OLDaily

Why we shouldn’t push a positive mindset on those in poverty
Jennifer Sheehy-Skeffington, Psyche, 2022/02/18

If you work in education (and especially education policy) think this is a really important message. "Many of us assume that flourishing in the face of adversity requires a certain kind of mindset... yet such efforts have been largely unsuccessful at reducing poverty and unemployment, and have been derided both by the people they were designed to help and by those advocating on their behalf." Why? Because "the four components of a mindset that are claimed to enable flourishing – locus of control, self-regulation, approach orientation, and being trusting and agreeable – are not only less common in low-income contexts, they fit poorly to such contexts." Rather, abandoning them is a rational response to their reduced circumstances; "they’re regulating emotions and conserving their energies so that they don’t face continual disappointment or overlook very real threats."

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A Conversation with Bill Fish
Will Cailes, Thomas Spiteri, Jack Hawke, Jessica Sophia Ralph, The Undergraduate Philosphy Journal of Australasia, 2022/02/18

Skip past the standard ten-cent interview questions to about half way down the page, where the discussion of critical thinking starts. That's where you get this: "what we need is to try and understand one another... to do this, we need to try and see the world from the other person’s perspective... and this requires both critical thinking skills and a dose of good will. So although both critical thinking skills and good will are useful in isolation, when they are present together – that’s when the magic happens." Exactly. Of course, the corollary is, when you lose the good will, you have also lost the ability to understand one another.

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Open love!
Teresa MacKinnon, Debbie Baff, ALTC Blog, 2022/02/18

This post argues that people in the open learning community should use open badges. The authors write, "Community responses are instrumental in pushing back against creeping commercialisation of education, it is vital that we pay attention to how such shared effort in technology is used. One way to ensure that our voices are heard is to occupy the open badges space." It's worth comparing this perspective with some of the other perspectives on microcredentials from this week, especially those arguing that they should be managed and regulated. You can be sure that the list thing administrators will want to do is 'keep badges weird'.

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The Creative Economy in the Philippines
FutureLearn, 2022/02/18

I want to pass this along because it shows pretty clearly the value proposition FutureLearn and other online course services are offering to potential learners around the world. "The creative economy," they write, "comprises industries that are based on individual skill and creativity, which have the potential to generate income and jobs through the generation of intellectual property." All you need to earn an income in this economy is a computer, an internet connection... and an education. The article lists a variety of occupations, along with corresponding salaries, expressed in Philippine pesos. For example: Video Editor, median salary: PHP 300,000 annually. If you're wondering, that translates into about $7,500. Annually.

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A new hybrid learning methodology
Robert O. Brinkerhoff, Edward L. Boon, Chief Learning Officer, 2022/02/18

The pile of Lego blocks as the main image should be enough to show that there's nothing new about this "new hybrid learning methodology". It's that old standby, created back in the 90s as learning objects: "Imagine the program design as the creation of a set of building blocks (think LEGO) that can be assembled in a variety of configurations, with each configuration personalized to the interests, needs and constraints of that local site." But I wanted to include this post because of its use of the term 'digital learning transfer platforms' in place of learning experience platforms (LXP). I thought it was a nice touch. That is all.

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The Fallacy in Learning Loss Panic
Peter Greene, National Education Policy Center, 2022/02/18

Peter Greene  minces no words (nor should he): "one element of Learning Loss is just plain made up," he writes. "There is no reason to believe that getting Pat to score higher on the Big Standardized Test will earn Pat more money at work and a better life. None. Raising Pat's test score above the score that Pat would have achieved in some other unboosted alternate universe accomplishes nothing except getting Pat a higher score." This, though, won't stop the hucksters from trying to convert learning loss panic into a money tree.

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