About Anything

At the Learning and Technology World Forum in London, Cisco Systems Inc., Intel Corporation and Microsoft Corp. announced plans to underwrite a multi-sector research project to develop new assessment approaches, methods and technologies for measuring the success of 21st-century teaching and learning in classrooms around the world.

The three companies also announced the appointment of Barry McGaw, currently the director of the Melbourne Education Research Institute at the University of Melbourne, as executive director of the project. McGaw will oversee an executive committee, project lead team, and up to 50 leading experts and innovators in academia and government, to collaborate on the research and assist in influencing the development of future international and national assessments.

Press release: Cisco, Intel and Microsoft Lead Collaboration to Improve Global Education Assessments

In early December, Google announced a Curriculum Competition to combine Google Earth Rome 3D content with traditional classroom curricula.

Rome 3D is based on Rome Reborn, an international initiative whose goal is the creation of 3D digital models illustrating the urban development of ancient Rome from the first settlement in the late Bronze Age (ca. 1000 B.C.) to the depopulation of the city in the early Middle Ages (ca. A.D. 550).

Submissions are due by February 9, 2009. The Submission guidelines, from the Google site, are:

Submissions to the Google Ancient Rome 3D Curriculum Competition will be judged based on the following elements:

* Educational value
* Creativity
* Clarity, organization, and resources used
* Use of Ancient Rome 3D layer in Google Earth

Winners will be chosen in each of three curriculum areas:

1. Geography/social studies/history
2. Art/design/pre-architecture/engineering/math/science
3. Literature/language arts/English/philosophy.

One K-8 and one 9-12 submission will be chosen as a winner in each subject matter group.

Rome Reborn website at Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities (IATH) of the University of Virginia: Rome Reborn

Google Earth Ancient Rome site: Ancient Rome 3D

Contest site:  Ancient Rome 3D Curriculum Competition

eSchool News,  a monthly print and web newspaper read by K-20 decision-makers, has published a summary of developments that they believe could have a profound effect on educational technology in the schools. They are:

5. How will ‘validated learning’ be enforced among the nation’s colleges and universities?

4. How will new federal and state regulations affect internet safety education in schools?

3. Who will be Kevin Martin’s successor as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, and how will this change affect telecommunications policy in 2009?

2. Will the transition to digital TV broadcasting next month occur seamlessly–or will schools experience any problems?

1. How will education fare under the Obama administration?

The article is at: Five ed-tech stories to watch for 2009 (registration required to read the entire article.)

A report, Virtual learning environments: an evaluation of their development in a sample of educational settings, published today by the UK’s Office for Standards in Education , shows that despite expectations the use of Virtual Learning Environments across schools and colleges has been slow to take off.

The survey, carried out in a range of settings, including schools, colleges, work-based learning and adult and community learning centres, says the concept of VLEs is still relatively new and represents only a small aspect of learning.

Among other points, the report says: “The common factor in effective VLEs was the enthusiasm of the subject teacher; that is enthusiasm for the subject and teaching and learning as much as any competence in computing”.

The news release is here:  The virtual reality of e-learning

The report is here:  Virtual learning environments: an evaluation of their development in a sample of educational settings

An article in The Guardian provides a bit of background and perspective: No escape from turning up to class

A research report in Science, Why Peer Discussion Improves Student Performance on In-Class Concept Questions (subscription required), reports that clickers used in the classroom (see clickers in the classroom for a review) can help students arrive at conceptual understanding on their own through the process of group discussion and debate.  According to the authors of the study, most instructors report that the percentage of correct answers almost always increases after peer discussion. They go on to say that it has been generally assumed that active engagement of students during discussion with peers, some of whom know the correct answer, leads to increased conceptual understanding, resulting in improved performance after PI.

In this study, students were asked to answer the question a second time after their peer discussion, but also to answer a different, conceptually related question. Neither the correct answer, nor the student responses were shown between questions. The authors conclude that “our results suggest that peer discussion can be effective for understanding difficult concepts even when no one in the group initially knows the correct answer.”

One of their students, quoted in the study says it pretty well: “Often when talking through the questions, the group can figure out the questions without originally knowing the answer, and the answer almost sticks better that way because we talked through it instead of just hearing the answer.”

For work related reasons, I need to get up to speed on educational technology. I was once actively working on simulation based teaching and training systems, but haven’t kept up for the last 10-20 years. A lot has changed. This will be challenging, but I hope fun and rewarding. Posts to follow as I find articles and resources that interest me.

Diving in…