This Chronicle article concludes that MOOCs are reaching mostly the privileged. While this is often the way things go, there is a certain irony here in that MOOCs often seem to be promoted in terms of reach and cost effectiveness.
Big data and school improvement
This post comments on state differences in the use of big data to improve K-12 education. The post focuses on Oregon, but within it are links to state specific factors identified by the Data Quality Campaign. It is interesting to consider the factors this “campaign” recognizes and to determine your state’s performance on each of these factors. So, for example, I can learn that North Dakota is deficient in reporting longitudinal data. I would think one could just look at individual annual reports, but that is just me. Anyway, what I find lacking is a list of the adjustments that have been made because of the data that are available. I would like to see a list that might include items such as – state has committed more resources to preschool programs, state has increased number of online science courses available to rural schools.
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Access to the tool is not the same as a solution to the problem
I just encountered this blog post and in reaction submitted a comment:
Improving Education Using Technology
As big an advocate for educational technology as I am, my professional experience as an educational psychologist (research and observational) suggests that the availability of productive tools may be the easy part.
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However, here is the thing about many proven study tactics.
Try this is a large class. How many of you have ever heard of Cornell notetaking, SQ3R, etc.? How many of you are presently using Cornell notetaking, SQ3R. etc.?
While I often have to describe what these tactics are for students to recognize them, the reality is that students have frequently been exposed to these procedures, but very, very seldom use them.
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Knowing and knowing what they know
What is it a good teacher knows? He/she knows what is being taught AND whether students know what is being taught. A recent study (summarized by Willingham) evaluated what middle school science teachers knew about physical science with an emphasis on concepts that are prone to misconception (meaning not so much the lack of knowledge, but faulty beliefs – see below). Teachers not only answered questions about the science concepts, but indicated how students were likely to answer the questions. Both forms of knowledge (perhaps these forms of knowledge might be described as content and pedagogical) were important. The study found that less capable students were particularly vulnerable when teachers lack content knowledge. This study has important implications for understanding teacher competence and the type of teacher most needed in schools with many underperforming students. While this may seem obvious, the reality is that chronically underperforming schools are less likely to attract AND keep the more competent teaches.
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YouTube iOS upgrade
Google has upgraded the YouTube iOS app to allow more sophisticated video production capabilities. I can’t claim to find the potential of postproduction editing on a phone that intriguing, but it is possible if you find yourself in the situation that this makes sense.
Google wins present legal round on its book scan project
Google has for many years scanned large numbers of books including many covered by copyright. Making content from this process available has brought legal challenges from the copyright holders.
However, if you try Google Books you can see the benefits. I found out our books were scanned and it was kind of fun to search for different things.
The suit brought against Google argued that content could be secured without a purchase.
For books in “snippet view” (in contrast to “full view” books), Google divides each page into eighths — each of which is a “snippet,” a verbatim excerpt. (Google Resp. ¶¶ 43, 44). Each search generates three snippets, but by performing multiple searches using different search terms, a single user may view far more than three snippets, as different searches can return different snippets. (Google Resp. ¶ 45). For example, by making a series of consecutive, slightly different searches of the book Ball Four, a single user can view many different snippets from the book. (Google Resp. ¶¶ 46, 47).
The reference in the comment I have abstracted is to Bouton’s “Ball Four”. However, having explored what this looks like for my own books it does not seem a serious concern. For a given search, I can view three “snippets” of a couple of sentences. As a viewer, it would give me some assurance that the author has addressed a topic, but the amount of content I could collect is minimal.
The newest decision argued that what Google is provided is covered under “fair use”.
Fair use rulings focus on four factors. Of these, the most important is whether the use of the work is “transformative.” Chin ruled that Google Books passes this test easily.
“Google Books digitizes books and transforms expressive text into a comprehensive word index that helps readers, scholars, researchers, and others find books,” he wrote. “Google Books does not supersede or supplant books because it is not a tool to be used to read books.”
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