Do-gooders get voted off island first: People don't really like unselfish colleagues, psychologists find. mediocrity MORE >>

So rather than teach teachers or students how to intelligently use social media tools to communicate(like people do in corporations or in everyday social interactions), a school in Florida decided to advise against such silly and dangerous Web 2.0 behavior without supervision. We are advising teachers to make good decisions online so they don't get themselves into trouble later." It seems to me that Facebook just made the inappropriate actions public, those teachers doing inappropriate things aren't going to stop doing those things just because they aren't on Facebook. Stay way.danger. Web 2. MORE >>

I’ve been slowly making my way through Cliff Atkinson’s Beyond Bullet Points: Using Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007 to create presentations that inform, motivate, and inspire. While it’s geared toward the live, stand-up presentation (e.g., the sales presentation, the keynote, a lawyer’s opening arguments at a trial), there’s a lot to apply towards self-paced, asynchronous eLearning programs. Atkinson draws greatly from Richard Mayer’s research and writings on principles for multimedia design (see Richard E. Mayer, Ed., and then “how do I do this.” Have you read this book? MORE >>

What is the most outrageous alternative education scenario you could imagine? Children not attending school, but instead learning from home? Done it. Got the t-shirt. Distance education in the outback of Australia and other large area countries has been there for years, and so has home schooling in all its hues and colours. What about no school at all then? Children going straight to work as soon as they are able to walk? Well, the sweat shops in the Far East can easily lay claim to that one. And of course, in Europe in the last century but one, it was prevalent for all but the very well off. MORE >>

Skype is one of those tools I have had installed but rarely used. Over the past few weeks I seem to have been using it nearly everyday; I don’t know what happened but all of a sudden it’s become more popular with the people I work with. Whether it’s a simple chat message (instead of the email or “walk down the corridor and open my door&# ) or a full hour-long conversation, it’s become my new best friend. Or could be my new best friend. The thing is; I can put an email to one side and deal with it when I have finished whatever it is I’m doing at the moment. MORE >>