Author: Aanchal Agrawal

Blendspace is a digital learning platform for teachers to access various resources and forge bundled and interactive lessons. It is the easiest way to blend your classroom with digital content.

Blendspace.com (now known as TES Teach) is an online tool by the education curriculum company TES.com.  It is a tool that was created and is used for collecting and bundling information for multiple uses. It is not only accessible to the non-tech savvy teacher but also to the students across levels, grades, and subject areas. The goal of Blendspace is to enable teachers in seamless “blend” of into the classroom in an efficient and effective way.

Blendspace is a digital learning platform for teachers to access various resources and forge bundled and interactive lessons. It is the easiest way to blend your classroom with digital content. Certainly, blendspace is a tool that provides many possibilities. It is not only used as a method to curate resources or flipping of the classroom but also to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the classroom in the long run.

Why use Blendspace? 

• Easy creation and collection of web resources,
• Integration of online content (such as videos, images, etc.) with a single link,
• Tracking of student progress,
• Personalization in student learning in real-time through “classes”,
• Easy accessibility of content, anywhere and anytime with an internet connection,
• A better way to communicate and collaborate with the students,
• To have a positive impression on the classroom,
• Differentiated lessons with different online materials and built-in assessment,
• Easy display and view, and
• Easy sharing and collaboration.

Technology has gone through a great revolution especially in the classrooms. It has given various new innovations which have made teaching simpler. Technology has taken teaching to a whole new level and yes it has made the boring dusty classrooms… the very colorful ones and so has Blendspace. It has certainly helped in the integration of technology into the classroom.

WAYS TO USE BLENDSPACE IN THE CLASSROOM

In every single class period, Instead of having to search for a particular YouTube video or a specific PowerPoint presentation the resources can be bundled up in Blendspace. A sequential lesson plan for different classes can be created. It is then super easy and accessible for the teacher as she/he has to just log into Blendspace at the beginning of each class period, select the correct bundled lesson for the class, and get the class started. It is very simplified and therefore, it means to deliver lesson plans with multimedia content is an excellent way to use this resource.  But yes, there are many other ways to use Blendspace in the classroom as well including the following:

1. Flipped Classroom

Blendspace provides a variety of benefits to the teachers both personally and professionally.  Teachers can create lessons for students, which are easy to access for them at home. It can be used for classroom flipping and to save the essential classroom time for student interactions, engaging activities, or having students work independently while teachers assist the progress of their activities and provide feedback one-on-one. Lessons can be created, using the TES Resources tab which can then be shared with students through a direct link or their class account. The easy access to many resources is given to the students by the teachers; hence, they can learn and gain knowledge outside of the classroom, on their own schedule, using whatever device and medium they choose.

This certainly means, that teaching and learning can take place anywhere at any time. It entirely depends on the choice of the students and the teachers, which proves the greatness of technology with the usefulness of tools like Blendspace. It can also be used as a storage medium for storing presentations, web tools, or one’s personal work. It helps in easy sharing of ideas with colleagues, organized teaching and learning materials with students and also promotes innovation in classrooms.

2. Grading and Tracking

Blendspace enables to create multiple-choice quizzes throughout a lesson bundle in order to check comprehension. It also enables to grade the multiple-choice quizzes easily. Quizzes act as an excellent opportunity for formative assessment. Preferably, they can also be used as a survey. If the teacher wants to include open-ended questions or more involved quizzes, he/she can input Google Forms, or just simply attach a Word document.

The teacher can easily set up classes, and students can have their own accounts.  Once the students have set up their accounts, teachers can easily track what their students are working on. Comments can also be made by the students alongside the resources within each lesson. This tracking feature helps the teacher to have a record of where each student is in the lesson and what the student still needs to complete.

The blendspace accounts which have already been created (by other teachers and students) can also be accessed by users as long as that particular teacher or student has made it public.  So, if any teacher or student needs a lesson on Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet, they can search Blendspace to find one that has already been created by another teacher and use it.  Some of these can even be saved.

