Hi all,
I'm currently attending a day long workshop set up with the Joan Ganz Cooney Center - the workshop has brought together about 15 experts in social media and networking for kids (lots of professors and brainiacs here, I'm feeling like a dork) - I'll post some interesting thoughts on this blog that I think you'll find interesting.
Aim: to better understand ways in which social networking technologies mediate kids (below age 12) socializing and providing opportunities or limitations for participation.
- They found there's not that much research out there for kids under 12.
- What types of platforms, venues and activities are being researched? What are not?
- Need to push debates beyond the same old issues.
- Need to broaden the scope when it comes to who and what we talk about when it comes to kids and social networking.
Starting points for defining social network in this discussion:
- a public or semi public profile within the system
- a list of other users with whom connections are shared eg friends
- the ability to view others list of connections (tempered by new affordances, privacy settings, child-centric design.)
- distinction between 'friendship-driven and interest driven genres of participation which correspond to different genres of youth culture, social network structure etc.
Age
- There was a lot of focus on young adults, teens and tweens. There's very little data on kids under 12, in particular kids under 9. However recent studies that hav included younger kids identify online social networking activities among children as young as 8 years. Use among this group varies significantly by age as well as by country, cultural context etc.
Digital Divides
- Issues remain, although inequality must move beyond simple questions of 'access' or 'use' / 'non-use'. Think about what kinds of participation, types of activities and under what conditions.
Broadening Platforms
- include platform systems (eg. LittleBigPlanet, Nintendo 3DS)
- need to think beyond traditional ways of learning. social networking is a key platform.
Discourses
- kids and social networking attracts alot of negative attention.
- must examine risk, controversy.
- What's not being discussed when the discussion is framed in the terms of privacy, copyright, safety?
Showing posts with label education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label education. Show all posts
Friday, November 11, 2011
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Study finds toddlers learn more from Elmo
Via KidScreen
"There’s something about Sesame Street‘s Elmo.
Researchers from the Children’s Digital Media Center at Georgetown University have found that toddlers performed a sequencing task better when an Elmo toy puppet demonstrated it than when an unfamiliar puppet performed the same exact task."
Friday, April 29, 2011
Sandbox Summit: CHANGING THE GAMES WE PLAY: A LOOK AHEAD
Stacey Matthias, Founder and co-CEO, Insight Kids and Insight Research Group
After 2 days of hearing educators, policy makers, designers, marketers, and researchers talk about why tech is so important in 21st century classrooms, playful ways it can help with learning, the difference between well-designed games and not, and how to stay "real" in a virtual world, this presentation sorted and summarized highlights, ideas, controversies, etc.
TRUTH
It’s about ‘time’. Many of our students are leaving school before it’s time. Also about time in that we have 24 hour mobile access. We have no down time. How do we create ‘snack’ time? How do we power down? Concern about time spent on screens, concerned if it’s time well spent. A notion of time compression – of instant gratification and instant reward. Not being able to wait for reward and impact. People want more time to play together. This passion and desire for play endures.
‘I play my way’. No matter what we do in this industry, kids will always play their way. Devices or games might not be designed in the way that kids end up using it. One kid said that his favorite part of a specific game was testing it.
‘The Truth of Boundary Smooshing.’ There is a boundary smoosh between digital and physical worlds. Smooshing boundaries between playing to learn and learning to play, between formal and informal learning, smooshing of content, smoosh of who is the creator and who is the player. The smoosh of roles – who is the teacher and who is the student? What it means to move forward in a learner centered culture smooshes the boundaries of education and how we learn within it.
POSSIBILITY
A teacher in a classroom creates rules and norms, then the students follow those rules. Used ‘Simon Says’ as a simple example. Then used another example ‘the mirror game’ can give us a glimpse of what learning might be like in 20 years.
This is different to Simon Says in that there’s no competition, no interruption, it’s intimate, you need to work with your team member, it’s more creative, you have more control. It’s a moment of mutual expression.
The presenter learned this game working with special needs kids who have autism. Encourages kids to make eye contact and tune in to another person’s body language and movement. Also very powerful for grown-ups in the work environment. Says it’s also a metaphor for the possibilities of where we see technology and learning as we have this ‘boundary smoosh’ between the teacher, the creator, the learner, the user.
