Google Forms, Refreshed | Google Drive Blog

These are really nice features to roll out, but I have a feeling that we are going to see a lot more of the features we want from the output (spreadsheets) and the forms itself (images perhaps?) Love that my toolkit just expanded and became more collaborative and all I did was open up the app. So cool.

Google + mention feature in Blogger

There are a couple of things that I really like about mentioning someone in a post and thereby replying, or by bringing someone in to a post that you're reading from blogger.

"If you really want to grab someone's attention when you share in Google+, try mentioning them using the '+' or '@' signs. When you do this, the person may receive a notification that you mentioned them in a post (depending on their notification settings.) They'll also be able to see the entirety of the post on which they were mentioned even if the post wasn't originally shared with them."

A couple of important notes:

• You can only mention people who are on Google+
• As you type, an auto complete list of people will appear
• If author or commenter "locks" the post you will be unable to share or comment

Unleashing creativity in Google’s CSI:Lab | Official Google Blog

I especially love the idea of know and own what inspires you.;) "Take a peek at five tips to help you embrace the CSI:Lab spirit and add more creativity and innovation to your everyday life—whether it be at home or at the office! Know and own what inspires you. Understand where your inspiration comes from and do it 10x more than you do now. For example, if your inspiration comes from museums, then go to museums 10x more often; if your inspiration comes from people, talk to 10 new people each week. Think like a child. Be open and question everything around you. Try not to pre-judge thoughts or ideas; develop them. Dive into something new. Involve yourself in areas at work where you’re unfamiliar with the content and want to learn more. People are generally happy to share their knowledge and you can often teach them something too just by bringing a fresh perspective to their work. Play with fun and unusual materials when developing an idea. We all constantly use our computers and paper and pen, so think outside the box to get your mind flowing. Want to “prototype” a solution you’ve thought of? Grab some pipe cleaners, construction paper, LEGO figures, feathers...you name it! See how the materials inspire you. Invest in your physical space. Having a supportive environment can make a big difference, so learn how what types of space inspire creativity. To create a more open, playful environment, try a flexible workplace with no offices. Or, help ideas flow more freely by making lots of whiteboard space easily accessible. For example, at Google’s Mountain View campus, we’ve created our own innovation space, called “The Garage” (a nod to the iconic Silicon Valley workspace). “The Garage” is big enough for 170 Googlers to use the area to create, collaborate and experiment"

via Diigo http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/12/unleashing-creativity-in-googles-csilab.html

Googliciousness: Unleashing creativity in Google’s CSI:Lab | Official Google Blog

I especially love the idea of know and own what inspires you.;) "Take a peek at five tips to help you embrace the CSI:Lab spirit and add more creativity and innovation to your everyday life—whether it be at home or at the office! Know and own what inspires you. Understand where your inspiration comes from and do it 10x more than you do now. For example, if your inspiration comes from museums, then go to museums 10x more often; if your inspiration comes from people, talk to 10 new people each week. Think like a child. Be open and question everything around you. Try not to pre-judge thoughts or ideas; develop them. Dive into something new. Involve yourself in areas at work where you’re unfamiliar with the content and want to learn more. People are generally happy to share their knowledge and you can often teach them something too just by bringing a fresh perspective to their work. Play with fun and unusual materials when developing an idea. We all constantly use our computers and paper and pen, so think outside the box to get your mind flowing. Want to “prototype” a solution you’ve thought of? Grab some pipe cleaners, construction paper, LEGO figures, feathers...you name it! See how the materials inspire you. Invest in your physical space. Having a supportive environment can make a big difference, so learn how what types of space inspire creativity. To create a more open, playful environment, try a flexible workplace with no offices. Or, help ideas flow more freely by making lots of whiteboard space easily accessible. For example, at Google’s Mountain View campus, we’ve created our own innovation space, called “The Garage” (a nod to the iconic Silicon Valley workspace). “The Garage” is big enough for 170 Googlers to use the area to create, collaborate and experiment"

via Diigo http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/12/unleashing-creativity-in-googles-csilab.html

CK12, Curriculum Hacks, and Cognitive Surplus

CK12, Curriculum Hacks, and Cognitive Surplus rattling around in my head today. Received an email today from the fine folks at CK12 and it seems that their robust learning platform and community are growing exponentially. They are growing and sharing at a speed and quality point, where more folks besides just those in the state of Utah, will have to begin to pay attention to this disruption.

In my rear view mirror I can see and hear me pontificating as a young curric developer of a soon to be launched virtual high school about how crowdsourced curriculum will change the world and education as we know it.

“if even 1% of the teachers within the US started Moodling their curriculum, a snowball effect will occur that will forever change the archaic US education system.”

Truth is the idea wasn't insanely original, but it was dismissed as insanely optimistic and Utopian. Again, the timing wasn't right, the content wasn't as close to ready as it is now, and the platforms for sharing, collecting., and curating across platforms and operating systems didn't exist in the state it sits today, and perhaps tomorrow. To steal language form an email sent recently by my good friend Bill Fitzgerald,

"As part of this work, we are building an open content platform that anyone can grab and use. It converts pages created and stored in the platform to ePub and mobi, so it's a pretty effective ebook publisher that works with both iPads and Kindles (or phones/tablets with Kindle/ePub reader apps).".

