Relive the Glory Days with eduFire Class Recordings
Posted on 05. Nov, 2009 by Koichi.
If you’re like me and you wish you had something to watch now that the World Series is over (and you’re also sad that the Seattle Mariners didn’t make it to the playoffs), you’re definitely in luck. We’ve been secretly asking people for permission to take the recordings of their classes and put them up for your viewing pleasure. [...]
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Looking for a Lead UI/User Experience Designer at eduFire.com
Posted on 26. Oct, 2009 by Koichi.
Do you want to change the world by making learning fun for students and empowering teachers around the world? Are you fanatical about delivering world-class user experiences? Would you like to join a small team where you’ll be the lead UI/UX designer working closely with marketing, engineering and a customer-focused CEO to create the best learning experience possible?
Here’s the kind of thing we’re looking for (plus a little more about ourselves!). [...]
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Learn From Successful Entrepreneurs for Free
Posted on 22. Sep, 2009 by Koichi.
We are so excited to present to you the eduFire Business Channel. It’s kind of like our language section or our test prep section except now we’re finally “getting down to business.” Subjects you’ll find here include marketing, entrepreneurship, business development, management, career development, and more! Better yet, to kick things off we’ve partnered with twenty entrepreneurs (and growing) who will share their stories and strategies of success with you. Don’t miss out on their classes. There are several up in the business listings already and more to come soon. Here is a sampling of some of the classes available right now. [...]
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3 Quick Tips on Becoming a Successful Learner
Posted on 10. Sep, 2009 by Koichi.
I found this image in a great blog post that I was reading, and it really struck a chord. How about you? You certainly aren’t one of the 99%, right?
In all before-and-after success stories, there’s one thing that they didn’t tell you about: perseverance. Every one of these people had to work hard to be successful, and even though they make it look easy, it wasn’t! Nothing is as easy as we want it to be, but in the end, if you try hard and take the leap you will make it. Then you will be the one to make it look simple. Today, let’s look at three things you can do to increase your learning potential and be one of these success stories. [...]
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What is the Future of Teaching?
Posted on 01. Sep, 2009 by jon.
Great article from Josh Catone in Mashable yesterday entitled What is the Future of Teaching? I posted a follow-up in the comments and wanted to share. Here it is. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts in the comments!
Great article Josh. I’ve spent *tons* of time thinking about this over the last decade. Here’s my quick take:
#1 – Online vs traditional learning can be viewed across three vectors: Cost, convenience and quality.
There is little doubt that its cheaper to run classes online (no facilities costs, less personnel required, etc.). There is also little doubt that online classes are more convenient. You can take them from home, office, etc. and likely have a more flexible schedule than traditional classes offer.
However, the big question is around quality. I’d offer (and this is coming from the CEO of a company that specializes in online classes) that on quality alone traditional classes are still better. But what’s interesting is that the gap is narrowing quickly. It’s not at all unrealistic to envision a future in which the online class is significantly more engaging and effective than its offline equivalent. If that happens then guess what? Game over for the traditional class model (after all, why would you choose something that is more costly, less convenient and lower quality?).
#2 – I do disagree with the notion that the price of education is going to zero.
I believe in The Grand Unified Theory of the Economics of Free (I think that’s the right title…it’s a TechDirt post from back in the day) which states while abundant resources will trend towards zero (their marginal cost), the spreading of those very same resources will drive up the prices for scarce resources. In music, a band gives away MP3s (abundant resource) and makes more money from concert tickets. MIT gives away OCW material but more people hear about MIT (especially in developing countries) which leads to more demand for MIT degrees.
The abundant resources (e.g., textbooks, audio/video recordings of lectures, etc.) will tend towards free. That makes total sense. What will not tend towards free will be things like the value of a scarce degree (Ivy League degrees are likely to become valuable not less), a teacher’s time or the attention of the students. To say that education will be free assumes that the marginal costs of those things are zero which is almost certainly not true. Sure you’ll always have people who might volunteer to teach a free class (just like a band might play a benefit concert for free) but that doesn’t mean this will happen at scale anymore than any other industry can expect to draw talented people in if they aren’t being paid.
