Weekly Bookmarks (1/8/12)

  • Project Management for Instructional DesignersStudents in David Wiley’s Project Management class remixed a textbook with an open license to customize it for instructional designers. They added new examples, photos, video interviews, and assessments. See the blog post for information on the project: http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/2119

    tags: instructionaldesign projectmanagement opensource

  • Summary of a series of posts on LinkedIn connection myths, debunking the idea that indiscriminately connecting to thousands of people is valuable.

    tags: linkedin networking

  • eLearning Learning’s calculated top blog posts for 2011

    tags: e-learning blog lcbq informallearning

  • List of open source applications for creating e-learning. Most of these aren’t specifically designed for creating online learning, but can be used that way. The list is divided into desktop software like Audacity and CamStudio and server software like Moodle and MediaWiki.

    tags: e-learning opensource moodle

  • A physics professor at Harvard discusses the improvements to learning results when he stopped lecturing and started using small group discussions and peer learning. He’s using a more engaging and interactive way to teach even though he has large classes with 100+ students.

    tags: highered instructionaldesign engagement

    • At a recent class, the students — nearly 100 of them — are in small groups discussing a question. Three possible answers to the question are projected on a screen. Before the students start talking with one another, they use a mobile device to vote for their answer. Only 29 percent got it right. After talking for a few minutes, Mazur tells them to answer the question again.

      This time, 62 percent of the students get the question right. Next, Mazur leads a discussion about the reasoning behind the answer. The process then begins again with a new question. This is a method Mazur calls “peer Instruction.” He now teaches all of his classes this way.

      “What we found over now close to 20 years of using this approach is that the learning gains at the end of the semester nearly triple,” he says.

    • Mazur says the key is to get them to do the assigned reading — what he calls the “information-gathering” part of education — before they come to class.

      “In class, we work on trying to make sense of the information,” Mazur says. “Because if you stop to think about it, that second part is actually the hardest part. And the information transfer, especially now that we live in an information age, is the easiest part.”

  • Common networking mistakes. The suggested strategy is to give before you take: “Giving is the only way to establish a real connection and relationship.”

    tags: career networking

    • Here’s what not to do when you’re trying to expand or leverage your network:

      1. Try to take before you give.

    • 2. Assume others should care about your needs.
    • 3. Care about others first; then, and only then, will they truly care back.
    • 4. Assume tools create connections.
    • 5. Reach too high.
    • The “status” level of your connections is irrelevant. All that matters is whether you can help each other reach your goals.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.