Ideaphora Insights

School districts spent more money on digital content and curriculum last year than ever before, according to a recent survey report from The Learning Counsel. With increasing use of digital content in the classroom, it’s imperative that schools support students in deeply engaging with the material so they not only understand the concepts presented but also are able to apply what they’ve learned. We created Ideaphora to address this pressing need.

To ensure that all schools are able to use Ideaphora Classroom, we’ve partnered with PledgeCents, which offers a streamlined way for school leaders and educators to easily raise the funds needed to cover the cost of purchasing annual subscriptions. We want every school and educator regardless of their financial situation or budget to have the opportunity to use Ideaphora to empower their students as they prepare for work and life beyond the school walls in today’s digitally driven world.

This year marked several milestones for Ideaphora - we launched our product out of beta with versions for individual and classroom use. We also have more than 175 classroom pilots in progress. Over the course of 2016, we've shared numerous updates, concept mapping strategies and tips for using Ideaphora with learners of all ages, but our blog readers responded most to the articles listed below. While these posts spanned various subject areas and instructional strategies, they all had one thing in common. They illustrate that concept mapping is an increasingly critical in the age of digital learning as educators prepare students for the college and future careers. 

As we noted in a previous blog post, an engaging, distraction-free digital learning environment is critical to student comprehension and academic performance. To that end, Ideaphora has added new enhancements to its online concept mapping platform to offer even greater convenience and time-savings, and further minimize disruptions to students’ thinking and learning while they interact with digital content.

As a participant in GSVlabs, a community of carefully selected startups, I had the opportunity to attend the ASU+GSV Summit earlier this week. The conference, designed for ed tech business leaders, startups and investors, featured a diverse range for speakers, including celebrities, authors, tech icons, nonprofit leaders and government officials.

One of the major themes stressed by speakers, Bill Gates and Tom VanderArk among them, was personalized learning—what it is and isn’t, and the aids and obstacles to implementation. VanderArk noted that while the technological capabilities now exist to fully realize personalized learning, it’s not implemented in all schools. Gates also stated that personalized learning is the future of education, but must scale up. Progress toward personalized learning varies widely due to a variety of factors such as insufficient infrastructure and funding.

This post is written by Mary Chase, Ph.D., an expert in curriculum design, literacy education, and technology integration.

In an earlier post, we explored the importance of dual coding in learning and retention. In short, when information is encoded in the brain both visually and verbally (that is, in the kinds of maps we create using Ideaphora) learning is enhanced. Dual coding facilitates making connections, understanding relationships, and recalling related details. Related to dual coding theory is John Sweller’s (1994) “cognitive load” theory. Sweller states that information may only be stored in long-term memory after first being attended to, and processed by, working memory.

It's official. President Barack Obama has signed the Every Student Succeeds Act into law to reauthorize the long overdue Elementary and Secondary Education Act and replace its latest version, No Child Left Behind. Its passage has long-term implications for digital learning.  While schools and districts have increasingly implemented  digital learning initiatives in recent years, t he  new law bolsters the movement by  funding  key programs, including   innovative instruction and assessments and digital equity research. Digital learning initiatives can also help school districts and states address the  key goals of ESSA to close the achievement gap and ensure all students excel. To address the growing needs of schools districts and states, Ideaphora offers an engaging digital learning environment for students to discover ideas, evaluate their thinking, and apply their knowledge in ways that accelerate that their academic growth.

At the Content in Context Conference in June this year, Judson Wagner, Supervisor of STEM, CTE, and Instructional Technology at Brandywine School District in Delaware, explained that his hope for the future of education technology was to provide solutions that enable educators to make students' thinking visible. He expounded that he was seeking ways to evaluate when and how student engagement is translating into learning.

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Mark Oronzio, CEO and co-founder of Ideaphora, was interviewed by Brian Friendlander of Assistive Tek Times. Brian is a professor at the College of St. Elizabeth, a blogger, and an ed tech consultant who specializes in training educators in how to use mind mapping and assistive technology to address the needs of a diverse range of learners. Mark shared how Ideaphora began when industry colleagues introduced him to his co-founder, Anil Arvindam, an opportune meeting that brought together reknowned experts in their respective fields. He further explained how the Ideaphora web-based knowledge mapping environment supports educators in developing students' higher order thinking skills and deepening their understanding of curriculum concepts.

 

Digital Promise has released a new report, “Using Research in Ed Tech,” that shares promising practices, quotes, and examples from 38 developers. Ideaphora was among the companies highlighted that are using research to design and develop educational technology products. By showcasing examples of research-based product development, Digital Promise aims to help researchers, developers and educators collaborate to use scientific and user research to improve student outcomes and better understand learners.