Relearning Learning-Applying the Long Tail to Learning

From the MIT World website:
In a digitally connected, rapidly evolving world, we must transcend the traditional Cartesian models of learning that prescribe “pouring knowledge into somebody’s head,” says John Seely Brown. We learn through our interactions with others and the world, he says, and there’s no more perfect medium for enabling this than an increasingly open and organized World Wide Web.

Watch the video - Relearning Learning-Applying the Long Tail to Learning
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eSchool News Publishes My Article

I was asked early last fall to write an article for eSchool News about our “Inclusion” experience last year. I submitted one and finally today it was published. They gave it a new title:

“Video conferencing, web 2.0 apps help distance learners feel included”

Free services let homebound students enjoy classroom routines

If you follow this blog you probably know the story and there probably isn’t much new here, but I get encouragement from many fronts to continue to spread the word as an example of the power of web based FREE tools among other things … and I would have to agree with that notion. I’ll be teaching a class to teachers about Web 2.0 tools beginning next week and it will be interesting to see how many of them will know much about any of them. Getting the word out is still, unfortunately, one of the things we need to be doing.

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Using Pageflakes as Student Portal

Since we’re getting practical around here, I just wanted to share a Pageflakes page that I’ve been using in my RSS workshops to show how anyone can create topic specific portals with feeds. This page on Darfur/Sudan (not the most uplifting topic, I know…we have much to be thankful for) is built on tag feeds from YouTube for videos, Flickr for photos, the New York Times AND the Sudan Tribune for news, del.icio.us for what people are bookmarking, and Google Blogsearch for, well, blogs. What you get is a dynamic, constantly updated page of content about what’s happening in that part of the world and what’s happening in other parts of the world in response.

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TechYES Project Showcase

Computers4Kids is a non-profit after-school technology mentoring program for disadvantaged youth. The program uses computers as a catalyst for youth to challenge themselves, become engaged in their own learning, and realize greater possibilities academically, professionally, and for their community.

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Edublogosphere.com - what I?d like to do

Perhaps I should not have used the word “centralized”. My goal is to offer a space for folks to use as a backchannel that has lots of functionality.

What I’d like to do is create a web-based IRC spot, whereas folks can drop by and chat all they like and not have to register for anything. No registration, no password, no privacy concerns, just chat. Just backchannel.

I am thinking IRC because it is an already-established network and I would merely provide a gateway. This way we can prevent all the trouble of IRC clients and frustration. Imagine if at the blogger’s cafe folks could just hit up edublogosphere.com and start chatting.

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