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Beloit Mindset List: 2016

Dwayne Harapnuik — September 10, 2012 — Leave a comment

The Mindset List: 2016 List via kwout

What started as a witty way of saying to faculty colleagues “watch your references,” has turned into a globally reported and utilized guide to the intelligent if unprepared adolescent consciousness.

The Mindset list will help faculty understand just who their freshmen students are and where they are coming from. Understanding your learner and their preparedness for learning is the first and most important step in creating and effective learning environment. While the Mindset list is definitely American and some of the cultural norms identified are also uniquely American the list as a whole paints a very accurate description of the North American freshman entering college or university for the first time.

In Technology & Culture freshman, mindset

Seton Hall University to pilot Windows 8 Tablets – Slippery slope to limiting learning

Dwayne Harapnuik — September 6, 2012 — Leave a comment

http://www.centerdigitaled.com/classtech/How-Seton-Hall-University-Decided-to-Pilot-Windows-8.html?elq=270a196d0f29424cb1f7ec9456f053ab&elqCampaignId=1738

Seton Hall University Trying Windows 8 via kwout

Seton Hall University is best know for following Abilene Christian University (ACU) into the mobile learning space with their iPad and Android tablet pilots in 2011. Having had the opportunity meet with several Seton Hall faculty at ACU Connected conferences while I was at ACU I know first hand that the user experience and using technology to enhance learning was a top priority for these people at Seton Hall. This is why the Converge article which points to the Seton Halls Windows 8 pilot and the primary reason for giving up on the iPad and Android pilots as device management was so disappointing. The Associate CIO’s statement:

The enterprise deployment and support features just aren’t there in the other two platforms like they’ve existed in Windows for so long.

confirms that when Information Technology (IT) management and deployment issues become the top priority for a platform deployment you can be certain that the users needs, in this case the faculty and students, are no longer the drivers for change. In addition to management issues the article does also points to the institutions desire to run Microsoft’s One Note which only runs on Windows. Once again this is unfortunately and another indicator that IT management needs are driving this move because the free and cloud based application Evernote is not only a viable substitute for One Note it is actually an upgrade.

Having worked in the role of a CIO and other IT management capacities I can appreciate the convenience that working with well established Windows based deployment tools can offer but I need to remind everyone that when it comes to building an effective learning environment the needs of the IT department should not override the needs of the learner. IT should be supporting the learner (which includes the faculty member) and should be striving to provide an infrastructure where the learner can seamlessly do what they need to do with their own iPad, Android or other mobile device. The learner/consumer has spoken by making the iPad the most popular and transformative network device we have seen in the history of information technology. Its popularity is based primarily on the fact that you don’t need the “dark arts” of the IT department to install software or even configure the device to work or you don’t need to take a course to use it–the iPad is intuitive and it just works. While I can’t yet comment on the Windows tablet yet, many years of experience with Windows has confirmed that there is nothing intuitive about Windows and huge IT departments are necessary to support this platform.

The moves that Seton Hall are making are troubling but not that surprising. We have seen Higher Education IT departments influence platform choices in the past. When the early Learning/Course Management Systems (CMS or LMS) were being developed in the late 90’s it didn’t take too long for the management, deployment and support issues to become the drivers of change. When you factor in the consolidation of the LMS industry by companies like Blackboard we now have some of the best “walled gardens” every built that most faculty would much rather not use. The command and control model so useful for IT departments and offered by the Blackboards of the world not only limits innovation and change it limits learning.

In contrast the iPhone, iPad and related IOS devices as well as Android devices that students choose on their own and most often come to school with are simply tools that these leaners have chosen to help enhance their learning. I have repeatedly stated that the best technology is invisible and simply enhances the experience without drawing any attention to itself. The best technology is also the technology that that average person will set up on their own and use on a daily basis. The best technology for higher education is what faculty are willing to use on a daily basis and what they and their students have to chosen to use on their own. The bring your own device (BYOD) model of technology deployment is what the iPad and related IOS devices have established. This is the technology strategy that can enhance learning.

Unfortunately for Seton Hall and many similar institutions issues of command and control will trump user preference and usability.

