Interview with Spencer Striker, History Adventures. Innovators in Education Series

 History can come alive online, especially in a gaming platform that allows the learners to immerse themselves not only in the time, but in the struggle to stay alive. Welcome to an interview with Spencer Striker, who has developed History Adventures, a unique educational that takes learners to the most intense times and places of history.

1. What is your name and your background? 
My name’s Spencer Striker. I’m a Digital Media Design professor at Northwestern University in Qatar. My background is a mixture of digital media production, digital learning design, and entrepreneurship—with an armchair passion for history. I grew up moving around a lot—mostly in New England, but also Los Angeles, San Diego, and Chicago. I was fortunate that I got to travel a lot as a kid because my mom loved to travel. She took us to Australia, Hawaii, and all over Western Europe—and this evoked a wanderlust in me as well as a fascination for different cultures and lived human experience. I finished high school in Chicago, then did my undergrad in History and Radio-TV-Film Production at the University of Texas. After that I tried my hand at writing novels for a while, while living abroad in Costa Rica, Honduras, and Brazil. That was an amazing adventure—but ultimately, I wound up broke in New York City, with some unpublished novels under my arm, and realized, as many people do in their mid-twenties, it was time to play the Get Out of Jail Free card and head to grad school!

After having tried old-school novel writing for a few years, I really missed collaborative media production. Writing novels is a lonely gig! I missed working with cross-disciplinary teams and all the technical/creative challenges of production/design. It was 2005, and I decided that interactive media was the future. I was fortunate to get into the New Media Design and Production Master’s Program at Indiana University. That’s where I really discovered my passion for building digital media projects and working with talented collaborators. At IU, I started a video game media studio called GameZombie TV, and scaled it up. That’s when I first saw how digital production technologies were colliding with entrepreneurial opportunities in totally unforeseen ways—and as we’ve seen over the past 15 years or so, digital media has disrupted how we do just about everything.

2.  How and when did you become interested in online learning?
Eventually, GameZombie TV came to a crossroads. Here was this online media production studio covering the video game industry that we’d built from scratch using the tools and resources available to grad students at Indiana University. We’d won Webbys, covered all the major game conferences, and achieved official partnerships with YouTube and Dailymotion. So at that point, I could try to make the project a professional organization—and achieve “escape velocity” from the university… or I could double-down on the education component of GameZombie TV—whereby this online production studio run by students at Indiana University had become a powerful way for students to learn all the different aspects of modern, team-based digital media production. Since digital learning design was my true passion, I decided to take this other route.

I got the opportunity to co-found the Media Arts and Game Development Program at the University of Wisconsin at Whitewater, and meanwhile expand the GameZombie project to the new university, introducing it to a whole new cohort of undergrads interested in the intersection of the video game industry and online media production. Driven by my enthusiasm for the project, as well as its momentum, I got into the PhD Program in Digital Media (in the School of Education) at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, whereby I began to formally study the field of digital media and learning with some of the top experts in the world, including Kurt Squire, Constance Steinhuehler, Dawnene Hassett, and others. And at the same time that I was studying this cutting-edge field of digital media and learning, I was able to apply theory to practice in my day job as Lecturer/Co-Founder of the MAGD Program at UW-W.

3.  what have been some of your experiences in online learning? 
So I had this wonderfully intense experience in Wisconsin studying Digital Media & Learning at the doctorate level at Madison—while simultaneously working full time as Co-Founder of the MAGD program at Whitewater. Doing all this in combination with continuing to run GameZombie TV: the theory/practice of digital learning really got seared into me. Once I completed my PhD in the Fall of 2012, I wanted to try my hand at industry. I went out to Silicon Valley in January of 2013, and soon after that became Founding Creative Director for a games and learning startup called Galxyz, whereby we used a sci-fi narrative game design system to teach kids the Next Generation Science Standards. We managed to raise about $4 million dollars and build a fantastic little studio in Mountain View, CA. The cross-disciplinary team we assembled of educators, creative writers, animators, and game engineers was truly top-notch. After heading up creative and product for the company for two years, I was enthusiastic to return to academia, as I thought that would be the ideal environment in which to build my idea for a new digital product initiative, History Adventures.

