When and how do the learning environment, the student, or the teacher determine which form of teaching works best?
This photo kindly provided by Gennifer Reed; GenSafaris
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Current Issues
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There have been some interesting studies of late that provide insights into the psychology behind social responses to creativity. These findings may help to explain why the creative process and new ideas aren’t blazing ahead in various fields of science, science generally being housed with various forms of social hierarchy. A subset of the work points to the tendency of people in power positions to trust the creative idea coming from far away over those coming to them from there own social group. Educational institutions are as vulnerable to this form of bias as any business or corporation, and risk the same reduction in innovation as a result. Read more in the article by Mueller to the right.
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Brower June 2013
A turning point in education
News reports are starting to look like the who’s who of a digital era hit list…everyday it’s something: Government privacy, a thing of the past? – what agency or leader can take a shower with an arms dealer without the rest of the world watching? Stupid criminals – use to be a vandal might brag to a couple of his buddies and get away with it, but these days it’s just about impossible to resist posting the details on Facebook. The Maytag repair guy? Okay, that wasn’t the Internet. The latest though is personal, our beloved Institutions of Higher Learning – really? Are they on the chopping block too?
If you ask young guys like David Blake, founder of Degreed, he will paint a bleak forecast for our traditional degree programs. Many in his generation will echo the notion that education-as-the-property-of-degree-granting-institutions has met a strong and growing adversary in the digital community. Higher Ed, your days are numbered. The Internet has stolen ownership of information from these institutions the way it has stolen privacy. Open access has made the old system of denying people jobs until they have paid an institution increasingly difficult to justify. You don’t have to look far to see what the change over might look like. Spoiler alert, the Udacity mission statement may shock and upset the more conservative educator, so if you’re heavily invested in “the way we did it when I was growing up…” avoid the forecast this web link implies: https://www.udacity.com/us. As a scientist who has spent the better part of 12 years working in institutions of higher learning, when I look at the line ups of the ‘leadership team’ aka administration at many of these sites I can’t help but note, for example, that it is still dominated by men sitting atop women with some serious and very archaic differences in their job titles. In fact, if you start to scratch the surface of a lot of new educational models and on-line organizations you can see much of the old system has been dragged along intact, simply modified to conform to digital platforms. The meet the team page typically requires that you scroll down the hierarchy, and there is no shortage of attention paid to sales and service. Because I am of the opinion that digital transformation is an evolution rather than a revolution, I’m not too surprised to see fossil evidence in ‘new models’ of education, and perhaps it will provide a little comfort to the old guard.
The real bad news is that the new models don’t have the place where real things happen, because they can’t. They are on-line. It’s not real. As a person in science, I look at these programs and think about what I need to do what I do, what I need to know, and how I continue to acquire skills and knowledge. Can I get any of it on-line? No, I really can’t.
New models of learning and brash statements about the end of archaic physical institutions and the educational paradigm appear to be giving universities an ultimatum: figure out a strategy to survive or admit defeat and close shop. If they take the threat seriously, I hope our institutions of higher learning will look long and hard at what dissolving the reality of bricks and mortar would mean to fields like science. But hey, maybe all of this agitation and sense of urgency is a lot of artificial hype. I mean if I look out of my window instead of into this computer screen, I see the sun peaking out from behind some rain clouds just like it’s done for millennia; oh wait, that’s about to change too.
If you ask young guys like David Blake, founder of Degreed, he will paint a bleak forecast for our traditional degree programs. Many in his generation will echo the notion that education-as-the-property-of-degree-granting-institutions has met a strong and growing adversary in the digital community. Higher Ed, your days are numbered. The Internet has stolen ownership of information from these institutions the way it has stolen privacy. Open access has made the old system of denying people jobs until they have paid an institution increasingly difficult to justify. You don’t have to look far to see what the change over might look like. Spoiler alert, the Udacity mission statement may shock and upset the more conservative educator, so if you’re heavily invested in “the way we did it when I was growing up…” avoid the forecast this web link implies: https://www.udacity.com/us. As a scientist who has spent the better part of 12 years working in institutions of higher learning, when I look at the line ups of the ‘leadership team’ aka administration at many of these sites I can’t help but note, for example, that it is still dominated by men sitting atop women with some serious and very archaic differences in their job titles. In fact, if you start to scratch the surface of a lot of new educational models and on-line organizations you can see much of the old system has been dragged along intact, simply modified to conform to digital platforms. The meet the team page typically requires that you scroll down the hierarchy, and there is no shortage of attention paid to sales and service. Because I am of the opinion that digital transformation is an evolution rather than a revolution, I’m not too surprised to see fossil evidence in ‘new models’ of education, and perhaps it will provide a little comfort to the old guard.
