This story sends me back to those times when I built worlds with Legos and imaginary robots with Tinker Toys. And for me the worlds I constructed were the worlds I wanted to live in… to be a part of. Those worlds were the better worlds, and they held all the potential that my monotonous, uninspiring, sometimes unbearable life in southeast Texas did not.

The Esquire story of Dean Kamen - best known for his invention of the Segway Scooter - is that kind of story. Kamen is a true dreamer… a real life Captain Kirk. Kamen belongs on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise proclaiming his defiance to all those who would stand in the way of exploration… charting a course into the unknown so that the rest of humanity may benefit.

Kamen is David Farragut at the Battle of Mobile Bay shouting Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead! Because despite the difficulties and obstacles that face him, Kamen will not stop until he has conquered… or died.

The Esquire piece is a long article. But engaging and well worth the time it takes to read if you are like me, and you would see the world for what it could be… not what it is.

Esquire’s How Dean Kamen’s Magical Water Machine Could Save the World by John H. Richardson.

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For those of you who aren’t familiar with it, Manga refers to a style of comic books that can be found in every book store / newspaper stand in Japan. Everyone from students to business men can be seen reading it.

So how does this affect education? According to a report from Matt Ford at Ars Technica, Manga will soon be used to introduce students (and others) to various topics in science and technology - everything from relativity to statistics to biotechnology.

Entitled The Manga Guide, the series of comic books will be drawn in the style of Japanese Manga and each book will focus on a single topic or field. The series is a translation done by No Starch Press and will be distributed by O’Reilly. The first Manga to be published will be entitled The Manga Guide to Statistics.

On a similar note, this reminded me of another article that I came across while I was stuck in my World of Warcraft obsession period. From a report by Iconoculture, Kaplan Publishing has partnered with TokyoPop to bring SAT/ACT prep to Manga. Psy-Comm, Von Van Hunter and other full-length graphic novels in the World of Warcraft Manga series are studded with highlighted words commonly used in the SAT/ACT tests.

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In an effort to simplify the search for emerging e-learning / edtech, I have reviewed four new products that can be used inside and outside the classroom to bring new media technologies to education. In order of review they are:

• Social Media Classroom - an open e-learning platform developed by Howard Rheingold and offered free to students and teachers
• iKnow - an e-learing social networking platform developed by Cerego that focuses on language learning
• Edmodo - it is Twitter for educators… enough said
• Xtranormal - this application allows you easily create your own flash movies complete with dialogue and 3D animated characters

That was for the busy people. For a more complete look at each of these new platforms / application, continue reading below.

Social Media Classroom

Social Media Classroom is the brainchild of Howard Rheingold, a professor at UC Berkley and Stanford and the author of Smart Mobs. Social Media Classroom is built on the free Drupal CMS platform and provides teachers and learners with an integrated set of social media tools.

Each course created can use these tools as required and customize its usage for its own purposes. SMC has integrated forums, blogs, comment, wiki, chat, social bookmarking, RSS, microblogging, widgets, and video commenting.

The idea behind SMC was to create a free, easy to use, “student-centric pedagogy that engages students in actively constructing knowledge together about issues that matter to them, rather than passively absorbing it from texts, lectures, and discussions.”

Further enhancing its potential is the ability to utilize SMC in enterprise level organizations. The SMC becomes a collaboration platform where “groups, teams, nonprofit organizations, communities of practice can bring the advantages of online media to the purposes of their enterprises.”

So what is my personal take on this? I have not yet had the chance the chance to explore SMC, but I love the idea. I have been using Wordpress and Ning to enhance the classroom experience and bring the learning out of the classroom environment. One of the things that I appreciate most about Wordpress and Ning is the ability for every individual to customize their blogs (Worpress) or their profile pages (Ning). I have noticed that this feature does a lot toward encouraging students to take it and adopt these platforms for more than just classroom assignments. And I hope that SMC supports similar customization features. (If you have information on this… please let me know)

iKnow

Cerego introduced iKnow at DEMO Fall 08 as “the first intelligent social learning platform.” iKnow is built on sophisticated learning algorithms that is supposed to enable individuals to learn faster and improve memory retention. (Anyone have any data to back this up?) Because individuals learn at different paces each person’s training schedule is unique and customized according to their periods of time for studying and learning.

Even more exciting though is the community that iKnow is building around this platform. iKnow is not only a tool to help users learn but also an intelligent social network where they can share and collaborate with other users. The goal is to create a member-centric platform where members voluntarily help each other learn within these customized online systems. Ultimately, users from all over the globe will be able to remix content and share it with others within the learning community.

Reading about this I couldn’t help but remember the post that I had written on the XPrize for Education idea. There is no XPrize for Education yet, but already with iKnow it seems that we are seeing some of the ideas being bounced around there coming to life. The future is an exciting one for educators.

