January+1,+2011+-+Online+Learning,+Professional+Development,+Social+Media,+Intellectual+Property,+and+More

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=**Worthy of Note: January 1, 2011**=

Share your vision for education in the 21st century Join with educators from across the country that use the Speak Up Surveys to identify how their students, teachers, administrators and parents want to use technology for learning, communications and collaboration.
 * Speak Up Survey (K-12) **
 * Participate in Speak Up 2010 through Fri., Jan 21, 2011 **

Participating in the Speak Up Surveys is free and 100% confidential. Best of all, you will have free online access to your survey results to use for your own technology initiatives. Last year, over 5,757 schools and 1,215 districts participated in the Speak Up Surveys – Project Tomorrow and iNACOL invite you to participate this year! It’s easy to get started, visit the Speak Up website to register your district (or school). Then encourage your students, parents, teachers and administrators to take the online survey. To help you out, check out the tools and tips on this Project Tomorrow website.

If you would like additional information or have questions, please contact the Speak Up team at speakup@tomorrow.org or 949-609-4660 ext 12.

Online Learning K-20
__Federal Regulations for State Approval Regulations for Distance Education__ Here is the latest update provided by WCET on State Approval Regulations. There are links to previous posts and other sources of information. Consider the fifth item in the list on this page: The Southern Regional Education Board, the American Distance Education Consortium, and the University of Wyoming are assisting in creating a basic state-by-state list of state approval agencies.

Digital Learning Now //Foundation for Excellence in Education// In August, Jeb Bush, former Governor of Florida and Bob Wise, former Governor of West Virginia, launched the Digital Learning Council to identify policies that will integrate current and future technological innovations into public education. The Digital Learning Council unites a diverse group of more than 50 leaders from education, government, philanthropy, business, technology, and think tanks to develop the roadmap of reform for local, state and federal lawmakers and policymakers. View the 10 Elements of High Quality Digital Learning Report.

Hopes and Challenges of Virtual Education: 5 Questions with Julie Young //Natasha Wanchek, T.H.E. Journal, December 1, 2010// Read Julie’s answers in Natasha’s interview to these questions:
 * How can virtual education best be incorporated into traditional schools for the best interest of students, or is it primarily one or the other?
 * What are the most significant reforms you've seen in funding, policies, practices, and infrastructure owing to the increasing popularity of virtual schools?
 * What are the key challenges with the technology at this point?
 * Should we expect that virtual schools will result in new perspectives?
 * What can teachers and administrators in traditional K-12 schools learn from virtual schools--both the positive and negative?

Online Learning //The Chronicle of Higher Education// Online Learning is a regular feature of The Chronicle. Check out the current entries here.

Teaching Online Professors ... Online //Inside Higher Ed,// //November 10, 2010// Will colleges and universities buy online courses designed to train the instructors who teach online courses?

Pearson, the education and media conglomerate, is betting on it. The company has announced a plan to sell courses aimed at preparing professors to teach online. The company plans to market the courses in the K-12 and corporate training sectors too, but it plans to do about half of its business in higher education.

Class Differences: Online Education in the United States, 2010 //I.Elaine Allen and Jeff Seaman, Sloan Consortium, November 2010// The 2010 Sloan Survey of Online Learning reveals that enrollment rose by almost one million students from a year earlier. The survey of more than 2,500 colleges and universities nationwide finds approximately 5.6 million students were enrolled in at least one online course in fall 2009, the most recent term for which figures are available. The complete report is available.

The Efficacy (and Inevitability) of Online Learning in Higher Education //Wendy Rickard; Foreward by John Flores, United States Distance Learning Association; Pearson Learning Solutions, 2010// This white paper is a guide for administrators, instructors and policymakers about how technology provides a cost-effective approach to increase access and improve student achievement despite growing budgetary constraints. The report follows the trajectory of online learning from its distance learning beginnings to the integral role it plays today across a range of educational environments.

Quote: True industry growth of online learning consists not only of getting bigger but also of becoming better, more focused, and even more effective. And that the strongest impetus for improvement comes when there is a system of accountability—an insightful process designed by a representative group of experts in the field of online learning, all of whom understand the critical elements of technology and learning processes. Knowing how to best combine the two elements in order to effect student achievement and academic rigor is mandatory. Rickard recognizes that there is no single simple formula for doing this. Rather, formulas vary with the subject and vary with the students. Yet with all of the differences, certain broad principles apply, and those principles are outlined in this report.

Managing Online Education Survey //WCET, Campus Computing Project (continued from Worthy of Note, December 1)// Just in case you have not seen this WCET report already, here is the executive summary of the 2010 survey of higher education institutions. For more information, check here.

**Professional Development**
33 Indispensable Open Courseware Tools: Search, Browse, and Bookmark //Copyright © Masters in Education Administration, 2010// Using open courseware, it is possible to enlarge your learning. These are courses that schools allow the public to view on an independent study basis. Open courseware can include video lectures and presentations, course syllabi, reading materials and lecture notes, and even assignment suggestions. You won’t receive credit for these classes, but if you enjoy learning, you can take classes from some Ivy League schools. If you are interested in open courseware, here are 33 tools that can help you search, browse and bookmark so that you can enhance your learning efforts.

