Laura Weldon recently sent along a link to a new post she has written and posted at Laura Grace Weldon called All Day Every Day Video Game Learning for the readers here to enjoy.
Thanks Laura!
“What civic value do you believe is most essential to being an American?” is this year’s topic for the nation’s largest high school essay contest.
Sponsored by the Bill of Rights Institute, the contest is open to homeschool students as well as those in traditional schools. Last year’s contest drew over 30,000 entries.
Both teachers and students can win cash and other prizes for submitting an essay. A first prize of $5000 cash and an all-expenses paid trip to Washington, D.C. goes to the top essay writer in each of nine regions.
Deadline for entries is 11:59pm EST on December 1, 2009.
For details, tips, and sample essays go to:
Being an American Essay Contest Official Rules and Regulations
Submitted by Linda Aragoni
Metro Homeschool of Blue Springs, Mo., beat 11 other teams to win first place in the BEST (Boosting Engineering, Science and Technology) division the 2009 River Valley BEST Robotics competition Oct. 31 on the University of Arkansas – Fort Smith campus.
Metro also took first place in the Robot Competition.
Metro advances to the Frontier Trails BEST scheduled for Dec. 3-5 where 40 teams from Arkansas, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota will compete.
Apparently the Obama/Duncan team is supporting “open source” educational curriculum for high school and college work. The details are in the Legislative Update from Education Legislative Services.
The president is proposing to invest $500 million over the next 10 years to create world-class online college and high school courses that will be available to all 24/7/365.”
“Colleges, universities, publishers, other institutions and related consortia will be invited to compete to create state-of-the-art online courses that combine high-quality subject matter expertise with the latest advances in cognitive and computer sciences.” “Such courses will enable students to move through the material at their own pace. When students do not understand a particular lesson or concept, carefully designed assessments will identify the gap in their learning. They’ll relearn the material and have another chance to demonstrate mastery.”
“Such an open-source, easily accessible system of robust courses will produce the most profound equalization of access to cutting-edge knowledge and information since the creation of the public library. We will see the creation of new companies, perhaps even entirely new industries, situated squarely in the knowledge sector, which is so crucial to our national and global economic success.”
It does sound like a library situation, which is a robust educational success in communities. This proposal does leave me with some questions. If it’s open source, could this be used by all teens, et al, just as homeschoolers use the infinite number of educational resources that are accounted for in colleges? That’s with the assumption that is wanted by the scholar. A lot of educational authorities’ focus is on a college degree. I’m pleased that our car mechanic knows how our car works (or not) without a degree. Significantly, he loves his job too.
If the federal goverment sinks money into programs, I can’t think of an instance where their sketchy accountability wasn’t also required. So what is the need for more federal monies inserted into the education system, when we already have brilliant minds who are all about open source and passing it along without government ‘help’?
Last month on my blog, I’d mentioned MIT OpenCourseWare program that included all MIT courses this fall.
Open Education – It’s the Learning that Counts
We are working with a combination of the MIT biology and chemistry courses and it is intense. The expertise that is offered with these courses are stunning. For instance, video lectures are offered by Dr. Weinberg (National Medal of Science winner). Our boys also had some interest in How to Stage a Revolution. We have the reading materials, but keep running out of time. Let me also introduce you to TED Talks, if you’re not already familiar.
From the AEP Govermental Relations newsletter again:
The Secretary envisions that colleges and universities would decide whether to grant college credit to students who exhibit “mastery” of the course content and skills. There could be proctored testing centers available to accelerate and accommodate student learning. Professors could use all or only part of the content of these courses in their own classes, says the Secretary, and the Department of Defense would have similar options for use in their classes for military personnel. Students could gain access to these free courses to learn on their own, to explore and successfully complete educational challenges that previously were unimagined.
Is the Obama administration considering being rid of compulsory attendance demands? How awesome would that be? What does the “open” mean to this particular executive branch?
What’s the catch? The federal government money inserted into “open source” seems to be oxymoronic, but I -think- I’m encouraged at an “open source” frame of mind in the White House. It’s worth watching, despite the teacher union accomodations in this administration’s past actions. Teacher unions protect teacher unions, not education.
Politico published an Arne Duncan article October 1st, that contains many of the thoughts and agenda that was quoted above.
Moving College Into the 21st Century
ht to Virtual Meanderings
Submitted by Susan Ryan
Theater cast presents $1,190 to home school
NORTH TONAWANDA—Cast members from Starry Night Theatre’s record- breaking production of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” last weekend presented a check for $1,190 to North Tonawanda Catholic Home School Association President Barb Fronczak after the closing performance in Ghostlight Theatre.
Contributed by Linda Aragoni
