education & tech

A Columbia university educator, addressing students at the University of California at Los Angeles, predicted that "by the year 2000, we won't send children to school until they are 10 years old." He said that "while they are young, we will keep them busy building healthy bodies in the fresh air". Evidently, he doesn't know the mammas. They want to get their children into school as early as possible. One of the reasons for the development of the kindergarten is to hasten the time when even devoted mothers can get a little freedom from the demands of their children. But the year 2000 is a long way in the future.

Post writen by Matt at Paleofuture.com

We've quoted more than once Stephen Downes, and today after reading over one hundred post that come from his feed, we are able to share with you the five most useful under our blog Philosophy. He's one of the most prominent bloggers among those writing on education and he deserves to be followed:

1. He wrote a post over The Teacher Appreciation Day, but he's thrown a big question.
Does Steve counts as a teacher? Michael Larsen, Mary M,and Anymouse had posted answers on this one. Our appreciation is Steve should be considered as a teacher and should say a Teacher's teacher. Reasoning my answer with the introduction I've just made on top.

2. Just yesterday my wife's daughter was being called her attention for posting some of her personal pictures on Hi5. On this post he questions what is most dangerous posting information on blogs Hi5, Facebook or whatever or send your teenage kids to work evenings and weekends at McDonalds. Predators are everywhere, caution is always advisable.

3. Quoting Judy O'Conell, he raise concerns about what it'll be the roll of Yahoo for Teachers. How this new beta (look for invitations) will solve some problems for schools, or just create new ones. Education has a lot to be with theory, so as far as I am concerned, this will be another place for this business.

4. He abides by the Scientific Method and really, really calls for an stop of 'multiple choice surveys' being called research or worst scientific! I would like (same as the Stephen's link suggests) all educators (not only researchers read, Robert Nola & Howard Sankey's book Theories of Scientific Method
for a better understanding of what we talking about.

And the last one as for today and for myself,

5. A new issue (at least for me) is brought to the bench. Steve Downes says we shouldn't be paying much attention to the 'syndication' word, but (and this is news to me, again) the difference between (open) syndication networks, and (closed) federations. No comments here, I have to read more and deeper to understand more about what Jon Udell is into. Help my teacher!

Technorati: stephen+downes, netiquette, scientific+method, federations

There is a great tool which help us analyzes RSS/blog feeds. AideRSS, allows you to determine the popularity of each of your posts according to the number of comments, Diggs, Del.icio.us bookmarks, backlinks and clickthroughs. Although, as for us, one of the most useful features of AideRSS for bloggers is the ability to analyze the popularity of items in your own blog feed!

Here are our top 20 posts all times.(Thanks to bloggerbuster.com)

1. Please, your Majesty don't get angry. [link]
2. Holly Jobe: The changing expectations of learning. [Link]
3. Comics: Friends 2.0 [Link]
4. Steve Jobs: Following his Macworld watchers. [Link]
5. The future in technology is here. [Link]
6. Merry Christmas to all of you. [Link]
7. Dealing with cellphones in our classrooms. [Link]
8. Academic Social Networks, academics are wary people. [Link]
9. Why the so popular Scoble isn't getting comments on his blog as before. [Link]
10. Social filtering, the new great challenge. [Link]
11. Find out who's the one that couldn't finish college and is rich and famous![Link]
12. Firefox, downloading Free Access Plus. [Link]
13. HC: MacCain will 'Gut Obama like fish'. [Link]
14. Jump onto Technorati train. [Link]
15. Support Freddom of Speech. [Link]
16. Best Flickr Photo during 2007. [Link]
17. Edublogs.org is a great place to start a classroom blog. [Link]
18. Why Technorati ranking is also important. [Link]
19. Experiences: An online continuig education case. [Link]
20. How to cheat schools under Internet filters. [link]

Technorati: education&tech, education+tech, top20

Educators across the nation are finding that iPods and other MP3 players are more than just high-tech toys. Students are using the portable devices in classrooms and libraries to listen to books, watch documentaries and record podcasts, among other educational uses.

MP3 players have a range of benefits. Instead of sitting in a library cubicle to watch a video or listen to an audiotape for class, students can download content onto a portable MP3 player and watch or listen anywhere as many times as they need.

Some research even shows that listening to music on an MP3 player while taking a test or doing other schoolwork may help some students drown out distractions

(*)Tiffany Ray wrote this abstract and she is a staff writer for the Birmingham (Ala.) News.

Everyone who has been teaching temporarily or in a regular peace has confronted problems of discipline in the classroom ( or even in the surroundings of this room). Those experiences go from pre-K to universities and there is no book or standard procedures to get along with such a disgusting events for a teacher.

Beginning April, if you didn't have the chance to get familiar with this note, Laurence Thomas a respected professor teaching Philosophy at Syracuse University, left his class in order to correct a misbehaviour of one of his Cuban female students.

Comments, opinions, the e-mails form the same professor were all out in the Internet. Some agree with Thomas and some others disagree completely. Even when Thomas has recognized he's an old fashioned instructor, what is being debatable is whether the old fashioned teacher will adjust to the cyberculture era or his students must correlate to their old school of correcting disciplinary actions.

Gerald Amanda is quoted in the Inside Higher Ed post about this topic. She supports the old fashioned way to address this kind of situations saying: "There’s only one person in that room who has the bureaucratic, legal, and moral authority to establish discipline — and that’s the instructor". But youngsters more familiar with the cyberculture media do not agree with the Philosopher way of solve misbehaviors such as text-messaging in class. One of Thomas' students complains, "We the students are the customers, the consumers, the ones who make the choice every day to pay attention or not...Does he think that this is the first time this has happened on any college campus? Had he acted like nearly 100 percent of the other college professors in this country, he would have shrugged it off and continued with his lecture,..."


