http://smithclass.org/edet Pepperdine University ... Playing to Learn Sun, 27 Jun 2010 05:48:59 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Reflection: Hands On Learning in Washington, D. C. Dr. McManus told my cadre on many occasions that the Washington policy experience would be the most unbelievable trip we’d do in our doctoral program. He was full of excitement and exuberance and anyone listening knew that this particular experiential instance was beyond ... http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=450 Too much of traditional education is like having a manual for the game, but students spend all their time with the manual and not playing the game. Gee argues that playing video games is constant assessment and feedback, that is, the learning progresses based on moment to moment interactions, decisions, ... http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=435 Good friend and teaching colleague, Bob Greenberg from Connecticut, is always making videos about something in education.  In this one, he interviews a few of us teachers from around the world who have been partnering in classroom projects. http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=423 I'm posting this short video of David Kelly, Professor of design, at Stanford University and IDEO co-founder. I like his take on the importance of fun, chaos and project-based learning. My classroom experiences with elementary kids are exactly as the learning that he describes here. Teachers will say "all ... http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=418 I just finished a short paper called  Can a Human Resources Model in Schools Result in Increased Student Achievement? In short, schools need more of a professional function for recruiting experienced teachers. Current methods fall very short of matching experience to needs. Followup support is often nonexistent. Reasons ... http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=392 Dr. Barab discusses some of the prime reasons why virtual learning situations such as in Quest Atlantis are better received by kids than typical classroom learning situations. Concepts that intersect in QA are educational instances involving activity, narrative context, trying on identities, agency, and consequentiality. A key problem in schools ... http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=407 The title of my blog incorporates playing. We all play, or should play, and we derive important satisfaction, good feelings, overall life benefits...so of course it follows that play should be an important component in learning. The brilliant Dr. Stuart Brown tells a story in the following TED talk that ... http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=376 Twitter is certainly garnering a lot of attention in education and everywhere else. Here is an example of how a University of Texas professor uses Twitter in her classroom. Professor Monica Rankin uses a weekly hashtags to organize comments, questions and feedback that students post on Twitter in class. The tweets ... http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=372 I've been back in the United States for a few weeks now, still reeling in the memories of the week in Dublin, Ireland, followed by two weeks in England. Edtech 2009 was my first international conference presentation, and I was welcomed with such enthusiasm and friendliness that I feel like ... http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=365 This video shows some of the important aspects of project-based learning. Especially notable is Seymour Papert's input to the idea of veering from a curriculum and focusing on the immediacy of learning. http://smithclass.org/edet/?p=340