Blendspace avoids fumbling with flash drives, losing valuable class time opening emails and attachments.  All of the student projects can be uploaded into one lesson or added by their URL or, given it a title, and in class, only one lesson has to be opened to display the student work for the class to experience.  

3. Lesson Building

Blendspace makes it easy to build a lesson for any level. It is all very simplified as one just has to choose the topic and then can start building it up by using the TES Resource tools provided such as Google Search, Educreations, Google Drive, Dropbox, uploads from your computer. All that needs to be done is to find the resource and drag it into place in the lesson. Items can be moved, boxes can be added and many things too fast and too simple. Certainly, blend space is a great way for sharing information; tracking of projects, and so much more. Once you are taken to the lesson screen; you can title your lesson, search for the suitable needed content and choose where to search using the icons on the black strip on the right, add text, or quizzes to the lesson, or insert content by dragging from the right or from your computer, and share it when you’re done. Once the lesson is completed, it can be made accessible to others by clicking Share near the top. It can be shared as a link, on Google Classroom, Twitter, or Facebook. It can be embedded, emailed and even a QR code can be created for linking it with the link. After that, the privacy policy and co-authors can also be changed. As the changes are made to the lessons, the work will be automatically saved.

READ MORE – 7 Active-Learning Strategies for Higher Education

4. Web Quests and Games

Teachers can send their students on a Web Quest to discover information and gain knowledge about new topics of study. There are other features on Blendspace as well; like fun and interactive games, Jeopardy etc. which take teaching to a whole new level and make it simpler and more interactive with the students.

One of the games suggested by Blendspace is A Dozen Dilemmas in which the teacher presents various real-world problems or dilemmas such as poverty, pollution etc. that need to be resolved.  Students can select a dilemma and then create a Blendspace presentation in which they may provide solutions to the problem.  This certainly helps the teachers to know about their students in a better way.

Talking about Jeopardy, it is about creating a game with Blendspace in which the students have to write the questions and the teacher has to give the answers, just like in the game Jeopardy!

5. Professional Development

Professional development sessions can be created by the teachers within Blendspace that can be shared out to teachers online or can be used during in-service sessions. These sessions help the teachers in improving the effectiveness of the class and the students as they are able to mold the students for a better tomorrow. A “notebook” or “scrapbook” of images, which are relatable to a particular topic of study (Image Bank), can also be created by both Teachers and students. The highlights from the marking period, semester, or year can be shared by the teachers with a virtual scrapbook, and students can do the same.

Blendspace can prove itself to be very effective in the classroom. It supports the idea of letting students choose which tech tools they will use. It motivates not only the teachers but also the students to show their interests in the classrooms and perform better in the long run.  

Active Learning Strategies enable the faculty and learners to learn, grow, gain knowledge and engage in activities based on ideas in the best effective ways.

According to the statistics, the concept of Active-learning classrooms has gained attention and growth way beyond imagination since the past few years. It has not only evolved the educational methods and helped the students but has also helped the pedagogy in many ways. It has changed the way and methods of learning. An Active Learning Strategy enables the faculty and learners to learn, grow, gain knowledge and engage in activities based on ideas in the best effective ways.

Many universities have started considering the concept of Active Learning Classroom as very beneficial for student outcomes; they, therefore are investing massively for the transformation of their age-old traditional classroom into an active-learning classroom. It helps in catalyzing student engagement but also their responsiveness and confidence. It motivates both the teachers and the students to work harder and perform better.

Numerous active learning strategies may be used in each of the active learning designs. Here’s a list of seven active-learning strategies helpful for pedagogy especially in the higher education field.

1. Facilitation of a whole group discussion

• Listening to the responses of the students carefully.
• Asking students to elaborate on their answers and thinking by giving explanations, evidence, or clarifications.
• Staying neutral in your reaction to the comments of students’.
• Encouraging others to respond and react to the ideas by providing different viewpoints, agreements or disagreements.

2. Turn and Talk Sessions

Having a turn and talk session plays a major role in an active-learning classroom. In such a session, a question is asked to the class and students simply turn to the person next to them to discuss the answer.

