Competency-Based Education
EdTech
Leadership
Staff Picks: Opportunity Gap, Resilience & Learning Apps
Karen and Carri Pick “The Education Response to the Opportunity Gap” Karen says, “There’s still lots of work to do to improve the opportunity gap. I really appreciate all of the groups mentioned here. Not time to slow down on equity.” Carri says, “Tom does a great…
EdTech
SMARTtech Roundup: Blended Learning, STEM, Common Core
Blended Schools & Tools HBCU blends. The Thurgood Marshall College Fund (TMCF) and Connections Education will launch TMCF Collegiate Academies a blended learning program that will allow students to individualize their education and work at a personalized pace. More than “just add water.” PBS/Media shift provides two questions to guide technology integration:…
Personalized Learning
The Difference Between Improvement and Innovation
Improvement is doing things better. Innovation is doing things differently. Well-deployed technology enables both. Two bloggers missed these important distinctions this week.
EdTech
Do You Have the Edtech Lingo Down?
When was the last time you were at an edtech conference and heard fragmented conversations laced with the latest education lingo and acronyms? Does flipped classroom, blended learning, gamification, OER, BYOD sound familiar? Here at Getting Smart, we toss around many of these words every day and work constantly to keep up with the latest trends. We understand how confusing it can be, which is why we've decided to share this great Edtech Cheat Sheet by Boundless.
Personalized Learning
What the PGA Can Teach Us About Value-Added Modeling
Value-added modeling, or VAM, is an analogous method of attempting to gauge teacher effectiveness. Technically, SGP is most similar to a variation of VAM known as Student Growth Percentiles (we’ll distinguish the two as SGPGolf and SGPEd). Like SGPGolf and unlike more traditional VAMs, SGPEd does not attempt to explicitly account for the myriad drivers of results such as peer effects, poverty, gang involvement, or home life.
EdTech
10 Apps That Combine Learning With Fun
From traditional games, such as Scrabble, which can be used as a vocabulary-building incentive, to Foldit, a game designed by scientists to use crowdsourcing to better understand proteins, to apps that help identify plants and wildlife that are useful on hikes and field trips, here are 10 apps that combine learning with fun, and give you one less reason to have to take that phone away when it's time to learn.
EdTech
Q&A: Hey, We Invented Blended Learning
After I described blended learning at a recent conference, Diana Frezza from Scholastic came up to me and said, “Hey, we invented blended learning with READ 180.” Having seen a lot of READ 180 classrooms over the last 20 years, I knew it was a proven multi-modal reading intervention. But I wasn’t up to date on READ 180 Next Generation so I called Scholastic president Margery Mayer.
Personalized Learning
How to Leverage Tech to Keep Students Focused
Technology has the potential to dramatically change the role of teachers, especially when it comes to secondary and higher education. Students no longer need instructors to pass along facts when they have access to the internet and other data gathering sources that they can use to learn the essentials. Teachers, then, must transition to take on more of a “guiding” role in students’ education—they should suggest materials and assign exercises to help students think deeply about and synthesize information.
EdTech
3 Trends You May Have Missed At ISTE
I tend to eschew the advice of seasoned, world-weary attendees to the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) conference each year. “Ignore the exhibit hall,” they implore. “All the real action is in the sessions. The exhibits are just products.”
Leadership
Staff Picks: EdTech, Blended Learning, Summer Learning
Karen Picks “Book Review: Born to Rise“ Karen says, “Deborah’s heart warming story of turning a painful life event into a chance to make a difference is powerful. She was relentless in her pursuit to open schools in tough neighborhoods for students that needed them most. She built schools…