Edmodo

Edmodo is a tool for students to ask questions either within the classroom timeline, pose questions to the teacher directly, and submit their assignments. Edmodo is the brainchild of Jeff O’Hara and Nic Borg, two techies who work in the field of education. The simple explanation is that it is a microblogging platform (think Twitter) for education.

But it is much more than that. Edmodo contains the all the functionality of Twitter, but then adds some very useful applications on top of that, such as a calendar that teachers can use to post events and assignment due dates. But Jeff and Nic plane to expand Edmodo even further so that teachers can use it as a grading system and a way to interact with parents.

For more information on Edmodo, check out this interview with Jeff and Nic of Edmodo.

Xtranormal

Xtranormal is my favorite program on this list. Not because it is better as an educational platform… it isn’t even an education platform. But rather because it is a lot of fun. Xtranormal gives anyone the ability to create flash movies complete with 3D characters and dialogue… simply and painlessly - all you need to do is click and type. No programming required.

Now this won’t dramatically change the way we teach our students, but it can make teaching and learning a hell of a lot more fun. Want to make your student’s watch the Presidential debate? Why not have them create their own mock movie of it, rather than having them write a report.

I have not yet had a chance to use this for my classes yet, but you can be sure that I will. This would make a great project for my writing class… script writing plus animation. I wish something like this had been around when I was going through school.

Once I have given it a try, I will let you know how it works out.

Concluding Remarks

I hope you found this information useful. Check back regularly to find updates on new educational technologies. I will post them as I find them. If you have any suggestions, or if you have used any of the above, I would love to here about your experiences. Leave a comment below, or link back to this post.

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Furthermore, as we try to integrate these technologies into the classroom environment, it would be good for us to understand both the abuse that is possible with it, and also the point (legally) at which a students actions go from harmless fun / teasing to something deliberately hurtful.

J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District

Earlier this month a court ruled that a school was within its rights to suspend an eighth-grade student (J.S.) for 10 days after she created a fake page on MySpace.com that depicted her principal as a pedophile and a sex addict. (
J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District)

This is an interesting case because it speaks to the rights of students to express themselves. Had I been J.S.’s age I would more than likely have used MySpace or YouTube to make fun of my teachers, but I think that making fun of someone and slander are two different things.

Although I am a proponent of freedom of speech, I think that in this case I would support the judges decision mainly because the MySpace profile was a public one and also because from what I have read of the case, it was not so much a parody as it was meant to slander the principal by painting him as a pedophile and degrading him.

Additionally, J.S. made it a public page so it was intended for anyone and everyone to see. Had it been private, I don’t think the school would have had a case.

The one problematic point of this case is that J.S. did not mention the principle by name on the MySpace page.

What legal precedents are really being debated here?

First is whether or not the principle constitutes a public figure. If the principle is considered a public figure then the burden of proof is higher for him.

A public figure is a legal term applied in the context of defamation actions (libel and slander). A public figure (such as a politician, celebrity, or business leader) cannot base a lawsuit on incorrect harmful statements unless there is proof that the writer or publisher acted with malice (knowledge or reckless disregard for the truth).

So does the principle of a school fall under this definition of a public figure? I would say that he does. Although the case did not seem to think so (or at least the judge made no mention of it), he is the face of his school and so should be considered a public figure, and thus a valid target for students or parents who want to ridicule him and his policies, as long as such ridicule is truthful.

However, ridicule does not entitle one to libel or slander. So the next question is was this a case of libel? In order for that to be established actual malice must first be proven.

The legal definition of actual malice was established in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, a Freedom of the Press / Civil Rights Case.

The actual malice standard requires that the plaintiff in a defamation or libel case prove that the publisher of the statement in question knew that the statement was false or acted in reckless disregard of its truth or falsity…. Proof of “actual malice” was required in order for punitive damages to be awarded, or for other increased penalties. Since proof of the writer’s malicious intentions is hard to provide, proof that the writer knowingly published a falsehood was generally accepted as proof of malice, under the assumption that only a malicious person would knowingly publish a falsehood.

So in this case I think that actual malice can be legitimately established. The information about the principle was obviously false, and very few would consider the label pedophile to be a harmless one. Furthermore because no punitive damages were being asked for, rather only that the school be allowed to suspend a student for disrupting the learning environment, I believe that the burden of proof is even lower in this case.

Some may cite the Draker v. Schreiber as evidence that the court made an incorrect decision in this case. But the biggest difference between these two cases is the scope of the penalty being enacted. In the Draker case, the principle was asking for punitive damages, while in this case the school was only asking to do what it already had the authority to do.