#3 – Flat out, we need better tools.
And to get better tools we need more innovation and investment. While education is a huge industry ($2 trillion by many estimates) I think it’s safe to say that social gaming has received more investment in recent years despite being a much (much!) smaller industry. The problem is that while it’s easy to look at a social game and figure out how to squeeze out some short-term cash it is much (much!) harder to look at a big industry with huge structural problems and figure out how to improve it. And improving it likely will take a lot of time and patience. It won’t be a “Build one thing in year 0. Have billion dollar company in year 3.” scenario.
But there are a lot of great people trying. Check out places like 2tor, Academic Earth, Cramster, Grockit, Knewton, LiveMocha, PrepMe, School of Everything, Smart.fm, TeachStreet, Tutor.com, Tutorvista and a whole host of others that I’m sure I’m forgetting to see what I’m talking about.
Oh, and of course us. :) (http://www.edufire.com)
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Bacon Cookies and Goodbyes to our Intern Robyn
Posted on 14. Aug, 2009 by Koichi.
Yesterday was the last day for our wonderful intern Robyn. Even more wonderful, she brought in Bacon Maple Chocolate Chip Cookies. I’m pretty sure we’re the ones who are supposed to bring things in (like donuts, as per eduFire tradition goes), but at least we all went out and got sushi later in the day (still not as good as the cookies). Bacon, c’mon!
Robyn did an incredible interny job for us, and we’ll miss her! She’s a hard worker, learned all about social media marketing, became a Facebook marketing hero, helped build our community, did some UI design work, wrote some site content, networked with some San Fran tech stars, and more. That’s not bad for a two month stint (feel free to use this blog post if anyone doesn’t want to give you a job – hey, hire this girl!).
When you go back to that Ivy League school of yours don’t forget about us, study a bit, and keep in touch! Thanks so much for all of your hard work!
P.S. That also might mean we are looking for a Robyn-replacement. You can ask about it via Twitter.
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Take eduFire Classes on Apple’s new Tablet
Posted on 13. Aug, 2009 by Koichi.
Here at eduFire, every single one of us (except for a couple of traitorous interns) are Apple lovers. Everywhere you look you’ll see Apple products. iPhones, Macbook Pros, Mac Minis, and more. Now, for the first time ever, a brand spankin’ new Apple tablet… well, in our poorly photoshopped dreams, anyways. But you knew that right after looking at the picture, right? [...]
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Top 10 Learning Resources for the Aspiring Esperantist
Posted on 29. Jul, 2009 by Scott.
In case you haven’t heard of Esperanto, I recommend checking it out. For a quick introduction, know that Esperanto is a constructed language that is easy to learn, fascinating, and meant for international communication. It is over 100 years old, and has a thriving culture to this day. However, I am not here to convince you to learn Esperanto. Katherine Garcia, one of eduFire’s members, has already done a good job of that. I am here to give you some fantastic resources for assisting you in your studies. [...]
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Top 10 Psychology Blogs on the Web
Posted on 26. Jul, 2009 by robyn.
Psychology is powerfully linked to education; without research in neuroscience, speech pathology, learning, cognition, and much more, we would never be able to advance and improve teaching. Besides being useful, psychology is extremely interesting and can tell you a lot about how you learn and why you think the way you do. Sadly, there aren’t too many psychology courses on eduFire, though that will hopefully change in the near future! In the meantime, here are ten blogs about various fields within psychology. All of them provide great ways to learn more about the subject (the links and articles are REALLY interesting) and see how it relates to important social issues like bettering education or special needs learning.
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7 Free Online Resources for Homeschool Language Learning
Posted on 21. Jul, 2009 by Koichi.
Of course, we think eduFire (not to mention SuperPass!) is an absolutely incredible way for any homeschooler to learn a language or new skill, but we can’t always go and toot our own horn when there’s so many others that do such a good job as well. Here is a list of seven free resources (besides us) that home schoolers can use to study a language quickly and effectively. With the web, using software on your computer is old. These resources are often better, more effective, and free! [...]