4.  What is History Adventures?  
History Adventures is a tablet-based digital learning product that seeks to inspire curiosity for history by using various creative techniques, including character narratives, animation, 3D, interactive infographics, choose your own adventure, sound design, and original music. The idea is to bring history to life by exploring lived human experience through the lens of five amazing men and women who lived through extraordinary, gripping, and dramatic flashpoints in time.

5.  Why did you develop History Adventures, and what is the overall goal?
I developed History Adventures as a way to defeat this unfortunate notion some students hold that “history is boring.” I think the only reason students think that is because typical formal history education emphasizes all the most boring bits—and all the inherent action, drama, and emotional stakes get buried beneath long lists of kings, queens, facts, and dates. History Adventures foregrounds the power of story through the development of character narratives, intended to pull the reader/user into the emotional stakes of these people’s drama-filled experiences. At the same time, I’m using all the tools and tricks I have from digital entertainment product design, to make the product experience come to life and feel magical and fun.

6.  Please describe two or three History Adventures.
In this newest version of the product, History Adventures, World of Characters, Revolutions & Industrialization, 1750-1900, students will encounter five amazing men and women who have to work out where they stand in this age of dramatic, sweeping change.  In late 18th Century America, one unnamed slave turned spy, Agent 355, decides to risk everything for the cause of revolution and the principle of freedom. On the other side of the world in Australia, Jiemba of the Eora Nation, decides to fight for his traditions against British invaders intent on colonizing his ancestral homeland and trampling on his beliefs.

Half a century later, a Chinese trader, Fei Hong fights a different battle. Hong decides to smuggle British opium from India to China and loses everything as he goes from smuggler, to trafficker and finally addict before being caught. In 1890s Africa, Khari decides to oppose European trade and fight back against the Belgian exploitation of his ancient tribal lands along the Congo River. The Belgian’s murderous regime mercilessly extracts rubber using local labour and Khari refuses to let his tribe suffer any more. Resistance is the only choice. 150 years after Agent 355, a social reformer called Thomas Brown decides to disguise himself as a janitor and expose the truth about the infamous Chicago meat packing district. He uncovers a world of filth, corruption and reckless disdain for human life that leads him to question what the future will bring.

7.  What are your plans for the future?
Having just published the definitive version of History Adventures, World of Characters, Revolutions & Industrialization, 1750-1900, we’ve already begun development on the next product in the digital book series, Empires & Interconnections, 1450-1750. This new product will include enhanced interactive features, 3D designs, motion fx, and animation—as well as six fascinating new characters. A conquistador trekking through the treacherous jungles and mountains of 16th Century Peru, doomed to a dismal end in his quest for glory and riches. A woman in the Medieval court of Tokugawa Japan, trading in secrets and intrigue when the politics couldn’t be more high-stakes or ruthless. A man from Angola sold by Portuguese slave traders to the Jamestown colonists in 1619. A zamindar (tax collector) in Mughal India during the British conquest of the South Asian continent. A young woman of Turkish and Byzantine ancestry living through the traumatic 1453 Siege of Constantinople by the Ottoman Empire. And finally, a Spanish alchemist living at the nexus of superstition, science, literacy, and the powerful Catholic Church, experiencing the Inquisition even as the Scientific Revolution is just gaining hold. The big picture goal of History Adventures, World of Characters is to spark enthusiasm for learning about the past… and bring the pages of history to life!

Instant Online Education Using WhatsApp or WeChat

What do you do if your school is shut down for a week or even longer due to outbreaks of flu, bad weather, or a new virus?  Many schools have not budgeted to put their courses online, and even if they had the funds, many of the online commercial options do not meet the curriculum standards.  On top of that, there is simply no time.

 Further complicating the situation is the fact that many families in some school districts may not have a family computer or online service. Those who do may need the computer for other purposes during the day, particularly if a family member is working remotely from home. In addition, the students may not feel comfortable with a new learning management system, and they may not know how to proceed.

Are there any quick answers? Yes. It builds on the lesson plans and course materials you already have, but makes it possible to hold class and maintain student engagement, instead of simply having a week of homework and independent study.

Here is a bold approach that allows a school to seamlessly move to online education with very little extra cost by using smartphones.  In general, the extra cost would involve having a more robust data plan. It may be necessary to negotiate with the phone service providers to allow more data transfer each month.  If there are many children in a household, it may be necessary to have a family plan with more than one phone.

