- Blackboard as the Learning Management System of a Computer Literacy Course
- Refraction of Light
- Confusing Words
- GSI workshop for MERLOT
- Rome Reborn
- Cancer Control P.L.A.N.E.T.
- Cancer Control: Journal of the Moffitt Cancer Center
- deneme
- One Size Fits None: Whats the
- PHP Tutorial
- Universities as Responsive Learning Organizations Through Competency-Based Assessment with Electronic Portfolios
- LectureTools
- Learning, Reflection, and Electronic Portfolios: Stepping Toward an Assessment Practice
- UIPUI's 2008 Assessment Institute
- Assessment Clear and Simple -- Practical Steps for Institutions, Departments, and General-Education
OER Blogs
Harvard Extension School Offers Online Learning Course on Environmental Management - GreenBiz
The Harvard University Extension School is offering a popular course on strategies for environmental management via distance learning. The seventh edition of the course, "Strategies for Environmental Management: Path to Sustainable Development," begins on January 26 and registration is already under way for the class that is taught by Harvard adjunct professor Robert B. Pojasek.... Online
Categories: OER Blogs
the gadget cube: Synthetic Intelligence Learning Online - Kelly Lewis, Central Penn Business News
Imagine being able to interview Abraham Lincoln. Although the country's 16th president has been dead for 143 years, Synthetic Interview (SI) technology makes it possible. SI allows computer users to interview historical figures, living or deceased, using voice-recognition software. Carnegie Mellon University patented the technology in 1998.
Categories: OER Blogs
AHS students get ahead with online college courses via online learning - Brenda Erdahl, Annandale Advocate
Brittany Partridge gets up every morning and heads to school like a normal high school kid. But unlike the majority of her classmates, her first stop is the media center where she pulls out a hefty textbook on the history of western civilization and starts to read. From 8 until 11 a.m. Partridge is no longer an Annandale High School senior, but an online student at Northwestern College in St.
Categories: OER Blogs
What Not To Build
Longer article posted in my Half an Hour blog. My sort of environmental scan is a bit different from what you'll get from consultants and venture capitalists. Don't ask me what companies are developing what products, how industry stocks are performing, or where all the 'smart money' is going. I don't know and I don't care. What I can tell you, though, is what technologies are working, what technologies are flopping, and what technologies are fads. So, here is my advice on what not to build. Actually, it's a bit more than that: it's a list of what not to build, a list of some things that people are working on now, some fads to avoid, and some indication of what's out there for the taking, if you can get your act together in a hurry. And what lies beyond that? The domain of real innovation and progress. Stephen Downes, Half an Hour, January 5, 2009 [Tags: Web Logs] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
A Quickly Created Chatroom...
Neat. No login, no muss, no fuss. Create a chatroom by clicking on a button, share the resulting URL with your friends. The chatroom disappears a few hours after you've finished using it. Doug Dickinson, Dougmuses, January 5, 2009 [Tags: Chatrooms] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
Should Higher Education Course Materials Be Free to All? Leo Pollak in the IPPR's Public Policy Research
Seb Schmoller links to Leo Pollak, who argues in favour of open education. "Without intellectual property, a significant amount of innovation still occurs and welfare may actually be higher than with intellectual property." Schmoller, though, also cites Michael Feldstein, who argues that "access to course materials is not the same as access to education." Maybe not, but is this enough to make us open education sceptics, as Feldstein suggests? I take up the case in the comments, and Feldstein replies. Seb Schmoller, Fortnightly Mailing, January 5, 2009 [Tags: Patents, Open Content, Copyrights, Patents] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
Cobalt - Edusim (Downloadable Software)
This - and not closed worlds like Second Life - is the way forward for 3D software: "Cobalt is a free and open source metaverse browser and construction toolkit for accessing, creating, and publishing hyperlinked multi-user virtual worlds. Powered by Croquet technology, Cobalt uses peer-based messaging to eliminate the need for virtual world servers and makes it very simple to create and securely share deeply collaborative virtual worlds that run on all major software operating systems." Paul Hamilton, Free Resources from the Net for (Special) Education, January 5, 2009 [Tags: Operating Systems, Second Life, Books, Open Source] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
12 Steps to Economic Recovery
The very first sentence in the very first step in this Forbes article is, "Admit our mistakes." The author then proceeds to recommend exactly the same sort of thinking that led to the downturn in the first place (a far more sobering - and sober - reflection can be found in the New York Times article by Michael Lewis and David Einhorn, as well as this column from Paul Krugman). After a paean to tax breaks, cuts to medicare and welfare, drill baby drill, and xenophobia, Rich Karlgaard addresses education: "we'll have to break the teachers unions." As though underpaying teachers will really solve any sort of economic (or educational) problem. Isn't this sort of vindictive, partisan, narrow-minded thinking not thoroughly discredited yet? They have wrecked the world's economic system. Why is anyone listening to these people? Why is anyone publishing them? Rich Karlgaard, Forbes, January 5, 2009 [Tags: none] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
