Make the world a better place!

What idea do you believe will help the most people?

I recently learned about Google’s 10 to the 100th initiative:

Last fall we launched Project 10^100, a call for ideas to change the world by helping as many people as possible. Your response was overwhelming. Thousands of people from more than 170 countries submitted more than 150,000 (or around 10^5.2) ideas, from general investment suggestions to specific implementation proposals. As we reviewed these submissions, we started noticing lots of similar ideas related to certain broad topics, and decided that combining the best aspects of these individual proposals would produce the most innovative approaches to solving some very pressing problems.

The result is the list you see below of 16 “big ideas,” each inspired by numerous individual submissions. Which ones should we make happen? You tell us. Your vote for one of these ideas will help our advisory board choose up to 5 projects to fund, at which point we’ll launch an RFP process to identify the organization(s) that are best suited to implementing them.

As a huge supporter of open education resources, I voted for idea #7 “Make educational content available online for free”. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every child or adult that wished to learn something could find high quality educational materials online or on their mobile to pursue their passions for free?! Furthermore, wouldn’t it be wonderful if those resources were organized in a way such that they were easy to find and immediately useful…

To cast your vote, click here. (Note: Voting ends October 8, 2009.)

To free knowledge!

Anna

P.S. I just posted a poll on the top right side of this blog. I would greatly appreciate your feedback. Thanks for reading Literacy is Priceless.

Are Textbooks Going the Way of the Dinosaurs?

I recently posted a blog on Curriki that I think Literacy is Priceless readers will find of interest as well. So, here it is…

Anna

Not likely, but thanks to the Internet and social media tools, the traditional model by which textbooks are written, produced, distributed and updated just might be!

In a recent post by Dan Misener on Spark, he writes:

So how is digital technology affecting on the textbook business? According to a New York Times story from this past weekend:

Many educators say that it will not be long before they are replaced by digital versions — or supplanted altogether by lessons assembled from the wealth of free courseware, educational games, videos and projects on the Web.

As more and more players enter the digital textbook and open educational content space, it is interesting to see the variety of strategies, platforms and styles of digital textbooks and textbook alternatives that are sprouting across the Web. Here are a few to sink your eyes, ears and creative sharing, mixing and remixing juices into:

• Flat World Knowledge (FWK): Looking for free and open college textbooks online? Take a look at FWK’s catalog and course listings to start browsing. If reading on a bright screen is not your thing, FWK gives you print, audio and self-print PDF options, as well as numerous mixing and remixing tools to customize your “text” to your needs. To learn more about FWK’s business model, listen to this interview with Eric Frank (FWK co-founder).
• CK-12’s Flexbook Tool: As the website states, “CK-12 Foundation is a non-profit organization with a mission to reduce the cost of textbook materials for the K-12 market both in the U.S. and worldwide. Using an open-content, web-based collaborative model termed the “FlexBook,” CK-12 intends to pioneer the generation and distribution of high quality educational content that will serve both as core text as well as provide an adaptive environment for learning.” For a sample of what Flexbooks look like, take a look at these resources on the human body. Or, if you’re feeling ambitious, start creating a Flexbook today!
• Curriki: California is pioneering an experiment with free high school digital textbooks. Curriki has two science books—chemistry and earth science—in the running, and is calling on science teachers to make these open source books the best they can be. That means you! Click on the curriculum tabs on the aforementioned chemistry and earth science links to get started! Or, if high school science is not your subject, search for digital textbooks and textbook alternatives here! Feel free to share your own content too!

Obviously there are a lot of great digital textbook and textbook alternatives out there beyond the three above. Leave a reply below to share you content and favorites!

Curriki

Note: The image above is a public domain work and can be found in its original form on Wikimedia Commons.

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Open Education Resources of Note

“The advent of the Web brings the ability to disseminate high-quality materials at almost no cost, leveling the playing field…We’re changing the culture of how we think about knowledge and how it should be shared and who are the owners of knowledge.“ Cathy Casserly, Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching

This week we put together a list of our favorite Open Education Resources on the Bon Education website.

For those of you that are new to OERs…

Wikipedia defines OERs as “educational materials and resources offered freely and openly for anyone to use and under some licenses to re-mix, improve and redistribute.”

Our OER page contains:

• A definition and explanation of OERs
• Links and descriptions of great OERs (by grade level)
• Stories about how people around the world are using OERs
• Information on OERs and copyrights
• Quotes from major education movers and shakers on the impact of OERs and technology in general on education

Take a look! We hope you will enjoy the resources and information presented! Let us know if there are any resources that you think should be added to the list.

Anna

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Searching for Treasure: Find the Perfect Resource for Tomorrow’s Class

Tomorrow I will lead a workshop at one of the UAE Higher Colleges of Technology titled, “Technology Tools for Early Childhood Instruction”. During the workshop, participants will have a chance to use Curriki and other open education resources to to find free materials (lessons, simultions, games, etc.) for their early childhood classrooms.