We would use WhatsApp or WeChat.  I’m selecting those two because they are extremely flexible and it is possible to create groups, use video chat, send group and private messages, share and send files for text, images, and videos.  However, the same could be done with Skype, Zoom, GoToMeeting, with just a few adjustments in considering the individual apps and their differences.

Step 1:  Modify daily lesson plans to be structured into lectures, check your knowledge quizzes (fun interactive polling), independent work, and receiving student work.

Step 2:  Review WhatsApp and familiarize yourself with video chat, group chat, photo transfer, and text messaging.

Step 3:  Build your Course Design Plan, which will be your lesson template. It will contain the following:

    Learning Objectives:  Clearly state to your students what they will learn. Use Bloom’s Taxonomy to describe the outcome.  It is best to limit your learning objectives to one or two. Keep in mind that their learning activity and assessments will tie to the learning objectives.

    Lectures:  You will talk to the students via video chat.  Plan for the video lecture to be between 10 and 15 minutes.

    Check Your Knowledge and What Do You Think?:  At least twice during the lecture, pause for a moment and ask your students to answer a question. They will send in their responses via text message. It can be an opinion (as in What Do You Think?), which could make the topic and lecture more engaging. Stress that class participation is a part of their grade.

    Independent Activity:  This will be a moment when you’ll ask your students to turn to their books and read a passage.

    Activity Review:  Doodle Polls are extremely easy to make and they are free. Most people use them for selecting schedules, but you can create multiple choice questions as well.  You can send the URL of your poll to your students via WhatsApp messaging, and when they complete them, you will see their responses in a single document. These are ideal for keeping students engaged, checking their knowledge, and giving them a class participation grade. For graded quizzes, ProProfs is a sophisticated package and also free, although the free version is limited. It takes some time to create the multiple choice questions, so you may not wish to do more than one per week.

   Assessment:  
   Multiple choice quizzes:  You can use ProProfs or one of the other free quizmaker programs to create graded multiple choice quizzes that your students can do via their phones.  You will be able to see their grades. Ideally, your quizzes will provide feedback that points them to the correct answer and also ties directly to a specific text in the lessons.

   Written Assignments: This is an opportunity for you to ask your students to complete one or two short answer questions and to turn it in via WhatsApp. 

• Student procedure:  Ask your students to write the answers on a piece of paper and then take a picture and send it to you. Alternatively, they can create a document using an app on their phone, save it, then send it via their phone.  
• 
  How you provide feedback: You will grade the work and provide feedback by recording a message in WhatsApp and sending it to each student. Your response should not be more than 2 minutes in length.  If you need to write an answer or add diagrams, you can do so on a piece of paper, and then take a photo and send it.

How you record grades:  You can record grades in the way that you normally do so. 

If you teach the same course to several different sections of students, you may wish to record your group video chat in order to save it for anyone who may have missed it due to illness.

For maximum engagement, however, it is important that all the students participate together in the group chat.

Online Classroom Management. 
As you move forward, you may have a few online classroom management challenges.  Here are the main guidelines:

•     Ask everyone to mute their phones during the lecture.
•     Do not send messages during the lecture.
•     Ask for 100% participation in the Check Your Knowledge and What Do You Think?  Sections. Make sure that you emphasize that participation is a part of their grade.
•     Shut down any possible cyberbullying or cybershaming right away.
•     Make sure that your recorded responses are succinct and positive.
•     When your students complete their graded multiple choice quizzes, put some thought into encouraging your students to work in groups.  If you do so, you will increase engagement, collaboration, and facilitate deeper learning.

   

Interview with Andrea Leyden, ExamTime: Focus on Adaptive Learning

Adaptive learning comes in many different forms and for many different users. Welcome to an interview with Andrea Leyden, ExamTime. 

1.    What is your name and relation to e-learning?

My name is Andrea Leyden and I am  part of the ExamTime team. ExamTime is an elearning platform designed to encompass a variety of areas including social, mobile and adaptive learning to enhance the effectiveness of education.

ExamTime is a web-based learning solution which provides students and teachers with free access to elearning tools to create, share and discover resources including Mind Maps, Flashcards, Quizzes and Notes. The tools on the site encourage engagement and participation in the learning process by developing independent thinking and analytical skills in students.