• This serves as an interactive session of the students amongst themselves and makes it easy for the teacher to understand the students.
• It is a comfortable way and an initial stage for students to share and discuss their ideas with others and set the stage for them by sharing their perspectives with the larger group.
• It is not necessary for the teacher to hear all (or any) of the ideas shared as the important motive of this strategy is for the peers to share and for students to access their prior knowledge about the particular topic.
• You can ask students to turn to someone next to them and discuss their responses and perspectives to the following question and give them a time limit.
• It helps the teachers to understand how his/her students are interacting with each other and what they need to learn and understand more. It motivates develops confidence and improves the communication skills of the students.

3. Technology Support and Management

• In an active-learning classroom, one of the most basic and important things needed is proper management of technology.
• Without upgrading the technology of the classroom it is difficult to adopt the new methods of teaching and learning.  
• Lack of appropriate technological management may lead to hindrance in the working of the devices and connection required, which might also lead to hindrance in communication amongst the teachers and students as well.
• Also, the digital tools which are needed by the pedagogy in the incorporation into their planning are only possible when the access to technology is consistent.

4. Repurpose of  Existing Items in Active-learning classroom Design

READ MORE – Bloom Your Creativity With Bloom’s Taxonomy

• Universities can also upgrade the existing infrastructure and spaces for the facilitation of active learning.
• Instead of the construction of a new building or space, reusing of the same building with the new purpose of an active-learning classroom can be done.
• This proves to be economical and also students can be surrounded in engaging classroom technology.

5. Polling

• Polling is a strategy of an active-learning classroom which enables the teachers to know and group the students according to the different explanations/answers they carry.
• It is all about giving the students the opportunities to discuss their ideas with peers, and then to vote again leads to greater learning of the material.
• It is important to make students discuss why their explanation is the most accurate and also why the other explanations are not accurate. It helps the teachers in building the co-operative attitude amongst the students.
• Also, it is important that the teacher analyses the polling results and listens to the explanations and the reasoning of the students for their answers in order to determine what further explanations and summary will be needed to make in lecture.

6. Individual and Group Quizzes

• The ability to answer, reason and compete is a major aspect of an active-learning strategy. This can be made possible giving students quizzes that they complete individually and submit it to be graded.
• Immediately after the individual quiz, the same should be taken as a group quiz by putting the students in small groups. The students then should be allowed to discuss the answers in their group and submit it in for a group score.
• Both the quizzes should then be graded and if the group score is higher, the two grades are averaged.
• There is no discouragement if in case the individual score is higher than the group score.
• This strategy helps the teachers to understand and analyze the students in a better way.

7. Tests/Quizzes with common misconceptions as distracters

• Assessments should be Designed in such a way that they include common misconceptions that students often hold.
• Students should be allowed to answer the question on their own and then discuss their answer with a partner.
• Make them answer the question again after the peer discussion.
• Conduct a whole group discussion about why the correct answer is correct and why the others are not.
• Common misconceptions students have about different topics and concepts should be discussed and explained appropriately.

So, here was the list of the 7 Active-Learning Strategies for Higher Education for the teachers and faculty. These strategies for an active-learning classroom are very necessary and beneficial for the teachers and the students in the long-run.

What more advantages to they hold and how this concept evolves is yet to be seen in the future.

A PlagTracker is generally used by content owners (students, teachers, bloggers, and researchers) to detect and analyze cases of “content theft”.

The issues being faced due to plagiarism are spreading immensely and rapidly. According to the experts, plagiarism is the illegitimate appropriation and stealing/copying and publication of another author’s work and representing it as one’s own original work. It is basically copying of the language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions of some other author and showing it as owns. However, to control the issues being caused by plagiarism PlagTracker comes to the rescue.

A PlagTracker is a Ukrainian-based online plagiarism detection service which was launched in 2011 by Devellar. It checks whether similar text content appears elsewhere on the web. It also gives the list of all the sources, from where the particular content is copied.

