From Professor Kahlil Marrar and Assistant Professor Eric Landahl at DePaul University, this video is a great introduction, from the academic point of view, on why social media can or should be used in the classroom, but also how: “I think that our role is to sort of guide students towards seeing social networking sites as not simply this implement they can use in order to discuss ideas that do not relate to their education. ” YouTube: Social Media and the Classroom. And this clearly begins with defining an outcome.” MORE >>

You may have seen all of these videos before but together they make a powerful case for changing education and viewing instruction and learning in a new light. The first about educational reform with the most interesting piece being how schools are exactly like factories. see my post on What Happened to the Promise of One-to-One Online Learning? So, then I got thinking about how education can change. One method is flipping the classroom. That is certain one way to address the problem of “standardization” and “mass education.” MORE >>

There's a lot of thought flying around the web at the moment about the concept of "flipping the classroom" - using the internet to provide pre-classroom lectures and the classroom to embed that knowledge through exercises, coaching and discussion. Key posts include: Donald Clark - flip the classroom, every teacher should do this. Karl Fisch - We see this as the future of higher education. Salman Khan on TED Talks - Let's use video to reinvent education. Learning Context, Management & Implementation Change ManagementIt would be complex. MORE >>

Education, and specifically the art of designing, developing and delivering it, is far too often interpreted as an exercise in content depth. To shift to the ‘connected learning’ model, where learning is part formal, informal and social, education purists might assist the overall evolution of the industry (from antiquated to purposeful) by employing the use of The Educational T. Education and thus the process of learning is denoted by the level of breadth and the level of depth that is required to ensure transfer of knowledge is occurring. MORE >>

Transcending Distances in Online Learning. Next → The Flip Side of the Flipped Classroom. Today’s “Hot Topics Wednesdays” episode is dedicated to the concept of a flipped classroom that is still buzzing in the world of education in general and distance learning in particular. In distance learning ”flipping” refers to the synchronous and asynchronous realities.  Flipped Flipped classrooms are believed to make learning more engaging as teacher’s direct instruction is no longer at the core of the class. Thank MORE >>