2.    What is adaptive learning and how does it work?

Adaptive learning is an educational method which uses computers and other technology to adapt the learning experience based on the students' needs and progress.  

3.    What are some of the advantages?

There is a huge benefit from personalizing education by continually assessing student knowledge and skills. Applying this learning method in the classroom means that students have more control over their learning and their individual needs are heard. Education is not an area where "one size fits all."

Not only does adaptive learning help students by identifying knowledge gaps and barriers to assimilation of new information, it also highlights where a student's strengths lie. Identifying and highlighting weaknesses alone will only work towards student isolation and under-achievement. Build confidence by showing your students that their skillset is important and beneficial.

4.    How is ExamTime adaptive?

ExamTime has added new tracking and progress tools meaning students can apply adaptive learning to their own study. Students can analyze their progress based on their completion of resources such as Flashcards and Quizzes within a subject. After creating a comprehensive set of study notes and collecting resources using the pinning option, the new subject analytics feature will highlight the areas which need more work and where weaknesses have arisen. Resources can also be tracked individually to understand and assess key knowledge.

The Quiz feature is particularly helpful in this area. Creating an online quiz demonstrates if there is a gap in student's knowledge of key concepts and ideas in your subject.

Outlined below are some steps that allow students to use ExamTime for adaptive learning:

a.    Create Subjects for each course:

b.    Build a comprehensive set of study resources by creating and pinning with Mind Maps, Flashcards, Quizzes and Notes. Here are some examples:

       

Mind Maps

c.    Organize resources by categorizing study aids into topics:

d.    Test knowledge by completing Quizzes and Flashcard decks:

 

e.    Analyze understanding of core concepts based on this testing by using the Analytics feature within each subject. This step in the process is key to using ExamTime for adaptive learning. Using the Subject Analytics feature, students can see their score and progress after they have tested themselves. The graph will highlight areas where study has been focused and show where there is a gap in student knowledge. The related resources section within each subject will provide even more opportunity for students to have access to knowledge in areas they are lacking.

There are future plans to develop this feature even further so students and teachers can analyze progress even more so and adapt their learning needs based on this.

The Quiz feature is particularly helpful in this area. Creating an online quiz demonstrates if there is a gap in student's knowledge of key concepts and ideas in your subject.

6.    What are some of the topics used in ExamTime?

ExamTime supports active learning by encouraging students' creation of resources such as Mind Map, Flashcards, Quizzes and Notes. As a result of this philosophy, users have the ability to create any subject or topic they specialize or are involved in. That being said, the most popular subjects on the site which are already created are Math, English, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, History and Geography.

7.    Can you give a few examples of case studies?

Selam Habtemariam, an 8th grade student has been using ExamTime to progress her learning for over a year. She comments that "in the last school year I started taking high school classes such as Physical Science and Geometry so I had to try a little harder to pass those classes. I tried my hardest studying with ExamTime and sure enough, I ended up getting the highest score in the class."

Not only does this show that studying hard and giving it your all is important, it also shows how much ExamTime can help students achieve their study goals.

Rafranz Davis, an established US education blogger and instructional technology specialist, helps teachers to empower students to become autonomous learners using innovative teaching strategies. Davis and her students seek out new ways to approach learning by sharing new discoveries.

Her students flipped their role by teaching her and other teachers how they were using the free online learning platform ExamTime to impact their learning.

"You can't get this kind of work on paper," Davis comments while her students show her how easy it is to create a Mind Map online.

Interview with Brad Parkins, McGraw-Hill: Innovators in E-Learning Series

Adaptive learning is expanding and being incorporated in a constantly increasing number of higher education applications. Welcome to an interview with Brad Parkins, McGraw-Hill Higher Education, where McGraw-Hill LearnSmart s a new offering designed for a personal experience. 

What is your name and relation to elearning?

I’m Brad Parkins, director of digital product marketing at McGraw-Hill Higher Education.

How would you define adaptive learning, given today's use of technology?

Adaptive learning is a method of education that seeks to personalize learning by using sophisticated technology to continually assess students’ knowledge, skill and confidence levels and design study paths that are specifically targeted to help each student improve in the areas where they need to the most.