PlagTracker is generally used by content owners (students, teachers, bloggers, and researchers) to detect and analyze cases of “content theft”. The content is copied to another site, without the permission of the author or owner, from the original site. Many content publishers also use the PlagTracker in cases where old content is repackaged and sold as new original content also known as content fraud.

A proprietary algorithm is used by the PlagTracker in order to scan a given document and compare it to the content sources across a database of academic papers and the web. It uses a set of algorithms to identify and recognize the copied content that has been modified from its original form. Today, there are a variety of techniques for checking the plagiarism, but the end results are almost always the same. A PlagTracker processes the text to find matching sections of words between the documents it is processing and the ones it has indexed in its databases.

PlagTracker: A Wonder  for teachers, faculty, and staff

A PlagTracker is of major importance especially in schools and colleges for the faculties. They generally use it while checking the annual final dissertation projects, research projects, yearly reports and projects, and much more. with the help of a

PlagTracker, a teacher cannot only help in the improvisation of the student’s work but also in developing a healthy and motivational environment in the classroom. Let us see a few out of many uses of a PlagTracker especially for the pedagogy.

READ MORE -: Plagiarism norms tightened by UGC. 

• Easy and User-friendly for all
• Allows the users to scan and detect plagiarism
• A complete plagiarism report is received which is henceforth analyzed
• Checking the originality of the content
• Checking the sources of the content from where it is copied
• Checking the originality of project reports, dissertation projects, research projects and reports etc.
• The plagiarism report shows and highlights the lines where there is duplicity of the content and where changes are needed.
• It also shows the links of copied sources.
• The report gives a percentage to show and state the amount of content that has been plagiarized
• There is complete scanning of each and every word from top to bottom irrespective of the link, font size, color, and family.

How To Use a PlagTracker

Teachers spend a lot of time and energy while checking the reports, research papers, projects of the students. Time is a very precious thing in both a teacher’s and a students’ life. A PlagTracker certainly acts as a helping hand as it saves both time and energy while checking the student’s work.

A PlagTracker might not be first such service which provides these benefits but is very quick, easy and user-friendly. Most of the plagiarism detector tools work on the same plagiarism test principle and basically function very much the same as Google or any other search engine works to find the matching words or phrases in other sources. They provide the best results, sometimes along with the plagiarism checker percentage and the complete report. The checking process comprises three steps.

Step: 1

In the first step, the users are required to upload (copy-paste) the document they want to run the plagiarism check on. The uploading is done by entering (or copying) the text in a text box. To start the plagiarism checker, hit the ‘Start Checking’ tab or ‘Check Plagiarism’ tab.

Step: 2

The entered text is then scanned by the PlagTracker within no time and is very quick.  

Step: 3

In the final step, the users are provided with the plagiarism report and the plagiarism percentage that highlights the areas where they need to provide citations or rephrase the text. It includes the complete information about from what source the text was copied and how much of it.

Examples Of PlagTracker Sites

Here are two of the most used PlagTrackers.

• Small SEO Tools (SST)

It is a very challenging task to find a free plagiarism checker for teachers and students. It is not just free but also proves itself to be the best because the software that works behind plagiarism checker is costly to develop. Good plagiarism software is the one that doesn’t cost you heavily and is reliable and so is SST. After the test is completed the user is given the exact percentage that tells how original or unique the content is. The Phrases or sentences are shown in red and they mean that they already exist online and will not pass Google plagiarism tests. There are also links given on the red lines which enable to see the original source for the records. SST is a perfect platform to check the paper for plagiarism, in order to verify the integrity of the written content. It is trusted by millions of people globally, who use it daily as a part of their studies or work for articles, papers, essays, etc.

plagiarism tests. There are also links given on the red lines which enable to see the original source for the records. SST is a perfect platform to check the paper for plagiarism, in order to verify the integrity of the written content. It is trusted by millions of people globally, who use it daily as a part of their studies or work for articles, papers, essays, etc.

