Category Archives: Education

Google Puts Online 10,000 Works of Street Art from Across the Globe | Open Culture

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Circling Birdies by Cheko, Granada Spain

Since last we wrote, Google Street Art has doubled its online archive by adding some 5,000 images, bringing the tally to 10,000, with coordinates pinpointing exact locations on all five continents (though as of this writing, things are a bit thin on the ground in Africa). Given the temporal realities of outdoor, guerrilla art, pilgrims may arrive to find a blank canvas where graffiti once flourished.

A major aim of the project is virtual preservation. As with performance art, documentation is key. Not all of the work can be attributed, but click on an image to see what is known. Guided tours to neighborhoods rich with street art allow armchair travelers to experience the work, and interviews with the artists dispel any number of stereotypes. READ MORE: Google Puts Online 10,000 Works of Street Art from Across the Globe | Open Culture.

Young Girls Are Much, Much Better Readers Than Boys, And Have Been For A Long Time | HuffPo

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The gap between boys’ and girls’ respective reading abilities has been getting a lot of attention lately, but the trend itself is not new.

Girls have been better readers than boys for a long, long time, according to a report released Tuesday by the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution. The annual report analyzes three topics in contemporary education through the lens of up-to-date research. This year, the report looked at the effectiveness of the Common Core state standards, the relationship between student engagement and academic achievement, and the gender gap in reading.

READ MORE: Young Girls Are Much, Much Better Readers Than Boys, And Have Been For A Long Time | Huffington Post

The 5 Biases Pushing Women Out of STEM | HBR

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The Story of Lorem Ipsum: How Scrambled Text by Cicero Became the Standard For Typesetters Everywhere | Open Culture

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READ: The Story of Lorem Ipsum: How Scrambled Text by Cicero Became the Standard For Typesetters Everywhere | Open Culture

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The Gorgeous Typeface That Drove Men Mad and Sparked a 100-Year Mystery | Gizmodo

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No one seemed to notice him: A dark figure who often came to stand at the edge of London’s Hammersmith Bridge on nights in 1916. No one seemed to notice, either, that during his visits he was dropping something into the River Thames. Something heavy.

Over the course of more than a hundred illicit nightly trips, this man was committing a crime—against his partner, a man who owned half of what was being heaved into the Thames, and against himself, the force that had spurred its creation. This venerable figure, founder of the legendary Doves Press and the mastermind of its typeface, was a man named T.J. Cobden Sanderson. And he was taking the metal type that he had painstakingly overseen and dumping thousands of pounds of it into the river.

As a driving force in the Arts & Crafts movement in England, Cobden Sanderson championed traditional craftsmanship against the rising tides of industrialization. He was brilliant and creative, and in some ways, a luddite—because he was concerned that the typeface he had designed would be sold to a mechanized printing press after his death by his business partner, with whom he was feuding.

So, night after night, he was making it his business to “bequeath” it to the river, in his words, screwing his partner out of his half of their work and destroying a legendarily beautiful typeface forever. Or so it seemed.

READ MORE: The Gorgeous Typeface That Drove Men Mad and Sparked a 100-Year Mystery | Gizmodo

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30 Useful Apps For Students You Probably Don’t Know About | InformED

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The number of college students taking at least one online course has nearly doubled over the past five years according to a report by market research agency Refuel.

Online students are often faced with the challenge of juggling their academic responsibilities alongside families or full-time jobs, which is certainly no easy task.

Technology can help students better manage their learning by providing everything from study aids and research tools to time-management apps, so it’s somewhat surprising to learn that few students are actually using such tools for learning purposes.

The majority of students use online and mobile apps primarily for entertainment according to the Refuel report, with over 70% using them for games, 67% using them for music, and 64% using them for social networking.

If you want to encourage your students to start taking advantage of the many technology tools available to them, here are a few examples of the types of productivity and learning apps that can support them in their studies.

SEE THE LIST OF TOOLS: 30 Useful Apps For Students You Probably Don’t Know About | InformED

26 Contemporary Books That Should Be Taught In High School | BuzzFeed

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We recently asked members of the BuzzFeed Community to tell us what contemporary book should be taught in high school. Here are the brilliant results. READ MORE: 26 Contemporary Books That Should Be Taught In High School | BuzzFeed

Versal Helps Teachers Create Interactive Online Lessons, Partners With Wolfram Alpha | TechCrunch

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Versal is a service that allows teachers to build and publish interactive online courses, homework assignments and tutorials. The company launched its service out of beta [March 4, 2015], but maybe more importantly, it also announced a partnership with Wolfram Research. Thanks to this deal with Wolfram Research — which includes Stephen Wolfram joining the Versal board of directors — Versal now allows teachers to embed content from Wolfram into their courses.

READ MORE: Versal Helps Teachers Create Interactive Online Lessons, Partners With Wolfram Alpha | TechCrunch

Kapow! Stan Lee Is Co-Teaching a Free Comic Book MOOC, and You Can Enroll for Free | Open Culture

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“Why did superheroes first arise in 1938 and experience what we refer to as their ‘Golden Age’ during World War II?” “How have comic books, published weekly since the mid-1930’s, mirrored a changing American society, reflecting our mores, slang, fads, biases and prejudices?” “Why was the comic book industry nearly shut down in the McCarthy Era of the 1950’s?” And “When and how did comic book artwork become accepted as a true American art form as indigenous to this country as jazz?”

All of these questions … and more … will be explored in an upcoming MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) co-taught by the legendary comic book artist, Stan Lee. He will be joined by experts from the Smithsonian, and Michael Uslan, the producer of the Batman movies who’s also considered the first instructor to have taught an accredited course on comic book folklore at any university.

The course called The Rise of Superheroes and Their Impact On Pop Culture will be offered through edX, starting on May 5th.

MORE: Kapow! Stan Lee Is Co-Teaching a Free Comic Book MOOC, and You Can Enroll for Free | Open Culture

This Throwable Computer Teaches Kids How To Code | Co.Design

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This Throwable Computer Teaches Kids How To Code | Co.Design | business + design

Coding is a great skill for kids to learn but it can be a lonely, sedentary endeavor. Hackaball, a new toy created from a partnership between the design agencies MAP and Made By Many, promises to get kids off their butts and playing outside—all while teaching basic coding skills and empowering kids to invent their own kind of play.

READ MORE: This Throwable Computer Teaches Kids How To Code | Co.Design | business + design.