Hello everyone and welcome to the Synap Blog! We’re incredibly excited to launch Synap later this year. In the meantime we wanted to share some information on what it is and what it’s going to achieve. Synap is an online education platform that uses insights in neuroscience to help people to learn more in less The post The Surprising Neuroscience Behind How We Learn appeared first on Synap.

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We are happy to announce Acrobatiq’s first Intelligent Courseware available for faculty to use in courses starting January 2014. If you teach Introduction to Psychology, Introduction to Biology, Probability & Statistics, Statistical Reasoning, Anatomy & Physiology or STEM Readiness, I invite you to sign up and explore our courseware on your own, or schedule a demo with one of my colleagues. You may be asking yourself, "Who is Acrobatiq and what exactly is courseware? Acrobatiq (Ac-ro-bat-ic) is not just another ed tech/adaptive learning start up. We’re in the unusual position of being a new company with a long history. Backed by Carnegie Mellon, we’re building upon the work of its Open Learning Initiative, a pioneer in online learning. Our Intelligent Courseware design is based on 10+ years of research, and tested in hundreds of classrooms. A simple way to think about courseware is that it’s like a textbook, only smarter.  Courseware: Contains content you assign students to work on outside of class. Covers all the topics in your course. Includes the reading that a textbook covers. Complements your teaching. What makes courseware intelligent? Unlike a textbook, Intelligent Courseware is a more thorough and integrated learning solution that pulls together disparate parts of a course for faculty. Readings, multimedia, assignments, practice, and formative and summative assessment are combined into a cohesive, well-designed learning product.   Then, faculty can use tools we provide to make changes to the courseware to better suit their needs. Intelligent Courseware: Involves students in learning by doing, with hundreds of embedded activities. Provides immediate & targeted feedback to keep students on track. Pinpoints what students know (and don’t), so you can provide targeted help. Won’t break the bank. Costs students less than the average textbook. Works with your LMS. Arms you with online tools, and real-time data and insights to measurably improve learning outcomes. Intelligent Courseware may just be a smarter way for your students to spend their time outside of class, actively building up their foundation of knowledge. For the first time, you know what students are learning (and not). One of the benefits of students interacting with learning materials on the Web is that you can actually measure learning.  For the first time, at a very granular level, you can see what students are learning, and what they’re not.    And then draw causation. The assessments embedded within Acrobatiq courseware tell you the level of skills, knowledge and outcomes students have for each course; for each module and unit in that course. Textbooks can’t do that. Nor do textbooks let you monitor student progress in real-time, provide targeted feedback, or make timely course adjustments. Intelligent Courseware does. Explore Acrobatiq Intelligent Courseware today, and decide for yourself whether it’s a smarter alternative for you.                 

We are starting a conversation about learning analytics here at Acrobatiq. We’d love for you to join us. We’ll use this blog, social media (I’m on Twitter @keithhampson), and a new 11-Minute Webcast series to keep the conversation moving. Our first 11-Minute Webcast is October 9, Wednesday, 12 pm, EST.  Learning Analytics: Forget the Hype. Trust the Evidence. Sign up and bring your questions and ideas. Use hashtags #LearningAnalytics and #11MinuteWebcast The field of Learning Analytics involves the capturing, measuring and reporting of student data, for the purposes of understanding and improving learning outcomes. While research into the potential of learning analytics goes back a number of years, it is only now starting to truly take shape in higher education. You and I have an opportunity - at this early stage - to shape one of the more important developments in higher education. The emergence of learning analytics at this point in the history of higher education is no accident. Certainly, advances in technology are part of the story.  The rise of Web-based instruction makes capturing student-learning activity recordable in a way that was never feasible in the classroom. But also important is the growing pressure to fully account for student learning. This is driven by regulatory pressures, climbing tuition rates, and growing budgetary constraints. Moving closer to the great promise For me, the great promise of learning analytics is that it helps us move closer to addressing the unique needs of our increasingly diverse student population. Students benefit when they are presented with the right type and level of instructional media; assignments that are suitably challenging; and social interactions that match their way of learning. Learning analytics can help us make this possible. What do you see as the promise for learning analytics in higher education? Add your voice to the conversation. Join us on the 11-Minute Webcast on October 9.