I am a teacher and a blogger and many teachers are working hard to get students into technology and the positive workarounds to it, how is it possible we are training our students to know how to use technology just to block them up there in the university? I am not in disagreement with professor Thomas, of course, he has the right to manage his classes whatever he wants but I am talking about our output product getting prepared just now. Shouldn't we pay attention to investigation of the cyberculture being headed by Kurt Reymers?

Rebecca James from The Post-Standard of Syracuse in a post by Newhouse News Service makes a chronicle of what's going on at College Campuses and quotes experiences coming from different professors. One of them is Reymers, assistant professor in the Morrisville State College he explains himself in about the use of laptops and cellphones in class, "What is normal for us may not be normal for the up-and-coming 'millennial' generation."

How are you coping with your rude students?

Technorati: schools, college, education, syracuse

Extract from DigiActive:

"The goal of the campaign is to draw attention to the persecution of the university, a particularly difficult task since the mainstream media in Russia is all state-controlled and is ignoring the issue. For this reason, members of the university community are using alternative media to raise awareness of the situation."

If you are to support these students, please head over to this Livejournal Community!

This is the second part of a Spanish post we published here. The authorship correspond to John Metzler, head of Fresh Promo; which we reproduced, because TonNet considers many bloggers are still in the first steps to build up credibility and authority with their blogs.

The post in reference can be traslated in the same other Spanish page and it was referred to: How to create Search Engine-Friendly Content and Choosing Your Keywords Wisely.

Get Others to Link to Your Blog

In theory there are countless ways, some traditional and some quite innovative, to get other web sites to link to yours. In practice, it can be easier said than done. Google defines a link as it pertains to rankings and SEO as a "vote" from one site to another. The more quality votes your site receives, the greater chance you have of ranking well. If a well established site links to yours, that link carries more weight than one would from a mom & pop shop or less reputable page.

If your blog has useful content and is doing something unique, you're already ahead of much of the competition. People need a reason to link to your blog, as very few will do it out of the goodness of their heart. Trading links can work, but link exchange networks have decreased in value and won't be of much use in competitive fields. Buying links, if you haven't heard, is a big Google no-no. While entire articles could be written on this topic, here are a few popular methods of acquiring incoming links:

>Issuing special event releases with a link back to your site.
>Submitting to reputable business directories such as Yahoo! and Business.com
>Be active on related blogs by commenting and exchanging ideas.
>If you have friends with blog sites, ask if they would mind adding your link in a "visible" section
>Participate in relevant forums and discussion boards with a link in your signature.
>Write and submit original articles to web publications in your field with a link in your bio (Guest posting).
>Get involved and active in social media and bookmarking.

Don't Fall Behind to the Social Media Revolution

The collaboration between Internet users and the development of online communities is at an all-time high. Social bookmarking sites such as Del.icio.us, StumbleUpon, Furl, Reddit, and Technorati offer users a way to store their favorite pages and media online, and share it with others. These services also provide a way to promote your own blog or create a buzz over a event or service. Creating a Myspace page or Squidoo "lens" is also a way to network and share information.

The key to using social media and bookmarking sites to your advantage is to not be shy. Network with other users, bookmark and share useful content, create eye-catching titles for your entries, and tell your friends and co-workers to vote on content you have on these sites.

These points are a general guideline to follow for SEO. If you want to perform a profesional search engine optimization, experts are a good outsourcing option in competitive blogosphere, while the DIY attitude can yield great results for blog owners with small income budgets. So, if you're in the latter group, hopefully this post will help you to get started.

Tags: SEO, blogging, 101

Latin America is moving to the left and great part of this change has been patronized by Venezuelan President. However, as we all know, changing the educational curricula means a social change, indoctrination. Laura Vidal in the GVO reports the buzz on blogs en Venezuelan media:

Part of what is attacked is the new system, which seeks to remove some competitive sports. They propose more traditional games based on solidarity and equality. Also, there is the discussion of studies on national culture and traditions, since the new project seems to highlight African and aboriginal heritage over the European. Above all, an extended and detailed study of Chavez's government and ideals are preferred over world history and Venezuelan contemporary history.

How this will affect future college education generation in this South American country?

Tags: venezuela, education, blogging

Fields turn green and flowers bloom, birds return from their long winter migration. The sounds of summer soon begin, with children laughing and enjoying the most popular pastimes. Are they? Unless your kids count on organized football leagues, pee wee baseball, swimming, kids just don't seem to play 'pickup' games or get involved in elderly family conversations like before. The reasons can be as different as families we have, but taking away the enjoyment of summer and the freedom that allow kids to create, invent and discover new games and sports, we as teachers and parents, are preventing our children from discovering themselves and acquiring life skills that can ultimately improve their chances of future success.

It has often said that television is the modern day babysitter, and more and more heads of households are relying on the 'boob tube' to entertain youngsters and keep them safely indoors. As if the hundreds of channels available on cable TV aren't enough, most children now have access to computers, entertainment consoles and handheld video games.

Many (even ourselves) are choosing to play virtual sports rather than get together in the park, school playgrounds or visit your family or friend('s) for a quick game of ball. Before it gets completely out of hand and after we lose more obese children or have shootings and killings in the educational world, parents and teachers as well, should limit and encourage kids to use less time spend on using the most current technology and if necessary, encourage them to go out and play. Kids just don't do it anymore.

But once they find the computer or TV are off limits and the Playstation is put away, they will quickly realize that the best way to enjoy this summer is to play outside and have old fashioned fun. What do you think?

Technorati: kids, sports, summer, school, health