The Information on School Websites Is Not as Safe as You Think
E.K. Moore, New York Times, 2018/08/02
Because there's nothing good in todays' world that won't be spoiled, we have this: a study of 159 public school websites "from among the nation’s largest and most tech-savvy districts" showed that all but one of them employed some sort of surveillance or tracking tool. More...

My Face is Personally Identifiable Information
Eric Hellman, Go To Hellman, 2018/08/03
Good brief analysis. " The reason that face-identity is so scary is that it's a type of identifier that has never existed before. It's globally unique, but it doesn't require a central registry to be used. It's public, easily collected and you can't remove it." So what do we need to do? " We need to start by treating facial profiles and photographs as personally identifiable information. More...

For Some Reason, These Quantum Mechanics Toys Didn’t Catch On
Allison Marsh, IEEE Spectrum, 2018/08/03
These were aluminum blocks created by Costas Papaliolios in the 1960s to help students understand quantum mechanics; they were hollow and had polarized filters through which you would shine light. More...

The Powerlessness of Positive Thinking
Adam Alter, The New Yorker, February 23, 2014
Beware philosophies saying 'thoughts become things'. Thoughts do not become things, nor do outcomes appear merely because you hope for them. Yes, there is a relation between visualization and desired outcomes. More...

Not Every Disagreement Is a Logical Fallacy
Alex B. Berezow, Newton Blog, February 23, 2014
Nice article debunking some supposed 'logical fallacies' that have started to appear in the media and on discussion boards. More...

Getting the Mix Right Again: An Updated and Theoretical Rationale for Interaction
"This paper," writes the author, "attempts to provide a theoretical rationale and guide for instructional designers and teachers interested in developing distance education systems that are both effective and efficient in meeting diverse student learning needs." The heart of the theory is Anderson's equivalency theorem: "Deep and meaningful formal learning is supported as long as one of the three forms of interaction (student–teacher; student-student; student-content) is at a high level. More...

Email is Dead
Is this really the end or this this just yet another 'end of the internet' article? There is no denying that there is a problem. In my own email box, spam easily outnumbers useful email, and this is after filtering. Of course, it may just be that my email reader is broken - Outlook is, as I have commented on numerous occasions, the world's worst piece of software. According to this author RSS will replace email. More...

A Full Stomach Leads to Better Learning, Schools Say
I think the headline says it all. Is there any reason, any reason at all, why a society that could afford it leaves its children unfed? I hear from all sides about morality in society. But before you begin to talk to me about the morality of this or that, let's begin with the basics. More...

Real Time, Real Young, Real Smart
Nice article describing the use of NetMeeting to provide 'direct instruction' (the methodology is described) to a group of distance education students aged 5 to 8 years who were unable to attend regular schools for various reasons. More...

Learning Molecules White Paper
The concept of the learning molecule is interesting, though not really revolutionary. The metaphor of the molecule, of course, has been used in many previous papers. An object-oriented approach, reusable templates - these also are in wide use around the world. More...