Ben Harper's Profile

a single course that meets eight times will not make anyone “literate” in the contemporary, digital sense

Constructivism is the predominant learning theory today (Biggs 2003), and from a constructivist point of view, all learning implies the transformation of information into knowledge, and this goes for teaching, too, in the modern – i.e. constructivist – sense of the word: Creating an adequate environment for learning. This transformation takes place in an absolutely individual process based on the learner’s foreknowledge, experience, and cognitive potential (Lauridsen 2007). Knowledge, thus, is linked to the individual; encyclopedias, manuals, dictionaries, data bases, etc. contain information (of course based on other peoples’ knowledge), and the individual processes this information into knowledge.

· Analytic Processing vs. Global Processing: Analytic learners prefer information presented step by step in logical sequences leading up to the whole concept. Global learners need to start with a preliminary overview of the whole concept in order to understand the details. Learners capable of using both ways are referred to as integrated.

One issue in achieving progression, is that educational technology is a little like an elastic band. As it tries to stretch out further, to incorporate more approaches and tools, it is not only a greater distance between entry-level users and transformational users, but there is more tension. So what do we do, relieve some of that tension by reducing the scope? The Educational Developers are few, and the audience is massive.

Most of the professional development is centered around the learning theory author du jour, and the focus of all of it is maintaining or increasing test scores. In other words, it’s pretty much all about trying to do better what we’ve been doing all along, assessing it all the same way, and hoping for the same result.

Later, when she was done and had left it open on the dining room table, I flipped through it a bit and saw page after page of pretty basic math and word problems and (fill in the blank). When I closed it, I finally noticed the title: “Preparation for the 3rd Grade New Jersey ASK Assessment.”

Rip Mix Learners is a student-run Open Courseware project, in which students make audio recordings of the lectures, compile class notes, and other materials and share them with their peers online.

Following a unit of study, ask your students to think about the “what ifs” of history and give them the chance to do just that. You and your students brainstorm a list of the events that took place during the period of time just learned and select the two or three most pivotal.

Children with the disorder typically have trouble sitting still and paying attention. But they may also have boundless energy and a laserlike focus on favorite things — qualities that could be very helpful in, say, an Olympic athlete.

Dr. Hallowell says low-self esteem and low expectations result from the way the A.D.H.D. diagnosis is presented to children, parents and teachers. He tells children with attention deficit that they have the brain of a race car, and he wants to work with them to build better brakes.

Youth respect one another’s authority online, and they are often more motivated to learn from peers than from adults

Erecting barriers to participation deprives teens of access to these forms of learning