Adaptive learning systems don’t just pay attention to whether or not you answered a question correctly or incorrectly. McGraw-Hill LearnSmart, for example, also weighs factors like how long it took you to answer the question, which incorrect answer you chose (if indeed you answered incorrectly), and your level of confidence in answering the question. That last part is key—for students to improve in areas where they have weaknesses, they have to know where those areas are. Students often get into trouble when they think that they know something but actually don’t.  [it’s the system that based on a number of factors it identifies what they know and they don’t know]

What are the benefits of adaptive learning?

By allowing students to focus their study time on the topics and concepts that are most challenging to them, adaptive learning has been shown to help students study more efficiently, develop greater proficiency and—most importantly— earn better grades. That’s part of the magic of adaptive learning.

Adaptive learning also benefits instructors: By better preparing students for class, adaptive learning enables instructors to spend more time delving into advanced concepts and engaging students in high-level discussion.

How do you use adaptive learning? Which are the primary fields of study that you believe are most amenable to adaptive learning?

In an adaptive learning environment, students use their outside-of-class study time to review course materials and answer questions that assess their knowledge and skill levels. Students can work in adaptive learning systems on their desktop or laptop or on their mobile device. We’ve designed the adaptive products in our LearnSmart Advantage suite so that students can use them on their phones or tablets even while offline and have their progress be automatically uploaded into the system the next time they come online.

Beginning this spring, we’re offering our adaptive learning products in more than 90 course areas, from American government to organic chemistry to Spanish. I really think that adaptive learning works in just about every area of study.

How do you motivate learners who may feel anxiety about being assessed online? Can adaptive learning help?

That’s a good question. In the vast majority of cases, schools or instructors decide to use adaptive learning systems in their course as a way of providing students with a more intelligent, more efficient way of preparing themselves, both for in-class discussions and more formal assessments. With all of the products in our LearnSmart Advantage suite, we’ve tried to take the stress out of assessment.

What makes some adaptive learning solutions better than others?

A few things come to mind, but probably the biggest differentiator is the amount of student data that’s been entered into the system. As students answer more questions within an adaptive learning system, the system becomes more familiar with student learning patterns and becomes better able to assess each student’s knowledge and skills to provide personalized study recommendations. In 2012, we reached two important milestones with LearnSmart: 1 million student users and 1 billion questions answered. We’re not excited about these numbers just because they’re big—we’re excited about them because they really speak to our ability to adapt to students’ individual learning needs and improve student performance.

What are the next steps for adaptive learning?

2012 was the breakout year for adaptive learning, but in 2013, I think we're going to see personalized learning through adaptive technology truly come into its own. By the end of the year, we’re expecting to see adaptive learning systems will be in use at every higher education institution across the country.

Where will adaptive learning go next? Already we’re seeing it move beyond the realm of course study tools into new areas of the student learning experience. Adaptive e-books, adaptive virtual labs – these are things that we’ve been waiting on for a long time, and they’re finally here. Personally, I can’t wait to see how tools like these start to improve the performance of students around the world. I truly believe we’re onto something big here.

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Susan Smith Nash

Innovators in E-Learning: eStudies Weekly

Welcome to an interview with Ed Rickers, founder of Studies Weekly, and eStudiesWeekly.com. E-LearningQueen.com is interested in the eStudiesWeekly.com format because the tight, condensed format is a good way to help students (and teachers) develop schemata for organizing what can often be an overwhelming amount of material. Their format also incorporates appropriate graphics and media which further help forge classification /organization schemes in the learner's mind. They take advantage of semiotic epistemological considerations (signs / symbols, etc), as well as text / audio / language-based ones. In addition to developing schemata for cognitive systems to help with data retrieval, the format can, when used within a solid instructional strategy, be used to optimize working memory. In the meantime, it's useful to note that the publication's stated design and information presentation objectives engage and create positive conditions for learning.

1. What is your name and your relation to e-learning?
We are Studies Weekly Publications with our electronic equivalent www.eStudiesWeekly.com. There are more than 1.5 million K-6 students per week that receive curriculum content fro Studies Weekly publications. eStudiesWeekly is the electronic version of those publications. Students with a subscription to Studies Weekly may login and take advantage of augmented learning opportunities available online.

