OLDaily

Lost Year of Schooling or Year One in a New Era of Education?
Kamran Rosen, Attention FWD, 2020/11/20

Tony Bates points to this article looking at the future of digital schooling. The provocative illustration tells us what to watch for: "Worried skeptics can point to studies showing that online learning may stunt reading growth." Against the sceptics, we note that last year "teens averaged 7 hours a day on their screens—more time than they spent in class." But how to make it work, especially given dismal engagement figures? "Make lectures as interesting as blockbusters."  As well, as Bates suggests, "use videos in one of at least thirty five ways that wouldn’t be possible in a physical classroom." None of this is bad, but it underlined to me the distinction between "digital schooling" and "online learning".

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Supporting Teachers in the Transition towards Distance Education: Challenges and Means
Cathia Papi, Journal of Learning for Development, 2020/11/20

As the abstract says, "this article presents the creation of a training course aimed at helping teachers to shift from in-person classes to distance learning. It highlights the issues and challenges encountered and pinpoints the first observable impacts of this course, as well as in-progress and upcoming developments." The course, J’enseigne à distance, was offered in French (an English version will be available soon, according to the website) and attracted more than 100,000 visitors.

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The Impact of COVID-19 on International Higher Education: New Models for the New Normal
Asha Kanwar, Alexis Carr, Journal of Learning for Development, 2020/11/20

The authors assess the impact of the pandemic on international education, particularly with respect to its role as a projection of 'soft power'. "As more students now accept online learning, there is an opportunity to build hybrid models that can reduce costs and provide more flexibility," the write. However, institutions can't depend on students traveling for education. Hence, they "need to take a much more proactive approach to establishing their presence in other countries and strengthening national and international partnerships. Branch campuses, twinning arrangements and hybrid provision could be some of the ways forward for international education." Image: ICEF.

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Yet’s xAPI Sandbox
Yet Analytics, 2020/11/20

Yet Analytics has announced the availability of a fully functional xAPI sandbox (xAPI - or the eXperience API - is a protocol for saving activity records to learning record stores (LRS)). He writes on LinkedIn, "And it's entirely free meaning no fees, no API limits, no limit on users/learners, and no data storage limits. If you've been on the fence about xAPI, you now have no excuse."

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How Slack uses Slack
Kevin McAllister, Protocol, 2020/11/20

Slack is a really useful communications tool for groups. The next time I run a MOOC I will use Slack (or an open source equivalent if I find one that works as well). This article looks at how Slack the company uses Slack the tool. Some lessons: signify consensus with an emoji. Slack uses the shrimp to do this (with the result that 'shrimp' has become a verb at Slack). Other emoji can be used for other tags. Slack also uses automation tools as much as possible. For example, "if you want to test something with these external participants, you can submit a request using Workflow Builder."

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