What’s the hope for how tech will transform kids lives? Some of the people in this presentation said:
- help transform kids lives
- break down barriers
- support each child’s learning
- to make connections
- to give new opportunities
- to accelerate path to be literate citizens
- to allow them ot be producers, not just learners
- to individualize an adaptive learning
- pursue and deepen their interests and passions
- tech will encourage kids to imagine, create and engage
- improve quality of childhood minutes
- tech will bring kids across the world
- help become more aware of opportunities in their lives and make them happen
- helps them become engaged global thinkers
- become collaborative and creative thinkers
How can we play at the edge of innovation and invention?
What is the pop up book of the future?
How can we help kids favore the savor?
How can we help kids move beyond the screen and into the world?
What will be the next apache and Wikipedia?
How do we create flow experiences for learning?
How do we create a LPS? (learning positioning system?)
How do we make learner centered design feasible on a large scale?
How do we reward kids at school for creativity?
How can gestural interfaces help all kids, including those with disabilities?
How does smart design mitigate the pitfalls of tech?
How do we integrate formal and informal learning?
Mine all this mega data and make meaning from it
How can we close gap between kids parents and schools?
What is the difference between process and product?
How do values manifest in the tech that empowers and eduates kids?
Create the playground of the future?
SUMMARY: As industry leaders, creators, producers we must look to:
Face our fears
Clarify our intentions
Play with passion
Trust yourself and your collaborators.
Trust kids.
After 2 days of hearing educators, policy makers, designers, marketers, and researchers talk about why tech is so important in 21st century classrooms, playful ways it can help with learning, the difference between well-designed games and not, and how to stay "real" in a virtual world, this presentation sorted and summarized highlights, ideas, controversies, etc.
TRUTH
It’s about ‘time’. Many of our students are leaving school before it’s time. Also about time in that we have 24 hour mobile access. We have no down time. How do we create ‘snack’ time? How do we power down? Concern about time spent on screens, concerned if it’s time well spent. A notion of time compression – of instant gratification and instant reward. Not being able to wait for reward and impact. People want more time to play together. This passion and desire for play endures.
‘I play my way’. No matter what we do in this industry, kids will always play their way. Devices or games might not be designed in the way that kids end up using it. One kid said that his favorite part of a specific game was testing it.
‘The Truth of Boundary Smooshing.’ There is a boundary smoosh between digital and physical worlds. Smooshing boundaries between playing to learn and learning to play, between formal and informal learning, smooshing of content, smoosh of who is the creator and who is the player. The smoosh of roles – who is the teacher and who is the student? What it means to move forward in a learner centered culture smooshes the boundaries of education and how we learn within it.
POSSIBILITY
A teacher in a classroom creates rules and norms, then the students follow those rules. Used ‘Simon Says’ as a simple example. Then used another example ‘the mirror game’ can give us a glimpse of what learning might be like in 20 years.
This is different to Simon Says in that there’s no competition, no interruption, it’s intimate, you need to work with your team member, it’s more creative, you have more control. It’s a moment of mutual expression.
The presenter learned this game working with special needs kids who have autism. Encourages kids to make eye contact and tune in to another person’s body language and movement. Also very powerful for grown-ups in the work environment. Says it’s also a metaphor for the possibilities of where we see technology and learning as we have this ‘boundary smoosh’ between the teacher, the creator, the learner, the user.
What’s the hope for how tech will transform kids lives? Some of the people in this presentation said:
- help transform kids lives
- break down barriers
- support each child’s learning
- to make connections
- to give new opportunities
- to accelerate path to be literate citizens
- to allow them ot be producers, not just learners
- to individualize an adaptive learning
- pursue and deepen their interests and passions
- tech will encourage kids to imagine, create and engage
- improve quality of childhood minutes
- tech will bring kids across the world
- help become more aware of opportunities in their lives and make them happen
- helps them become engaged global thinkers
- become collaborative and creative thinkers
How can we play at the edge of innovation and invention?
What is the pop up book of the future?