Small SEO Tools also checks sentence one by one on various search engines comparing it with already indexed content. Moreover, this plagiarism detector does not save any content in the database; therefore, it is not risky. The user may sign up for free and will also receive updates about the latest developments and improvements in the tools through the newsletters. Unlike Other plagiarism checker tools, SST is not limited to the option to ‘go premium. It is completely free and holds no catch and hence, no membership is required.

• PlagTracker (www.plagtracker.com)

This is a website which provides the features of a Student Management and Tracking System i.e. all the grades, classes and groups are made available on one easy to use dashboard. There is the feature of custom filter setup which allows selecting of specific pieces of information which one needs to include or exclude from the document. The grading system in this site allows the users to check problems with originality and grammar quickly. It also keeps the document in its original format with the live document view.  The document cross-checks feature allows the user to check a group of papers against each other to detect plagiarism. This site is very user-friendly and free to use.

Teachers can be benefited from this site by having the student’s essays or research papers checked for any plagiarism. Many university and college students face extreme penalties for plagiarism such as failing an assignment, loss of privileges, academic probation, or even expulsion. In severe cases, punishments may also include lawsuits, criminal charges, and even imprisonment. Even if anyone commits unintentional plagiarism, it can still be viewed as plagiarism in the eyes of the law.

READ MORE -: UGC’s New Policy To Curb Plagiarism 

Nowadays, the use of a PlagTracker is gaining a lot of influence. It is useful for both the teachers and the students. They can now easily do an originality test and then proceed with their respective work to be completed. It is a red signal to those students (and users) who just copy text from same sources while working on the same project. The examiner will have to do nothing but just check the content in a PlagTracker. Many educational institutions also ask for a plagiarism report attached to the project which is submitted. It is being accepted widely across India as no any prior training is needed and just copy-paste is required to analyze the content which is useful for busy students and teachers who want to check plagiarism and protect their written work.

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• PlagScan

In the 21st century, Technology is the modern revolution that is now successfully invading our classrooms. And if you do not wish to be swept away with the Tech-savvy invasion, I’d suggest that the Professors of the modern era do some pre-preparations apart from their courses and ride along the wave of change.

Most professors have accepted this new norm in their classrooms while others are still implementing it into their learning spaces. Though technology does enrich pedagogy providing new methods and making it highly diverse but not everything that’s on the web is beneficial for the students.

Here are a few things that professors should hold onto and be careful of so lets TURN YOUR CLASSROOM TABLES WITH THESE IMPORTANT TECHNOLOGIES

Wikipedia – Is it really flawless?

 If you Google search about Wikipedia then you’ll probably get something like “Wikipedia is a free online encyclopedia, created and edited by volunteers around the world and hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation.” This means that any information it contains at any particular time could be vandalism. Some edits on Wikipedia that are in error are sometimes fixed, however, because Wikipedia cannot monitor contributions made by millions of users, there are many errors that remain unnoticed.

Read Also: All You Need To Know About NCTE (Amendment) Act, 2017 Bill

  However, If an assignment is given the first instinct of your students will be to use information from Wikipedia, if only to gather the background information of the relevant topics. To avoid the use of Wikipedia is to suggest your students use factually correct online platform such as :

• • Google Scholar

• • Factcheck.org
•          Merriam-Webster

Mobile Devices – Are the teacher’s no. 1 enemy?

 Students are addicted to these small metallic boxes and unlike drugs, there are no rehabs to cure this disease. Then what’s the cure? Why not use this disease wisely, use this technology for good instead of yelling at the students because it isn’t going to work.

A professor would have to be very creative in a way that integrates the technology in the classroom because it gets distracting to the point that it distracts not only to the person using it but to multiple people in the classroom.I’d suggest that you ask your students to shut down their phones during the classes unless you are conducting some debate and want your students to have access “immediate fact check“ and make your classrooms more engaging.

Social Media – Are you connected?

Despite being distracting, social media is one the largest platform to be connected on and mass sharing of information. And it’s unavoidable in modern times so why not be connected with your students? Share articles, work details, homework submissions and reminders on social media with them. Tag them on famous work of professors, artist, researcher of your fields. Open the floor of Facebook and twitter discussions with them.

