March 29th at 1pm Eastern/12pm Central
#LITAchat will discuss XR (eXtended Reality) in libraries.
Join our Twitter conversation about your approach to VR (Virtual Reality) AR (Augmented Reality) and MR (Mixed Reality) for library and campus purposes.
The @ala_lita twitter account will be moderating the chat.
Propaganda, Hate Speech, Violence: The Working Lives Of Facebook’s Content Moderators
March 2, 2019 SCOTT SIMON EMMA BOWMAN
https://www.npr.org/2019/03/02/699663284/the-working-lives-of-facebooks-content-moderators
In a recent article for The Verge titled “The Trauma Floor: The secret lives of Facebook moderators in America,” a dozen current and former employees of one of the company’s contractors, Cognizant, talked to Newton about the mental health costs of spending hour after hour monitoring graphic content.
Perhaps the most surprising find from his investigation, the reporter said, was how the majority of the employees he talked to started to believe some of the conspiracy theories they reviewed.
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more on Facebook in this iMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=Facebook+privacy
What Researchers Want Teachers to Know About Virtual Reality’s Health Risks
By Jenny Abamu Feb 16, 2018
https://www.edsurge.com/news/2018-02-16-what-researchers-want-teachers-to-know-about-virtual-reality-s-health-risks
with Google ramping up sales of its Expeditions Kit, and Facebook giving away 500 free Oculus Rift headsets to schools in Arkansas, the number of teachers using VR tools in U.S. classrooms could jump to more than 15 percent by 2021, predicts Futuresource, a market research firm.
A recent study was done by Children and Virtual Reality, a collaboration between researchers, VR companies, universities and health organizations, found that using VR tools could have significant health impacts on children.
What the researchers found in the third phase of the study, published last October, was that usage of VR headsets could impact a child’s vision, balance and spatial awareness
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more on VR in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=virtual+reality+health
Chief Privacy Officers: The Unicorns of K-12 Education
https://www.edsurge.com/news/2019-02-25-chief-privacy-officers-the-unicorns-of-k-12-education
Last month, the nonprofit Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) published a report arguing schools and districts should go the way of other industries and hire a Chief Privacy Officer to oversee their organization’s privacy policies and practices.
But the reality is that Chief Privacy Officers in K-12 education are about as common as unicorns.
Two years ago, Denver Public Schools created a new role, the Student Data Privacy Officer, after the Colorado legislature passed a law to promote student data privacy and transparency.
5 All-Too-Common Ways Edtech Implementations Fail
https://www.edsurge.com/news/2017-04-06-5-all-too-common-ways-edtech-implementations-fail
End users are too often removed from the decision-making process during procurement. Educators argue that too many products don’t actually meet the needs of teachers or students. Still others worry that it is too easy to implement new and popular technology without considering whether it is research-based and effective.
Only 33 percent of parents surveyed by the Learning Assembly said their child’s school did an excellent job using technology to tailor instruction.
Insufficient Modeling of Best Practices
A survey from Samsung found that 37 percent of teachers say they would love to use technology but don’t know how, and 76 percent say they would like a professional development day dedicated to technology.
implementations should start with the “why” and then address the “how.” Trainings should first model the best pedagogical approach, and how technology fits into this approach to support a learning objective. How to effectively use and troubleshoot the tool itself is also important, but it’s not the only factor.
How teachers integrate technology into their own teaching practices can have a dramatic impact on the results, even when they’re all using the same edtech tool. Videos that focus on scaling and modeling best practices (produced by places like the Teaching Channel and The Learning Accelerator) can help teachers and schools do this.
Teachers face initiative fatigue: They are constantly being asked to implement new programs, integrate new technologies, and add on layers of responsibility.
take the time to learn from the challenges of other schools, and recruit a coalition of the willing.
Real-World Usability Challenges
Relying on multiple devices (remote, clicker, iPad, computer mouse) to launch or navigate technology can be difficult. Additionally, teachers may start to use a tool, only to realize it is not flexible enough to meet their original needs, fit into the constraints of their particular school or classroom, or allow them to integrate their own content or supplemental resources.
The Right Data to Track Progress
Sometimes tech implementations fail because the products themselves don’t have the right depth of data for teachers or a workable interface. And sometimes they fail when eager IT directors lock down hardware and networks for security purposes in a way that makes the tool far less valuable for instructors.
Teachers Are Turning to Podcasts as an Instructional Tool
Students practice reading, writing, interviewing
By Sasha Jones February 11, 2019
Anchor allows users to record and edit podcast episodes, all through an app on their cellphones. The service distributes and uploads episodes to streaming services, such as Spotify and Apple Podcasts, and provides analytics following publication.
“Traditionally, it’s write, write, write, write, write, and if you’re not a strong writer, you may start to think you’re not good at an English class in general.”
Podcasts that require scripts similarly encourage students to explore writing formats that stray from the traditional essay.
“When it’s just my eyes seeing it, it’s one-on-one and I’m the safety net,” Stevens said. “Even when you open it up to their classmates, they realize ‘OK, I’m going to be judged by them,’ and then you open it up to the internet. It’s a big deal.”
Last spring, cinematic arts and broadcast journalism teacher Michael Hernandez introduced his 11th and 12th graders to podcasting to teach them speaking skills that could be necessary for upcoming college or job interview.
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more on podcasts in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=podcast