My son is 9.8 years old and it's time he started working and earning his own money. I had a notion that he should "busk" - which is perform music on the street for tips. There's no doubt in my mind that he would make a ton of money playing the keyboard here in London [...]
John, age 8.5, just hit his one year mark/anniversary since he started Khan Academy's math section. As you can see, he's completed 382 of the 432 skills on the website. There used to be about 300 skills, but Khan keeps adding more and more! In fact, John was most displeased the other day when he [...]
Ever see that book before? It's a classic, I think. That was my father's *bible*. Every time something broke in the house he'd go looking in that book for the answer. Of course, armed with only that and being *knackless*....he really couldn't fix anything! But today a DIY fixer has the greatest resource EVER at [...]
Of course, the title question is rhetorical! Modern technology has always had the capacity to be a mixed bag. For example, nuclear energy....good, but nuclear missiles....well, not so comforting. But exactly how much have the latest and greatest breakthroughs changed education, if at all? For one thing, the internet is an absolute beast. I submit [...]
More than a few people have told me they are having problems doing Khan Academy... So I made another screen-capture tutorial. Hopefully from the video others who haven't even tried it yet can see how terrific the PRACTICE section is. Now Khan is a flash website AND it experiences very, very high traffic. So yes, [...]
Wikipedia defines gamification thusly: Gamification is the use of game design techniques, game thinking and game mechanics to enhance non-game contexts. Typically gamification applies to non-game applications and processes, in order to encourage people to adopt them, or to influence how they are used. Gamification works by making technology more engaging, by encouraging users to [...]
The latest online edu-gold mine we are using is Khan Academy. Many people have heard of it....but few are actually using it right now. And that's a shame because it's become an amazing resource. (Funny what million$ in funding can do!) When it was first highly publicized (by Bill Gates, among others) it was just [...]
He started with basic LEGOS as most boys do. First with small sets, assembled mostly by a parent. Soon he was able to do them on his own. Larger sets came and they too were built solo. Now, at age 7, he's graduated to LEGO Mindstorms - which sync to the computer, are programmable, etc. [...]
Too many of the technological breakthroughs trumpeted in the education field today are for *group learning environments*. Smartboards, Piazza, Blackboard, packaged software... And most educational websites are designed for and marketed to classrooms and over-funded school districts. I would even, to a lesser extent, throw in all the free online lectures proliferating out there as [...]
That young man - Magnus Carlsen - is now 21 years old and has been the best chess player on Earth since he was 19. You can watch him beat 10 players simultaneously, while PLAYING BLIND, here. Many people have labeled him *lazy* and a *natural*....but is that possible? Of course it's not. Magnus just [...]
