September 14, 2012
Dell Foundation Case Studies Examine Blended Learning. The Michael & Susan Dell Foundation released its first case study on blended learning in five charter management organizations across the US. The first case study examined a “station rotation” method of blended learning at KIPP LA charter school and found the school had significant improvements in literacy assessments, but experienced some technological difficulties.
YouTube Launches ‘American Idol’ Search for the Best Teachers. YouTube is conducting a competition for the best video lessons, which will be judged by online educators such as Sal Khan. The goal is to find “inspiring online educators…from all walks of life…and to find the next generation of educational YouTube stars.”
New National School Speed Test hopes to help all K-12 students get effective digital learning. NPO EducationSuperHighway will be evaluating the state of internet connections in K-12 schools across the US in order to determine which are not reaching 100MB+ of broadband. K-12 schools can test their internet capabilities individually or with the help of NSST and determine which are lagging behind. All results will be open to the individual institutions, districts, and state departments of education.
A Checklist For Using Google’s New eLearning Course Builder. Google ‘s Course Builder software is an opensource software allowing users to create courses on any subject. Google’s first course, “Power Searching with Google” had over 155,000 people sign up and 20,000 complete the course is useful for experimenting with online learning structures and tools, as well as hosting individual courses.