So Many People, So Little Time
Valdis Krebs, on why he follows so few people on Twitter: "or the time invested, I want maximum return. I use the redundancy of connections, between the many social circles I am interested in, to my advantage. I follow a select group of people that give me the same access as following someone in every group. Follow the few to reach the many!" Valdis Krebs, T N T - The Network Thinker, January 5, 2009 [Tags: Twitter] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
Taiwan OCW (TOCW) Launches, Provides Interesting Credit Option
Part of what I did when I visited Taiwan in 2007 was to tour with a group of international representatives organized by Lucifer Chu to some local universities, introducing their administrations to the concept of open courseware. Luc Chu's work has been paying off, and in some interesting ways: "if high school graduates who apply to enter the school can pass the September exam on the subject they have been self-learning when their freshman semester begins, they will be eligible to apply for advanced credit standing." Mike Caulfield, OpenCourseWare Blog, January 5, 2009 [Tags: Schools, Online Learning, OpenCourseWare, Flickr] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
The Latest Doomed Pedagogical Fad: 21st-Century Skills
The core of Jay Matthews's objection to "21st Centruty Skills" is actually found in a previous column: "it never explained how teachers are going to find the time to introduce all these skills to students who, at the moment, are still struggling with plain old reading, writing and math." But it never occurs to him that the reason students are struggling with reading, writing and math is that they don't have these "21st century skills." We should stop trying to cram facts into students' heads, and instead give them the means and motivations to learn through practice and reflection. But the crank from the Post isn't interested in that. Related: Will Richardson responds to Matthews. And Darren Kuropatwa shows why the '21st century' approach is important: "Mathematics is the science of patterns. It's not the particular facts that are so interesting, it's the patterns." Jay Mathews, Washington Post, January 5, 2009 [Tags: none] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
US Dept Ed Statistics "First Look" at Distance Education - December 2008
At the end of December, 2008, the US Dept of Education released the results of their first look at distance learning in higher education. They found that 2/3 of colleges and universities are offering online, hybrid/blended, or other distance learning.
Areas covered in the report:
• Whether institutions offered various types of distance education courses, and enrollment in those courses,
Categories: OER Blogs
Crystal Ball Gazing at the Coming Year in Tech Law
Michael Geist offers one of the best forecasts I've seen as his month by month report for 2009 combines stone-sober forecasting with an imaginative flair. What to expect? Secret agreements, government reports, hearings, protests, and a November election. See also Phil Muncaster with some additional thoughts on the coming year, including e-discovery, social computing, and mobile ECM. Michael Geist, Weblog, January 5, 2009 [Tags: none] [Link] [Comment]
Categories: OER Blogs
2008 Access Statistics
Late December, 2007, I set up an access log function. And then forgot about it. It is now 55 million lines long and more than 500 megabytes. I have to delete it. But not before parsing it to find out what people were reading last year. Note that this list under-reports hits on posts, because most reads from OLDaily are directly to the article in question, and not via the website.
Top 10 Articles
How to Create an RSS Feed With Notepad, a Web Server, and a Beer (46420)
An Introduction to Connective Knowledge (20777)
Resource Profiles (12995)
E-Learning 2.0 (9973)
Models for Sustainable Open Educational Resources (9533)
Principles for Evaluating Websites (8168)
Things You Really Need to Learn (7860)
How to Write Articles and Essays Quickly and Expertly (7567)
How To Be Heard (6954)
Seven Habits of Highly Connected People (5223)
The Semantic Social Network (5195)
Top 20 Posts
The Blue Book: A Consumer Guide to Virtual Worlds (32145) Unattributed, Association of Virtual Worlds
Cuil (17035) Various Authors, Website
Google Chrome (10474) Scott McLeod, Google
Introducing Edupunk (8749) Leslie Madsen Brooks, BlogHer
2009 Predictions (8472) Raj Boora, EDITing in the Dark
Download YouTube Videos As MP4 Files (4396) Ionut Alex Chitu, Google Operating System
Stockhouse (4155) Jennifer Griffin, Website
Travian (2757) Various Authors, Website
SeeqPod (2695) Various Authors, Website
Creepy Treehouse (2126) Barbara Fister, ACRLog
Should Teachers Adjust Their Teaching to Individual Students' Learning Styles? (2022) eduwonkette, Weblog
Blackboard Awarded Patent on e-Learning Technology (2017) Press Release, Blackboard
Robert F. Kennedy (1811) Various Authors, Wikipedia
Vixy (1786) Various Authors, Farside Inc.
