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BY KEVIN HODGSON

We all leave behind a trail of digital footprints when we use technology, whether it is from searching with Google, adding a comment to a blog post, or logging into a social network. While most adults might be cognizant that, given the archiving abilities of the internet, our trail will never really go cold, it is doubtful that many young people realize this. Sites like MyFootprints are designed to fill that gap by giving students the tools and experience to understand that what they are doing today with technology might have ramifications for tomorrow.

MyFootprints is pretty basic, but it has the potential to open up discussions between teachers (or parents) and young people. The site features videos from high school and middle school students who talk about digital identity in an engaging way, and it also has a page of activities that are appropriate for elementary school students by using puppets for characters.

I liked that the site pushes for privacy, noting that everyone should keep a “top secret folder” with information they should not give out to anyone. The list of nine items in the top secret folder are:

1. your full name
2. your photograph
3. your address or location
4. your school
5. your phone number
6. your email address
7. passwords
8. where your parents work
9. your mom’s name before she married your dad

The site also urges teachers to work with students on designing a handbook for protecting your footprints online. Topics include purchasing items at e-commerce sites, appropriate online conduct, security issues, and more.

All in all, MyFootprints is a good place to start when it comes to discussing digital identities and the trail we all leave behind us as we develop an online presence.

MyFootprints

Secure your internet and educate yourself with NetSmartz

Net Cetera: A handy cybersafety booklet from the FTC

Help stop cyber pressure: Thats Not Cool

Believe me, one day you’ll regret all those bathroom mirror photos

by Leena Rao, TechCrunch

Grockit is an online learning community that adds game mechanics to helping high school students prepare for standardized tests such as the GMAT and SAT. The startup, which just raised $7 million in funding, is also moving into general online education for high school and middle school students with impending launch of the Grockit Academy, an online destination where students can learn together and teach each other.

http://techcrunch.com/2010/07/19/grockit-makes-youtube-edu-more-useful/

By Stanford University School of Medicine, Health News Digest

The setting is clearly a simulated operating room, with a robotic mannequin as the patient, but the resident’s anxiety feels all too real. And the scary soundtrack — imagine the ominous music played when the shark approaches in Jaws — only adds to the tension. This is not just entertainment, it’s also educational. This video is part of START, a new 10-month online course from the Stanford University School of Medicine, filled with lectures, video-podcasts, interactive group projects, virtual classrooms and virtual mentoring. The name stands for Successful Transition to Anesthesia Residency Training, and is the brainchild of Larry Chu, MD, assistant professor of anesthesia, and Kyle Harrison, MD, clinical assistant professor of anesthesia. The course was designed to help relieve some of the anxiety that often accompanies the start of the residency.

http://www.healthnewsdigest.com/news/Education_390/New_Online_Learning_Approach_Prepares_Doctors_for_Stanford_Residencies.shtml

by Jennifer Aaker, Andy Smith, Good.is

Stanford Graduate School of Business offers a class called the Power of Social Technology, the goal of which is to arm entrepreneurial business students with online social media tools that create social good. The class has also spurred research on the “ripple effect”—the idea that small acts of goodness can create big change—and has welcomed speakers from Pixar, Facebook, Twitter, FourSquare, Groupon, and Google to talk about how students can harness social good in a way that goes hand-in-hand with profit-making.

http://www.good.is/post/how-do-you-teach-social-good/

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BY JASON DON FORSYTHE

There are many ways to increase a person’s vocabulary, from the classic pick-a-word from the dictionary each day (my father’s preferred method), to the little desk calendar with a daily vocabulary word on each page. But in this day and age people aren’t always working from the same desk each every day, and lugging around an unabridged Oxford English dictionary isn’t practical.

Enter EasyWords, a free downloadable application that helps you memorize and learn new words right from your computer. EasyWords runs in the background and, at an interval that you set, presents you with a vocab question. Once you select the correct answer, it goes away again. It’s pretty unobtrusive — you can just click close if you don’t want to be bothered right then.

The words can be everything from very basic to GMAT stumpers. You get to pick how hard you want to push yourself. There are also word sets for testing your German and Turkish, with more languages planned for down the road.

If you always wanted to expand your vocabulary but think you never have the time, give this nifty little program a try and see if it works for you.

EasyWords

Ditch the flashcards — review with Smart.fm instead

Expanding your vocabulary with VocabSushi never tasted better!

