The missing perspective(s) on MOOCs?
David T. Jones, The Weblog of (a) David Jones, February 11, 2013

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David Jones criticizes a presentation by John Daniel on the future of education (available here). He writes, "Sir John’s talk focused entirely on xMOOCs. There was no mention whatsoever of cMOOCs." Why is this significant? "Senior management taking it upon themselves to analyse and determine how best the institution can navigate these 'turbulent times' informed mostly by their experiences and the abstractions of interest to those operating at a strategic or institutional level. The absence of other perspectives suggest they are more likely to miss the boat, than successful navigate to another port." They understand the didactic model as practiced by traditional institutions. But the cMOOCs were something quite different from that - and outside their, and John Daniel's, experience.

[Link] [Comment][Tags: Experience]

A Sample Philosophy Paper
Angela Mendelovici, Prezi, February 11, 2013

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Sample philosophy paper with all the major elements presented and explained. It's a short four-page paper, but for the longer papers authors typically repeat the same process. I wish the author had chosen a less user-histile format to present the paper than Prezi. But I really like the content, especially the idea that "even though I will argue against it, I try to make it sound as plausible as possible." So many people miss the point of argumentation, which is not to 'win' by whatever subterfuge necessary, but to engage with the strongest form of the position possible, and let reason and evidence carry the day. Via Brian Leiter.

[Link] [Comment][Tags: none]

B. F. Skinner on Teaching Machines (1954)
Mike Caulfield, Hapgood, February 11, 2013

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Mike Caulfield links to this video with the commentary, "Skinner tackles concepts of self-paced learning, the importance of quick feedback, the basics of gamification, aspects of proximal development, and mastery learning. He understands that it is not the *machine* that teaches, but the person that writes the teaching program. And he is better informed than almost the entire current educational press pool in that he states clearly that a “teaching machine” is really just a new kind of textbook." Behaviourism was criticized because it was a 'black box' methodology that downplayed the importance of what goes on inside the mind or brain, mostly because we did not have empirical access to it. Today we are not in a much more privileged position- while we know a great deal of what goes on inside the brain, our focus continues to be on inputs and outputs.

[Link] [Comment][Tags: Video]

Blogger’s Guide to Creative Commons: In Pictures
Angus Shaw, The Blog Herald, February 11, 2013

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This article makes me think about how I would have designed Creative Commons had I been the one (as opposed to, say, a Harvard lawyer) to design it at the outset. I like the Nerdson approach, pictured above, making it clear that every CC license allows people to copy, distribute, digitize and shift the work into other formats. What about the various conditions? I would have made them explicit statements of permission as well. In particular, I would have created icons to allow commercial use, to allow derivatives, to allow unattributed use, and to allow folding into a new license. My version of Creative Commons wouldn't have been 'some rights reserved'. It would have been 'sharing encouraged'. Maybe (just to completely confuse the terminological world) I should call my version 'Free Commons'. Yeah, that's it.

[Link] [Comment][Tags: Google, Blogger]

The Future Of Google Plus, And Its Path To Social-Media Domination
Dave llorens, Fast Company, February 11, 2013

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I think this is a generally accurate account of how Google is stocking its new (well, not so new any more) Google Plus service with members. It's taking the slow, patient approach, gradually absorbing one service after another under the G+ rubric, gently nudging people along, while at the the same time closing the door to services outside G+. Will it become the Twitter-killer and Facebook-killer Google hopes? Maybe - both Twitter and Facebook have responded by becoming more closed, not more open, to match Google's baseline. Maybe there's room here for Yahoo to fill a gap, based on the social media mode of Flickr. Or perhaps there's room for a new service, something inherently webby, that counters Google's big closed box.

[Link] [Comment][Tags: Yahoo!, Flickr, Twitter, Books, Google]