computer-based educational tools
Net Texts: an app for the classroom
Net Texts is a free app which organises and delivers the wealth of Open Educational Resources available on the Internet.
Net Texts helps schools replace or supplement printed textbooks with customized multimedia courses delivered to students' iPads, Android tablets and laptops.
- Teachers use the app’s Content Management Website to select existing courses or to create new courses by mixing and matching items from the library with their own educational material.
- Students use the Next Texts iPad or Android or web app to download and view these courses, filled with videos, slideshows, e-books, PDFs, text, audiobooks and links.
Microsoft Mathematics 4.0
Microsoft Mathematics 4.0 is a free online algebra system with a friendly user interface and a step-by-step equation solver which aims to help students understand the path to a correct answer. Its powerful visualization tools also help to capture students’ imaginations and keep them engaged, allowing their comprehension to rise exponentially.
Mathematics 4.0 can help students understand mathematics, science, and tech-related concepts with powerful, easy-to use tools including a graphing calculator, unit converter, triangle solver, and equation solver.
Step-by-step solutions are provided for each problem, so students can learn problem solving skills fast and easy. An improved Computer Algebra System (CAS) helps teachers share and solve more complex equations and functions. It’s capable of handling many subjects, including pre-algebra, algebra, trigonometry, calculus, physics, and chemistry.
Handwriting recognition is also included, so all students can write out problems by hand.
Microsoft Mathematics 4.0 is part of the Microsoft Partners in Learning free online resources for educators and schools.
OCW Universidad de Alicante
The OpenCourseWare programme of the University of Alicante (Spain) offers more than 350 free and open courses, making it one of the top contributors in Spanish to the international OpenCourseWare Consortium.
Hundreds of teachers have already participated in the OCW-UA project since its creation in 2007 as one of the major initiatives from the University to allow the promotion of open knowledge, improve the quality of teaching materials and increase their distribution.
In 2011 the University of Alicante was awarded with the Landmark Site for OpenCourseWare Excellence for its materials and innovations, including integration with institutional repositories, export-to-wiki functionality and search and discoverability tools.
Teaching 4.0 - Graphic Expression in Construction OCW
The concept Teaching 4.0 is the result of uniting the use of participatory networks, online tools and digital content available in the Internet, and adding educational material generated by teachers in traditional media (offline) and using ICTs (online).
The Universitat de les Illes Balears (Spain) is a pioneer in the implementation of this 4.0 concept, where professor Antonio Fernández-Coca combines face-to-face teaching, following the traditional parameters, with the external support of relationship marketing and ICT tools (such as online videos and social networks) to produce specific content aiming to support teaching in an open and shareable way.
The Teaching 4.0 website developed by professor Fernández-Coca shares the learning and teaching materials produced under a Creative Commons licence for the subject Graphic Expression in Construction, part of the UIB’s Construction Engineering degree curriculum.
Teaching 4.0 is the winner of the Universia Open Course Ware 2012 contest, organised by the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports and Universia.
Click here to see a video where professor Fernández-Coca explains his Teaching 4.0 concept (in Spanish).
Project Maths resources on Probability and Statistics
A series of high-end complementary maths teaching resources directly aligned with the Irish Department of Education’s “Project Maths” syllabus and the Irish Leaving Certificate Exam are being offered by Alison (Advance Learning Interactive Systems Online).
These resources were created in collaboration with two Galway-based, Project Maths trained, secondary school teachers in partnership with the Galway Education Centre and the Athenry Maths Academy.
Currently available is Strand One of the curriculum: Probability and Statistics (Ordinary Level and Higher Level), an area found to be of traditional difficulty among students, and an area of increasing importance in the growing knowledge economy.
These are a complementary resource, not a replacement to in-classroom teaching of maths, and are made up of video lectures as well as interactive lessons from teachers and tutors from all over the world.
A Certificate of Completion is awarded to students who complete the full course.
OpenStax College
OpenStax College is a non-profit organisation providing students with professional-quality textbooks that are free online and low-cost in print.
Launched in February 2012 with a philanthropic model, the platform ultimately plans to offer free textbooks for 25 of the most-attended college courses in the United States. The first five titles are already available and have been adopted in one year by more than 150 colleges, universities and high schools.
The books offered are developed and peer-reviewed by educators to ensure they are readable, accurate, and meet the scope and sequence requirements of the courses.
OpenStax College is an initiative of Rice University.
ICELW
ICELW works to improve online learning so that it makes a measurable difference in workplace performance and morale. Anyone with an interest or background in workplace eLearning is invited to attend and participate in the conference, which will take place in New York City from the 12-14 of June 2013.
The ICELW program cover a variety of topics relating to e-learning in the workplace and the use of technology to improve job performance, in the form of demonstrations, mini-seminars, case studies, interviews, debates, presentations, and panel discussions.
MOOCs are More Social than You Believe
We report about two ongoing studies, which challenge the individualistic model of MOOC based learning. MOOC usage is embedded in the context of collocated study groups.
The ability to pause a lecture and discuss its contents with peers creates learning opportunities. Learning by explaining has been proved effective through many empirical studies. We investigate the best way to configure these study groups with different tools.