algorithm to refine results for additional materials. Users can rearrange the materials within a chapter or reorganize entire chapters on the fly through a click-and-drag interface.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2015/10/22/penn-state-technology-allows-faculty-and-students-to-build-their-own-textbooks-from-oer.aspx

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=14160

Britannica® and Merriam-Webster® Announce Free English Learning App and Site for Spanish Speakers

by Merriam-Webster

Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc. and Merriam-Webster, Inc. are pleased to announce the launch of Nglish—a free English language learning app and site designed especially for Spanish speakers. In addition to full bilingual text translation, Nglish offers a unique and tailored learning experience that allows users to learn the words they want to learn, on their own schedule, wherever they are. Nglish includes a comprehensive Spanish-English dictionary with hundreds of thousands of example sentences in English, synonyms, and audio pronunciations by native speakers. Word and sentence translation is available from Spanish to English and English to Spanish. Automatic language detection makes translation fast and easy, with one single search box for both languages.

http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/-britannicareg-merriam-websterreg-announce-free-english-learning-app-/2015/03/18/8161241.htm

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Beyond Programming: The Power of Making Games

By Lisa Castaneda, Manrita Sidhu, THE Journal

Art and creative expression have an interesting way of weaving in and out of classrooms, offering students the opportunity to explore their own ideas and minds. Video games are no different, and while most of the discussion about their use in classrooms centers on play, we at foundry10 wanted to examine the value of making games. Through easily accessible programs such as Scratch and Gamemaker, students from early elementary up through college are creating games and learning while doing it.

http://thejournal.com/articles/2015/02/18/beyond-programming-the-power-of-making-games.aspx

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from Educational Technology http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/uis/edtech/~3/jWJuimP6ONI/

How Teachers Will Change the Future of Tech

By Nicole Comforto, Edudemic

We often write about how technology can help teachers, but sometimes it’s useful to take a step back and consider how teachers influence technology. As with other subjects, the knowledge and enthusiasm that teachers show for technology in the classroom will have long-term effects on students, and the nation as a whole. A tech-savvy nation starts with tech-savvy teachers.

http://www.edudemic.com/teachers-will-change-the-future-of-tech/

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Students adding online classes to schedules

By JAMIE FORSYTHE, Belleville News-Democrat

Whether it’s learning a new language or how to do computer programming, students at Gibault Catholic High School had the opportunity this semester to take an online elective class through the Illinois Virtual School. And eight students at Gibault jumped at the chance, even though it meant more work, better time management and collaboration with teachers and classmates across the state. Sophomore Matthew Lock is taking Mandarin Chinese. “It like it,” he said. “It’s actually pretty hard, but I’m enjoying it.”

http://www.wral.com/exchange-students-adding-online-classes-to-schedules/14472970/

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from Educational Technology http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/uis/edtech/~3/ksnw_Yjn6Do/

Our Schools: The new era of learning in the digital age

by Beth Burt, the Huntsville Item Online

What do most high school students have today? They have a phone, or other electronic device. Bring Your Own Technology (BYOT) allows students to bring and use their own personal electronic devices to school for educational purposes. However, students must also learn about the importance of exercising good digital citizenship, so at Huntsville High School we are teaching students how to be safe online, what appropriate use of technology is and how to communicate academically and productively. The use of computers, tablets and other digital devices have moved us far past the days of mere word processing and playing games.

http://www.itemonline.com/news/our-schools-the-new-era-of-learning-in-the-digital/article_aef99e50-ba6d-11e4-a6b7-73794ee4743f.html

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More schools using technology to teach character skills

by eSchool News

As schools are increasingly fitted with new technology, the classroom atmosphere is changing. Tablets are replacing textbooks, interactive whiteboards are ousting chalkboards and software discs are going the way of the dinosaur. Amidst all of the change, however, there’s one constant: the pursuit of academic excellence and mutual respect. During the Texas Computer Education Association (TCEA) Convention, experts from the nonprofit foundation Great Expectations shared best practices for fostering productive classrooms in the presence of increased technology integration. Great Expectations is a school transformation model that emphasizes a climate of mutual respect and academic excellence.

