To Learn Twice

Some Technologies Referenced by David Thornburg Cisco’s Telepresence http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQnffi6tN0g Jeff Han’s Multi Touch Display www. ted .com/index.php/speakers/view/id/65 Johnny Lee – Wii Hack http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~johnny/projects/wii/ http://www.ted.com/speakers/view/id/204 http://www.makezine.com/01/stabilizer/ Some others that he didn’t show that are way cool: Photosynth: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/129 Robots that are self aware: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/165 If you want to go back in the time machine – here is a similar presentation to David’s by Nicholas Negroponte done in 1984 about what technologies would be coming. Some people thought he was off base then – and a lot of this came true. http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/230 With a lot of technology – it isn’t if – it is when… As Dr. Thornburg said – “It is creativity that is holding us back, not technology”

Last Friday, after the district institute, we had a round table discussion with Chris Dede and David Thornburg. Here are the highlights: Topics Discussed in the Roundtable Discussion: Games and Education: There can be real power in the engagement level of kids playing games. However, the transition from using them as a form of entertainment to that of an instructional tool has not been successful. Referenced several projects: River City: http://muve.gse.harvard.edu/rivercityproject/ NASA’s MMO Proposal: http://ipp.gsfc.nasa.gov/mmo/ Lucas Learning: http://www.lucaslearning.com/ Additional Resources: Gaming helps students hone 21st-century skills: http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/top-news/index.cfm?print&i=53586 Video – Video Games in Education http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6117726917684965691 Marc Prensky Videogame & Education References: http://www.marcprensky.com/dgbl/Prensky%20-%20Selected%20URLs(web).htm Cell...

Last night was a huge day for our district. Our board of education approved us to move forward on a project that will revolutionize our web presence and what we can do on the web. Here are the main parts: A main site for each school in the district governed by a CMS. A branch in the site for each activity/sport/teacher/etc... with the same CMS tools Each teacher will have a portal page that will bring their customized content to them Here is the real kicker - Each student will have their own portal page that will populate with important information from around the school - and they will have the ability to post content to it - AND SHARE that content with other teachers and students This will be a collaborative web 2.0 environment that gives our teachers and students the power to change the way they work in a classroom. American Eagle has given me permission to post part of the proposal so anyone who is interested can get a better idea of the direction we are heading in. When we star...