A new series of updates about emerging trends in learning technology and digital literacy
Trends in Education Technology II
Education technology is a rapidly moving, sometimes divisive and always interesting, especially to us working in Higher Education.
Here’s a round-up of some of the articles I found interesting, and thought you might too.
Do comment, recommend and share.
MOOCs
Can the Current Model of Higher Education Survive MOOCs and Online Learning? – Henry C. Lucas, Educause Review
Henry Lucas, Professor of Information Systems at the Robert H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland, College Park, analyses the impact MOOCs and other disruptive technologies will have on the Higher Education industry. He concludes that MOOCs offer a great opportunity to engage a new generation of students, and universities need to adapt their business models to incorporate emerging trends to avoid becoming redundant like the companies Lucas uses as case studies.
Let them eat MOOCs – Gianpiero Petriglieri, Harvard Business Review
Countering Henry Lucas’ article is an interesting argument by Gianpiero Petriglieri, Associate Professor of Organisational Behaviour at INSEAD. Prof. Petriglieri questions whether MOOCs can actually deliver the democratization of higher education, and open up elite institutions to all. Instead, he argues that MOOCs may actually lead to “colonialism” by elite universities and deepen the divide between themselves and smaller institutions.
Report by Faculty Groups Questions Savings from MOOCs – Lawrence Biemiller, The Chronicle of Higher Education
Summary of the latest report by Campaign for the Future of Higher Education. The executive summary to their report can be accessed here. The paper, backed by faculty unions in the US, argues that students are not getting value for money by having to pay for credentials from online courses which are “virtually valueless in the marketplace”. It cites the example of Georgia Tech’s fully online Masters course in Computer Science provided by Udacity as being exploitative of the university’s reputation and course content for their own commercial gain.
Gamification
Infographic – Knewton
A useful little infographic charting the history of gamification in education.
Created by Knewton and Column Five Media
Mobile Learning
Five Fabulous ways to use Google Apps in the Classroom – Mary Claudia, Edudemic
A useful summary of how Google Apps can be used to organise lessons and allow collaboration between teachers and students.
Trends in Education Technology I
Education technology is a rapidly moving, sometimes divisive and always interesting field of study, especially to us working in Higher Education. Therefore, I will be posting a fortnightly round-up of some of the articles I found interesting, and thought you might too.
Do comment, recommend and share. That’s what blogging is all about after all!
General
40 Future Uses for Educational Technology [Infographic] – EdTech Magazine
http://www.edtechmagazine.com/k12/article/2012/07/40-future-uses-educational-technology-infographic
Whilst aimed at K-12, concepts such as gamification and digitized classrooms also have implications for HE provision.
MOOCs
Moocs: From Mania to Mundanity – Times Higher Education
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/comment/opinion/moocs-from-mania-to-mundanity/2007773.article
Written by the author of the recently released BIS report on the impact of MOOCs on HE provision, this article argues that MOOCs have moved beyond hype and hysteria, and are now becoming normalised into the teaching strategies of many universities.
Third-party credentialing
College Diplomas are Meaningless. This is How to Fix Them. Design specs for upgrading the communications device formerly known as the sheepskin – New Republic
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/114692/college-diploma-time-upgrade
Whilst quite transparent in suggesting that LinkedIn could be a better alternative to demonstrating skills than a University degree, Reid Hoffmann, co-founder of LinkedIn, does make a point that the way graduates gain skills in future will involve a an unbundled format of course provision, allowing students to tailor skills to their own career aspirations. Central to this would be the ability for third-party course providers to be able to grant recognisable credentials to subscribers, e.g. Mozilla Open Badges.
Online mentoring
Internet mentors could supplant traditional lectures – Times Higher Education
One of the findings to come out of the Horizon 2020 report from the Observatory on Borderless Education. As information becomes more freely available via MOOCs and other platforms, support provided by junior-level lecturers at universities may be replaced by Online mentors, who may themselves be professionals in the topic or PhD researchers.
Education technologies
50 Education Technology Tools Every Teacher Should Know About – Edudemic
http://www.edudemic.com/50-education-technology-tools-every-teacher-should-know-about/
A lot of technologies mentioned here will be familiar to many, but this is a useful round-up of the tools available to educators.
