Activity Seven: Invest or not to invest
This is a space to discuss your thoughts on whether or not it would be viable for your school, district, business or yourself to invest in the venture selected for the SWOT analysis and explain why.
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joeltremblay 9:45 am on October 23, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I’m actually going to suggest Luminosity to my SEA’s for some of the more challenging students. It might be a way to improve their autonomy and abilities since some of them spend a lot of time doing similar activities on their computers.
ETEC522grp8 3:33 pm on October 23, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I would love to hear what your SEA thinks of the idea, as I think Lumosity’s combination of neuroscience and game based learning would definitely help challenging students with their learning.
adi 12:00 pm on October 23, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Though the MEC is not free, it is not that expensive given what it provides in exchange; last I heard the monthly licence was around $25.00 dollars. For this price, schools have access to a huge database of exercises, activities, WebQuests, graded ‘The Guradian’ articles, games, grammar reference and practice, listening activities, IELTS, TOEFL, and Cambridge Exams practice, the Macmillan English Dictionary, and a personal word list the student creates and personal gradebook. Teachers can monitor students work in great detail, e.g. when they first tried out an activity, their first and last score etc. Teachers can also create courses using the database.
In short, it’s a lot of resources in one place, and unlike many online resources, it is authored by experts in the field and supervised and edited for quality.
ETEC522grp8 3:43 pm on October 23, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
That’s a really good price to pay for the contents you get. I was thinking the price tag was in the hundreds.
It is too bad that MEC is not available to people outside institutions, and I do wonder why?
– James
jkotler 2:44 am on October 24, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I am not familiar with MEC but it sounds like a really great resource. Have you ever used it before? Also, I am interested to learn more about it; can you provide a link for it?
jhodi 11:13 am on October 24, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
This is very interesting, I had not heard of it previously. It seems like for what you get, the price is very good! Does it provide resources for all grade levels? I am very intrigued by the idea that it is all created by experts in the field, because as you note, not all online resources are.
pcollins 2:07 pm on October 25, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I always have the concern, that even though for the moment… the price appears quite reasonable. What will happen to this resource if the school does invest it’s time heavily into putting it into production and then they face a price jump? It’s one of the issues that I have with moodle…. concerns about when they do decide to charge, and what will that charge be.
PC
visramn 10:00 pm on October 28, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
i think monitoring is a key component. The fact that this tool has that capacity makes it a lot less riskier to use with students.
Nureen
tomwhyte1 10:52 am on October 24, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
The venture I selected was Mathletics, something that as our schools Math/Science Department Head we have begun to explore. For as a department, we are aware that for some students, our multiple approaches are not meeting their needs, regardless if they are at the low or high end of the spectrum for ability.
Therefore, we explored two services and decided upon Mathletics. We are going through the process of purchasing 10 student accounts, to provide a more personal learning environment for students that either require more remedial training or more advanced work, for Mathletics allow you to go 6 grade levels above and below where the student is currently at.
It is our hope, that those students selected for this trial run will find some benefit in what we are providing.
Thoughts?
Suhayl Patel 2:15 pm on October 24, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Mathletics seems interesting. I’ve heard about it a few times but never tried it myself. From the looks of it, it seems like a mesh between Khan Academy and the gamification of learning. Are there specific students you are going to target with those 10 accounts?
tomwhyte1 10:15 am on October 26, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
We are hoping to try this service with 5 students who need assistance to bring their grade level up (easy group to identify, education does an excellent job identifying this area), and with 5 students who are working significantly beyond grade level (education needs to do a better job identifying this group, as most themselves do not want that recognition).
Hope this helps.
ETEC522grp8 9:07 pm on October 24, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi tomwhyte1,
Can you share with us the other choice that was being compared to Mathletics and some of the main factors you considered when deciding between the two platforms?
– James
tomwhyte1 10:16 am on October 26, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
We were originally wanting to try 5 accounts of Mathletics, and 5 accounts of IXL to compare the services. Unfortunately, IXL could not accomodate our request of only purchasing 5 accounts. Therefore, we went with Mathletics for all 10.
pcollins 2:02 pm on October 25, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Tom,
I can see the affordances of Mathletics with certain students. I am wondering however, how specific students will be selected for the trial and how it will unroll in the classroom. Will these students be seperated from their classmates to focus on developing their math skills (perhaps under the guidance of the Learning Assistance Room) or will the program be implemented to help advanced students jump further into math while their class continues with the status quo?
tomwhyte1 10:18 am on October 26, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
The classroom teacher would identify students that they feel would benefit from an alternative approach. Then, with the classroom teacher, grade level admin, learning coach, and myself we would discuss if this would be the best option for that student.
As for what it might look like in class. Our thoughts were, that the student would still receive regular classroom instruction, but when students were working on assignments, those identified students would access one of our netbooks and complete lessons and assignments through Mathletics.
Thoughts?
ETEC522grp8 11:15 pm on October 26, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Wow, there are a lot of people involved there! I always am hesitant to “pull’ students from classes before the lessons. There are so many contextual elements that a (good) teacher presents within any lesson, that can help a student understand content, not to mention questions from peers that arise. Did these reasons affect that decision for when to use it, or were there others?
jhodi 11:07 am on October 24, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I feel as though creating or changing a current school into a School of One school could be a very large task. Within my school board, to develop a new school for this purpose would require first of all the lessons to be created based on curriculum and different lessons to be created based on different learning styles and needs. After these were created, an algorithm would need to be determined to place students, and teachers would need to be placed according to their strengths and teaching abilities. Students would also need to be assessed for skill level and learning preferences. I also imagine that it would take some time for students to become accustomed to this new type of school and learning style.