For another perspective on the perspective of command and control model of technology deployment verses the BYOD model review the SAP Business Innovation article: Will Prosumer Tablets Beat The iPad In The Enterprise?

In Learning 2.0 android, IOS, iPad, Learning, Windows 8

Data reveals what works in online discussion forums

Dwayne Harapnuik — August 28, 2012 — Leave a comment

http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/what-a-tech-start-ups-data-say-about-what-works-in-classroom-forums/38960?cid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

What a Tech Start-Up’s Data Say About What Works in Classroom Forums – Wired Campus – The Chronicle of Higher Education via kwout

Jeffery Young from the Chronicle of Higher Education shared an analysis of research conducted by Piazza, a start-up company that manages online discussion forums for thousands of courses, on online interactions among students and professors in 3,600 courses at 545 colleges and universities over a period of 18 months. The data revealed:

highest gains in student understanding when discussion was less strictly marked
students at highly selective universities are far more likely to ask questions anonymously than are students at other institutions
the practice of asking students to post a comment to introduce themselves correlated with more-robust discussions

These finding are no surprise to those of us in the academic community who have been using online discussions to enhance both classroom and online courses. Perhaps now the dataset for this study is large enough to finally appease even the most vehement opponents to online instruction.

Then again…will there ever be enough data and evidence to fully convince the detractors of online and digital learning?

In Online Learning

Make Your Own Infographics

Dwayne Harapnuik — August 27, 2012 — Leave a comment

http://edudemic.com/2012/08/diy-infographics/

10 Fun Tools To Easily Make Your Own Infographics | Edudemic via kwout

Inforgraphics are wonderful tools that can be used to visually convey a unique message, compile several thoughts and ideas into a single frame and to help people get a visual representation of your ideas. Sharing inforgraphics has also never been easier through blogs, twitter and Pinterest. Now even making infographics has been simplified by using one of the many of the sites listed on edudemic

In Social Media infographic

The Perpetual Promise of Adaptive Learning

Dwayne Harapnuik — July 20, 2012 — Leave a comment

http://mashable.com/2012/07/17/knewton-adaptive-learning/

Adaptive Learning: Why Your Kids Will Be Smarter Than You via kwout

I have been following the Knewton story for a while. I actually I have been following the perpetual promise of technology enhanced adaptive learning since the early 90’s. Remember Authorware? We used to build adaptive learning arrays that enabled systematic instruction based systems to adapt to the response a learner provided. Remember a system from Austria called Hyperwave? It was heralded as the first web-based adaptive learning system in the 90’s and chances are most people have neither heard of it nor recall it. Remember the early promises about adaptive learning with system like WebCT, Courseinfo, and even Blackboard? The adaptive learning holy grail has been pursued by many of us in educational technology for a long time. There is a serious shortcoming to most adaptive learning systems, one that I hope Knewton can overcome. Unfortunately, by their own admission, their system is faced with the same challenges as all the other adaptive learning systems. Consider the following quote:

Knewton can power anything where there’s a “right” answer — that’s all of math for much of K-14. We also can power most of verbal skills, since most people agree on what constitutes good writing, like grammar, sentence structure and topic sentences.

The things we can’t power are things like art or ballet or philosophy, where there’s no right answer ever. But even what people think of as pretty subjective courses, there’s often a right answer.

One of the biggest challenges with any system that is based on making an adaptive decision is that there has to be a definitive right answer. We know from the research that this informational approach really only deals with superficial or surface learning. In contrast, learning processes that require application and integration involve much more subjective answers and are the substance of deeper learning. Unfortunately, Knewton isn’t able to go there. One of our biggest arguments for why liberal arts institutions like Concordia hold much more promise for future learning than any adaptive learning system is that a liberal arts education means learners do not just deal with the right answer, they go much much deeper. Systems like Knewton will continue to evolve and for some aspects of education where the right answer is necessary these system may be useful and I am excited to see them evolve. But for the really complex problems of the world that require very complex interdisciplinary approaches system like Knewton just don’t go deep enough–only institutions like Concordia can provide this depth and interdisciplinary foundation.

In Liberal Arts adaptive learning