Brandon Muramatsu

Posts of the Week for July 29, 2011

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  • How Khan Academy Is Changing the Rules of Education: If you already knew something about the Khan Academy, Clive Thompson’s article is a good update to what’s going on there. This is one of the interesting uses that sites like the Khan Academy, or some of the things we’re working on at OEIT can do:

    “Initially, Thordarson thought Khan Academy would merely be a helpful supplement to her normal instruction. But it quickly become far more than that. She’s now on her way to “flipping” the way her class works. This involves replacing some of her lectures with Khan’s videos, which students can watch at home. Then, in class, they focus on working problem sets. The idea is to invert the normal rhythms of school, so that lectures are viewed on the kids’ own time and homework is done at school.”

    Is what he’s doing new or novel, not particularly. Nevertheless the Khan Academy is an interesting tool and community for improving teaching and learning. It’s the possibilities it opens up that interest me the most.

    (StartupDigest EdTech, July 22, 2011)

  • Bored People Quit: I found this Rands in Repose article interesting from a management perspective. What I think it doesn’t include is that individuals should be looking for new and interesting projects all the time. Certainly where I work, if you’re bored, you bear a significant (if not a nearly total) responsibility for that boredom.

    (Startup Digest, July 15, 2011)

  • 11 Insider Tips You Must Follow If You Want Your App To Succeed: Brian Akaka’s recommendations mostly boil down to simplicity and beauty.

    (StartupDigest Mobile, July 15, 2011)

  • Can We Ever Digitally Organize Our Friends?: Kevin Chang brings up the question that’s perplexed me for a while. And one that bedevils Circles in Google+. I’m not sure that I think Facebook has even considered this in dumping everyone into one pot to begin with. One of the more interesting revelations is that he writes:

    “Sociologist Gerald Molenhorst has shown that we change half of our social network every seven years…”

    So I guess the takeaway is that sharing, not just in the online world, is something that changes over time and needs to be managed. We think that computers should be able to help that, but really it comes down to us doing the work (or not caring).

    (StartupDigest Design, July 22, 2011)

  • Little Big Details: Your Daily Dose of UI Inspiration: This was cool to see what UI/UX designers have been doing on live websites to make users’ lives easier.

    (StartupDigest Design, July 22, 2011)

  • What am I not seeing?: Good question. Publishers are developing their own LMS systems–to lock schools, educators and students into their platform. Startups are innovating in features to support learning rather than simplifying administration. Current LMS’s do useful things if you’re an administrator. I won’t say who said this, but this quote is from an administrator with respect to LMS selection,

    “We don’t care about learning.”

    That’s absolutely true, they care about things like software maintenance, having someone to call if there’s a problem, does it integrate with their administrative systems and so on. With the sale, Blackboard maximized their shareholder value, which was their goal, but to what end for education and for institutions?

    I think (hope) that Blackboard as a behemoth has a limited lifespan–the game in which it plays, I think will change, and the company won’t (hopefully) be relevant in a few years.

    (StartupDigest EdTech, July 22, 2011)

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