December 13, 2010
On the Twelfth Day of Christmas – My 12 Favourite Gifts from OLDaily
Scott Leslie,
edtechpost, December 13, 2010.
Thanks to Scott Leslie for compiling this list of his favorite posts from OLDaily over the years. There are some good ones in there - and some ones even I had forgotten.
UK public universities become privatized while the banks are state-funded
Tony Bates,
e-learning & distance education resources, December 13, 2010.
Tony Bates warns that legislators who cut education funding in response to the fiscal crisis are playing with fire. "In the UK's case, it is particularly invidious that young people, potential students, who had no responsibility whatsoever for the financial crisis, are directly paying for the incompetence and greed of the financial sector. This is the fuel to spark a violent revolution, and I say this with real trepidation as all my family are living and studying or working (so far) in England."
A Dozen or So Reasons I Applaud Lamar High School for Ditching School Library Books
Lisa Nielsen,
The Innovative Educator, December 13, 2010.
eBooks might not yet be all they could be. I'd certainly like to see something more interactive, open and interoperable. But even with these weaknesses, with crisp and usable reader displays, they are an advance over paper books. That's why schools are beginning to convert from the paper-based product to the electronic version. This post offers twelve reasons why they're making the change.
Paper Accepted for CHASE2011 about #PLENK2010
Dalit Levy,
Plenk2010, December 13, 2010.
Vladimir Kukharenko draws four lessons from her participation in PLENK 2010. From her paper, 'Lessons Learned from Participating in a Connectivist Massive Online Open Course (MOOC),' accepted for CHASE 2011, here are the four lessons:
- Learning in a MOOC is Possible
- Learning Often Occurs Through the Back Channels
- Learning Without Being Assessed
- Learning Needs a Daily Reminder
What international test scores really tell us: Lessons buried in PISA report
William J. Mathis,
Washington Post, December 13, 2010.
The lessons from PISA are very clear and are being repeated by numerous pundits. Odds are that policy-makers will continue to ignore them, because it means shifting from superficial 'reform' efforts to something more substantive. Here are the lessons, as found by yet another pundit:
- The best performing school systems manage to provide high-quality education to all children.
- Students from low socio-economic backgrounds score a year behind their more affluent classmates. However, poorer students who are integrated with their more affluent classmates score strikingly higher. The difference is worth more than a year's education.
- In schools where students are required to repeat grades (such as with promotion requirements), the test scores are lower and the achievement gap is larger.
- Tracking students ('ability grouping') [a.k.a. 'streaming'] results in the gap becoming wider. The earlier the practice begins, the greater the gap. Poor children are more frequently shunted into the lower tracks.
- Systems that transfer weak or disruptive students score lower on tests and on equity. One-third of the differences in national performance can be ascribed to this one factor.
- Schools that have autonomy over curriculum, finances and assessment score higher.
- Schools that compete for students (vouchers, charters, etc.) show no achievement score advantage.
- Private schools do no better once family wealth factors are considered.
- Students that attended pre-school score higher, even after more than 10 years.
What Do Econ 1 Students Need to Remember Most from the Course?
Brad DeLong,
Grasping Reality with Both Hands, December 13, 2010.
I am the last person to say education should be dominated by economics. That said, people who write about education should nonetheless know some economics, even if they think it's all voodoo and propaganda. Brad DeLong offers a service with two posts (What Do Econ 1 Students Need to Remember Most from the Course? and What Do Econ 1 Students Need to Remember Second Most from the Course?) that help give people the basics of economic theory. You don't have to believe any of this. But you have to know it, because the people who manage education believe it, or at least part of it. And economics has some basis in fact, so it shouldn't be discounted entirely.
Teach Don't Tell
George Couros,
Connected Principals, December 13, 2010.
The diagram presented here is tempting to endorse, partially because it supports the objective of relaxing control and partially because appeals to the sense of gently scaffolded learning support. But. First, why are 'demonstration' and 'control' tied together? Why does the teacher need control in order to demonstrate? I demonstrate stuff all the time in these pages or elsewhere, but I don't exercise any control to do it. Second, one wonders about the time frame for the release of control. If we were teach the very young how to manage their own learning, we could do away with this sort of scaffolding process by the time they are 10. In such a case, the diagram isn't very much of a revelation.
No Next Button - Some Examples
Jeffery Goldman,
MinuteBio, December 13, 2010.
Having just gone through some awful mandatory occupational health and safety training - a page-turner masterpiece complete in the corporate common look and feel (arraugh) I am appreciative of the 'no next button' ethos. And while some of these - such as We Choose the Moon, which has been covered in these pages before - are quite good, others are less so. The blood-typing game, for example, was so badly written I still don't understand what it was trying to say. Deep Brain Simulations was just an animated talking person, which didn't work at all for me (I was viewing at home, with no sound because other people are watching TV). Zombies in Plain English is fun, but (a) just a video, and (b) not about anything real. It's not enough merely to get rid of the 'next button'. You also need to be engaging, clear, interactive, and factually-based.
Dramatic Growth of Open Access
Heather Morrison,
The Imaginary Journal of Poetic Economics, December 13, 2010.
Athabasca University is the latest university in Canada to withdraw from the Access Copyright licensing agreement. Not only did large increases make the service unattractive, as Associate VP Rory McGreal points out today, the rapid expansion of open access journals makes Access Copyright unnecessary.
Dramatic Growth of Open Access
Heather Morrison,
The Imaginary Journal of Poetic Economics, December 13, 2010.
Athabasca University is the latest university in Canada to withdraw from the Access Copyright licensing agreement. Not only did large increases make the service unattractive, as Associate VP Rory McGreal points out today, the rapid expansion of open access journals makes Access Copyright unnecessary.
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