How can we help kids favore the savor?
How can we help kids move beyond the screen and into the world?
What will be the next apache and Wikipedia?
How do we create flow experiences for learning?
How do we create a LPS? (learning positioning system?)
How do we make learner centered design feasible on a large scale?
How do we reward kids at school for creativity?
How can gestural interfaces help all kids, including those with disabilities?
How does smart design mitigate the pitfalls of tech?
How do we integrate formal and informal learning?
Mine all this mega data and make meaning from it
How can we close gap between kids parents and schools?
What is the difference between process and product?
How do values manifest in the tech that empowers and eduates kids?
Create the playground of the future?
SUMMARY: As industry leaders, creators, producers we must look to:
Face our fears
Clarify our intentions
Play with passion
Trust yourself and your collaborators.
Trust kids.
Sandbox Summit: The Future of Learning
Diana Rhoten
Cofounder and Managing Editor, Startl
Cited the movie Waiting for Superman that follows five families and their quest to get into better education through the state lottery process.
Says it’s hard to argue with the message and intent of the movie. However she does argue that it’s unimaginative and derivative of the solutions that it offers.
At Startl they’re trying to reframe the problem from one that is about reforming schooling to one that re-imagines the notion of education and learning.
Assumptions and Aspirations
She says solutions are not going to come from policy alone. Facing a design challenge. Solutions will come from environments and rooms, new ideas and new approaches.
Assumption 1 –
Future of education is about learning, not schooling. Needs to be rephrased to think about learning as anywhere, anytime. Retool education with a variety of new models and approaches, like the game initiative ‘Vanished’.
Assumption 2 –
We believe technology has a critical role in the future but it’s not a means to an end.
Concept of technology as being important to schooling is not new. Most recent technologies have been about improving the efficiency of schooling rather than the efficacy of learning. They are thinking about the learning.
Assumption 3 –
Power of tech to advance learning really depends on the context and the practice of use. Don’t believe technology is ever the silver bullet. Tech is a tool and it’s effect on learning depends on the people that use them, how the use them and where they use them.
Just as we design new tech we also design new contexts for those techs.
Aspirations:
1. Want to be disruptive and shock the system. Bring to life concrete real life examples of what the future could look like.
2. See their work as taking place on the edge – where the risk of failure and the opportunity for success are most allowable.
3. They want to work with thinkers, doers, makers and movers beyond the usual suspects. Recruit talented people who may not have necessarily seen themselves in this education system.
Technology and Theory
Tech will revolutionize education – this has been known since the 70s. Yet in schools there is still little evidence of a structural revolution in terms of tech.
The theories that people have about learning are grounded in what it means to be educated and skilled – in her opinion much of this is influenced by behaviorism and cognitivism. Believe knowledge is external and objective, that students should learn the same knowledge in the same amount of time, with standard models. This basic model has not changed.
How do we make it a learner centric model? This would involve interaction, exploration, collaboration and co-production. They look for products on the market that support this concept. Help learners become producers and not just consumers of information and knowledge.
At Startl, they want to focus on tech and the theory that can lead to change the way we approach education in this country. What does it mean to be knowledgeable in the 21st Century?
Haven’t come up with a framework for where education is headed.
Quoted: It is the framework that changes with new technology and not just the picture of the frame.
Programs and Products
Valley of Death in education. Traversing this valley requires talent to fuel promising innovations.
What do they want to explore?
- Play and learning through interaction
- Products that are learning rich and market smart.
- Help support entrepreneurs as they develop their products.
Partnered with IDEO, DreamIT, Sundance to help figure out business models and strategies for emerging businesses.
IDEO is their ‘design boost’, DreamIT is their ‘acecelerator’, Sundance becomes the ‘broker, tastemaker’.
They run a variety of showcases that companies can apply to – they focus on companies they consider to be smart capital. Sundance, through it’s channel has offered a variety of distribution pathways. How can they go direct to the learner and get around old ‘channels’ such as book publishers?
Also engaging with youth become platform testers. Eg. New Youth City learning Network.
Examples of products that have come out recently
Mind Snacks - multiplatform learning games
Toontastic - enables young kids to have an interactive experience about play and narrative, but also teaches about arc of narrative and storytelling.
