Alison J. Head on Modeling the Information-Seeking Process of College Students in the Digital Age | Berkman Center

"What is it like to be a college student in the digital age? Alison Head — lead researcher for the national study, Project Information Literacy, Berkman Fellow, and Research Scientist in University of Washington's Information School — presents a working typology of the undergraduate information-seeking process, including students’ reliance on and use of Web sources."

Tags: information_literacy, students

• - By Emily Rimland

Strategies for Blog-Powered Instruction -- Campus Technology

Best practices for using blogs to supplement coursework and enhance student learning.

Tags: blog, instruction, technology, teaching

• - By Erin Long

Games and Accessibility

Interesting blurb about the new Star Wars game winning an award for accessibility.

Tags: no_tag

• - By bartmon

• The AbleGamers Foundation, an organization focused on providing disabled peoples with information and technology that allows them to more easily enjoy video games, has awarded Star Wars: The Old Republic its 2011 Accessible Mainstream Game of the Year Award for launching with "colorblind friendly options, full subtitles, and control options to let those with mobility impairments play the game as easy as possible."

6 Ingredients for the 21st Century Classroom -- Campus Technology

Tags: technology, teaching, classroom

Gooru

Tags: gooru, education, teaching, learning

Google’s and Facebook’s facial recognition opt-in policies are a smokescreen. - Slate Magazine

Tags: privacy, facialrecognition, optin, google, facebook, slate

• - By Emily Rimland

MIT Will Offer Certificates to Outside Students Who Take Its Online Courses - Technology - The Chronicle of Higher Education

MIT steps into credentialing world. sounds like they are adding interactive pieces, a la stanford's growing portfolio of courses, but also offering certificates for fee. interesting on many levels.

Tags: technology, online, mit, opened

• - By gary chinn

Use Appcelerator Titanium to build mobile apps for iPhone & Android and desktop apps for Windows, Mac OS X & Linux from Web technologies

Tags: iphone, iOS, apps

A 'Moneyball' Approach to College - Technology - The Chronicle of Higher Education

Great article on Learning Analytics. I respectfully disagree with Gardner Campbell's quote, but I do see where he's coming from and that is something that universities need to be careful of.

Tags: no_tag

• - By bartmon

• Think of it as higher education meets Moneyball.
• Today, half of students quit college before earning a credential. Proponents feel that making better use of data to inform decisions, known as "analytics," can help solve that problem while also improving teaching.
• In April, Austin Peay debuted software that recommends courses based on a student's major, academic record, and how similar students fared in that class.
• One analytics tactic—monitoring student clicks in course-management systems—especially worries critics like Gardner Campbell, director of professional development and innovative initiatives at Virginia Tech. He sees these systems as sterile environments where students respond to instructor prompts rather than express creativity. Analytics projects that focus on such systems threaten to damage colleges much like high-stakes standardized testing harmed elementary and secondary schools, he argues.

• Mr. Mazur argues that his new software solves at least three problems. One, it selects student discussion groups. Two, it helps instructors manage the pace of classes by automatically figuring out how long to leave questions open so the vast majority of students will have enough time. And three, it pushes beyond the multiple-choice problems typically used with clickers, inviting students to submit open-ended responses, like sketching a function with a mouse or with their finger on the screen of an iPad.

  "This is grounded on pedagogy; it's not just the technology," says Mr. Mazur, a gadget skeptic who feels technology has done "incredibly little to improve education."

• By the eighth day of class, Rio Salado College predicts with 70-percent accuracy whether a student will score a C or better in a course.

Bastion - Chrome Web Store

This is pretty wild. Google managed to reproduce several top mobile and PC games in chrome, but nothing of this scale yet. Bastion is up for all sorts of awards this year, cool to see Google managed to port this to a browser at such an extreme level of detail.

Tags: no_tag

• - By bartmon

• Bastion is an action role-playing experience that redefines storytelling in games, with a reactive narrator who marks your every move. Explore more than 40 lush hand-painted environments as you discover the secrets of the Calamity, a surreal catastrophe that shattered the world to pieces. Wield a huge arsenal of upgradeable weapons and battle savage beasts adapted to their new habitat. Finish the main story to unlock New Game Plus mode and continue your journey! Also included is the all-new 'No-Sweat Mode', offering unlimited chances to continue.

Learning Technologies - Yammer

Tags: yammer, learning, psutlt

• Yammer enables co-workers to discuss ideas, post news, ask questions, and share links and other information. It’s your virtual watercooler that helps you get things done faster. Find answers to questions, connect with colleagues and learn more about what is going on around ECU on Yammer.

Comparing E-Readers—And Tablets | November 2011 | paidContent

Nice comparison view of e-readers!

Tags: ereaders, ebooks

• - By Emily Rimland

Going the Distance: Online Education in the United States, 2011 | The Sloan Consortium™

Tags: sloan-c, online education

Apple - Education - Apple iPad Learning Lab

Just learned about this nifty thing and heard that EMS may be getting one? Lots of possibilities with this!

Tags: ipads, tablets, mobility, education, teaching

• - By Emily Rimland

50 most stunning examples of data visualization and infographics | Richworks

"The terms Data visualization and Infographics are used interchangeably, the former means the study of visual representation of data and the latter is its representation per se. In this article, I have showcased some of the most creative infographics and data visualization examples, along with some really effective tools to help you improve your skills in creating infographics. Enjoy the journey!"

Tags: visualization, data, design, inspiration, infographics

• - By Allan Gyorke
• - By Allan Gyorke