As my good friend once told me, “You can’t learn to drive, without getting behind the wheel”.

In that spirit, learn how to find free and open education resources for your classroom by participating in this Curriki Scavenger Hunt.

The knowledge and resources you will find… PURE GOLD!

Anna

P.S. Thanks to clevercupcakes for creating and sharing the delicious looking cupcake above!

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Open Education Resources and Links (Re: Dubai ISTE Conference Links)

Tomorrow I will give a presentation on “Open and Collaboratively Developed Education Resources” at the 2009 Gobal Forum on Innovation and Technology in Teaching and Leading in Dubai. So that presentation attendees don’t have to take copious notes (and so that others can benefit as well), I’ve decided to post links from my presentation here!

Just in case you’re wondering what open education resources (OERs) are… Wikipedia defines OERs as “educational materials and resources offered freely and openly for anyone to use and under some licenses to re-mix, improve and redistribute.” I like to think of OERs like a delicious cookie recipe–Sara passes her recipe to Michiko. Michiko decides to add dark chocolate chips to the recipe and passes the recipe along to several people over the Internet. Mustafa gets a hold of the recipe and decides it would benefit from some rock salt and an egg yolk. He then posts the recipe for others to see… and so on! Just replace the cookie recipe with a lesson plan, an educational video or a collaboratively developed unit or other resource and you’ve got yourself an OER!

There are several fabulous OER projects that are 100% worth checking out if you are looking for lessons, eager to share resources or interested in collaborating on education projects with people around the globe:

• FreeReading–a K-3 open source literacy curricula program and community
• Curriki–a community of educators that share K-12 multilingual OERs with people across the globe
• MIT Open Courseware–with over 1000 free college courses online, this one is NOT to be missed
• Open Learning Initiative–sponsored by Carnegie Mellon, take a look at the site’s tutors, virtual labs, intro courses and more!
• Connexions–Based out of Rice University, the site contains content in the areas of arts, business, humanities, math and tech and social sciences
• CK-12–if you are look for free full textbooks, this site is a must-bookmark!
• OER Commons–more wonderful K-12 and higher ed OERs! Do a search for OERs and you’ll find a ton of useful background information on using and finding OERs

Finally, if you are interested in finding teachers to collaborate with on OERs or other cross-border initiatives, make sure to spend some time on:

• The Global Education Collaborative–”a community of teachers interested in global education”
• ePals–connect with thousands of teachers and students around the world on collaborative education and volunteer projects
• Curriki groups–create or find a group that interests you and start building and exchanging OERs

Enjoy,

Anna

PS Don’t forget to think about copyrights when you use and post OERs! To find a flexible license for your intellectual property, take a look at the Creative Commons!

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Open Education Efforts Around the Globe: Curriki

At the moment I am involved in a number of education, literacy and technology projects across the GCC. As a part of this work, I have the fortunate opportunity to meet with education stakeholders from the public, private and NGO sectors daily. It is so exciting to see so much energy and enthusiasm in the region around literacy and technology as highlighted by the upcoming Emirates Airline International Festival of Literature as well as the work EDC is currently doing to bring open source course materials and trainings to teachers across Yemen.

Every time I meet with universities and school teachers in the region, the same buzz words keep coming up:

• 21st century skills
• Technology literacy
• Reading
• Blogging, wikis, and other web 2.0 tools
• International collaboration and global citizenship

Not surprising, these are the same buzz words I heard on a daily basis last year while working on education technology projects around the US!

In line with the aforementioned themes, there are a number of organizations across the globe creating platforms and initiatives to help teachers share lessons and best practices while at the same time building their own technology literacy skills. One such organization is a non-profit called Curriki:

Curriki is a social entrepreneurship organization that supports the development and free distribution of open source educational materials to improve education worldwide. The online community gives teachers, students and parents universal access to a wealth of peer-reviewed K-12 curricula, and powerful online collaboration tools. Curriki is building the first and only Web site to offer a complete, open course of instruction and assessment. Founded by Sun Microsystems in 2004, the organization has operated as an independent nonprofit since 2006.

With nearly 25,000 free education resources, Curriki is a site not to be missed! To start, take a look at the K-2 literacy resources here.

From Bahrain,

Anna

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OER Commons–More Great and Free Teaching Resources!

Today I was introduced to two of the organizing forces behind the OER Commons website (OER stands for open educational resources). The website explains, “OER Commons is a teaching and learning network, from K-12 lesson plans to college courseware, from algebra to zoology, open to everyone to use and add to.”

I found OER Commons immediately appealing because it is easy to navigate, it looks very Web 2.0 and it already contains thousands of free and useful lesson ideas and teaching resources. Check out the primary education resources! In particular I liked the learning object titled “100+ Web 2.0 Ideas for Educators: A Guide to RSS and More.” As a person relatively new to blogging, social bookmarking, tagging and more, this is an excellent, easy-to-reading guide to the world of Web 2.0. Thank you Quentin D’Souza (an elementary resource teacher from Toronto) for sharing this useful guide! -Anna