Category Archives: Hackathon

Connected Learning Hackathon @ UBC

Yesterday (March 4), I had the privilege to participate in the Connected Learning Hackathon as part of the Sky, Water, Earth project. Here’s the blurb from the website:

Sky, Water, Earth is a collection of informal learning activities that evoke a sense of wonder about the planet we live on and beyond, through astronomy, marine biology, and the intersection between the two. Sky, Water, Earth takes the form of a career preparation initiative for youths aged 17-24 who are interested in the field of science. The initiative encourages youths to follow their passion and through a variety of activities helps them build competencies employers value. Youths who are fully engaged are awarded with unique real-life opportunities that provide additional in-depth experiences and further expand their personal and professional networks. These opportunities bring forward-thinking students closer to success in their academic and professional careers.

More interestingly, from an educational technology perspective, this project ” is a joint initiative between the Faculty of Education at UBC, the Vancouver Aquarium Marine Science Centre, and the HR MacMillan Space Centre. Sky, Water, Earth will be facilitated online using edX Edge and an emerging connected learning website called LRNG.org.”

I think the notion of ‘connected learning’ as a self-curated playlist of learning activities is fascinating, and warrants further study (at least by myself). So I found myself participating in the connected learning hackathon, along with fellow educators to help design and create several lessons for the learning playlist.

Looking forward to following the progress of this project.

What happens at an MIT hackathon

A nice summary video from The Atlantic, that showcases ‘what happens at an MIT hackathon.’ For me, what distinguished this video/event from the other typical coding/tec hackathons is that the event was called Hacking Arts. Their mission was to “ignite entrepreneurship and innovation within the creative arts.” Interestingly, most of the technological artifacts seemed like it would be more commonly found in a makerfaire.

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A recap of 2015 Learning Analytics Hackathon at UBC

I wasn’t able to attend this hackathon last year, but here’s the recap video of the 2-day event in November, 2015.

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