Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 02/29/2012
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What Is a Leap Year? - YouTube
A video explaining leap year if you want to share it with your students.
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Recess - Read, submit, vote and comment on education articles.
A friend of mine, AJ Juliani, will be launching academic recess soon where you can read, submit, vote, and comment on education articles. He's very sharp so I expect great things out of him. For now, you can put in your email to be notified about the service.
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Featured Wiki: Expedition Earth and Beyond
This wiki has NASA scientists and students sharing on a wiki. This wiki is where the student teams that participate in EEAB collaborate and share.
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How to remove your viewing and search history. It is time to do this now.
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BBC News - Twitter partners with Datasift to unlock tweet archive
We need to be backing up our own tweets, I guess. Tweets are going to be sold to companies now.
"Firms can search tweets back to January 2010 in order to plan marketing campaigns, target influential users or even try to predict certain events.
Until today, only the previous 30 days of tweets were available for companies to search. Regular users can access posts from the past seven days -
Cool Cat Teacher Blog: Clear your Google web history NOW! Why and how educators should do this.
Wednesday, February 29 is a leap day in many ways as you'll get just one more day to clear your web history before Google puts in place new policies on March 1st. Here's how.
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California expected to reap Facebook windfall - Feb. 28, 2012
If government could understand that business is good for the state. California is set to "balance the budget" perhaps literally from the Facebook IPO. I wish they'd invest in education more as they've been struggling there for some time.
"California could reap as much as $2.45 billion in additional revenues over the next five years from Facebook's initial public offering, according to a new report issued by the state Legislative Analyst's Office." -
Foldit, crowdsourcing, and labor. - Slate Magazine
I know that some are saying that we can't gamify education. But what happens when problems become a game and we compete to find answers? This article talks about foldit and how crowdsourcing has become a possibility for something that can work when it becomes a game. This is a great read for those exploring how we will use games in education. I would suggest that this is an approach that we could use.
". Foldit, a novel experiment created by a group of scientists and game designers at the University of Washington, had asked the gamers—some still in middle school and few boasting a background in the sciences, much less microbiology—to determine the how proteins would fold in the enzyme. Within hours, thousands of people were both competing against (and collaborating with) one another. After three weeks, they had succeeded where the microbiologists and the computers had failed. “This is the first example I know of game players solving a long-standing scientific problem,” David Baker, a Foldit co-creator, wrote at the time." -
Have you accepted online technology as your organizational savior? - Small Act
If you work in social media, this article talks about the balance between immediately distrusting new technology and "shiny object syndrome." There is a balance and this article does a great job of helping you see both sides.
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France Says Google Privacy Plan Likely Violates European Law - NYTimes.com
The French data protection authority said Tuesday that Google’s new privacy policy appeared to violate European Union law, raising the stakes in a showdown with the company only days before it planned to put the new system into effect.
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Women in Haiti | United States Institute of Peace
If you work with empowering the victims of crimes, I think the Women in Haiti case study shared on this website is an important one to help you understand how to empower people who are or could become victims. This program by digital democracy, uses technology, trains volunteers, and collects data so that an understanding of what is happening can help drive solutions. This is something we should look at doing in many other areas. If you work as an advocate with victims of any kind, take a read.
This, my friends, is a great use of technology. I want to be part of helping such things spread. Will you?
"Recommendations
Technology is not a panacea. In any successful project, it is only one piece of the puzzle. However, technological tools provide an opportunity to amplify peacebuilding efforts. Some key recommendations from Digital Democracy’s recent experience working with women’s groups in Haiti include:
Survivors of sexual violence are not passive victims. They are often strong, vocal advocates for change.
A shared blog can provide a powerful platform. In the aftermath of the earthquake, the blog Fanm Pale offered an opportunity for women to share their stories with the outside world.
Data matters. Accurate data can help target preventative and relief efforts. With technical skill-building, women can collect this data themselves.
Engaging male allies is crucial. Gender parity and respect for both sexes can only be achieved through engaging men and women alike to work for peace in their communities. -
Cybersecurity's new reality: The attackers are winning - Feb. 28, 2012
Cybersecurity is a growing problem. Schools shouldn't think we're immune. Be smart about what you do to protect your school's system and remember that one of the biggest problems is people who keep their passwords under their keyboard.
This from a cyber security conference...
"Never have the attacks been as targeted, with the aim of breaching one organization as a stepping stone to breaching others," he said.
Coviello dealt quickly with the elephant in the room, acknowledging RSA's black eye over the breach -- one of the largest in terms of the number of clients put at risk through a vendor's vulnerability.
"My colleagues and I feel this as personally as everyone in this room," he told the crowd of thousands. "Since the breach, we've been dedicated to regaining and maintaining your confidence in us. We have a sense of urgency as never before." -
iPads for Orangutans: Program would let apes Skype other zoos
I think that giving apes iPads to let them skype other monkeys is over the top. Why not connect retirement homes with their families like my students are doing with their Skype project? This is a bit over the top.
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BBC News - Apple iPad 3 expected on 7 March following press event
We'll see on March 7 if the world has been fooled. Is it an iPad 3? Is it an iTable? What is it? The journalists are banking on the Ipad 3 but who knows. Here is what the BBC is reporting on February 28.
"Invitations sent to journalists read: "We have something you really have to see. And touch."
While not officially confirming the product's launch, the message was accompanied by an image showing what looked to be an iPad touchscreen.
