Technology for Learning

photo credit: phil dowsing
Jan Hoffman wrote an article recently in the New York Times I Know What You Did in Math Class. The article reviews the use of online programs that provide parents with up to date information about their children at school, and explores the implications.
Students complain about being grounded twice for the [...]

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Stephen Downes delivered the keynote today at TLt Summit 2008 in Saskatoon. This is my first attempt at almost-live blogging. Enjoy.
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Artifacts that are relics of the past that help us to understand our present and predict our future.
http://www.downes.ca/page/60/
We were invited to enter content during the presentation.
photo credit: sbzondergeld
Future #1:
The web will be pragmatic.
Absurd that [...]

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photo credit: Todd Baker << technowannabe
Recently I responded to a colleague’s question as he pondered whether to introduce open source to his school district. I recalled that advice as I commented a few days ago on Dave Snowden’s blog Cognitive Edge on a related issue. Dave’s post was that open source is not the [...]

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photo credit: redjar
Dr. Debbie Pushor from the University of Saskatchewan was the guest on Parents as Partners webcast tonight. She led a lively discussion with her message that we need to change the story in our schools from fortresses to places that truly welcome parent engagement.
I blogged previously about Dr. Pushor’s belief in the [...]

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Does the physical structure of a school dictate the kind of learning that goes on inside the building?
View the slideshow and take the test. What is your visual image of schooling? Do buildings matter?

| View | Upload your own

Adapted from unknown source

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The Mike Wesch video Vision of Students Today by his university class went viral (now almost 2 million views).
Now there is a K-12 version poised to do the same (more than 70,000 views), produced by bjnesbitt. Same message, but with data more relevant to K-12, and a context for both teachers and parents. Watch A [...]

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photo credit: Clav
I was most fortunate this year to participate in the inaugural offering of a graduate class called Computers in the Classroom. I just posted reflections on this amazing class to Alec Couros’ blog through a VoiceThread. The name of the course did not come near to doing justice to this brave, open, [...]

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Good communicaton requires each side of the dialogue to connect with and understand the other side. I’m working on a couple tools to help teachers and IT staff talk to each other. This is the first draft of the teacher tip sheet (the IT staff tip sheet will follow). Can you help? I’m looking for [...]

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Jen posted a great podcast today about Instructors and IT Working Together. Her message resonated with me – here is the comment I left:
This is a very important topic. I’ve also blogged about it – most recently about who gets to decide. I looked at content filtering but that is only one example of the [...]

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I’ve been doing a lot of reading about Parent Engagement in K-12 Schools. What has struck me is the relative lack of controversy in the literature.
There are two consistent themes in the literature:
1. The parent engagement models are both limited and validated in the research. Parents want to engage, engagement declines over the schools years, [...]

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