Do Arts Training Matter in School?
Friday, April 9th, 2010
Yes, says jensenlearning.com. Arts training changes the brain physically in ways that enhance academic and social performance of students, according to the writer. This might surprise people who believe that arts affect only one’s emotions.
Arts should be considered a stand-alone discipline on its own that can contribute to the goals we seek through teaching, viz. brain functioning in ways that are academically and socially useful. Arts training changes the brain in ways that other disciplines do not do.
As things stand now, teachers are likely to be overwhelmed with the variety of suggested teaching strategies. Choosing among the strategies becomes a hit or miss affair with no certainty of successful results. This situation, together with the pressure to produce better results, can lead to teacher burnout.
The author of the post advocates focusing on fewer things, on things that have demonstrated their effectiveness. Arts have proven their effectiveness in improving attentional and cognitive skills. Dana Foundation had funded a study to discover the effect of arts on the brain and the resultant findings showed that music enhances cognition, for example.
The brain is plastic, a constantly changing thing. And arts training changes in desirable ways. The article titled Musical training shapes structural brain development in The Journal of Neuroscience provides peer-reviewed evidence.
Read the post at jensenlearning.com
Tags: arts training, cognitive functioning, cognitive science, education, learning, social skills
Posted in cognitive development, cognitive science, education, learning | No Comments »
Workshop on Cognitive Tutor Development
Wednesday, April 7th, 2010
Cognitive Tutoring reportedly aligns student learning process to “best practices” of learning. It is particularly suitable for education delivery over the Web where the trainer and student will not have face-to-face interactions. A number of cognitive tutor authoring tools are available on the Web.
The workshop on “Hands-on introduction to creating intelligent tutoring systems without programming using the Cognitive Tutor Authoring Tools (CTAT)” is to be conducted during the 9th International Conference of the Learning Sciences,
at the Palmer House Hilton Hotel, Chicago and is scheduled for
June 29.
The conference will provide background on cognitive tutors and how Cognitive Tutor Authoring Tools (CTAT) work. Participants will get an overview of the process of CTAT development and extensive hands-on use of both basic and advanced CTAT features. These will be supplemented with illustrations and examples that provide specific insights into actual applications.
The course will prove of value to learning science researchers who will learn to create cognitive tutors even if they have no programming skill. The researchers will then be able to decide whether the tool will be of use to them.
Participants are expected to bring laptops with pre-installed CTAT software, which can be downloaded free from Carnegie Mellon.
Read more about the workshop at ICLS 2010 announcement.
Tags: cognitive science, cognitive tutor, education delivery, learning research
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Is Our Pedagogy Scientific?
Friday, March 26th, 2010
Are educational institutions checking that the pedagogical practices they follow are really based on evidence-based research? Or are they just practices handed down from generation to generation or practices that look “practical and sound” as everbody with commonsense can understand?
As in every other area, fads can pop up in the educational field also. These fads, if they do work, might have undesirable “side effects” that we do not want. Or they might be pure fads with no real impact on teaching effectiveness.
According to one author, research indicates that student achievement variations depend primarily on the students themseves (50%). However, 30% of the achievement variance could be attributed to the role of teachers. Unlike conventional wisdom, it seems that the home, school, principal and peers make very little difference to student achievement.
The major factors that influence achievement include Feedback, Student’s cognitive ability, Instructional quality and Direct instruction, according the author. Three of the four fall under the role of the teacher. Even computer assisted education and individualization of teaching are ranked lower for their effect on student achievement.
However, computer-assisted education, for example, has moved much since the time of this view. What effect can modern developments like cognitive tutor can have on student achievement is to be seen. Cognitive tutors supposedly monitor how students go about their learning, and direct them towards “best practices.”
Read a blog post at Pedagogy Science.
Tags: cognitive ability, pedagogy, student achievement, teacher role, teaching
Posted in cognitive science, cognitive tutor, education, learning | No Comments »
The Kindle Reader instead of a bulky Schoolbag
Sunday, March 21st, 2010
The Kindle e-Reader is an electronic device that can store 3500 books, articles and documents downloaded from Amazon website. Tim Wilson, director of Student Activities at College of Education, Seattle University is planning to store study materials in e-book format into Kindle Readers for students of his class.
Upto five graduate student volunteers from Wilson’s class will test the device during the entire quarter. The university, faculty and students hope to learn from the trial and determine whether future courses can be offered with electronic readers.
The Kindle readers, available from Amazon, cost $489 each and are not exactly cheap. However, if enough text books are available in e-book format, students can save money in the long term as e-books cost significantly less than paper text books. Then, of course, there is the prospect of replacing the heavy school bag with a compact device.
On the other hand, students will have to learn new skills for using the device. Taking notes, for example, is more complicated than adding them to the margin of a book using a pen.
Seattle U has been trying out modern technology in teaching. Classes are offered both on-line over the Web and in classrooms. Wilson corrects his students’ papers electronically via e-mail and uses podcasts in a project.
Read the story at su-spectator.
Tags: electronic learning, electronic reader, kindle e-reader
Posted in education, education delivery, information technology | No Comments »
One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) for all of World’s Children
Wednesday, March 17th, 2010
The One Laptop per Child Foundation (OLPC)is reportedly a nonprofit organization whose mission is to help provide every child in the world access to a modern education. A recent report mentions of their activity in Kandahar, in war-torn Afghanistan.
OLPC delivered 774 XO laptops to students and teachers at the Zarghona Ana middle school in Kandahar. The report adds that this brings the total of XO’s distributed by OLPC to 3,700 in Afghanistan, and 1.4 million worldwide.
The Kandahar project involves in addition OLPC, USAID/Afghanistan Small and Medium Enterprise Development (ASMED); the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology; Roshan, Afghanistan’s leading telecommunications provider; and PAIWASTOON, a local private IT company. The project is led by Afghanistan’s Ministry of Education.
The XO laptops will have thousands of pages of digital content in the local languages of Dari and Pashto. Also included are acess to 150 educational mini games and interactive versions of curriculum content. Children can take the laptops home, and this means girl students can learn at home without inviting reprisals for going to school.
Read the news at: OLPC.
Tags: Afghanistan, education, laptops, OLPC
Posted in education, education delivery, information technology | No Comments »
Who Benefits from Online Courses?
Friday, March 5th, 2010
Some universities offering online courses have shut down as the venture proved unprofitable. On the other hand, online courses can prove ideal for adults in employment as they can study at their own convenience. At a time when the demand for traditional skills are declining, retraining options through online courses can be a boon.
At the same time, online courses might not be the answer for acquiring certain types of skills. You won’t want to entrust your life to a surgeon who has learnt surgery online, if such a course was available.
Online courses, however, can keep trained professionals up to date in their fields, provided the courses are designed with that objective in mind.
Enrollment at online courses are growing fast, with one in four students reportedly taking at least one online course in 2008. Online courses can help educational institutions to keep down costs and increase their revenues, despite the shutdowns mentioned at the beginning.
Read the discussion about online courses at NY Times Blog.
Tags: business, education, online courses
Posted in business, education | No Comments »