Project Noah - a mobile tool that professionals and amateurs use to explore in a fun way their local habitat and wildlife.
Cofounder and Managing Editor, Startl
Cited the movie Waiting for Superman that follows five families and their quest to get into better education through the state lottery process.
Says it’s hard to argue with the message and intent of the movie. However she does argue that it’s unimaginative and derivative of the solutions that it offers.
At Startl they’re trying to reframe the problem from one that is about reforming schooling to one that re-imagines the notion of education and learning.
Assumptions and Aspirations
She says solutions are not going to come from policy alone. Facing a design challenge. Solutions will come from environments and rooms, new ideas and new approaches.
Assumption 1 –
Future of education is about learning, not schooling. Needs to be rephrased to think about learning as anywhere, anytime. Retool education with a variety of new models and approaches, like the game initiative ‘Vanished’.
Assumption 2 –
We believe technology has a critical role in the future but it’s not a means to an end.
Concept of technology as being important to schooling is not new. Most recent technologies have been about improving the efficiency of schooling rather than the efficacy of learning. They are thinking about the learning.
Assumption 3 –
Power of tech to advance learning really depends on the context and the practice of use. Don’t believe technology is ever the silver bullet. Tech is a tool and it’s effect on learning depends on the people that use them, how the use them and where they use them.
Just as we design new tech we also design new contexts for those techs.
Aspirations:
1. Want to be disruptive and shock the system. Bring to life concrete real life examples of what the future could look like.
2. See their work as taking place on the edge – where the risk of failure and the opportunity for success are most allowable.
3. They want to work with thinkers, doers, makers and movers beyond the usual suspects. Recruit talented people who may not have necessarily seen themselves in this education system.
Technology and Theory
Tech will revolutionize education – this has been known since the 70s. Yet in schools there is still little evidence of a structural revolution in terms of tech.
The theories that people have about learning are grounded in what it means to be educated and skilled – in her opinion much of this is influenced by behaviorism and cognitivism. Believe knowledge is external and objective, that students should learn the same knowledge in the same amount of time, with standard models. This basic model has not changed.
How do we make it a learner centric model? This would involve interaction, exploration, collaboration and co-production. They look for products on the market that support this concept. Help learners become producers and not just consumers of information and knowledge.
At Startl, they want to focus on tech and the theory that can lead to change the way we approach education in this country. What does it mean to be knowledgeable in the 21st Century?
Haven’t come up with a framework for where education is headed.
Quoted: It is the framework that changes with new technology and not just the picture of the frame.
Programs and Products
Valley of Death in education. Traversing this valley requires talent to fuel promising innovations.
What do they want to explore?
- Play and learning through interaction
- Products that are learning rich and market smart.
- Help support entrepreneurs as they develop their products.
Partnered with IDEO, DreamIT, Sundance to help figure out business models and strategies for emerging businesses.
IDEO is their ‘design boost’, DreamIT is their ‘acecelerator’, Sundance becomes the ‘broker, tastemaker’.
They run a variety of showcases that companies can apply to – they focus on companies they consider to be smart capital. Sundance, through it’s channel has offered a variety of distribution pathways. How can they go direct to the learner and get around old ‘channels’ such as book publishers?
Also engaging with youth become platform testers. Eg. New Youth City learning Network.
Examples of products that have come out recently
Mind Snacks - multiplatform learning games
Toontastic - enables young kids to have an interactive experience about play and narrative, but also teaches about arc of narrative and storytelling.
Project Noah - a mobile tool that professionals and amateurs use to explore in a fun way their local habitat and wildlife.
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Sandbox Summit: Learning 3.0
Learning 3.0: Why Technology Belongs in Every Classroom
Karen Kator – Director of the Office of Educational Technology, US Dept. Of Education
US Dept. Education: Technology plan published in November is called “Learning: Powered by Technology”
This book is available online at: http://www.ed.gov/technology/netp-2010
How are we thinking of technology in the context of the US education system? How do we create education systems so we regain a bunch of time for play and interesting contextualized environments inside schools?