The curriculum text book resources built and designed by the fine folks at CK12 and the community at large are by no means the be all end all when it comes to content curation and instruction. But, what they are is a huge disruption to the textbook industry and an opportunity for schools and districts to get ahead of the curve. It is resources like these, built by professionals for professionals that will help to transform our current state of vendor-centric content providing.

Clay Shirky in Cognitive Surplus says,

“This linking together in turn lets us tap our cognitive surplus, the trillion hours a year of free time the educated population of the planet has to spend doing things they care about. In the 20th century, the bulk of that time was spent watching television, but our cognitive surplus is so enormous that diverting even a tiny fraction of time from consumption to participation can create enormous positive effects.” ― Clay Shirky

Help me think through the possibilities. Don't dismiss or snark about the roadblocks, because we as a collective have the power to not only dismiss the roadblocks, but overcome them.

• What would it look like if you pulled together 30-40 of your brightest teachers across each subject area and invited them to participate in a two-day curriculum hack, equipped with protocols, as well as experts in, content, curation, assessment, and data use? 
• What would your dream "curriculum" look like? 
• What could it look like if we truly empowered our best teachers to do this work? 
• Besides political ickiness, what is to stop us, and to that point, what would we need to avoid that, embrace it, or plow through it? 

If we can reward them both in financial and intrinsic means, we may be on to the disruption that many of us have seen on the horizon for years. 

• CK-12 Physical Science Concepts
• CK-12 Algebra I Concepts
• CK-12 Trigonometry Concepts
• CK-12 Advanced Probability and Statistics Concepts
• CK-12 Geometry Concepts
• CK-12 Concept Middle School Math - Grade 6

• Common Curriculum Helps You Create Common Core Lesson Plans
• Picking and Choosing Digital Content: The Open High School of Utah in Salt Lake City
• MasteryConnect Helps You Map Curriculum to Common Core Standards
• The OER Workshop at IMU!

A Disruption of "School" Worth REALLY evaluating

What does a "school" look like in light of these small victories and celebrations via #olpc. Can we "un-learn" as educators what our role is? Can we put the proverbial toothpaste back in the tube for our kids who are being indoctrinated in a top down instructional model that places far too much emphasis on conformity, norming, and _scale_?  What should it even begin to look like for our youngest learners and our Higher Ed institutions? Where do we start? 

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/506466/given-tablets-but-no-teachers-ethiopian-children-teach-themselves/

Technology Integration Matrix: Close but Not Really

Technology Integration Matrix

The matrix shared from fcit is looked upon as a standard and in relative high regard in ed tech circles. I would argue though that many ed tech circles still look at technology as salad dressing (h/t Bud Hunt.) In my opinion, our time with children is precious and we need to empower and support better use of our resources and people.  Generalizing a little here, but the Ed tech community at large can sometimes miss that crucial element when designing learning for children and adults.

My specific push back for lack of a better term initially is that while many of these examples provided do indeed infuse technology and sometimes really well, but I think to get to a larger paradigm shift there are critical elements that instruction and therefore instructional design must be anchored against.

Technology integration at a ubiquitous and transformational level in my opinion, should cover the following key axioms, many of which may just feel like best practice instruction (which is true) but with technology we can do it better, faster, and deeper without teacher burnout and learner disengagement.

• Personalization for the learner 
• (some amount of self direction, and a lot of sharing out loud) this one is hard for a traditional course whereby the content is consumed and then reproduced with little say in the direction for the learner 
• Blended strategies (many of what follows sit under this umbrella)
• maximize the time, space, and tools for the job while freeing up teacher time
• Tight feedback loops 
• Modeled use of data to drive instruction 
• Low level knowledge recall assessments should be automated for the facilitator and trigger multi-modal supports by the means of professor, peer, and outside provider created materials targeted to specific outcomes or objectives 
• Authentic application 
• Learner-centered (similar to personalization, but a little different) 
• allow for learner's to design their own inquiry and essential question,then measure that against the culminating task, (which should also allow four choice and "leveled accomplishments") 
• Project based learning is great, but if it is a teacher designed project it implicitly lays the focus and application as a teacher driven output. 
• Assignments and content should provide multiple levers for interactions with peers, the content itself, and the teacher
  Model best practice classroom instruction 
• Connected to community or service learning. 

• example: "You've demonstrated you understand and can apply this objective at a low level. What would it look like to Design and Apply this knowledge with your world, your school,, your community?" 
• Focus on the verbs (the nouns change) focus on what we want our children to be doing in the classroom and design backwards from that.
  For example: if a teacher is taking a course targeted specifically at teaching mathematics instruction. Modeling the use of digital calculators, or the use of video to design authentic applications of math in real life, while providing consistent opportunities for reflection, and opportunities for peers to review or build upon each learner's work.

That's where my head is today as I wrestle with some ideas in my mind and try to make sense of what I'm seeing.