The idea that we learn better when taught via our preferred modality or “learning style” – such as visually, orally, or by doing – is not supported by evidence. Nonetheless the concept remains hugely popular, no doubt in part because learning via our preferred style can lead us to feel like we’ve learned more, even though we haven’t.
For a new paper in Anatomical Sciences Education, a pair of researchers at Indiana University School of Medicine have conducted just such an investigation with hundreds of undergrads. Once again however the findings do not support the learning styles concept, reinforcing its reputation among mainstream psychologists as little more than a myth.
one of the most popular online learning styles surveys, the VARK. Taken by millions of people worldwide, the VARK categorises students according to how much they prefer to learn visually, via auditory information, through reading and writing, or through kinaesthetics (by doing or by practical example).
Husmann and O’Loughlin don’t pull any punches in their conclusion. Their findings, they write – especially when considered in the context of past research – “provide strong evidence that instructors and students should not be promoting the concept of learning styles for studying and/or for teaching interventions. Thus, the adage of ‘I can’t learn subject X because I am a visual learner’ should be put to rest once and for all.”
The annual school superintendent hunting season is open, and as usual, about a dozen cities are jockeying to woo an ever-shrinking pool of qualified candidates for a demanding job that requires one part managerial skills, one part political savvy and one part education-policy acumen for a tenure that, on average, lasts barely more than three years.
To be sure, big-city school superintendents are paid handsomely. In 2014, the salaries of superintendents at cities that are part of the Council for the Great City Schools ranged from $99,000 to $339,000, in addition to platinum health care, pensions, life insurance and other related benefits. Most superintendents of the biggest school districts clear $300,000 easily, with the job of helming New York City schools drawing upward of $500,000.
“Anybody who gets into this knows full well that the demands are extremely high,” Casserly says. “The context in which you do this job now is probably more difficult now than it’s ever been. It does give some people pause.”
Here’s how to evaluate the potential for mobile solutions
Before they set foot in their first class, incoming college students face a maze of requirements and resources that will be critical to their success. So-called “student supports” abound. Yet forty percent of first-year studentsdon’t return the following year, and a growing number report information overload as they navigate campus life amid newfound independence.
The nine in 10 undergraduates who own smartphones are probably familiar with the xkcd about it. College-aged Americans check their devices more than 150 times per day. So it should be no surprise that a growing body of research suggests that mobile solutions can play a critical role in enhancing the student experience.
1. Is the mobile app native?
We’ve all had the frustrating experience of using a smartphone to navigate a page that was designed for a computer. But when designing native mobile apps, developers start with the small screen, which leads to simpler, cleaner platforms that get rid of the clutter of the desktop browsing experience.
As smartphones overtake laptops and desktops as the most popular way for young people to get online, native design is critical for universities to embrace.
2. Is there a simple content management system?
It’s also critical to explore whether mobile apps integrate with an institution’s existing LMS, CMS, and academic platforms. The most effective apps will allow you to draw upon and translate existing content and resources directly into the mobile experience. My note: this is why it is worth experimenting with alternatives to LMS, such as Facebook Groups: they allow ready-to-use SIMPLE mobile interface.
3. Does it allow you to take targeted action?
At-risk or disengaged students often require more targeted communication and engagement which, if used effectively, can prevent them falling into those categories in the first place.
Unlike web-based tools, mobile apps should not only communicate information, but also generate insights and reports, highlighting key information into how students use the platform.
4. Does it offer communication and social networking opportunities?
Teenagers who grew up with chatbots and Snapchat expect instant communication to be part of any online interaction. Instead of making students toggle between the student affairs office and conversations with advisors, mobile platforms that offer in-app messaging can streamline the experience and keep users engaged.
As online education expands, students are bringing old-fashioned cheating into the digital age
According to the latest report from Babson Survey Research Group, nearly 6.5 million American undergraduates now take at least one course online
1. Listen to students and faculty. Every college, university, or online-learning provider has a different approach to online learning. At Indiana University, where more than 30 percent of students take at least one online course, the online education team has launched Next.IU, an innovative pilot program to solicit feedback from the campus community before making any major edtech decision. By soliciting direct feedback from students and faculty, institutions can avoid technical difficulties and secure support before rolling out the technology campus-wide.
