OLDaily

Michael Fullan Sees Global Momentum for Deep Learning
Getting Smart, 2018/05/31

This is mostly a podcast (beware: self-starting audio and video) but the article will give you a brief outline of Michael Fullen's career and influence. "Michael Fullan is Canada’s gift to education," write the Getting Smart staff. "For half a century and with 45 books to his credit, Fullan has been the world’s most persistent and persuasive advocate for powerful learning experiences." I see him as being more on the management guru side of the house (along with people like Don Tapscott and Mark Prensky. "Fullan thinks the focus should be 'life readiness' rather than college and career readiness. He thinks it’s the nexus of our time. He points to six Cs, the new global competencies: character, citizenship, collaboration, communication, creativity and critical thinking."

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post]

‘Marshmallow test’ may not pick out successful kids, after all
Jordan Bennett, Futurity, 2018/05/31

The 'marshmallow test' is a classic case of what happens when psychologist try to do educational theory. Essentially, they correlated a child's ability to defer gratification (to eat two marshmallows later rather than eat one marshmallow now) with future educational outcomes. It appears this test is a victim of the replication crisis: "the association was small and disappeared after the researchers controlled for characteristics of the child’s family and early environment." From where I sit, the marshmallow test isn't a test of character at all, it's a test of social class. Making this point for me is this argument: " If you have ten dollars to your name, you aren’t going to think any farther ahead than wondering where your next meal is coming from. You just aren’t." If you have one marshmallow the odds are equally good that the person with more power lied about there being a second marshmallow and may well steal back the first. So you eat it. I would.

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post]

Internet Trends 2018
Mary Meeker, Kleiner Perkins Partners, 2018/05/31

Mary Meeker's annual oracular tome has come out and this year it's a heavy 294 page PDF. What I'm seeing here is a mixed bag - some areas of growth are slowing and even stopping as the market approaches essential saturation. The number of internet users and mobile phones couldn't continue to increase indefinitely. On the other hand, certain technologies - especially commercial and data-driven technologies - are rapidly becoming mainstream. But the 'AWS Data Flywheel' (slide 197) is driving growth among the top companies, and nowhere is this more clear than in China (slides 217-218). The growth of lifelong learning is also significant (slides 232ff). More from Donald Clark. View my previous Mary Meeker coverage.

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post]

Separating Fact From Fiction: The Reality of Canadian Copyright, Fair Dealing, and Education
Michael Geist, 2018/05/31

Some useful data on the relation between the Canadian higher education sector and licensed publications. As the title suggests, the facts are different from the marketing we read from the lobbyists (quoted):

• education spending on copyright materials has increased over the past five years
• Canadian publisher profit margins have increased over the past five years
• fair dealing is ... a relatively small part of access strategies, with the vast majority of access coming from licensing and open access

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post]