As an educator, did you ever finish a class, a tutoring session or an entire day when you felt on top of your game? You know the feeling. The flow and sequence of content was perfect. The students were engaged and involved. You were able to anticipate and correct student misconceptions. And best of all, you saw light bulbs going off in your students. As a learning engineer at Acrobatiq, it’s my goal to take those aspects of the "perfect" teaching day and translate them into the online learning environment. "How is that possible?" you may ask. The qualities you need to be an effective teacher − whether it’s online or in the classroom − are the same qualities you need to design effective online courseware: a clear vision, a thoughtful approach to the subject and teamwork. Align content, assessments & learning objectives The vision for Acrobatiq courseware originates from Carnegie Mellon University’s Open Learning Initiative (OLI), and is based on the findings of learning science.  A clear sense of how students learn best − by doing and not just by reading or watching − comes from years of OLI research and classroom experience.   We incorporate this principle into every course we develop. This vision includes strict adherence to aligning the course content, assessments and learning objectives.  We call these three elements the Course Design Triangle.  It contains: Student-centered and measurable objectives A clear and logical sequence of content Numerous adaptive, problem-solving activities (which we call ADAPTivities) Authentic assessments Be creative in crafting activities Take the example of the heredity module in Acrobatiq’s Introduction to Biology courseware.  I had fun interacting with our course authors on this module. We were creative in crafting a variety of activities that scaffold the student carefully through the concepts of heredity, and help head off misconceptions. This is a critical part of the education process. The final result is a module with a minimum of text. Students are kept engaged and motivated with: Interesting visuals & drag and drops Video walkthroughs Multiple choice Essay and fill in the blank activities Along with carefully constructed content, it takes teamwork:  learning engineers, authors, instructors, subject matter experts and software engineers, who are all passionate about creating exceptional educational experiences for students. The light bulb effect So, what about those light bulbs going off? We capture the "light bulb effect" at Acrobatiq through The Learning Dashboard, which gives instructors a visual picture of how well students are meeting the course objectives. The Learning Dashboard allows you to see, in real-time, where students are having difficulties and misconceptions. Now, you can adjust your lessons and instruction quickly to meet the specific needs of your students. As a result, your students are better prepared, so you can spend less time on the basics and more time focused on giving them a deeper understanding and more memorable learning experience. If that’s not a perfect teaching day, it comes close.        

Is a digital revolution sweeping higher education? Perhaps, but like the so-called paperless office revolution, which has been with us for decades, it feels more evolution than revolution. In part, the perception of revolution and disruption comes from the relative pace of change in higher education. Much like human presence on earth is a blip compared to the 165 million-year reign of the dinosaurs (mental image intentional), we need to take the long view of recent changes in higher education and the evolving role of faculty. Consider the traditional classroom lecture. As a cultural touchstone, the idea of sitting through a lecture goes back to medieval times. Thanks to Wikipedia (its own influence on learning the topic of another discussion), I found images of manuscripts showing sages in the mid-1300′s lecturing in front of classrooms. Learning objectives play a big role, and therefore must be carefully constructed. We believe effective learning objectives are both student-centered and measurable. In the 21st century, it can be difficult keeping students attentive for long periods, particularly in large settings. Education and educators need to advance, along with the toolbox they use to facilitate better teaching and student learning. ‘Students are actually paying attention’ I recently worked with a faculty member who was teaching a lecture to more than 300 students. We had just put together a module of content for his course and let the students use it before the lecture. I showed him a learning dashboard that reported on how students were faring in their efforts at the learning objective level. Looking at the dashboard, the professor sat back and said, "I’ve got to rethink some things. I usually walk in and do a prepared 90-minute lecture. Now I see that students already have the basics, so I can focus on the areas they’re having trouble with. And I need to come up with some better examples in my slides!" He then shared the dashboard with his students and explained how he was adjusting the lecture to address what they really needed him to teach. His follow up with me was inspiring: "I’ve never seen so many students in such a large lecture actually paying attention and being engaged." That’s because he was making good use of their time - and his own. He was free to do what a teacher does best: explain the finer points of the subject he’s an expert in. Faster feedback, better outcomes This is a perfect example of how good teachers can become better teachers - indeed great teachers - by taking advantage of tools that improve their instruction and personal teaching experiences, rather than passively reciting notes. We know from classroom studies that providing students with real-time feedback helps them learn better and faster than having them hand in homework and wait a couple of weeks to get evaluated. Revolution or evolution, technology that significantly shortens feedback time is the kind of teaching tool that can have immediate and long-term impact. And it’s based on sound experimentation and evidence. Ultimately, it’s the role of the teacher to select the tools that work best for him and decide how to apply them. Just as an abundance of word processing tools for "going paperless" didn’t replace the need for people to write (here I am typing away after all), the most effective teaching tools for "going hybrid" or "flipping classrooms" don’t aim to replace teachers, but to elevate them and the importance of their role in advancing education.  