2. Go mobile. Nine in 10 undergraduates own a smartphone, and the majority of online students complete some coursework on a mobile device. Tapping into the near-ubiquity of mobile computing on campus can help streamline the proctoring and verification process. Rather than having to log onto a desktop, students can use features like fingerprint scan and facial recognition that are already integrated into most smartphones to verify their identity directly from their mobile device.
For a growing number of students, mobile technology is the most accessible way to engage in online coursework, so mobile verification provides not only a set of advanced security tools, but also a way for universities to meet students where they are.
3. Learn from the data. Analytical approaches to online test security are still in the early stages. Schools may be more susceptible to online “heists” if they are of a certain size or administer exams in a certain way, but institutions need data to benchmark against their peers and identify pain points in their approach to proctoring.
In an initial pilot with 325,000 students, for instance, we found that cheating rose and fell with the seasons—falling from 6.62 percent to 5.49 percent from fall to spring, but rising to a new high of 6.65 percent during the summer.
Rumours of the switch contributed to a 6% drop in Intel’s share price over the course of Monday, adding specific pain to a general collapse in tech stocks caused by fears of oncoming regulation in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandalat Facebook.
As Apple has grown into the largest company in the world, it has been able to unlock economies of scale that are not reliant on third-parties.
Digital storytelling uses video, audio, social media, blogging and other tools to convey ideas and information effectively. The emphasis is on empowering students to create authentic products that they can share with others beyond the classroom walls, and to allow for audience interaction and feedback.
why should we inspire students to be digital storytellers?
Requires critical thinking: Creating an interdisciplinary product from scratch requires high level thinking skills like evaluating evidence, editing and curation, and production timelines. Digital stories often use multiple skills like writing, public speaking, photography, design and collaboration in a single project which makes them ideal for practicing skills learned other units or classes.
Authentic projects have impact: Creating real-world, impactful products that students share with an audience beyond the classroom is one of the best ways to enhance motivation and increase quality.
Places focus on writing: A picture is worth a thousand words, and video is 30 photos a second. It has its own grammar and style, but concepts of content, structure, tone and audience impact are just as important in multimedia as they are for an essay. Scripts, voiceovers and interview questions emphasize traditional writing skills and are the backbone of all multimedia projects.
Develops digital citizens: What to post online, when and how are all important questions for our students to learn to answer. Require them to comment on others’ work and develop etiquette for online posts and feedback. Rather than being afraid of the internet, embrace it to teach digital citizenship.
Students can add to digital portfolios: All student work can be compiled into a digital portfolio that they can use to promote themselves for jobs/internships
How to Educate Digital Storytellers
1. Focus on content, not the tools
2. Take it to the next “SAMR level.” The SAMR model is a way to gauge how deeply and effectively you use technology (Salvador Dali)
Publisher / Organization: Athabasca University Press
Year founded: 2000
Description: The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning disseminates original research, theory, and best practice in open and distributed learning worldwide.
Publisher / Organization: The University of Illinois at Chicago- University Library
Year founded: 1996
Description: First Monday is among the very first open access journals in the EdTech field. The journal’s subject matter encompasses the full range of Internet issues, including educational technologies, social media and web search. Contributors are urged via author guidelines to use simple explanations and less complex sentences and to be mindful that a large proportion of their readers are not part of academia and do not have English as a first language.
Academic Management: University of Catalonia (UOC)
Year founded: 2004
Description: This journal aims to: provide a vehicle for scholarly presentation and exchange of information between professionals, researchers and practitioners in the technology-enhanced education field; contribute to the advancement of scientific knowledge regarding the use of technology and computers in higher education; and inform readers about the latest developments in the application of information technologies (ITs) in higher education learning, training, research and management.
