Tag: elearning

  • Learning in hallways (with APIs)

    I can’t let Clay Shirky’s piece, Napster, Udacity and the Academy, go un-commented-on: Open systems are open. For people used to dealing with institutions that go out of their way to hide their flaws, this makes these systems look terrible at first. But anyone who has watched a piece of open source software improve, or […]

  • Access to free courses is a freedom of speech issue

    The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the State of Minnesota is requiring any degree-granting educational institution providing an online course to pay a registration fee: Tricia Grimes, a policy analyst for the state’s Office of Higher Education, said letters had been sent to all postsecondary institutions known to be offering courses in Minnesota. She […]

  • Mission: Explore puts the fun back into checking in

    For the past few years, my friend Helen Steer has been working with the Geography Collective on Mission: Explore, a new way to promote exploration and curiosity: Mission:Explore is a game, but not as you know it. There are two aims to the game. One is to collect points and unlock rewards. The other is […]

  • “What it means to be a school is now up for grabs.”

    Education, for me, is still the most exciting field that open source is opening up. It’s a vital part of any civilized society, and so it seems right that the software that helps participants teach and learn should be open. I have no qualms about charging private institutions like Stanford, say, the six figure license […]