Designing Learning Technology

Sat, 23 Nov 2002

Radio post #137
In a cost-saving move (and under pressure from commercial interests), the Department of Energy has shut down PubScience, a site that provided free access to a huge archive of publicly funded science research.

@20.35 #

Wed, 20 Nov 2002

Radio post #136
Ed Week reports that the Bush adminstration will push for math and science education reform early in 2003. In all likelihood, the adminstration will argue for a basic skills approach in math, despite established "NCTM" recommendations. Their stance on science education is less clear. (The article includes links to more information about basic skills and progressive approaches to math ed.)

@18.33 #

Tue, 19 Nov 2002

Radio post #135
FileMaker has an education page. It's mostly focused on administrative uses for the database product. It would be nice to see an emphasis on ways to leverage databases for student learning. Finding patterns in data and making sense of data are very challenging tasks.

@18.54 #

Mon, 18 Nov 2002

Radio post #134
Congress Approves 'Dot-Kids' Measure (TechNews.com). This will lead to the use of "*.kids.us"-type domain names -- not as general as a top-level .kids domain, but still of use to ensure a safe space online. What defines a safe space? Currently, that would mean no chat, no IM, and no linking to any site outside of the kids.us domain.

@18.20 #

Sat, 16 Nov 2002

Radio post #133
Scholastic has released two reports on the state of technology in schools. Among the notes: among the current installed base of computers, roughly two thirds are Windows-based; the remaining third is Macintosh. For planned purchases, however, Macs constitute only 21% of new machines. Internet connectivity is at 99% (although this may be a per-school figure, not per-classroom). The reports also note the rapid increase in wireless networking equipment.

@16.43 #

Fri, 15 Nov 2002

Radio post #132
The National Association for Science, Technology and Society has an upcoming conference in Baltimore, Feb 20-22, 2003.

@02.13 #

Tue, 12 Nov 2002

Radio post #131
Revolution 2.0, a cross-platform development tool that is in many ways the successor to Hypercard, ships this month.

@20.15 #

Radio post #130
Another piece by the Times looking at a range of whole-school reform models. One interesting tidbit from this article: the programs that yield the best evidence for success on those that look most like direct instruction. Other programs suggest great promise but, because they offer educators more leeway in how the program is implemented, produce less reliable research data because there is greater variation. So more direct reform looks better in large-scale studies because it's more directly replicable; advocates of progressive reforms need to figure out how to bridge this methodology/implementation gap. (This was a major theme at "ICLS2002".)

@20.02 #

Radio post #129
The NY Times discusses No Child Left Behind and the current administrative push towards more "scientific" educational research. The takehome? Perhaps we will simply have to accept the fact that research will help us decide what is best but will never make those decisions for us.

@19.54 #