2. What is eStudiesWeekly?
eStudiesWeekly is the online version of the print publications published by Studies Weekly. These are primarily science and social studies publications that cover the state standards at each grade level. Students can take assessments online, read all the content, search the content topically, take advantage of speed reading, or fluency, tools, point and click for on demand vocabulary and pronunciation. Developing readers can even have eStudiesWeekly read the content to them as the words light up on the screen.

3. What motivated you to put together the project?
Teachers have expressed a need for powerful online components that do more than deliver a PDF version of the print media. We've developed eStudiesWeekly to help teachers use time saving tools that help them have more time for their students. If a teacher can spend 15 minutes one-on-one with a student that she would have had to spend grading assessments, then we feel we've accomplished one of our goals.

4. Who is the targeted audience? Who will benefit and how?
The target audience of eStudiesWeekly are the print subscribers to our publications. There are 1.5 million students in grades K-6 that use Studies Weekly on a weekly basic to learn required learning objectives.

eStudiesWeekly is an augmentation of all the Studies Weekly content. We realize that it may not be in the next 2 years, but eventually more and more of educational content will be accessed online. We're building eStudies in preparation for that day and we're off to a good start.

Eventually, we think the day will come when we will deliver all or most of our content exclusively online. When that day comes, we'll be competing not only with other online systems, but with teachers themselves. Due to the capabilities inherent in multimedia platforms, economic factors may foster the necessity to transfer more and more of the responsibility of teaching required learning standards to the medium itself. In the future, online system that incorporate video presentations of master educators combined with media of all other forms, will be the most efficient way to transfer required knowledge to students.

However, one of the biggest challenges will be to develop systems that adapt to the individual aptitudes and capabilities of students. Currently, only teachers are intelligent enough to do this, but their ability to do this varies greatly. With computer-based systems this may be accomplished by providing a multitude of choices at each learning juncture by which the learner will self navigate to fulfill their utmost potential, yet still accomplish the goals set forth in the frameworks mandated by the state. The pace and depth of learning will finally be determined exclusively by the learner. Without computer-based individualized instruction that is scalable to accommodate an unlimited number of students we will not move forward in our effectiveness in educating our society to fulfill its highest potential.



This is not to say that computers will replace educators. This is to say that computers will enable society to extend the reach and influence of our greatest educators. Computers will give these great teachers access to unlimited teaching resources to teach an unlimited student audience.

Like all potentially good things there is an opposite negative potential. If this model is brought to maturity and offered to the public by a small number of providers—presumably large corporations and/or government agencies—there is an enormous potential for large scale bias transfer. Instead of our current system that relies on the collective goodwill and sensibilities of millions of educators, the future computer-based system would be controlled exclusively by relatively few people. This group that would choose tomorrow's educators and learning systems may have more direct influence on the minds of young people then any group in history. If this happens it may be said at some future point, "Never have so many been influenced, for good or for ill, by so few." That is the risk.

However, if competition is maintained among providers the dynamics of the free market system will as always safeguard the best interest of our common welfare.

With all this we're talking about what might happen in the future. Since this is the present, we believe that magazines with textbook content that is updated only as needed is the most efficient curriculum delivery system available. The magazines cover the standards; for the same cost as one textbook you can subscribe for 12 years; they are more fun; they don't require user names or passwords; you don't need the latest download of Flash in order to run them; no hard disk is required; no screen is needed; and they're available right now for an affordable subscription rate.

5. Is eStudiesWeekly mobile-friendly?
eStudiesWeekly is designed to be used on a classroom or home computer. However, we're just getting started. Later we hope to develop lots of other games and content that may be used on mobile devices, Kindles, iPads, etc.

Additional bio details:
Ed Rickers is a self-taught publisher / entrepreneur who started the business in his basement based on a publishing concept that was proven by his father-in-law a retired educator of 32 years. Paul Thompson (father-in-law) published Utah Studies Weekly, the first Studies Weekly publication, from 1984 to 1998. In 1998, Ed Rickers got involved and started hiring teachers, writers, and artists to create textbook substitutes in newspaper format that would teach state history to fourth grade students. Eventually this model was expanded to K-6 social studies and science. There were other relatives of Paul Thompson that also started publishing on the same concept at the same time. Eventually, Rickers' company acquired the other Studies Weekly publishing companies from the other relatives and has been building the Studies Weekly brand nationwide under one banner now since 2007.