The quality of instructional content hasn’t kept pace with other developments in online higher education. In too many online courses, the instructional media is no more than hastily repurposed print and classroom materials. Early hopes of taking advantage of the medium’s extraordinary capacity to enable new types of instructional media and activities have been largely unmet or lost. Finally, there are signs of change. Sign up for this month’s 11-Minute Webcast: Trends in Instructional Content for Online Higher Education, Tuesday, November 19, 12:30 pm, EST. Join us as we explore: The social, educational and economic trends that have led higher education to refocus attention on the role and potential of high-quality instructional content. Learning Analytics as a key driver in the pursuit of quality instructional materials. How you can make better use of your resources, improve learning outcomes and scale your online program, without reducing quality. Are you paying more attention to the quality of the instructional content in your course? Share your ideas and questions at the 11-Minute Webcast, Nov. 19, 12:30 pm, EST.

Learning Analytics - powerful and promising, however you define it. Yes, learning analytics has become a buzzword. And at this early stage, definitions abound.  However you define it, learning analytics is one of the key developments in higher education, as these articles attest. At its core, learning analytics is about capturing the right data; reporting data; analyzing data; and acting on the data to improve the student experience and outcomes. Technology will make the process of capturing and manipulating data scalable, affordable and ultimately better. Each week in Acrobatiq Annotations we’ll share curated articles and resources about relevant topics in online higher education. Data-Driven Online Course Design and Effective Practices Mary R. Grant, University of Missouri-St. Louis, Continuing Higher Education Review, Vol. 76, 2012 In this paper, Grant offers a useful discussion on the value of data in higher education, and makes a distinction between "academic analytics" and "learning analytics." Academic analytics - essentially the application of "business intelligence" to higher education - focuses on administrative and institutional concerns, such as student retention, distribution of funds, and the like. Learning analytics concerns student performance and behaviors in courses and programs. Grant uses the term "learning analytics" broadly. She includes most of anything concerned with teaching and learning. Excerpt: "Analytics is more than evaluating what learners have done or predicting what they will do, it is about restructuring teaching and learning strategies to repurpose pedagogical paradigms and academic systems. Learning analytics is only as effective as the institutional capacity to accept and encourage a data-driven model of assessment". (185)  Data Changes Everything: Delivering on the Promise of Learning Analytics in Higher Education Ellen D. Wagner, Phil Ice, EDUCAUSE Review, vol. 47, no. 4, 2012 This article provides a high level overview of the evolving learning analytics landscape. The authors make comparisons to other sectors (advertising, Major League Baseball) to help readers imagine how analytics can be applied to higher ed. Excerpt:  "The recent movie Moneyball, based on the 2003 book Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, tells the story of how the Oakland Athletics applied the principles of what became known as "sabermetrics" to analyze every aspect of their game…. It is not a story of how statistics saved the day for Oakland, any more than collecting more and more data on everything we do in higher education is going to save the day for colleges and universities. Our Take: Like Grant’s paper, Wagner and Ice also define learning analytics broadly - including teaching and learning activities, as well as administrative functions. This broad definition differs from ours at Acrobatiq. We focus on learning-centric issues, rather than mere signals of student presence, which can be useful, but misleading (see the 11-Minute Webcast). Leadership and Learning Analytics Veronica Diaz and Shelli Fowler, EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative, Nov 2012 This brief is based on a 2012 event during which participants considered learning analytics in the context of leadership and institutional change. A particularly interesting aspect of the paper is the degree to which the participants hold out great hopes and expectations for analytics to not merely capture information, but to drive institutional change in higher education. Excerpt: "Developing and employing learning analytics that can help us envision and build a new model for improving teaching and learning—a tool with both the scope and depth to become a foundational driver of systemic change—requires more than a change-management approach. The widespread adoption of learning analytics that can foster significant results and drive systemic change requires us to develop a change-leadership mind-set." (2) Our Take: Analytics is not simply a new tool to help us do what we’ve always done, but more efficiently, but a means of changing the institution. In this context, the paper’s focus on leadership is especially apt. 11-Minute Webcast: Learning Analytics The team at Acrobatiq provides a primer on learning analytics via slide deck and audio, along with a list of resources for a deeper dive.  Note: This month’s 11-Minute Webcast highlights Trends in Instructional Content for Online Higher Education, Tuesday, November 19,12:30 pm, EST.          

