The Cyberlearning Technologies Transforming Education 19
aarondubrow writes: The National Science Foundation funds basic cyberlearning research and since 2011 has awarded roughly 170 grants, totaling more than $120 million, to EdTech research projects around the country. However, NSF's approach to cyber-learning has been different from other public, private and philanthropic efforts. NSF funds compelling ideas, helps rigorously test them and then assists in transitioning the best ideas from research to practice. This article describes several examples of leading cyberlearning projects, from artificial intelligence to augmented reality, that are transforming education.
Past NSF involvement (Score:5, Informative)
For those who can't remember this far back, we have the National Science Foundation to thank for CORE-Plus, SIMMS, The Interactive Mathematics Program, and the Connected Mathematics Project [nsf.gov], along with other curricula otherwise known as "Leftist Math" that really caught on in the late 90's. While their intentions were good, and their involvement in creating new math programs helped reshape much needed reforms in how mathematics was taught, the programs pushed the pendulum too far in the opposite direction. (I'm speaking as a mathematics teacher who instructed students in CORE-Plus and CMP.)
As much as I am frustrated with the current methods of "integrating" technology into classrooms, given their past track record, I'm skeptical as to how the NSF can improve it.
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It's new, therefore it's improved. They go together like military spending and pork.
Women's lib partially responsible for bad schools. (Score:3)
Not that women's lib is a bad thing but before women could get any job they were qualified for many were limited and selected teaching. This means that millions of women that were smart enough to be doctors, lawyers, scientists, or engineers were teachers instead. Now it seems like most teachers are C students at best.
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Hard to believe that teaching isn't an attractive option for a lot of people. What with the mediocre pay, constant and draining self-policing, self-righteous parents who always know better, and general contempt from large sections of society.
"This child is the most precious thing in the world to me. I want you to not only educate, but babysit, exercise, discipline, and ensure a dietary regime. There are about 25 of us who feel the same way. And we all believe our child is the chosen one the legends speak of
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The 12 Weeks of UNPAID vacation a year.
The right to take home piles of student papers to grade long into the evening. After which you get to
do lesson planning.
The healthplans that are no better then most anyone can get now that ObamaCare is in place.
The chance to be fired because the whole class was getting over the flu on the day that
the standardized tests were being administered.
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The End of Teaching (Score:2)
NSF's approach to cyber-learning (Score:2)
NSF's approach to cyber-learning seems to be mostly about pushing the current administration's agenda. Look at the projects - monitoring pollution, cross cultural training, environmental awareness, teaching girls to program, etc.
Those are reasonable subjects to be discussed in a classroom, but I'd prefer to see the projects identified for what they are rather than being funded as cyber-learning research.
What the fuck is "cyberlearning"? (Score:1)
Seriously, let's think about what particular kind of subhuman moron would come up with a word like that.
First, we have the "cyber" prefix, which is a reliable indicator that the person using it knows nothing about computers, computing, networks, electronics, software, math, or, well, much of anything. This was popularized by know-nothing Beltway blowhards.
Then we have the idiotic use of "learning" to mean teaching. This one comes from useless corporate drones.
These are not two great tastes that taste great