In today’s information age, educators are being inundated with research, resources, and tools – all aimed at improving education, instruction, and student performance. How can educators sift through all this information to find resources that are worth one’s time and attention? In this month’s issue brief, we focus on online resources for educators, pulling together Read more about October Issue Brief- Online Resources For Educators[…]
A new website, Learning Registry, which is an update to http://free.ed.gov, is an improved site for educators to find free digital learning materials. While still in its beta stage, Learning Registry offers promise as a much more organized, comprehensive, and inclusive education resource collaboration website. While there has been a proliferation of websites over recent Read more about Learning Registry[…]
Alison Anderson at Getting Smart has compiled a helpful list of new educational technology, or #edtech as is it often called on social media platforms. Several of these technologies are only in their beta phase or will not launch until sometime in August, so now is a good time to sign up for free access. Read more about 10 New Ed Tech Tools[…]
With an increased focus on student assessment and its application in classrooms across the United States, the Northwest Evaluation Association (NWEA) has officially launched a new informational website to initiate a meaningful dialogue among educators on assessment and to build “assessment literacy” skills for teachers and school administrators, in particular. Assessment literacy is the knowledge Read more about Northwest Evaluation Association Launches Assessment Literacy Website[…]
“The results being released today show that we are indeed in a new world. And we as adults need to learn from kids in this instance. We need to learn from students about how they learn, where they learn, and how they seek information. I believe we must harness this information to give all students Read more about From Chalkboards to Tablets: The Speak Up 2012 Report[…]
Coursera, one of the larger MOOC’s (massive open online courses), will begin offering free online teacher development courses this summer. And for a set of courses that are just beginning, a rather impressive list of traditional universities including the College of Education at University of Washington and John Hopkins University School of Education as well Read more about Coursera to Offer Free Teacher Development Classes[…]
The Education Division of the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) announces winners and finalists in its Innovation Incubator Program. The program was held during the annual flagship Ed Tech Industry Summit, May 5-7, at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco. Ten products and services were featured during the event, and awards were presented to Read more about Ten Innovators at the 2013 Ed Tech Industry Summit[…]
Over the last 15 years, TNTP, a national nonprofit committed to ending the injustice of educational inequality, has shared what they have learned about education policy and effective teaching mainly through publications like “The Irreplaceables.” Recently, they have launched a TNTP blog. TNTP hopes to use the blog to offer a different perspective on the Read more about TNTP Launches Blog[…]
The issue of whether and how much computers should be responsible for student grading has been around for decades, but the recent advent of MOOCs and the upcoming implementation of Common Core tests has brought the issue to the forefront yet again. One MOOC, edX, has recently developed software, which they will make available as Read more about Should student essays be graded by computers?[…]
The Alliance for Excellent Education and the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation are offering a first-of-its-kind online course for school district leaders. Last month, the Alliance for Excellent Education and Friday Institute for Educational Innovation at North Carolina State University opened enrollment for a first-of-its-kind Massive Online Open Course for Educators (MOOC-Ed). Titled “Digital Learning Read more about MOOC for Educators: “Digital Learning Transition”[…]
With the large increase in online learning in recent years, more and more students are reaping its benefits as well as facing its challenges. In response, a group of scholars recently joined together to compose the “Bill of Rights and Principles for Learning in the Digital Age.” Here is an introduction from the authors: On Read more about A Bill of Rights and Principles for Learning in the Digital Age[…]
A Los Angeles High School is trying to prove that more individual instruction can be provided with larger class sizes. How might they accomplish this? Alliance Tennenbaum Family Technology High School hopes that blended learning, a model which for this school includes a third of their class time in traditional teacher-led instruction, a third working Read more about Los Angeles school Pioneers Blended Learning Model[…]
Since 1906, the Carnegie Unit, or credit hour/student hour, has been the standard unit by which student progress and mastery in American secondary schools and colleges have been measured. The Carnegie Unit was originally created in 1906 by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching as a means by which professors could argue for Read more about Re-thinking the credit hour?[…]
In the spring 2011 issue of Education Next, Erin Dillon and Bill Tucker equate online learning with charter schools. Is online learning the next “cure-all” that will be implemented without any real way to assess its effectiveness? Their article, “Lessons for Online Learning” studies the lessons learned from the charter movement, such as focusing on Read more about Lessons for Online Learning[…]
Digital learning is disruptive. The personalization of learning that it makes possible is a radical break from the course-and-class model of school with its technology of teacher-instruction. Personalization would change school, change teaching and change learning. What is the best way to go about changing the long-standing system of schooling? It may be more difficult Read more about Strategy for Realizing Digital[…]
Changing circumstances mandate that we shift the focus of higher education policy away from how to enable more students to afford higher education to how we can make a quality postsecondary education affordable. The challenge before the country also mandates a new definition of quality from the perspective of students–so that the education is valuable Read more about Disrupting College: How Disruptive Innovation Can Deliver Quality and Affordability to Postsecondary Education[…]