What Is Retirement?

One of my granddaughters and I have had a running joke for the past decade around the word “retirement”.  As a pre-teen, she struggled with the idea that I could “retire” from a full-time job but keep teaching…and then retire from teaching but keep advising doctoral students, and so on. Well, I guess the joke… Read more What Is Retirement?

The Blogs I Read Now

Tomorrow, I once again will be teaching the Northeastern course EDU-6323 – Technology as a Medium for Learning.  This course has gone through a number of changes since I first taught it in 2015. At it’s core is the GRAD-602 course that Jeff Nugent and I taught back at VCU in the last decade.  I… Read more The Blogs I Read Now

Two Questions to My Class

We are starting the second week of an 8-week online graduate course for Northeastern University titled Technology as a Medium for Learning (EDU-6323). During this course, the middle six weeks explore different aspects of edtech, while we read and reflect on the learning science lessons embedded in Michelle Miller’s book Minds Online.  This week, the… Read more Two Questions to My Class

Opportunity Lost

Many have been bemoaning the final loss of the Martian Opportunity Rover, which lost contact last June and was officially declared dead this past week after 15 years roving the Martian landscape. One could say that we lost Opportunity…but it really is a story of what we gained.  It was designed for a three month… Read more Opportunity Lost

New Class New Perspectives

Last year, I was asked to develop a new course for a new Certificate in Catholic School Leadership.  My course is the middle course in a three-course program, and the pilot group started my course this week.  Given that the course focuses on technology, communication, and school improvement, I decided to have my students blog… Read more New Class New Perspectives

A Little b Blogger

Jeff Nugent, now Director of Learning and Applied Innovation at Colgate University, used to talk to Bud Deihl and I over coffee about synchronicity, noting that themes…particularly on the web…seemed to surface at the same time.  The one for me this week was “little b blogging.”  Cogdog started it off for me, noting that “…after… Read more A Little b Blogger

The Next Ten Years

This past week in EDU6323, we explored blogging as an educational process.  My students shared their favorite blogs from Teach 100 and reflected on the fit of blogging in this hyperactive Snapchat world.  For many, they had previously seen blogs as entertaining, but had not considered them as educational.  Some were impressed that niche concerns… Read more The Next Ten Years

Should Students Blog?

During the second week of EDU 6323 – Technology as a Medium for Learning, I had my graduate students examine blogging for learning.  In addition to starting Michelle Miller’s Minds Online, they read Stephen Downes’ Educational Blogging, Henry Jenkins‘ Why Academics Should Blog, Steve Wheeler’s Seven Reasons Teachers Should Blog, Sue Waters‘ Top 10 Ways… Read more Should Students Blog?