A Vortex of Technology, Cognition, and Research on Learning July 5, 2006
Posted by mkowalsky in : NECC2006 , add a commentCheryl Lemke referenced Bransford & Brown’s book, _How People Learn_ - knowledge, assessment, learner as community centered . . .learning with understanding matters - novices vs. experts. Experts have a schema where they put discrete pieces of info together, understand similarities and differences, we need to give students more of an opportunity to pull it all together.
Productivity tools operate differently in the hands of differently skilled teachers. . .
Some ideas about learning with tech that have lots of research behind them:
1. authenticity = one of the keys to student use of technology
2. cognitive tutors = senses where kids have problems and offers corrective advice
3. gaming and simulations
4. visualization
5. communication
More information and links at: http://www.metiri.com/presentations.html
21st Century Skills and High School Reform
Posted by mkowalsky in : NECC2006 , add a comment“Why are 21st Century skills important?” our presenters asked. . .The answers:
1. We need our students to become effective 21st century citizens (take in info and produce info, critically, creatively, etc.)
2. The world is flat - we need effective participants in the global community.
3. The U.S. is slipping in problem solving skills - we teach what’s easy to test rather than the skills students really need (isolated skills that can be shown on standardized tests; this is a crisis for the country).
4. The magnitude of our competition is changing. . .numbers of skilled workers is increading in China & India. . . even smaller & local employers (chambers of commerce) are clamoring for skilled workers.
5. The nature of work is changing - today’s kids can’t start and retire with the same set of skills. . .need our ability to learn and change and be flexible. . . we will be changing jobs not keeping the same job for 30 years as our generation or the ones before us.
The personal skills that employers want in new hires (new high school graduates):
leadership, ethics, accountability, adaptability, productivity, personal responsibility, people skills, self-direction, social responsibility
New employees need global awareness, financial, economic, business and entrepreneurship literacy, civic literacy, health and wellness awareness also.
NECC Teens on the Digital Fringe: What LIbrarians Can Do
Posted by Debbie Stafford in : NECC2006 , add a commentTeens on the Digital Fringe: What Librarians Can Do presented by Dr. Lesley Farmer
I chose this session because of the title and having read some of Dr. Farmer’s columns in professional journals.
I did find from the NECC web site that Dr. Farmer has a web presence at http://www.csulb.edu/~lfarmer/ and if you click on articles, you can find a summary of this presentation.
The main points that I took away;
There still is a “Digital Divide”. But there is also a “divide” based on other factors, lack of self confidence, language issues, cultural issues.
There are two types of access questions, Physical access which is usually address in the “Digital Divide” and Intellectual Access which is not addressed other than “drill and kill” stuff.
Libraries and Librarians help by providing access to teens but that we need to look at ways to provide access beyond the normal school day and by being somewhat flexible about what students do on the computers.
We also need to provide access fro student to create content rather than only using library computers for information retrieval.
I hope to revist this posting after NECC, and after I have had some time to digest the message.
Sunny, bring day here in San Diego.
Tag: NECC2006