by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate
In her book Reinventing Writing, Vicki Davis outlines the fundamentals of responsible digital citizenship through the “9 key Ps.” Putting these practices into daily use in your classroom is a great way to model digital citizenship for your students.
http://www.thetechedvocate.org/model-explain-digital-security-k-12-students/
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by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate
Just like listening to audiobooks through electronic devices, podcasts are becoming more and more popular. These iPod-based audio broadcasts encompass a wide variety of subjects, such as entrepreneurship, politics, history, to entertaining series on serial killers. These downloadable series can be subscribed to, so you automatically get the next installment. However, podcasts can be utilized in the classroom, primarily to promote learning. How? I am glad you asked. In this piece, I will discuss the two ways that teachers can use podcasts to promote learning.
http://www.thetechedvocate.org/teachers-can-use-podcasts-promote-learning/
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by Financial Times
In a difficult market for course providers, the numbers taking online programmes have grown only modestly. However, they have not declined in the same way as full-time two-year MBAs, which have seen a fall in applications. Last year, 62 per cent of two-year MBA courses in the US suffered a drop in applications, while numbers were either flat or up for 53 per cent of online MBAs, according to the Graduate Management Admission Council, which administers the GMAT business school entrance exam. The quality of online teaching varies significantly, however, both in the technology used by students to study and interact with their tutors and in the availability of face-to-face networking events and the way classmates are encouraged to work together.
https://www.ft.com/content/5e0dbd6e-02b8-11e8-9e12-af73e8db3c71
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By Richard Chang, THE Journal
The virtual schools market in North America is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of almost 13 percent from 2017 to 2021, according to a new report by market research firm Technavio. The report states that Technavio analysts forecast the virtual schools market in North America to grow to more than 1 billion enrollments by 2021, though there are fewer than 1 billion people residing in the United States and Canada, the researched countries. Technavio analysts provide the following three factors that are contributing to the growth of the virtual schools market in North America:
Increase in online content development and digitization;
Demand for cloud-based e-learning; and
Rise in custom learning methods.
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By Dian Schaffhauser, THE Journal
Despite all the headlines and conference coverage of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) for education over the last year, the technology is still gaining speed — residing at that sweet spot in the hype cycle where, when you place headsets on people and gently guide them to turn around to gain a full view, they tend to gasp and say, “Oh, wow.” So imagine how your students would respond if, in that next geography lesson, instead of handing them a flat map of Peru, you pass out pre-loaded smartphones to each table along with a $15 Google Cardboard and ask them to pull up a walking tour that places them in Machu Picchu. “Seeing is believing,” said Colin Messenger, a senior market analyst with a focus on education at FutureSource Consulting.
https://thejournal.com/articles/2017/03/06/immersive-education-ar-comes-of-age.aspx
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by Jarrett Carter, Education Dive
Amazon is betting that college students will help them to discover new frontiers with its Alexa technology, and is using college fellowship programs to recruit the nation’s best and brightest engineering students to develop intellectual property for the company. The Alexa Fund Fellows program is currently in schools like Carnegie Mellon University, Johns Hopkins University, the University of Southern California and Waterloo University. It pairs students with professors to help develop innovation in voice recognition technology and is backed by a $100 million investment from the company’s foundation.
http://www.educationdive.com/news/amazon-extends-ai-development-race-to-college-classrooms/437540/
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by Emerging Strategy
The global education sector is experiencing a shift in learning models. Fueled by the exploding demand for mobile devices and digital education across the world, mobile learning has become the mainstream and completely changed the way in which traditional educational business models are perceived. With an already well-established foothold in the West and exploding growth figures in emerging markets, the rise of mobile learning is leading to a need for both companies and education institutions alike to integrate its use into their business and learning models, respectively. In this article, we discuss the current penetration of mobile learning across key markets, the challenges brought to both traditional businesses and the education sector, and also look into its application and prospects for future development.