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2015/02/19/character-skills-847/

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from Educational Technology http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/uis/edtech/~3/67fqfR_fwgU/

U Central Florida Debuts Blended Learning MOOC for Educators

By Joshua Bolkan, THE Journal

The University of Central Florida (UCF) has partnered with two organizations to reboot a massive open online course (MOOC) for teachers focused on blended learning in higher ed and K-12. The university has partnered with Educause, a nonprofit focused on technology in higher education, and ed tech company Instructure to launch “BlendKit2015: Becoming a Blended Learning Designer.” The course is intended to build on the success of BlendKit2014, a similar MOOC released last year that also covered blending learning and was Educause’s first. “The power of online professional development is that we can collaborate and educate in real-time,” said Julie Little, Educause vice president of teaching, learning and professional development, in a prepared statement. “BlendKit2015 leverages that power to advance strategic understanding of blended learning’s full potential.”

http://thejournal.com/articles/2015/01/27/u-central-florida-launches-blended-learning-mooc-for-educators.aspx

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from Educational Technology http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/uis/edtech/~3/tpXVILsaJ4Y/

Teaching in the 21st Century – Quizzes Work: True or False?

by Traci Gardner, Ideas for Teaching Writing

Last month, I considered the strategy of including quizzes in a writing course. Essentially, while I hated pop quizzes as a student, I thought I might be shortchanging students who do well as test takers. I decided to try quizzes in the online technical writing course during Virginia Tech’s Winter Session. Now that the course is over, I have to admit that the quizzes seemed useful and effective. Logistically, the system was simple to set up. The companion website for the textbook included quizzes that were ready to import to Scholar (our campus installation of Sakai). I had to edit the quizzes in order to randomize answers where possible and remove the requirements for written rationales for some questions. Otherwise, they were ready to go. I just used what was available.

http://blogs.bedfordstmartins.com/bits/assessment/quizzes-work-true-or-false/tgardner/

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from Educational Technology http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/uis/edtech/~3/eY2M97gMW2c/

How Online Learning Can Close the AP Participation Gap

BY SOPHIE QUINTON, National Journal

A University of Iowa program called the Iowa Online AP Academy has been giving students access to free, online Advanced Placement courses since 2001. The online learning partnership offsets some of the disadvantages that can come with being a high-achieving student in a small, isolated school district, providing the chance to take challenging academic courses that many schools can’t offer. Over the past five years, an average of 430 students across Iowa have enrolled in courses through IOAPA each year. IOAPA was created with rural districts in mind, but any accredited school in Iowa can participate. Online courses can be prohibitively expensive, and it can be hard for even motivated teenagers to stay on top of their work without a teacher and classmates present. So IOAPA was designed to address both challenges.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/next-america/education/how-online-learning-can-close-the-ap-participation-gap-20150127

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EdX CEO Lays Out Disruptive Vision For Higher Ed

by WBUR Here and Now

Anant Agarwal, CEO of edX, says “I talk about unbundling in time, function and content. Let’s take unbundling in content. Why should it be the case that a professor who teaches a course writes a textbook, teaches a course, writes the exams, the whole thing. Instead, a blended course is an unbundled course, where you might use a MOOC from a professor from another university as a new age textbook. That would be unbundling of content. So we do some of that. Why can’t we increase that? Today, why is it that every student has to learn in college when they are 18? Why four years? How about unbundling time? …. So a continuous education system like this could solve many problems. It will allow people to get just-in-time education on topics that are on the cutting edge of technology and learn as they need to learn; they may be better able to pay later.”

http://hereandnow.wbur.org/2015/01/22/edx-moocs-anant-agarwal

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Global PC Shipments Increase Following 2-Year Decline

By Joshua Bolkan, THE Journal

Following more than two years of declining sales, global PC shipments increased 1 percent in the fourth quarter of 2014, according to a new report from market research firm Gartner. “The PC market is quietly stabilizing after the installed base reduction driven by users diversifying their device portfolios,” said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner, in a prepared statement. “Installed base PC displacement by tablets peaked in 2013 and the first half of 2014. Now that tablets have mostly penetrated some key markets, consumer spending is slowly shifting back to PCs.” “However, there are regional variations. Mostly, mature regions show an ongoing trend of positive growth, but emerging markets remain weak,” Kitagawa added.

http://thejournal.com/articles/2015/01/14/global-pc-shipments-increase-after-2year-decline.aspx

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