Description: Online Learning promotes the development and dissemination of new knowledge at the intersection of pedagogy, emerging technology, policy, and practice in online environments. The journal has been published for over 20 years as the Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks (JALN) and recently merged with the Journal of Online Learning and Teaching (JOLT).
Publisher / Organization: International Forum of Educational Technology & Society
Year founded:1998
Description: Educational Technology & Society seeks academic articles on the issues affecting the developers of educational systems and educators who implement and manage these systems. Articles should discuss the perspectives of both communities – the programmers and the instructors. The journal is currently still accepting submissions for ongoing special issues, but will cease publication in the future as the editors feel that the field of EdTech is saturated with high quality publications.
Description: The Australasian Journal of Educational Technology aims to promote research and scholarship on the integration of technology in tertiary education, promote effective practice, and inform policy. The goal is to advance understanding of educational technology in post-school education settings, including higher and further education, lifelong learning, and training.
DESCRIPTION: The Internet and Higher Education is devoted to addressing contemporary issues and future developments related to online learning, teaching, and administration on the Internet in post-secondary settings. Articles should significantly address innovative deployments of Internet technology in instruction and report on research to demonstrate the effects of information technology on instruction in various contexts in higher education.
Publisher / Organization: British Educational Research Association (BERA)
YEAR FOUNDED: 1970
DESCRIPTION: The journal publishes theoretical perspectives, methodological developments and empirical research that demonstrate whether and how applications of instructional/educational technology systems, networks, tools and resources lead to improvements in formal and non-formal education at all levels, from early years through to higher, technical and vocational education, professional development and corporate training.
Description: Computers & Education aims to increase knowledge and understanding of ways in which digital technology can enhance education, through the publication of high quality research, which extends theory and practice.
Description: TechTrends targets professionals in the educational communication and technology field. It provides a vehicle that fosters the exchange of important and current information among professional practitioners. Among the topics addressed are the management of media and programs, the application of educational technology principles and techniques to instructional programs, and corporate and military training.
Description: Advances in technology and the growth of e-learning to provide educators and trainers with unique opportunities to enhance learning and teaching in corporate, government, healthcare, and higher education. IJEL serves as a forum to facilitate the international exchange of information on the current research, development, and practice of e-learning in these sectors.
Led by an Editorial Review Board of leaders in the field of e-Learning, the Journal is designed for the following audiences: researchers, developers, and practitioners in corporate, government, healthcare, and higher education. IJEL is a peer-reviewed journal.
Description: JCMST is a highly respected scholarly journal which offers an in-depth forum for the interchange of information in the fields of science, mathematics, and computer science. JCMST is the only periodical devoted specifically to using information technology in the teaching of mathematics and science.
Just as researchers build reputation over time that can be depicted (in part) through quantitative measures such as h-index and i10-index, journals are also compared based on the number of citations they receive..
Description: The Journal of Interactive Learning Research (JILR) publishes papers related to the underlying theory, design, implementation, effectiveness, and impact on education and training of the following interactive learning environments: authoring systems, cognitive tools for learning computer-assisted language learning computer-based assessment systems, computer-based training computer-mediated communications, computer-supported collaborative learning distributed learning environments, electronic performance support systems interactive learning environments, interactive multimedia systems interactive simulations and games, intelligent agents on the Internet intelligent tutoring systems, microworlds, virtual reality based learning systems.
Description: JEMH is designed to provide a multi-disciplinary forum to present and discuss research, development and applications of multimedia and hypermedia in education. It contributes to the advancement of the theory and practice of learning and teaching in environments that integrate images, sound, text, and data.
Publisher / Organization: Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education (SITE)
Year founded: 1997
Description: JTATE serves as a forum for the exchange of knowledge about the use of information technology in teacher education. Journal content covers preservice and inservice teacher education, graduate programs in areas such as curriculum and instruction, educational administration, staff development instructional technology, and educational computing.
