January 13, 2014
We Didn’t Eat the Marshmallow. The Marshmallow Ate Us
Michael Bourne,
New York Times,
January 13, 2014
Pretty good post that outlines and examines the merit of the famous marshmallow experiment (kids are put in a room and told they can eat one now or two later - follow-yup study shows the kids who deferred gratification proved to be much more successful in later life). The experiment is not nothing, however, it is so narrowly focused, has so few subjects, and allows so many alternative explanations, that we cannot simply allow the simple conclusion. "But that isn’t what we want to hear. We want the instant gratification of an easy answer. We want to hear that character traits can be taught like algebra and geometry and that if you can resist eating a marshmallow at 4, you possess the secret to a successful life."
Group-ism: the larger problem behind racism, nationalism, and many other -isms
Charlie Chung,
To Notice, to Learn,
January 13, 2014
Some days I feel like utterly nobody agreed with me when I addressed this subject (in Groups vs Networks and That Group Feeling). People sure love their groups. So do I - within limits. But: "Most reasonable people nowadays acknowledge that prejudice is a bad thing. But it is such a strong, persistent force that we need to constantly guard ourselves against. It is so natural, this desire to identify with a group and disparage non-group members... many of us make efforts to counteract this by various means: trying to be consciously aware of our biases, exposing ourselves to other perspectives, following processes designed to counteract bias (e.g. blind resume screening, anonymous peer review, secret voting, etc.). However, the impulse towards group-ism is still quite strong."
College Registrar Creates the ‘Yelp’ of Higher-Education Software
Megan O'Neil,
The Chronicle: Wired Campus Blog,
January 13, 2014
Readers will be forgiven if they don't know what the Yelp of Yelp is. The story says "Education technology now has its own version of popular, user-generated review sites like Yelp and Amazon." How popular is Yelp? It's popular enough that you can get restaurant reviews for many of Moncton's eateries - not bad for a small Canadian city. But student review sites are not new - they've been around more than a decade (see ratemyprofessor.com). In this case, someone with good enough connections to land a Chronicle article has "made public Software PhD, which is designed to allow educators and vendors to exchange frank, constructive views about education software."
The vulnerability of learning
George Siemens,
elearnspace,
January 13, 2014
"Learning is vulnerability. When we learn, we make ourselves vulnerable. When we engage in learning, we communicate that we want to grow, to become better, to improve ourselves." So says George Siemens, and he's right. I've been learning French, slowly, painfully, but with increasing fluency. I have been taking management courses and learning the intricacies of our financial system. Learning to write machine language code was earier. Today was my third day of spin class. There's a lot that I am asked to do that I cannot do. Each one of these leaves me vulnerable. It makes me feel stupid, sometimes. But - it's all offset by the fact that I can say to the world, "I'm learning. I'm getting better."
CommonLearn Explained
John Connell,
I Am Learner,
January 13, 2014
John Connell wrote to let me know he is embarking on "CommonLearn – an automated, template-based service that will deliver a classroom in the cloud to anyone who needs such a platform." There's a "CommonLearn website and the CommonLearn blog (both still in their infancy)." I think the idea is good, but execution may be another matter.
Freire, MOOCs and Pedagogy of the Oppressed
Jenny Mackness,
Jenny Connected,
January 13, 2014
Nice reflection on the philosophy of Paulo Friere. "Freire believed that in a climate of ‘fear of freedom’ the oppressed becomes the oppressor. I think of this as 'going over to the dark side' – a trap so easy to fall into. In MOOC terms this can be equated to fear of uncertainty – which we can see in all those students who say 'Please tell me what to do and I’ll do it'. To overcome this, we need to be prepared to take risks and maybe the first risk is to engage in dialogue and communication with people we don’t know. Freire thought that dialogue and communication are essential to liberation and transformation. Also essential for him are reflection and action, love, humility, faith and trust."
Video Library CRECS' Ten Minute Window
Press Release,
University of Ottawa,
January 13, 2014
This is a pretty cool idea. As Ken Steele summarizes, "The University of Ottawa’s Centre for Research on Educational and Community Services (CRECS) has launched an open-source video series that allows researchers to present summaries of their research in 10 minutes or less." Initial videos include In Her Own Eyes: Photovoice of Single Mothers on Their Way to Success (in French) by Julie Gosselin, and Student Teacher, Teacher and University Professor Stress and Coping by Cameron Montgomery. University of Ottawa press release. View the rest here. "Similar brief research vignettes have been assembled by uVictoria in their faces of uVic research," notes Steele.
Why online teaching requires rigorous training (Mary Burns)
Mary Burns,
Larry Cuban on School Reform, Classroom Practice,
January 12, 2014
If this headline is true, then I am a bad online teacher, because I have not had rigorous training. But I don't think I'm a bad online teacher. So there is something wrong with the statement in the headline. Perhaps it's this: "But if a great teacher is to the classroom what Fred Astaire was to dancing, then an online teacher must be even better because teaching online is far more challenging than teaching face-to-face. Like Ginger Rogers, the online teacher has to do everything Astaire does—but backwards and in high heels." Oh I see - the author thinks that teachers online do the same thing as teachers in a classroom, that it's some kind of performance, like presenting and delivering content. But I'm pretty sure that's false. (Also, see a good discussion in the comments about the statement that "The single greatest factor in a student’s academic success is the presence of an effective (good) teacher." Again, we know that this isn't true, but people keep saying it.)
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