Dangers of being ‘strapped’ to technology and making it define who we are. Are we just talking about big tech or are we talking about a playground where we can discover what’s best about ourselves?
Obama in state of the union focused on innovation, education and infrastructure. These things used to power up the nation. Now we have a situation that we have an incredible amount of inequity. Schools missing 50% of our kids or more - a quarter or kids drop out of high school. 30 – 40% of kids who do go on to post-secondary need remedial help.
++ Digital Media & Opportunity ++
Social Media tools really powered up the opportunity for people to co-ordinate their efforts in Egypt this February. Provided ways to tell stories that we might not otherwise of heard. Tsunami in Japan had people publishing posts, photos, videos everywhere immediately. This offered also the opportunity the hope in the midst of destruction.
Superbowl this year was touted as transition between old and new media. This year, ads were not just ads but needed to figure out how they stretched the time? Used commercial for movie ‘Rio’ as example as how they tied in an Angry Birds promotion. Thinking about the ‘before, during, and after’ of advertising.
Decora Eagles is another example of digital media opportunities – it’s a live webcam that shows an eagle’s nest – it’s on 24 hours.
These kinds of opportunities can really the change the ways we think about powerful learning.
++ Learners of the 21st Century ++
Quest to Learn (school in NYC)
Designed to support digital lives of young people and their capacity for learning.
++ Mobility ++
- 24 hour access
- only have had tablets for one year and look at impact
- social interactions everywhere for learning – not just twitter, but things like epicurious, the strobist (lighting)
- proliferation of powerful, highly produced digital content is changing everything.
++ Big Data ++
Big data we think about today is location data. In education we have not begun to touch the opportunities for thinking about how we use data and help us help students learn better. We are at this transition between a print based classroom and a digital learning environment. Called it a ‘digital inflection point’.
This digital media is beyond interation it is a ‘guiding interface’. It doesn’t mean we ditch learning from people or books, but that we have a new opportunity to design and develop powerful learning environments. Focus of control can shift from teacher to the student.
++ Learning ++
How can we personalize the learning environment? With the internet we can bring in a long tail of interest. In some schools, they outgrow their library very quickly. Need ability for fluid research and analysis as they go.
How do we create an environment that is a universal design for learning? A book is inherently disabled - it can't read for you etc. Digital environments can scaffold lessons, provide greater access to content and demonstrate and help understand content in a variety of ways. Eg games have a perfect place in this world order.
The opportunity to create an environment that merges formal and informal learning. How do we give this credence inside of school?
++ Assessment++
Measuring what matters. Measuring the full range of standards. Embedded into opportunity of what students are having to learn. Sees games as one giant assessment engine.
Opportunity to create persistent learning records that STUDENTS OWN. Family have the copy and rights to that persistent learning record.
++ Teaching Environment ++
Technology used to augment human performance. Helps crunch data, connects them to what they need, when they need it, scaffolds students. Help them better connect to each other. Right now in schools, teachers are limited and not powered with the best technologies. We want tech to 'power up' the role of teachers.
++ Infrastructure ++
24/7, community wide, more access points. Devices come and go, but where can students get access to the tools and resources they need?
Print to Digital - how do we make sure that what we do is productive as possible for students.
What's killing education is the seat time to competency - everything is measured in the time you spend, rather than focusing on competence-based learning.
+ The Future of Learning ++
multiple pathways - multiple instructors
multiple devices - multiple environments - multiple sources
Learner centered.
++ Learning Position System ++
Can we create something instead of a GPS with a map - take those things off and have learning progressions from numeration, calculus etc. Could you create a map that maps out all of mathematics? Where are you in the whole scheme of mathematics? How do we create this notion of a Learning Positioning System?
Dept of Education is improving access, creating more transparency, focusing on the people on hte ground, investing in rapid improvement.
Karen Kator – Director of the Office of Educational Technology, US Dept. Of Education
US Dept. Education: Technology plan published in November is called “Learning: Powered by Technology”
This book is available online at: http://www.ed.gov/technology/netp-2010
How are we thinking of technology in the context of the US education system? How do we create education systems so we regain a bunch of time for play and interesting contextualized environments inside schools?