Publisher / Organization: Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE)
YEAR FOUNDED: 2015
DESCRIPTION: The Journal of Online Learning Research (JOLR) is a peer-reviewed, international journal devoted to the theoretical, empirical, and pragmatic understanding of technologies and their impact on primary and secondary pedagogy and policy in primary and secondary (K-12) online and blended environments. JOLR is focused on publishing manuscripts that address online learning, catering particularly to the educators who research, practice, design, and/or administer in primary and secondary schooling in online settings. However, the journal also serves those educators who have chosen to blend online learning tools and strategies in their face-to-face classroom.
The most commonly used index to measure the relative importance of journals is the annual Journal Citation Reports (JCR). This report is published by Clarivate Analytics (previously Thomson Reuters).
SCImago Journal Rank (SJR indicator) measures the influence of journals based on the number of citations the articles in the journal receive and the importance or prestige of the journals where such citations come from. The SJR indicator is a free journal metric which uses an algorithm similar to PageRank and provides an open access alternative to the journal impact factor in the Web of Science Journal Citation Report. The portal draws from the information contained in the Scopus database (Elsevier B.V.).
Introduced by Google in 2004, Scholar is a freely accessible search engine that indexes the full text or metadata of scholarly publications across an array of publishing formats and disciplines.
Introduced by Elsevier in 2004, Scopus is an abstract and citation database that covers nearly 18,000 titles from more than 5,000 publishers. It offers journal metrics that go beyond just journals to include most serial titles, including supplements, special issues and conference proceedings. Scopus offers useful information such as the total number of citations, the total number of articles published, and the percent of articles cited.
Anne-Wil Harzing:
“Citations are not just a reflection of the impact that a particular piece of academic work has generated. Citations can be used to tell stories about academics, journals and fields of research, but they can also be used to distort stories”.
Harzing, A.-W. (2013). The publish or perish book: Your guide to effective and responsible citation analysis. http://harzing.com/popbook/index.htm
ResearchGate is a social networking site for scientists and researchers to share papers, ask and answer questions, and find collaborators. The community was founded in May 2008. Today it has over 14 million members.
Google Scholar allows users to search for digital or physical copies of articles, whether online or in libraries. It indexes “full-text journal articles, technical reports, preprints, theses, books, and other documents, including selected Web pages that are deemed to be ‘scholarly. It comprises an estimated 160 million documents.
Academia.edu is a social-networking platform for academics to share research papers. You can upload your own work, and follow the updates of your peers. Founded in 2008, the network currently has 59 million users, and adding 20 million documents.
The ORCHID (Open Researcher and Contributor ID) is a nonproprietary alphanumeric code to uniquely identify scientific and other academic authors and contributors. It provides a persistent identity for humans, similar to content-related entities on digital networks that utilize digital object identifiers (DOIs). The organization offers an open and independent registry intended to be the de facto standard for contributor identification in research and academic publishing.
The Scopus Author Identifier assigns a unique number to groups of documents written by the same author via an algorithm that matches authorship based on a certain criteria. If a document cannot be confidently matched with an author identifier, it is grouped separately. In this case, you may see more than one entry for the same author.
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more on metrics in this iMS blog
My note: what about the quest for consensus? A former library director claimed as foremost goal to improve the work of the librarians – consensus. To the point, when I had to write the library director: consensus in this library means the codification of mediocrity.
A recent study published in Applied Psychology has now confirmed that a collaborative work environment can make top performers–the innovators and hard-workers–feel miserable and socially isolated.
The problem is that rather than seeing a top performer as a role models, mediocre employees tend to see them as threats, either to their own position in the company or to their own feelings of self-worth.
Rather than improving their own performance, mediocre employees socially isolate top performers, spread nasty rumors about them, and either sabotage, or attempt to steal credit for, the top performers’ work. As the study put it: “Cooperative contexts proved socially disadvantageous for high performers.”
This is not to say that teamwork is a bad thing, per se. Indeed, most complex projects require a team to successfully complete. For teams to be effective, though, they need leaders who can swiftly squelch any attempt to isolate or denigrate a top performer.