Therefore I believe that the court made the correct decision in this case.

Legal Cases

:

New York Times Co. v. Sullivan
Tinker Case

J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District

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The Long Now Foundation hosts a very interesting podcast called Seminars in Long Term Thinking (SALT). I was listening to their latest one, and the speaker for the show was Peter Diamandis - the founder of the X PRIZE Foundation. Although he was speaking about the advantages of using large prizes to create incentive to tackle problems in radical new ways, listening to this I think there is another message embedded in it.

For you multi-taskers, if you would like to listen to the podcast while you read, I have also embedded a copy at the bottom of this post. Enjoy.

History of the X PRIZE

On May 19, 1919 Raymond Orteig offered a $25,000 to the first person to fly non-stop from New York to London. At the time, no one believed that it could be done. But on May 27, 1927 that prize was won by Charles Lindbergh. Decades later, a young man by the name of Peter Diamandis heard this story and decided to create something radical… a vision that would send him into space.

In 1996, the first X PRIZE was formally announced. Backed by the Ansari family, the X PRIZE was…

“A prize with a goal that sat at the intersection of audacious and achievable…26 teams from 7 countries spent 100 million dollars [in total]” for a 10 million dollar prize. With the success of SpaceShipOne, we changed the paradigm that spaceflight was just for governments…and we changed government regulation in the process.”

Since the maiden flight of SpaceShipOne on October 4, 2004, there has been more than $1.5 billion dollars in public and private expenditure in support of the private spaceflight industry. This story is Peter Diamandis’ vision.

The X PRIZE Today

Now backed by Google co-founders Larry Paige, Sergey Brin and others, the scope of the X PRIZE has expanded dramatically and in some senses become even more ambitious than that original goal “to reach an altitude of 100km, and to do it again within two weeks”. Today the X PRIZE Foundation offers or will be offering prizes in 5 distinct verticals:

• Energy and Environment
• Global Development - wealth creation to combat poverty
• Exploration - space and underwater
• Education
• The Life Sciences

Listening to this, I can’t help but want to turn back the clock and start my schooling all over again. I want to take the right courses and learn the things that I need to so that I can help tackle one of these problems. And I cannot alone in this feeling. Since the Ansari X PRIZE was won, the X PRIZE Foundation have seen an extraordinary amount of interest - interest on the magnitude of “five and a half billion media impressions”. Alas since I cannot go back in time and choose a new course, I will do what I can to promote this and encourage our children to tackle these problems.

Making Incentive Prizes Work

So how does it work?

“When there is a market failure… when things are stuck… when there are entrenched bureaucracies… and when there is a stigma surrounding it - people are saying that ‘this’ cannot be done, that is when these incentive prizes like the X PRIZE work best.”

Do we face this problem in the way we educate our children today? I would say so, and there are many out there who would agree with me. So what can be done?

Making It Work For Education

As I see it the X PRIZE can be leveraged in two different ways to benefit education.

On the one side it can inspire educators and non-educators alike to invent and evolve in order to change the way we educate. The X PRIZE Foundation envisions prizes in two areas:

• Learning technologies: software and platform trials for products/services that dramatically accelerate learning and expand access.
• City competitions: mobilizing new resources and methods to improve early learning or college/work readiness.

Now I don’t know how many of you have read Ender’s Game but part of the training that the protagonist Ender Wiggens undergoes takes place through a computer game based on adaptive digital content. The game continuously assesses Ender’s skill, his interests, and his reactions to customize delivery. So why am I telling you this?

Ender’s Game was written in 1985 - the nascent stages of the personal computer industry. Orson Scott Card, the author, imagined an educational computer game like the one envisioned by the X PRIZE a decade before the X PRIZE was born. We live in a time now where his fictional visions can become a reality. We live in a time where sci-fiction can become… and does become reality. As educators we need to realize this, and we need to hold on to that vision because unless we do, we will not change the way our kids learn.

Additionally, the X PRIZE can inspire our students, just as it inspires us. Some of the competitions being presented by the X PRIZE Foundation may take decades to come to fruition. And they can serve as long term objectives for the children growing up today.

Who knows… maybe one of your students will win a billion dollars and save our planet in the process. It is our job to make sure they realize that this dream is possible.

Listen to the full podcast below. Click here to return to the top.

Download X PRIZE Founder Peter Diamandis Speaks About Highly Leveraged Incentive Driven Competitions

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But video games have moved well beyond entertainment. From addictions, to ADD therapy, to providing comfort during economic recessions and depressions, video games are playing an increasingly active role in defining us.