Video vocabulary with BrainyFlix

Beleaguered with vocabulary test prep? Try VerbaLearn

By Marc Parry, Chronicle of Higher Education

As more colleges dip their toes into the booming online learning business, they’re increasingly taking those steps hand-in-hand with companies like Embanet. For nonprofit universities trying to compete in an online market aggressively targeted by for-profit colleges, the partnerships can rapidly bring in many students and millions of dollars in new revenue. That’s becoming irresistible to an increasingly prominent set of clients. George Washington University, Boston University, and the University of Southern California, to pick just three, all work with online-service companies. But the new breed of online collaboration can tread into delicate academic territory, blurring the lines between college and corporation.

http://chronicle.com/article/Outsourced-Ed-Colleges-Hire/66309/

by Daniel B. Wood, Christian Science Monitor

A pilot program of 25 to 40 courses this fall would offer the university’s most crowded courses, including calculus, chemistry, physics, and freshman composition. Making it work will require $6 million in private donations, and it comes at a challenging time for higher education in California. It was just a year ago that students took over campus buildings and blocked parking lots in high-profile demonstrations, protesting a 32 percent increase in student fees.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Education/2010/0716/University-of-California-considers-online-bachelor-s-degree

By JEANNIE KEVER, Houston Chronicle

A board advisory committee later this month will recommend ways to cut costs in higher education, and requiring everyone who attends a public college or university in Texas to take some classes online could be up for discussion. Whether online education saves money is up for debate, since schools have to invest in technology and support services in order to deliver it. The most obvious savings comes from not having to provide additional classroom space. Campuses need fewer parking spaces, campus police and other auxiliary services, too. Tuition is generally the same, although some schools charge an additional technology fee.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7112203.html

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BY JASON DON FORSYTHE

If you’re teaching English-language learners in your class — which includes pretty much every teacher in every school — then you need to check out the great resources at ESL Basics. English is an incredibly frustrating language for many to learn, what with its hundreds of synonyms, and spelling and grammar so complex that even most native speakers can’t master them. Well, for those trying to learn English, ESL Basics is a great free resource to try and make sense of the oddities of the language.

ESL Basics has oodles of video-based resources, all made by the same dedicated ESL teacher, Andrea. Check out the video tab and you’ll quickly see the scope of what she has done. You’ll find videos on everything from the basics to idioms to tongue twisters. I don’t suggest just turning a beginning ESL student loose on the site, though. It will be the most useful if you do some assisted navigation or select a few particular videos you want to work on with your ESL students.

There are a lot more resources than just videos at ESL Basics, too. Andrea keeps up blogs, resource listings, and her tips for teaching ESL in the classroom. If reaching English Language Learners is a priority in your classroom, you’re sure to find something useful here.

ESL Basics

Help others learn English with the English Language Portal

Karaoke to learn English? I thought it was Japanese?

BY CHRISTOPHER PANNA

Should animals have the same rights as people? Should the English-speaking world adopt American English? There are some topics on which everyone has an opinion. Offering a controversial debate question is a great way to energize your students and open their minds to multiple points of view.

Whether you want to have an impromptu class discussion or explore an issue in more depth, a pair of online resources can serve as starting points. Opposing Views is a veritable marketplace for all things debatable and The Economist is a news magazine with a debate section on its site. Both provide conflicting opinions from verified experts in a point-counterpoint format.

Like any resource, each has their pros and cons. Opposing Views has questions that are relevant to most kids’ lives, but finding the debates can be tricky amid all the news stories on the site. The Economist, on the other hand, features a more user-friendly interface but focuses on current event topics that require background knowledge.

Should governments provide stronger guidance in food choices? Is torture ever justified? Open the door to a lively debate and show your students that even the experts disagree.

Opposing Views

The Economist

Argue landmark Supreme Court cases in Argument Wars

The candidates answer tough questions about science at Sciencedebate 2008

The art of the argument: Debatepedia

Defeat Poor Arguments with FallacyFiles.org

Photo credit: nathancolquhoun on Flickr.