Read Also: How To Create Google Forms? 6 Ways To Use Google Forms for Teachers

Introduce them with better management of their work with Google Drive and Docs or Save their notes on online platforms like Evernote or Dropbox. Changing times, It’s the duty of professors to use the technology innovatively.

Digital Textbooks – Are your friends in disguise?

With students having access to the Internet 24*7 Digital textbooks are widely replacing the traditional paperback books. It is important for educators to realize this shift. This also helps some students who can’t afford the books. So help your students with providing them appropriate material on the web they can refer to but don’t forget to your roots. Not all students prefer digital textbooks, also it can higher the risk of eyesight issues. Suggest your students use Electronic textbooks outside your classrooms for self-studying and research as they can acquire both visual and audio guidance on the net.

Flipped Classroom – Are you flipped enough?

 In a  Flipped classroom one is supposed to do background learning of a particular topic or skill occurs outside of class time – utilizing technological tools like videos and podcasts to teach the essential skills. This leaves class time free to work collaboratively on the higher-order thinking needed to utilize these skills. Though some researches show that this method is resulting in improved test score it’s necessary to switch back to the traditional learning time to time to have a balance and give attention to each individual.

With these tricks in your pockets, You can crack the Tech- savvy generation and Work with them with ease making your classrooms more engaging and better than ever.

The ease and portability which the reader’s receive with access to eBooks are amazing!!

Now, there is no worry to store and maintain the hard copies, all that is needed is just a smart device to read as many books as desired.

In the 19th century an English author, Martin Tupper wrote, “A good book is the best of friends, the same today and forever.” It’s true; books are not only friendly but also familiar, and loveable. Probably, this is what which explains why it is taking everyone so long to get used to the idea of portable electronic books or free eBook download sites.

Books not only serve as a constant companion in solitude but also serve as food for the mind by stimulating both imagination and creativity. However, buying a new book every time can burn a hole in your pockets. Thankfully there are lots of free books available online, ready to be read or downloaded without costing you a dime!

The ease and portability which the readers’ receive with access to eBooks are amazing. Now, there is no worry to store and maintain the hard copies, all that is needed is just a smart device to read as many books as desired.

With the arrival of a new generation of electronic book readers, the days of the printed word just might be numbered. Free eBook download sites such as the Sony Reader, and Amazon Kindle etc. have started making a great influence on the audiences with a rapid speed.

To know as to how these free eBook download sites work, it’s necessary to know about their benefits, let’s take a closer look at them.

• Free eBook download sites are good from an environmental perspective. It reduces paper use.
• These can be produced more quickly than printed books.
• The readers get to read even very minute topics and events via free ebook download sites.
• Free eBook download sites are easy to upgrade mistakes and to correct. Also,  information can be easily added.
• Such sites contribute to the preservation of books. They are ageless.
• These have high ease of portability.
• Free eBook download sites defy time: They can be delivered almost immediately.
• Their production is cheaper. Resulting for the small publishers in competing with media giants.
• Free ebook download sites can be annotated without damaging the originals.
• They can include multimedia: still images, moving images and sound.
• Free eBook download sites are particularly of great importance in science and technology issues. They are posted online and therefore, facilitate the exchange of ideas, proposals and corrective feedback by reducing the number of errors and improving accuracy.

The comforts which free eBook download sites provide have made them easily available for everyone. Below is a list of 10 amazing websites where anyone can easily get eBooks, anytime and that too free of cost!

Read Also: How To Create Google Forms? 6 Ways To Use Google Forms for Teachers

 

Open Library

The ultimate goal of Open Library is “One web page for every book ever published”.  Open Library is one of the very popular free eBook download sites which serve as a great digital library of Internet sites.

There are millions of free books to read on this website which can be downloaded in other formats such as EPUB, DJVU, MOBI, and PDF. A huge variety for good reading material on varied subjects and genres such as Fantasy, Biographies, History, Medicine, Art, etc. can be searched.

Open Library Features:-

• • Advanced search option as well that enables to search eBooks through the respective titles or authors.