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By Samiha Uddin, Daily Illini
Technology is constantly moving forward — from hoverboards to virtual reality. Ten years from now, will campus look the same? Brian Quick, University communication professor since 2007, said students’ communication techniques will continue to change. “Students have generally remained the same since 2007,” Quick said. “We attract strong students here at the University. However, in regards to technology, how students communicate continues to evolve as technology rapidly changes.” Along with the technological changes, Quick sees a bigger emphasis on online education. “The other large change I would say is the immense amount of online education. For the past several years I have taught an online health campaign class,” Quick said. “As instructors, I remember back in the day when we entered grades in paper grade books. Today, we enjoy sites such as Compass, Blackboard and Moodle to assist with course management.” Quick has a specific image that he envisions for the future of the University — one that includes experiencing campus culture no matter the format.
http://www.dailyillini.com/article/2016/03/what-will-campus-be-like-in-2026
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By Sabah Karimi, US News
Whether you want to excel at work or just adopt a new hobby, you’ll need to learn some new skills to reach your goals. Learning new skills can keep your mind sharp as you age and open you up to a whole new world of possibilities. The good news: You don’t have to spend a lot of money for a teacher or coach to learn that new skill set – you’ll find several free resources online to support your new endeavor.
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by US Dept of Education
Thirteen projects have been awarded a total of $1.2 million, as part of the Digital Media and Learning Competition’s “Trust Challenge,” to foster trust in online learning environments. The winners are tech developers, youth-serving institutions, collaborative networks, school systems and universities that will develop innovative digital badge systems, data management platforms, digital learning environments, online learning content and related digital tools to promote trust in connected learning experiences. The awards were announced today by educational innovator Richard Culatta, acting director of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Educational Technology, at the South by Southwest EDU Conference. The Trust Challenge is supported by the MacArthur Foundation and administered by HASTAC.
By DeLaina Tonks, KSL
As technology advances, more junior high and high school students and their parents are turning to more innovative schooling methods. Online classes that were previously associated with collegiate institutions are now beginning to resonate with dedicated millennials who want more flexibility, choices and control in their educational paths. In fact, by 2019, about 50 percent of courses will be delivered online, according to Michael B. Horn, the executive director of education at Innosight Institute. Linked below are five of the many reasons to explore online education:
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=1268&sid=33656049
By Clive Thompson, BoingBoing
Welcome to online learning at Rutgers! To make sure the person taking the test is actually you, they’ll be tracking your “face, knuckle and personal identification details”, including “all activity in the monitor, browser, webcam and microphone”, according to The Daily Targum.
http://boingboing.net/2015/03/10/rutgers-online-course-tracks.html
By Kate Lewis, Edudemic
Screencasting is getting a lot of attention as a tool for teachers when using the flipped classroom model. Certainly, screencasts are a great tool for teachers to create presentations for their students to view at home. But I think that screencasting is most powerful when it is used as a student creation tool. Screencasts take a typical presentation a step further by requiring higher order thinking skills; not only do students create the presentation, but they also have to explain their thinking. There are many excellent screencasting applications available, including Show Me, Educreations and Explain Everything. The students in my eighth grade English Language Arts classes recently used Explain Everything on iPads to create grammar screencasts. It was great to see the students engaged and having fun while learning about a topic that usually they would do anything to avoid!
http://www.edudemic.com/screencasts-in-the-classroom/
by Daniel Cohen, Matthew Sargeant, and Ken Somers; McKinsey Report
3-D printing, or additive manufacturing,1 has come a long way from its roots in the production of simple plastic prototypes. Today, 3-D printers can not only handle materials ranging from titanium to human cartilage but also produce fully functional components, including complex mechanisms, batteries, transistors, and LEDs. The capabilities of 3-D printing hardware are evolving rapidly, too. They can build larger components and achieve greater precision and finer resolution at higher speeds and lower costs. Together, these advances have brought the technology to a tipping point—it appears ready to emerge from its niche status and become a viable alternative to conventional manufacturing processes in an increasing number of applications.
http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/manufacturing/3-d_printing_takes_shape
by Brad Brown, David Court, and Tim McGuire; McKinsey Quarterly
At a unique gathering of data-analytics leaders, new solutions began emerging to vexing privacy, talent, organizational, and frontline-adoption challenges. This past October, eight executives from companies that are leaders in data analytics got together to share perspectives on their biggest challenges. All were the most senior executives with data-analytics responsibility in their companies, which included AIG, American Express, Samsung Mobile, Siemens Healthcare, TD Bank, and Wal-Mart Stores. Their backgrounds varied, with chief information officers, a chief data officer, a chief marketing officer, a chief risk officer, and a chief science officer all represented.1 We had seeded the discussion by asking each of them in advance about the burning issues they were facing.