As I work for a larger school board, I would not say that this would be impossible, but it would most likely be a several year project, since creating the lesson bank could take a considerable amount of time on its own. Overall, I like the idea, but it would be a large undertaking.
ETEC522grp8 9:22 pm on October 24, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I do wonder how the services, contents and infrastructure that the School of One provides differ from its competitors in this market..?
kstackhouse 6:48 am on October 25, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I also looked at School of One. I think that in a large district this is not a realistic venture, at this time. As you mention it would be a transition that would take a considerable amount of time. The initial costs and change from a traditional approach would be a tough sell. I think this type of program would be more likely to be found in a private school rather than in a large district.
Doug Connery 9:57 pm on October 24, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I selected Experiential Learning for the SWOT as this example seemed the most appropriate for the technical/business post secondary environment that I work in. A great example similar to this that I have seen work well are business case competitions. Here students in groups of four are given a business case to solve and then are locked down for 10 hours researching and creating a solution. The next day the groups present to a panel of judges, one of which owns the business with the problem and the panel decides on first, second and third.
ETEC522grp8 11:13 pm on October 27, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
That seems to be quite an intense approach to problem based learning, but I suppose that’s how the business world is like.
Thanks for sharing!
James
avninder 10:11 am on October 25, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I’m not sure that experiential learning can be called a venture per se. There is no IT software that has to be purchased or any other large capital investment that has to be made. From a business perspective, the main downfall is the time spent learning which could otherwise be used being ‘productive’. I think this makes EL ideal for new hires as they would spend a lot of time after they are hired training on the job anyway. This short term unproductive phase will develop employees as knowledgeable and capable.
manny 5:49 pm on October 26, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
My SWOT analysis was conducted on Lumosity. If I was in charge of allocating budget funds from a school districts perspective I would not invest in this venture. From an economies of scale standpoint, it is quite simply too expensive to cover every student in the district. If Lumosity had a bulk usage licensing agreement, my mind may change depending on the parameters of the contract.
From an individual investors standpoint, I would definitely consider investing in this venture. The billing is set up in such a way that after a set amount of users, you are guaranteeing a cash flow into the company. The overhead is low and I would think that a majority of the expenses are allocated towards research, most of which has been conducted already. Companies such as this have enormous growth potential and must be managed with the long term in mind.
Manny
melissaayers 7:51 am on October 27, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Since I do not work at an educational institute I can not answer the question as to whether I would invest in this venture (Smart Sparrow Adaptive eLearning Platform) for my school or district.
However, if I was a student of medicine, nursing or science I would lobby my teachers and school to consider investigating further the feasibility of introducing this platform at my learning institute. As part of my SWOT investigation I was not able to find out what the cost involved in using this platform (I needed to request a quote via their website to gain an idea) therefore further investigation and feasibility analysis would be required. As well the training and time required for teachers to be able to create content for this platform would need to be considered.
Eva Ziemsen 2:20 pm on October 27, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
If SOCRAIT was available, I would immediately make use of it for students, from day one in our film program. I would say, as I already do, learning is actually the responsibility of the student. I believe SOCRAIT would help empower students who want to be in charge of their learning, as a complement to a set curriculum. Therefore, I would suggest that they have on-going questions that they must answer throughout the three years in our program. In specific courses, I would ask them to incorporate SOCRAIT into their research. I believe SOCRAIT would be easy to incorporate, as long as there was a free version, which Andersen alluded to. SOCRAIT would help educators help students be more critical and self-guided in their learning.
ETEC522grp8 11:28 pm on October 27, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Check out Andersen’s take on Google Badges:
https://plus.google.com/114298145416183414351/posts/9jQx7S98EMf
James
teacherben 4:26 am on October 28, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Google shut down Google News Badges on October 15th.
ETEC522grp8 8:48 pm on October 28, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
No wonder I couldn’t find the badges on Google News. I wonder why they took it down?
C. Ranson 9:52 am on October 28, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I am going to introduce Lumosity to my students; this is a really interesting site that I can relate to. We recently attended a presentation on Brain Plasticity; I initially didn’t realize that Lumosity was a training program based on this theory. I am going subscribe and ensure compliance to see what the outcome is and then it would be reasonable to offer an opinion to my students and whether it would be worth investing time and money into. Thanks for sharing this site.
Catherine
visramn 9:56 pm on October 28, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
My swot analysis was on Khan academy. I found that the major factor that would draw educators to use this tool and to encourage the adoption of this tool in their school is that it is free and that it can be run from any computer with Internet access. It also has many resources and caters to all type of learners because of its multiple means of delivery for math content it offers instant feedback tend teachers can monitor students progress and how effectivley they have been using this tool Students can access this tool from anywhere and parents can view their child work and progress at any time. All of these factors indicate that this tool has many positives. I personally use this tool with my students already and believe it is a sound venture that deserves to be persued. Yes there are other products out there but this tool has proven to e successful and it’s free.
Nureen