Looking for Blogging Mentors

This is a very interesting way to use blogs to stimulate students.
ATTENTION BLOGGERS:

Interested in developing the worldwide blogosphere? Like working with young people?

We are looking for bloggers from around the world to be a blogging mentor for 1 week sometime in February, March, April or May 2006.

The project, Young Caucasus Women, is a group blog for young women from the Caucasus region (Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia). The young
women will be given a topic to blog on each week, although they are welcome to blog on any topic throughout the week.

We need bloggers to blog on a specific topic on Sunday, hence inspiring the young women's blog entries. The topic and week need to be determined at least month in advance.
Then throughout the week, the adult mentor blogger would need to comment on the young women's blog postings.

THAT'S IT - simple, yet a project with a lot of impact.

You don't need any background in the region. Just be culturally sensitive, have a topic that would be of interest to international young women and have a blog. We'd love to have English language bloggers from around the world.

Interested or know someone who is? Contact katy (at) katypearce (dot) org for more information.

Background:

There are almost NO blogs written by national individuals living IN-COUNTRY in the Caucasus. Generally blogs are written by ex-pats or diasporas. The students participating in this project are high school aged foreign exchange students currently in the US. The hope is that they will continue blogging once they return home in the summer of 2006.

The immediate aims of the project are:

To highlight the similarities and learn about the differences between young women in these neighboring countries.

To promote citizen journalism in developing countries as an alternative to mainstream media.

To promote weblogs as a method of democratic expression.

To expose young women to journalism and technology.

Gmail - [DDN] Making Computers Useful in Education

Quoting from an email on the Digital Divide Network mailing list:

Take a look at this meta-study of 59 computer-assisted instruction
(CAI) reports. http://www.nwrel.org/scpd/sirs/5/cu10.html
It indicates that:

* The use of CAI as a supplement to conventional instruction produces higher achievement than the use of onventional instruction alone.
* Research is inconclusive regarding the comparative effectiveness of conventional instruction alone and CAI alone.
* Computer-based education (CAI and other computer applications) produce higher achievement than conventional instruction alone.
* Student use of word processors to develop writing skills leads to higher-quality written work than other writing methods (paper and pencil, conventional typewriters).
* Students learn material faster with CAI than with conventional instruction alone.
* Students retain what they have learned better with CAI than with conventional instruction alone.
* The use of CAI leads to more positive attitudes toward computers, course content, quality of instruction, school in general, and self- as-learner than the use of conventional instruction alone.
* The use of CAI is associated with other beneficial outcomes,
including greater internal locus of control, school attendance,
motivation/time-on-task, and student-student cooperation and collaboration than the use of conventional instruction alone.
* CAI is more beneficial for younger students than older ones.
* CAI is more beneficial with lower-achieving students than with
higher-achieving ones.
* Economically disadvantaged students benefit more from CAI than
students from higher socioeconomic backgrounds.
* CAI is more effective for teaching lower-cognitive material than
higher-cognitive material.
* Most handicapped students, including learning disabled, mentally
retarded, hearing impaired, emotionally disturbed, and language
disordered, achieve at higher levels with CAI than with conventional instruction alone.
* There are no significant differences in the effectiveness of CAI
with male and female students.
* Students' fondness for CAI activities centers around the
immediate, objective, and positive feedback provided by these
activities.
* CAI activities appear to be at least as cost effective as--and
sometimes more cost-effective than-- other instructional methods,
such as teacher-directed instruction and tutoring.

Educational Weblogs:

http://educational.blogs.com/instructional_technology_/
Technology resource blog for educators - Disruptive Technology Resource for Educators using Weblogs, Blogware, Collaborative tools, RSS & Podcasting, web services and digital tools at home, school, university and community.

NSW Open Source :: Open Source for Education

NSW Open Source :: Open Source for Education
useful document (pdf format) that discusses the use of FLOSS in education (free and open source software - makes sense for impoverished schools in developing countries)

Mambo Server up and all your base websites created.

Please check with Mr. Paddington or email me directly for the information. I have finally received all the information necessary from the Department to set this up, and I apologise again on behalf of the Department for the length of time it has taken to get this done.
You can find the site at www.educationuwitt.com.
Note - you can also register on the main site to be able to post and stuff... it'smoderated, so I will need to finalise all registrations - this is to reduce SP@M on the site.