Hack Education

National Louis University is making headlines today by becoming the first university to offer a Groupon discount on tuition. The school is offering a three-credit, graduate level course, "Introduction to the Profession and Craft of Teaching," at a 57% discount -- $950 instead of the normal $2232 cost. But only...

Doodling is often seen as a sign of distraction. If you're doodling, you're not paying attention. If you're drawing, you're not taking notes. You're not listening. You're not learning. But research published in the latest edition of the journal Science challenges the anti-doodling stance. It contends that not only can...

Well kids, it's back to the drawing board, I guess. And by "drawing board," I do mean that old, wooden desk-like contraption, replete with paper and pencil. Not some nifty, new-fanged whiteboard app. Because the results are in: Computer and Internet technologies aren't doing much good. That's according to a...

Google Plus launched a "suggested users" list yesterday. I'm not on it, and I bet you aren't either, particularly if you're an educator -- because, well, there aren't any educators on the list. But hey, that's not surprising. Twitter's infamous Suggested User list was also utterly devoid of educational recommendations,...

Earlier this summer I attended Startup Weekend EDU in San Francisco. And I'm excited to be headed to another Startup Weekend EDU later this month, this one in a city that's known for some awesome education/technology entrepreneurs. I love Startup Weekend -- I love the energy and enthusiasm; I love...

Politics and Policies Citing the recent phone hacking scandal, New York officials have rejected a contract that the News Corp subsidiary Wireless Generation had initially been granted. The company was initially granted the $27 million no-bid contract to develop testing software. Teachers in Dayton, Ohio are the latest to find...

Earlier this month, The Atlantic's Alexis Madrigal began pursuing a series of stories about how people Google. He asked readers about their search strategies, giving people a series of hypothetical scenarios in which they'd need to look something up and asked how they'd proceed with finding the right information. (His...

Are technology and the media ruining kids' imaginations? U.K. folklorists have looked at children's play -- songs, playground games, and the like -- to see what, if anything, has changed. Read my story at MindShift for a look at some really interesting research.

I'm not sure where to start my story about Digital Scribbler, because there are several really important factors at work here: 1. "Built in the garage" has long been a powerful origin story for technology companies, but now it's even easier for this sort of thing to occur. The barriers...

Following moves in a number of states ban teachers and students from interacting via social media, now the employees of the Dayton Public School District in Ohio will no longer be allowed to "friend" students on Facebook. Nor will they be able to instant message or text students or, according...