With the role of video games growing in importance, is it really any surprise to think that education will have to follow suit? I don’t think so. Video games as education have existed for as long as I have been breathing. Growing up I played Number Crunchers, Math Blaster, Oregon Trail, and US Presidents to name a few. Even games that I wouldn’t have considered educational at the time contain educational value (Sim City) according to Mark Prensky. Simulations (like Sim City) were once “the province of gamers, scientists, and the military, [but today] has emerged as a huge buzzword in training.” Take for example the flight simulator. The “flight simulator was originally conceived as an entertainment device for fairs. Nevertheless, the flight simulator is [now] acknowledged as a revolution in learning and training [by the military and commercial flight schools].”

The real question is will games ever be accepted by those who need to accept it - the teachers and parents? That is a much more difficult question to answer. According to a 2007 survey conducted by Project Tomorrow we have some work to do in this area.

Among the survey findings:

• More than half of students in grades 3 through 12 believe educational gaming would help them learn.
• Only 16% of teachers, 15% of administrators and 19% of parents are on board today - although there was significantly more support for further exploration of the potential.
• And 11% of teachers say they’re already using video games in class, no matter how much you roll your eyes.

To download the full report by Project Tomorrow click the link below.

Speak Up: 2007 National Findings

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- Barack Obama

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What I have found promising, though, is the fact that they have begun to personalize their blogs. As I mentioned on Playing with Words - my blog about my experiences with my class - I think that this small step will help them look at writing as something that is enjoyable, rather than as a task. As the weeks progress, we shall see if my assumption is true.

On a slightly different topic, I had a brief conversation with one of my co-workers (and good friend) the other day. And we discussed the possibility of actually integrating a blog into the course description - that is making it a requirement for all the students taking this course, and not just the ones in my class. I personally think that that is a great idea.

But then came the idea to monetize this… make it an optional paid service that parents could enroll their kids into if they wanted to (FYI I work for a for-profit educational institution). While I have no qualms about making money, unless Chungdahm Learning (the academy I work for) can offer something well above what Wordpress or other free blogging platforms offer, then its a cheat.

So to make this service something worth paying for, the platform must have the following options:

• Ability to create individual, customizable blogs - like Wordpress
• Students must have the ability to link to and incorporate outside media - movies, pictures, etc - and also have the freedom to do so
• Must have a Wiki function - this is a great way to have students collaborate on research and share instructional material
• Social Network - allows students to create unique profiles for the purpose of online discussions, commenting, asking for advice, etc
• Forum - allows students to pose questions about homework or continue discussions started in class
• Chat - similar to the functions that are integrated into Facebook or Gmail so that students know who is online at that moment and thus who they can ask questions to or collaborate with on their homework

The only problem that I see is that if you tie a program like this too closely to school, then regardless of the intentions, the students are likely to reject it just because it is school. That is my two-cents. If you have any other suggestions to add to this list, please let me know.

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Although not necessarily an educational technology per se, as a 25 year old uninspired lad who has only very rarely participated in the democratic institutions to which I am entitled, this presents an educational opportunity - the opportunity to become an active citizen. All of a sudden I can participate and interact with others without having to go out of my way to drop in at the City Hall or pay for my dinner with Barack Obama. I can pose my questions and receive my responses on my own time.

Combine Moderator with a Twitter aggregator like Election 2008 and you have a powerful new way of participating in civil society - a virtual civil society. For technophiles like myself this is a wonderful new way to get in touch and stay in touch with the happenings in your community. This has implications for those of us who are too lazy to participate otherwise, but also those of us who cannot participate otherwise because we are living overseas for instance.

So in a nutshell what is Google Moderator?

Moderator is another one of Google’s infamous “20 percent” projects, produced on the 20 percent of Heath’s time that Google allots all of its engineers to work on their own ideas. The simple idea behind Moderator is to offer a public forum in which users can submit questions that they believe should be asked during a specific meeting or event.

- The above was borrowed from David Chartier at Ars Technica

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But there is a lesson to be learned from this. Because what David Rose is discussing is not how to sell an idea or a company, but rather how to inspire trust. And that - inspiring trust - is something that we could all become better at.

Enjoy the video. If you would rather skip to the pitch, follow me to learn to inspire.

Ten Things to Remember About Inspiring Trust

Before we get into this list, you must believe in one thing. If you don’t, you will fail.

You must believe in YOU - you are the most important thing at that moment. If you don’t believe it, why would the people you are talking to? Inspiration begins with confidence.

And now for the list. By order of importance the characteristics you must portray are:

1. Integrity
2. Passion about your idea / ideals
3. Experience ingrained from your past mistakes
4. Knowledge about the your world
5. Skills in everything from technical to marketing to speaking
6. Leadership
7. Commitment to your idea / ideals
8. Vision to change the world
9. Realism to know the limits
10. Ability to Listen so you can learn from others

Back to the top.

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