The real bad news is that the new models don’t have the place where real things happen, because they can’t. They are on-line. It’s not real. As a person in science, I look at these programs and think about what I need to do what I do, what I need to know, and how I continue to acquire skills and knowledge. Can I get any of it on-line? No, I really can’t.
New models of learning and brash statements about the end of archaic physical institutions and the educational paradigm appear to be giving universities an ultimatum: figure out a strategy to survive or admit defeat and close shop. If they take the threat seriously, I hope our institutions of higher learning will look long and hard at what dissolving the reality of bricks and mortar would mean to fields like science. But hey, maybe all of this agitation and sense of urgency is a lot of artificial hype. I mean if I look out of my window instead of into this computer screen, I see the sun peaking out from behind some rain clouds just like it’s done for millennia; oh wait, that’s about to change too.
Brower May 2013
"Open Access Digital Courses" - the good, the bad, and the ugly
The collision between institutionalized education and digital evolution is upon us. Some of the questions are:
What will educational systems look like on the other side? Who will control the information? Where will the money go? Where will the jobs be? How will we re-value information?
Major U.S. educational institutions like Harvard and MIT appear to be positioning themselves to keep a seat at the table when and if the dust settles, and smaller schools that have been feeling an economic pinch for some time may be picking different cards. The recent letters between the Philosophy Department at San Jose State University and Michael Sandel, a Harvard government professor are a glimpse of what is to come.
What will educational systems look like on the other side? Who will control the information? Where will the money go? Where will the jobs be? How will we re-value information?
Major U.S. educational institutions like Harvard and MIT appear to be positioning themselves to keep a seat at the table when and if the dust settles, and smaller schools that have been feeling an economic pinch for some time may be picking different cards. The recent letters between the Philosophy Department at San Jose State University and Michael Sandel, a Harvard government professor are a glimpse of what is to come.
All educational institutions and faculty will have to consider
where they stand on open-access one way or another.
Peter J. Hadreas, chair of the philosophy department at San Jose State, said the professors hope to spark a public conversation about the consequences that can result when superstar professors work with edX and other MOOC providers. Photo credit: SJSU
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Commentary on Education
E. O. Wilson Suli Breaks Noam Chomsky Bill Clinton Ken Robinson
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Revolutions in Visual Learning
Digital technology: CT, Scanning and 3D printing, MRI
How do you look through a solid without disturbing it's contents, or study the structure of something too fragile to withstand physical dissection?
Computed TomographyComputerized Axial Tomography operates based on the same principle as radiography ("x-ray"), that is, there is radiation produced on one side of an object, variable absorption of this radiation by the object (for example, by varied density of different tissues), and those rays that are able to penetrate are read by an imaging system on the opposite side of the object…it differs from a classic radiographic image in that the imaging is repeated as the object moves through a rotating beam of radiation that can be created to various widths. Shots from all angles around the object are then compiled through computer software (100’s of individual x-rays) to form images that are constructed slices. Because the slices of the object are taken in sequence as the object is moved through the rotating beam, they can in turn be compiled to create a 3-D view of the entire object. Read more and see some graphics/schematics HERE.
Antikythera Project:
Read through this PDF for a straight forward and detailed explanation of CT followed by a description of how this visual technology was used to understand a mechanism, found in a ship wreck, that is something akin to the ancient Greek version of a Garmin watch - it appears to have been a mechanical calendar, star chart, tracker of the olympic games and compass - it's called the Antikythera mechanism - you can read more about the discovery of this mechanism on the arts and scientific discovery pages of this web site.
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Visit the PATHOLOGY OF THE PAST page to read more about CT technology used in postmortem examination.
Micro CT - digital dissection
Go HERE to read more about this technology and see a number of fantastic scientific applications. |
3D Printing Meets Science
This new technology isn't all powerful, but it has been a game changer in merging visual and physical depictions of concepts, and promises wider use in public and private sectors in the future . Below are a few quick videos outlining the technique; better shown than described I think. Also provided are a few examples of how it has been used in science thus far.
Water tied in knots, previously a theoretical possibility, now created with the help of 3D printer technology.
