Scientists Put a Worm Brain in a Lego Robot Body - And It Worked
Fiona MacDonald, Science Alert, 2018/01/15
It's not an actual worm brain, of course. It's simulated, based on the OpenWorm project that "mapped all the connections between the worm's 302 neurons and managed to simulate them in software." It also uses digital sensors in places of the worm's senses. I find the demonstration (there's a video) interesting conceptually. More...
The Rise and Fall of Baby Einstein
Ruth Graham, Slate, 2018/01/15
This is a case study that will probably be repeated for some time. Baby Einstein launched more than 20 years ago with the proposition that selected videos could propel children into advamced achievement. It was acquired by Disney in 2001. More...
Building a trusted skills network in the humanitarian sector with Open Badges
Don Presant, Open Badge Factory, 2018/01/12
This post looks at the issue of accrediting people who work in the humanitarian sector but who receive only informal training through workshops and on the ground experience. It's a way of helping people affected by crises play a bigger part in responses. It's a problem identified by ALNAP, a global network of aid providers. More...
Making Virtual Reality a Reality in Today's Classrooms
Meredith Thompson, THE Journal, 2018/01/12
This afrticle shares "three vignettes of three different approaches: a social studies class in a suburban school district, a district-wide perspective from an urban school district and a class designed entirely around understanding and implementing VR for other classrooms." More...
WeChat reaches audiences conventional media in China cannot
Mia Shuang Li, Columbia Journalism Review, 2018/01/12
It's an interesting time in the world of social media. News agencies today are reporting that Facebook is changing it's news feed to show you more content from family and less from news sources (many of which were untrustworthy). They, along with Twitter and Google, are also being called to account for extremist content. More...
Task Analysis or “How DO you do that?”
Brett D. Christensen, Workplace Performance, 2018/01/12
Today's new word is "scalaring", not only new to the author's colleagues but to me as well. It is part of the process of analyzing a task to see what the person actually has to do. More...
Can a Test Ever Be Fair? How Today's Standardized Tests Get Made
Stephen Noonoo, EdSurge, 2018/01/12
This post interviews Mark Moulton, who works for Educational Data Systems, a company that makes exams in California. It's a good discussion of how bias can enter into testing and how it's detected. I appreciate the discussion of how difficult the problem of biias in testing can be. More...
Robo-Advisers Are Coming to Consulting and Corporate Strategy
Thomas H. Davenport, Barry Libert, Megan Beck, Harvard Business Review, 2018/01/12
What will the Harvard Business School do if its graduates are replaced by robots? It might not be long. More...
On 'Experiential Learning'
John Kijinski, Inside Higher Ed, 2018/01/09
The comment thread is far and away the best part of this article. Working without data or evidence, the author argues that in-class learning is more valuable than experiential learning. More...
Why Do Cartoon Villains Speak in Foreign Accents?
Isabel Fattal, The Atlantic, 2018/01/09
With the recent news that Disney will acquire the lion king's share of American cultural assets it becomes relevant to ask about the messages it uses this content to send. History does not reassure us. From the ideology of Donald Duck to the sexism of Disney princesses to their issues with dark skin, Disney has been sending messages of dubious ethical value to children for decades. More...
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