Dangers of being ‘strapped’ to technology and making it define who we are. Are we just talking about big tech or are we talking about a playground where we can discover what’s best about ourselves?
Obama in state of the union focused on innovation, education and infrastructure. These things used to power up the nation. Now we have a situation that we have an incredible amount of inequity. Schools missing 50% of our kids or more - a quarter or kids drop out of high school. 30 – 40% of kids who do go on to post-secondary need remedial help.
++ Digital Media & Opportunity ++
Social Media tools really powered up the opportunity for people to co-ordinate their efforts in Egypt this February. Provided ways to tell stories that we might not otherwise of heard. Tsunami in Japan had people publishing posts, photos, videos everywhere immediately. This offered also the opportunity the hope in the midst of destruction.
Superbowl this year was touted as transition between old and new media. This year, ads were not just ads but needed to figure out how they stretched the time? Used commercial for movie ‘Rio’ as example as how they tied in an Angry Birds promotion. Thinking about the ‘before, during, and after’ of advertising.
Decora Eagles is another example of digital media opportunities – it’s a live webcam that shows an eagle’s nest – it’s on 24 hours.
These kinds of opportunities can really the change the ways we think about powerful learning.
++ Learners of the 21st Century ++
Quest to Learn (school in NYC)
Designed to support digital lives of young people and their capacity for learning.
++ Mobility ++
- 24 hour access
- only have had tablets for one year and look at impact
- social interactions everywhere for learning – not just twitter, but things like epicurious, the strobist (lighting)
- proliferation of powerful, highly produced digital content is changing everything.
++ Big Data ++
Big data we think about today is location data. In education we have not begun to touch the opportunities for thinking about how we use data and help us help students learn better. We are at this transition between a print based classroom and a digital learning environment. Called it a ‘digital inflection point’.
This digital media is beyond interation it is a ‘guiding interface’. It doesn’t mean we ditch learning from people or books, but that we have a new opportunity to design and develop powerful learning environments. Focus of control can shift from teacher to the student.
++ Learning ++
How can we personalize the learning environment? With the internet we can bring in a long tail of interest. In some schools, they outgrow their library very quickly. Need ability for fluid research and analysis as they go.
How do we create an environment that is a universal design for learning? A book is inherently disabled - it can't read for you etc. Digital environments can scaffold lessons, provide greater access to content and demonstrate and help understand content in a variety of ways. Eg games have a perfect place in this world order.
The opportunity to create an environment that merges formal and informal learning. How do we give this credence inside of school?
++ Assessment++
Measuring what matters. Measuring the full range of standards. Embedded into opportunity of what students are having to learn. Sees games as one giant assessment engine.
Opportunity to create persistent learning records that STUDENTS OWN. Family have the copy and rights to that persistent learning record.
++ Teaching Environment ++
Technology used to augment human performance. Helps crunch data, connects them to what they need, when they need it, scaffolds students. Help them better connect to each other. Right now in schools, teachers are limited and not powered with the best technologies. We want tech to 'power up' the role of teachers.
++ Infrastructure ++
24/7, community wide, more access points. Devices come and go, but where can students get access to the tools and resources they need?
Print to Digital - how do we make sure that what we do is productive as possible for students.
What's killing education is the seat time to competency - everything is measured in the time you spend, rather than focusing on competence-based learning.
+ The Future of Learning ++
lifelong - preschool - k12 - postsecondary - career - life
Formal - informal - in school - out of school
multiple pathways - multiple instructors
multiple devices - multiple environments - multiple sources
Learner centered.
++ Learning Position System ++
Can we create something instead of a GPS with a map - take those things off and have learning progressions from numeration, calculus etc. Could you create a map that maps out all of mathematics? Where are you in the whole scheme of mathematics? How do we create this notion of a Learning Positioning System?
Dept of Education is improving access, creating more transparency, focusing on the people on hte ground, investing in rapid improvement.
Monday, May 17, 2010
Stupid, Lying Babies
A Canadian study reported by the BBC has revealed that toddlers who lie are more likely to do well later in life.
These lying babies are also able to do well while still young, as another study has revealed that most babies are stupid.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
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