On the other hand, Adrian Hon, Founder and Chief Creative at Six to Start, an online games company, says free online lectures will destroy universities – unless they get their act together fast (and he is talking about places like Harvard, MIT, and The Open University); unless universities face up to the Internet’s fierce competition they won’t have any future. (//The TelegraphDigest, Online Learning Update, Monday, December 27, 2010//)

Professional Development: Sorting Through the Jumble to Achieve Success (New Report) //Education Week, November 2010// This report aims to provide a fresh look at teacher professional development. The stories examine many facets of the training, including its research base, implementation in districts, cost, and evolution. For the project, our reporters drew on interviews with teachers, administrators, and scholars. This is the first study on professional development published by Education Week in 14 years.

Read Stephanie Hirsh’s (Executive Director, //Learning Forward//, (National Staff Development Council) blog comments about the report [|here]**.**

Priorities for Professional Learning //Education Week: Teacher, December 27, 2010//

Learning Forward (National Staff Development Council) outlines their five-year strategic plan for enhancing professional development.

20 Technology Skills that Every Educator Should Have //Laura Turner, Digital Learning Environments// This is a comprehensive list of 20 skills that are recommended for educators. While one may not use all these resources in the classroom, this is a good way to be knowledgeable about them. Many links are provided for explanation.

**Social Media**
Harvard’s Must-Have Guide to Social Media //Nicholas Lamphere, Introduction to Social Media, Edudemic// Nicholas Lamphere of the @HarvardSocial (http://twitter.com/harvardsocial ) group at Harvard University is teaching a course on social media and has just made his first presentation slideshow available to the public. From RSS to micro-blogging to crowdsourcing, you’ll find a lot of new and interesting information in this presentation. Well worth checking this out. = = New Social Software Tries to Make Studying Feel Like Facebook //Marc Parry and Jeffrey R. Young, The Chronicle of Higher Education, November 28, 2010// "Our mission is to make the world one big study group," says Phil Hill, chief executive of OpenStudy, a social-learning site that started as a project of Emory University and Georgia Tech. It opened to the public in September. “OpenStudy is a social learning network where students ask questions, give help, and connect with other students studying the same things. Our mission is to make the world one large study group, regardless of school, location, or background.”

EduBlogs 2010 Awards The Edublog Awards is a community based incentive that started in 2004. Awards in 23 areas were given in November and December. And here is an additional one:

Shelly Terrell, Teacher BootCamp, December 2, 2010. Shelly says, “I have learned by their examples. My knowledge as well as my passion for learning and collaboration I owe to them.**”**

Education and the Social Web //Norm Friesen, First Monday, December 6, 2010// The article addresses concerns about the growing reliance on "Web 2.0" tools ― driven by advertising ― on education. George Siemens has a good review of this article on his Website, eLearning Resources and News. First Monday is a peer-reviewed journal on the Internet.

**Intellectual Property**
Copying Right and Copying Wrong with Web 2.0 Tools in the Teacher Education and Communications Classrooms McGrail, E, & McGrail, J. P. (2010). Copying right and copying wrong with web 2.0 tools in the teacher education and communications classrooms. //Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education//, //10//(3). Students often create multimedia projects for classes that blend in clips from YouTube videos or hit songs, and many want to post their creations online for a wider audience. But does that violate copyright law?

The recent integration of video and audio content and the implementation of Web 2.0 tools in the contemporary English language classroom have made this learning environment a particularly appropriate proving ground for the examination of current student practices with respect to intellectual property. This paper describes an approach employed with English education and communications students to prepare them for such a complex subject matter.

**Other Topics**
Technology in Schools; What the Research Says (White Paper) //Metiri Group, Commissioned by Cisco Systems, [2010]// Three decades after the first computer was introduced into school classrooms, educational technology remains surprisingly controversial. This paper provides a forum for informed use of technology in the context of emergent research from the learning sciences.

5 Higher Ed Tech Trends to Watch in 2011 //Bridget McCrea, Campus Technology, 12.09.10// Campus Technology spoke with a handful of higher education technology experts to get their take. Five responses are listed here.
 * 1) The Cloud Computing Movement Will Continue.
 * 2) More Work Will Be Done Without Wires.
 * 3) Mobile Technologies Will Continue to Proliferate in the Classroom.
 * 4) Online Education will even Further Displace Seat Time.
 * 5) A Retreat from Technology Overload is Imminent.

Guide to Working with External Providers //Learning Point, September 24, 2010// This overview of the 2010 //Guide to Working with External Providers// highlights the five essential characteristics of high-quality provider services and describes the six-step process for creating effective partnerships with external providers. The complete report follows:

Guide to Working with External Providers; Partnerships to Improve Teaching and Learning, 2nd Edition //Bryan Hassel and Lucy Steiner, Learning Point, September, 2010// The guide offers a step-by-step approach to researching and selecting a high-quality service provider, establishing an effective partnership agreement and evaluating the success of the partnership. It digs beneath the surface and explains how actual schools and districts have successfully negotiated these partnerships.

Education Disappointed by Net-neutrality ‘Loopholes’ //eSchool News, December 21, 2010// Rules meant to prevent Internet service providers from discriminating against online content might not be the safeguard that schools and colleges were hoping for, as net-neutrality supporters believe the Federal Communication Commission’s new policy might lead to “bidding wars” that could leave smaller campuses without access to a high-speed web connection.