• Evaluating Online Learning

  80-page PDF from the US Department of Education on evaluating K-12 online learning. I haven’t read it all yet, but some of this would probably apply to higher ed settings, and maybe corporate settings. Includes examples & case studies of successful online K-12 programs.

  tags: e-learning, education, k-12, assessment

• » What Everybody Ought to Know About Instructional Design The Rapid eLearning Blog

  Great post on the value of instructional design and what instructional designers add to the process of learning.
  * More than just putting info in front of learners
  * Helps learners focus on the right things
  * Provides context and perspective
  * Saves time in the learning process
  * “Engages learners in clear and meaningful content”

  I love the use of the YouTube video as the attention getter and example in this post. I’ve seen variations on this video before, but never thought about it in this context.

  tags: instructionaldesign, learning

• Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling

  Directory for the educational uses of digital storytelling website. Resources include getting started with digital storytelling, examples, tools, and evaluation. The Evaluation section includes information on some of the research being done in this area.

  tags: digitalstorytelling, education, k-12, highered, digitalliteracy

A reader asked a question that I’m not really sure how to answer. My experience has mostly been in higher ed, so I’ve always needed to do grading or more tracking than what this reader needs:

I am the sole person involved with e-Learning in my branch, and I am mostly limited to using freeware.   At present we are developing self-paced CBTS using PowerPoint, a PowerPoint-to-Flash converter, and HTML.  My client wants two things that I am stuck on:

1) good server software for posting CBTs and then having basic tracking of student usage.  The ideal vendor solution might be the Adobe Connect training module.  Things like Moodle are overkill, as we don’t need grading, blogging, wikis, etc., however fashionable they may be.  We just want to post the modules and have some level of reporting.

2) a means to track % completion of course topics on the course menu (I think Skill Soft uses empty-, half- and full- moons to show completion).  We have created a home-grown HTML template with a course menu in the left navigation bar (the Flash files play in the main window), but the best we can do is change the HTML link color once it is clicked.  While this is better than nothing, it is a far cry from the “real” tracking of CBT course players.

What would you suggest for administering and tracking CBTs for this reader? Is there an open source solution that isn’t a full LMS but does what’s needed here? Has anyone done anything like this before?

I’m really not sure what’s available for this, so I’m hoping someone out there in the blogosphere will. Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks!

Technorati Tags: CBT, LMS, tracking

• Do Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic Learners Need Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic Instruction?

  Examines what cognitive science actually tells us about different learning styles and argues that the best answer is to choose the modality that best suits the content rather than adapting to the student.

  tags: learning, cognition, learningstyles, research, education

• Ask the Cognitive Scientist: “Brain-Based” Learning: More Fiction than Fact

  This article examines several myths of brain-based learning, looking at what the neuroscience research actually tells us. Very little of the research at this point is directly applicable to the classroom; it just doesn’t tell us enough about how people learn in real environments.

  tags: education, learning, research, neuroscience, cognition

  • For neuroscience to mean something to teachers, it must provide information beyond what is available without neuroscientific methods. It’s not enough to describe what’s happening in the brain, and pretend that you’ve learned something useful.
  • In general, if you are interested in describing effects at a given level of analysis, you are most likely to make progress by sticking to that level of analysis. If you’re interested in describing ways that students learn best, it makes sense to study classroom situations. To the extent that neuroscience will inform good teaching practice, it seems most likely that this influence will be funneled through the cognitive level of analysis: For example, neuroscience will help us better understand memory, and this improved understanding of memory might be used to improve classroom practice. It’s unlikely that leapfrogging the cognitive level analysis and going straight from the brain to the classroom will work out very often.

• US Copyright Sliderule

  Flash sliderule for figuring out whether something is protected by US copyright or not based on publication date and other factors

  tags: copyright

• Google Docs Templates for Students & Teachers

  Google Docs templates for syllabi, lesson plans, calendars, research reports, quizzes, and more

  tags: education, google, template, lessonplans

• Main Page - Social Justice Wiki

  Collection of student research on social justice organizations in New York City. Created with a wiki: each time the professor teaches the class, more organizations will be added to the growing resource.

  tags: socialjustice, diversity, wiki, highered, education

• Trendpedia - blog trend search

  Graphs the number of blog posts over time which include a search term or phrase. Works even for terms with low numbers of actual posts (e.g., edupunk). You can compare the trends for up to 3 terms at a time.

  tags: blog, visualization, patterns

A reader sent this question to me today:

I was wondering if you read Clayton Christensen’s prediction that by 2019, nearly 50 percent of high school courses will be taught online.  What exactly did the author mean by this?  Did he mean that by this particular date that nearly 50 percent of high school students will be at home doing virtual schooling or that 50 pecent of the high school courses will have an “alternative online option” to the course.  I teach History, do you think there will still be a need for plenty of classroom History and Geography teachers?

This is a scary world we are living in.

I hadn’t read Clayton Christensen’s article before, but I’d heard the prediction elsewhere (Technology Seen Transforming U.S. Education System and The rise of ‘virtual schools’ divides education world, for example). I believe it means that half the courses taken will be taught online. For some students, that probably will mean they take all their courses online; for others, it will mean taking some courses face-to-face and some online. For example, a student might go to high school in the morning but take other courses online from home in the afternoon. I think we’ll also see continued growth in areas like online tutoring outside of the schools.

Online courses can give students more choices, for starters. Many schools in the US, especially rural schools, don’t have enough students to fill advanced math and science courses or to offer multiple choices for foreign languages. Online courses allow students in those schools to take subjects that simply wouldn’t be available to them otherwise.

There will absolutely continue to be a need for teachers with online schools. When we’re talking about virtual high schools, we’re talking about schools where teachers are employed. This isn’t homeschooling or completely self-paced learning; the student-teacher ratios are usually comparable to face-to-face classrooms. However, if you’re only willing to teach in a physical classroom and not willing to teach online, that may hamper your job opportunities in the future if the prediction is right. Your job prospects may depend on your willingness to learn to teach online, and it is a different set of skills than teaching in the physical classroom.

To get an idea of what a virtual high school might look like, check out the Colorado Virtual Academy. Their curriculum lists 20 different history and social sciences courses; clearly, the need for history teachers still exists.

Are we looking at a future where we’ll only need half the teachers we need now? No, I don’t think so. Are we looking at a future where the role of teachers changes, and many more people will teach online? Yes, I do believe that. I don’t think that’s scary though; I think it’s exciting. We have all these possibilities for global collaboration in education. We can provide choices for students so they can find the right environment for their individual learning.

For instructional designers and others who develop e-learning, I think the online K-12 market is definitely something to watch. Whether the prediction of 50% by 2019 is right or not, this is an area that’s going to grow. This is good news for instructional designers; it means a whole other market for jobs.

For teachers, I think this means a different set of opportunities–not necessarily more or less, just different. My guess is that teaching online will allow some teachers to do a “partial retirement”; instead of retiring from teaching entirely, they might choose to teach a few courses online while travelling or spending time on hobbies or whatever.

If you’re working in the online K-12 environment, either as a teacher or as an instructional designer, I’d appreciate hearing from you. How would you address the fears identified by this reader?

• Beth’s Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media: Working Wikily: The fine lines between content and curriculum and self-directed learning and instruction ….

  Beth Kanter on the process of developing curriculum collaboratively with a “swarm” of contributors on a wiki

  tags: wiki, collaboration, learnercontrol, education, e-learning, creativecommons