We attribute value and meaning to people, objects and other things on the basis of the circumstances in which we experience them. Art is the classic example. If we take a work of art out from behind the red ropes, away from the quiet guards, and out of the art gallery, the meaning and value of the art typically changes a great deal. In fact it may no longer be interpreted as art at all by some people - particularly in the case of some modern art.  Context is crucial in commercial markets, too. Vendors go to great lengths to control the context in which their products and services are positioned. Television advertisers, for example, avoid placing ads in the middle of programs that address unsettling topics; that evoke emotions and sensibilities that are not supportive of the product being promoted. "The Day After" was a fictional "made for TV movie" about the aftermath of a nuclear attack on US soil. The film’s producers found it so difficult to attract advertisers that they choose to run all ads prior to the point in the film when the nuclear attack occurs.  Apparently, convincing people that having fresher breath will make them one of the "beautiful people" is more difficult after witnessing death and destruction. What, if anything, does this have to do with higher education? Until now, not much. Historically, higher education has been able to control the context in which student’s experience the institution and what it has to offer. Compared to other types of organizations, colleges and universities are like islands, "all-in-one" organizations, in which the student - if they chose - could spend their entire educational career without ever leaving the campus. Our Educational Content in New Contexts But the walls around higher education are becoming less substantial, primarily because of student behaviour. Whether creating work groups on Facebook or adding their opinion to RateMyProfessor, students are taking elements of their experience outside of their schools to the broader public, piece by piece. Institutions are cautiously joining in the dismantling of the walls by, for example, creating institutional Facebook pages. But the most interesting effort to reach beyond the walls is the placement of the institution’s instructional materials (course notes, lectures) on public platforms, like  Connexions and Merlot and Academic Earth. The fact that these materials are publicly available is significant, of course. Traditionally, these instructional materials were carefully hidden behind secure university course management systems, available only to students registered in the course. But it’s also significant that the materials are now subject to evaluation and comparison with materials from other institutions. This exposes the institution to an entirely new type of evaluation with its own criteria. The Net is doing to higher ed what it did for so many other sectors - exposing competitors to brutal side-by-side comparisons; creating a far more informed buyer. As these shared platforms for educational content become more user-friendly visitors may soon be able to compare lectures like they compare fridges. What the users experience is not always pretty. Philip Greenspun did a minute by minute evaluation of a well known finance professor’s lecture performance on Academic Earth, suggesting that the professor’s lecture was wasteful, self-indulgent and incoherent. On the other hand, some of the instructional materials on the sites are celebrated for their quality. (Platforms like Academic Earth highlight the higher rated materials.) This move to greater transparency is a positive development. But I’m not sure that the majority of academic managers are yet fully conscious of the implications. Indeed, the decision to put educational content online is, at most institutions, left to the individual academic. As these platforms become more popular and the ability to compare educational content/institutions becomes that much easier, we may see leaders paying closer attention to what is published publicly.

Like many of my colleagues, who have been working in digital higher education for a long time, my initial reaction to MOOCs was a mix of indifference and confusion. Yes, it’s obvious that we need to do a better job of distributing access to education. Our investments in education can and should be shared with learners in less developed nations. But it was clear from the beginning of MOOC Mania that the interest of prestigious institutions had as much to do with branding as catering to under-served students. The fact that these courses used the lecture format ignored much of the last 20 years of research into how students learn online. And given that MOOCs were technically feasible 15 years earlier - had schools been interested - made all of the excitement hard for us to understand. That said, MOOCs have generated new discussions and a sense of urgency in higher education that may prove to be one of its most powerful drivers of innovation, albeit indirectly. Below, we’ve collected some of the more interesting posts, presentations and essays that signal the end of MOOC Mania. Let us know your thoughts. MOOCs, MIT and Magic & video presentation, MIT Learning International Networks Consortium (LINC) 2013 Conference. Start video at 2:05:00. (Dr. Tony Bates, Research Associate, Contact North, ) Thrun Enters Burgeoning Sieve Market (Mike Caulfield, director of blended and networked learning at Washington State University Vancouver, Hapgood, Nov. 14, 2013) Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before (Martin Weller, professor of education technology at the Open University, UK, The Ed Techie, Nov 15, 2013) in the wake of MOOC hype, what shall we talk about? (Bonnie Stewart, TheTheoryBlog, 15 Nov 2013) Udacity: Shifting Models Means Never Having to Say You’re Sorry (Rolin Moe, doctoral student, Pepperdine University, All MOOCs, All the Time, Nov. 15. 2013) WANNABE (University Ventures, August 23 2013)