Human History Is Additive NOT Subtractive! (1773) Wayne Hodgins, Off Course-On Target
EduSpaces Shutting Down (1643) Unattributed, EduSpaces
gRSShopper (1643) Stephen Downes, gRSShopper
2008 Beijing Olympics (1581) Various Athletes, Olympics
Professor Pans 'Learning Style' Teaching Method (1502) Julie Henry, The Telegraph
Wikipedia & Edupunk (1502) Dave Warlick, 2 cents worth
Quick Quiz: What New Web Tool Can You Use and Get an ASUS? (1465) Alan Levine, CogDogBlog
Total: 5568035 posts read
, , January 5, 2009 [Tags: Google, RSS, E-Learning 2.0, YouTube, China, Blackboard Inc., Video, Wikipedia, Google Chrome] [Comment]Categories: OER Blogs
Web-based Case Studies Help Students Develop Career Skills - Lawn and Landscape Management
A survey of employers in the landscape industry revealed the importance of arming landscaping and horticulture students with technical knowledge, practical application, and problem-solving skills. Teaching students the skills necessary to solve complex landscape management decisions is crucial to their career success.With the rapid advancement of technology over the past two decades, tools are
Categories: OER Blogs
Going to school online - Laura Diamond, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Georgia Virtual Academy started in 2007 and has quietly become one of the largest public schools in the state. It teaches about 4,400 elementary and middle school students from 163 of the state’s 180 school districts. Internet-based schools have popped up across the country in the past few years because of improved technology and changing education laws. As of January, there were 173 virtual
Categories: OER Blogs
Meeting a virtual need Ohio Northwestern School Distrcit starts online learning school - CHRISTY JOHNSON, Daily Record
The board approved a new program that will open a virtual door for online learning possibilities.
Superintendent Jeffrey Layton along with high school Principal Mike Burkholder presented the board with a recommendation to make a Northwestern Virtual online school a reality. "We have been talking about doing this now for about three years, but it has been on the back burner," Layton said. "But
Categories: OER Blogs
What not to build
I met with an individual today who is creating a virtual world for young teens. The project is conceived as serving a niche market. Of course, we all feel our ideas are unique or our particular circumstance is different from others. I left the meeting with a sense of “why are people still building these things? why not take advantage of infrastructure that is already in place?”. Operating systems and platforms that are used as the base of innovation are increasingly free. The value is in the creativity and innovation unleashed by many contributors. Google gets this. That’s why they announced OpenSocial. And Android. Competition based on openness.
Stephen Downes continues his reflection/future thinking with What Not to Build (this follows his important Future of Online Learning: 10 Years On). In this (shorter) paper, he offers advice to the elearning industry on what not to build…what is being built…what is a fad…and what might be worth building. I don’t agree with all of his statements. iPhones are hyped, but I don’t think they are a fad…though Android and RIM may impact their market share. Cloud computing will not be noticed because, well, that’s the point. The technology becomes transparent. People are already “using the cloud” without being fully aware of it. This may depend on how one defines cloud computing - i.e. if it includes Google Docs, Gmail, MobileMe, and other hardware/software applications that don’t confine computing to a particular device - then I don’t think it’s a fad. Those two small points aside, Stephen has written a good article that will make edtech professionals rethink future/emerging projects.
Categories: OER Blogs
Online Learning on the School Bus? - Stephanie Simon, Wall Street Journal
The project, known as the Aspirnaut Initiative, gives some high-performing students laptops or video iPods and sets them up with online courses and educational videos during their long rural bus rides to and from school -- a round trip that often starts before dawn and ends after dark.
Categories: OER Blogs
Trying to get more out of less: Mergers will allow state technical colleges to save money, preserve services - Laura Raines, Journal-Constitution
Corporations merge all the time. Colleges and universities almost never do. Yet by July 1, 13 colleges in the Technical College System of Georgia will have merged into six new educational institutions.... Merged colleges plan to share instructors and use distance learning to enhance course offerings.... Merging gave Chandler’s faculty an opportunity to look differently at dual enrollment, which
Categories: OER Blogs
Featured OER
Open Ed Blogs
- Harvard Extension School Offers Online Learning Course on Environmental Management - GreenBiz
- the gadget cube: Synthetic Intelligence Learning Online - Kelly Lewis, Central Penn Business News
- AHS students get ahead with online college courses via online learning - Brenda Erdahl, Annandale Advocate
- What Not To Build
- A Quickly Created Chatroom...