Vortex loops are natural phenomena, examples include the corona around the sun and smoke rings. Understanding knotted vortex loops, and proving or disproving the theory posed by William Thomson in 1867, that if these loops were knotted they would persist, has been hard to test in the laboratory. While what Thomson originally proposed, that atoms were in fact various forms of knotted vortices, has been disproved, Peter Tait and other physicists that followed developed Thomson’s original ideas into a field of knot theory. Scientists at the University of Chicago, Dustin Kleckner and William Irvine are now a step closer to understanding the phenomenon of knotted vortices. They have managed, for the first time, to create a vortex knot in the laboratory by developing hydrofoils using a 3D printer, thus showing the physical existence of knotted vortices in fluid (see video above right).
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Medical ApplicationsEagle gets a prosthetic beak created using 3D technology Photo credit: Birds of Prey Northwest
Read more about the story and find a video by clicking HERE
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Computer model of prosthetic upper mandible. Photo credit: Kinetic Engineering Group.
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MRI
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Click to set custom HTML
fMRINot all it's cracked up to be in psychological research?
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fMRI application in memory research.
Interviews discussing memory research on the art and science page.
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Reviews and Articles in Medical Education
American Medical Education 100 Years After the Flexner Report in The New England Journal of Medicine
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Medical school programs, and institutional and student decision making
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Web-based educational tools
Below are some examples that attempt to improve on instruction of complex scientific concepts –
The question is do they?
What does it take ensure that these tools work efficiently?
Are students any less likely to turn to Facebook or glaze over the material in these modules than they are when sitting in a traditional lecture hall or reading a textbook assignment?
Below are some examples that attempt to improve on instruction of complex scientific concepts –
The question is do they?
What does it take ensure that these tools work efficiently?
Are students any less likely to turn to Facebook or glaze over the material in these modules than they are when sitting in a traditional lecture hall or reading a textbook assignment?
Creating interactive web-based learning modules
The following links will take you to a series of open access, interactive, educational tools authored by Brower that use the Xerte toolkit program to present basic concepts in veterinary pathology.
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/toolkits/play_3410
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/toolkits/play_3580
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/toolkits/play_3525
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/toolkits/play_3434
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/toolkits/play_3410
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/toolkits/play_3580
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/toolkits/play_3525
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/toolkits/play_3434
The Internet Pathology Laboratory for Medical Education, Mercer University School of Medicine Savannah
This is a computer-aided instructional resource that contains over 2700 images with text that illustrate gross and microscopic pathologic findings along with radiologic imaging associated with human disease conditions. For self-assessment and study there are over 1300 examination items. There are more than 20 tutorials in specific subject areas.
http://library.med.utah.edu/WebPath/webpath.html#MENU
This is a computer-aided instructional resource that contains over 2700 images with text that illustrate gross and microscopic pathologic findings along with radiologic imaging associated with human disease conditions. For self-assessment and study there are over 1300 examination items. There are more than 20 tutorials in specific subject areas.
http://library.med.utah.edu/WebPath/webpath.html#MENU
Multimedia Neuroscience Education Project - This NSF funded project aims to develop a three-dimensional, animated and interactive multi-media resource to support instruction in synaptic transmission.
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Pros and cons of digital microscopy, virtual patients and simulations, and issues and techniques surrounding practical skills teaching in medical education
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Programatic Integration see also: Community Outreach
Creating collaborative veterinary educational programs
The following link will take you to a program designed to create an educational community around high school students interested in attending veterinary school. Based in northern Wisconsin, portions of the program ran in 2004, and from 2008-2011, with co-instruction by undergraduate students, students attending veterinary school at the University of Wisconsin, academic and local private practice veterinarians and other animal health professionals. http://whasiprogram.org/
WHASI program Summary
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WHASI Contributors
Total numbers Veterinarians and veterinary medical staff instructing on the course: 8 High school science teachers involved in organizing in-school teaching sessions: 7 Graduate veterinary students hired as instructors: 8 Undergraduate students hired as instructors: 5 WHASI Outcomes at 4 Years: High school students attending in-school sessions: 900 High school students attending summer course for college science credit: 26 Undergraduate and veterinary student instructors receiving VMCAS or other letters of recommendation from program: 5 Undergraduate instructors accepted to veterinary school after working for the program: 3 WHASI Funding: Total cost of the program (2004, 2008-2011) $79,000 Sources: Partial support through a University of Wisconsin Baldwin grant ; Partial support through Northland College |
Diagramatic illustration: An integrated, community-based science education program in northern Wisconsin
Figures created by Eileen Horn, University of Wisconsin, Madison
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Good Education links
You can click on this logo to find infed, the encyclopedia of informal education, a non-profit web site: Our aim is to provide a space for people to explore the theory and practice of informal education, social action and lifelong learning.
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Where can veterinary pathology intersect with other educational disciplines?
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Indulgence WatchMusic, etc.
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