Kathy L. Guthrie & Holly McCracken, The Journal of Educators Online, Volume 7, Number 2, July 2010

The use of reflective pedagogies has long been considered critical to facilitating meaningful learning through experientially based curricula; however, the use of such methods has not been extensively explored as implemented in virtual environments. The study reviewed utilizes a combination of survey research and individual interviews to examine student perceptions of the meaningful learning which occurred as a result of their participation in two Web-based courses that utilized reflective pedagogies. One course focuses on topics related to service-learning and the second on placement-based internships. Both were instructed using online coursework based in reflective pedagogies to compliment on-site placements within local communities.

http://www.thejeo.com/Archives/Volume7Number2/GuthriePaper.pdf

by The Associated Press

The University of California is moving ahead with a plan to develop a new batch of online courses that could eventually lead to the country’s first highly selective, Internet-based degree program for undergraduates. The UC Office of the president is raising money from private donors so faculty can begin developing 25 to 40 online courses, starting with those in highest demand, including calculus, chemistry and physics. It’s unclear when students could enroll. UC already offers 1,250 online courses, which Edley said could serve as a starting point for a more sophisticated, high-tech approach that gives students easier access to instructors and classmates.

http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_15524372?nclick_check=1

by Rosalie L’Ecuyer, Fairbanks Daily News-Miner

As a result of readily available, new communications technology, there is a quiet, revolution in education under way but no one appears to be looking at its long-range impact. Hundreds in the Fairbanks area, perhaps thousands worldwide, are participating. Students at the graduate, undergraduate and secondary level are enrolling in online courses, some taking enough online classes to complete certification or degree requirements without attending a traditional campus class.

http://newsminer.com/bookmark/8767533-Online-courses

by Clayton M. Christensen and Michael B. Horn, Forbes

More than 70% of school districts already offer some form of online learning, and that number is growing among traditional brick-and-mortar middle and high schools. With big budget cuts looming, online learning is likely only to grow, as students increasingly look to it to for courses they want to take and credits they need for graduation. Many of the leading online learning providers have experienced sharp growth over the past few years, and that’s unlikely to slow. The adoption of online learning is much more than just a cost-saving move for school districts. It has the potential to transform schooling more broadly by allowing students access to a wide range of high-quality offerings and teachers, regardless of where they live.

http://www.forbes.com/2010/07/12/education-online-learning-leadership-careers-christensen.html?boxes=Homepagechannels

By Cory Hare, St. Albert Gazette

Summer school used to be just for students who had fallen behind. Now it’s increasingly for those who want to get ahead. “It’s actually a phenomenal trend here in St. Albert,” said Randy Kozak, summer school principal at St. Albert’s Paul Kane High School. Enrolment in that school’s summer program is around 450, more than a third of the student count the school attracts during the year, Kozak said.   The Catholic division offers traditional classroom-style summer school at St. Albert Catholic High School and also online learning through its St. Gabriel’s iLearn centre. The system has 120 students enrolled in the school setting and more than 300 learning online, said summer school principal Cara Mazur.

http://www.stalbertgazette.com/article/20100714/SAG0801/307149968/students-get-head-start-on-high-school

by Christopher Edley Jr., San Francisco Chronicle

The University of California is launching an online learning pilot program. If successful, I hope the university will embrace large-scale online instruction – not to replace the on-campus experience, but to enrich it. More urgently, online learning would enable us to serve the growing number of qualified students for whom there will be no room on campus or for whom a residential full-time program won’t work.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/17/INMJ1EDUFJ.DTL

by Katie Kim, WILX Lansing, MI

Kogut tells us creativity starts with cyber space. Several districts are restructuring their alternative education format to meet the needs of their students. “These children typically don’t want to come to high school,” says Kogut. “They need to have more flexibility in the way they learn and the time that the curriculum is offered.” Districts across Ingham County are incorporating online education one way or another. The Lansing School District is meeting Monday to discuss providing online alternative education to students at their old high schools, instead of at the Hill Center. “It’s new and very different,” says Dan Quisenberry, President of the Michigan Association of Public School Academies. “Teachers become facilitators of learning instead of deliverers of instruction.”

http://www.wilx.com/news/headlines/98266869.html?ref=869

By GAIL SCHONTZLER, Bozeman Daily Chronicle

Starting this fall, high school students in Bozeman and around the state can take free online classes for credit from the state’s new Montana Digital Academy. Bozeman High School students will be able to take online classes that aren’t already offered at the school, like oceanography, Principal Rob Watson told the Bozeman School Board on Monday night. Students who fail a class needed for graduation, like math, will be able to retake the class online to earn credits. That will be especially set up to make it convenient for students in the Bridger alternative program to recapture lost credits, Watson said.

http://www.bozemandailychronicle.com/news/article_b1710a74-8e30-11df-9a34-001cc4c03286.html