• • Anyone can also search for a particular free book to read online just by entering a favorite/famous line from the book.

• • It is one of those sites which contain an extensive collection of free online books in all almost every category one can think of.

• Full books can be easily downloaded for free in different formats.

 

Hathi Trust

Hathi Trust is a digital library truly dedicated to the student community.

It comprises the compilation of pre-curated collections of texts on topics such as Ancestry, Manuscripts, and Old Psychology Texts. It has a powerful search option which lets one find free books online in its database through titles or authors. One can read books online on this website without registration; but yes, downloading them requires you to sign up.

Read Also: Explore The Use of Technology In Education

 

Project Gutenberg

This is one of those free eBook download sites which has a diversified reading collection for readers. It is a volunteer effort to make books available for free of cost. There are free books available on all types of subjects ranging from Classics to Periodicals and History to Social Sciences. Books can be explored in any genre and downloaded in EPUB, MOBI Kindle, HTML, and simple text format too.

Project Gutenberg Features:-

• • It neither charges any registration fee nor requires you to sign up.

• • Huge archive of over 57,000 free books for downloading.

• • Directly saving eBooks to cloud storing services such as Dropbox, Google Drive, and OneDrive easy access is another perk which this site offers.

• • It is considered best for Classical Novels.

• It also gives the advantage as same genre books categorized as ‘bookshelves’ for easy browsing.

Bookboon

Bookboon offers free books to read online on every category one can think of. If one is specifically looking for an educational textbook or business book, Bookboon will help to find exactly what is needed. This is one of those free eBook download sites which has thousands of eBooks ready to be downloaded and read. One just needs to visit the free section and enter a few details to download books.

Bookboon Features:-

• • Certainly, this website is easy to navigate and is well categorized.

• • Not only in English, has Bookboon offered texts in other languages such as German, Dutch, Danish, French, Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, Spanish and Czech as well.

• It is considered best for downloading educational and business books.

 

Feedbooks

Feedbooks offers a colossal collection of original as well as public domain books for free. The website has a clean interface with well-cataloged sections of books ranging from Short Stories, Mystery Novels, Action, Fantasy, History to even Academic Books and much more. Exploring new reading material on Feedbook is easily accessible with the search options. One can find the free books to read on Free Public Domain Books and Free Original Books section

Feedbooks Features:-

Synopsis, pages, word count, reading hours, publishing date, etc. is displayed on the download page of each book.

It has sections like Bestsellers, New Releases and Editorial Reviews which can help anyone to find new books to read online.

It is a Mobile browser friendly website and is fast and easy to navigate.

Read Also: Three Things To Make A Good Teacher

Free-eBooks

Free-eBooks goes with the tagline, “Read anywhere; anytime.” Good literary works of fiction, non-fiction, and academic texts are offered by this free eBook download site.  Although there is a limit of 5 eBook downloads per month (in PDF format).

Free – eBooks Features:-

• • It contains a featured section which showcases the best eBooks at a particular time and great books of all time.

• This website offers audiobooks as well.

 

LibriVox

LibriVox is one of those free eBook download sites which is a digital library of free audiobooks.  The free audiobooks are read and downloaded by volunteers that work to release quality recordings of classic books. Even though the concept of audiobooks isn’t technically considered as eBooks, it is surely a great way to enjoy books when one is on the move and keeps one entertained as well.

Librivox Features:-

• • It offers great help for the visually impaired and helps them enjoy great literary works for free.

• • The titles can be downloaded in MP3 format and the links to the eBook versions are also available on each title page.

• The audio quality is certainly good.

Zing

Zing is one of those free eBook download sites which offers 1000s of fiction and nonfiction eBooks. Thousands of trade book titles which include award-winning titles, books and series from well-known authors, Spanish leveled books, and short texts, poems, and articles are easily accessible and can be read easily by everyone. It can be used on multiple devices like desktops, laptops, tablets or even whiteboards. The up gradation to the personalized learning package can be done to get even more additional features of Zing.

Wiki books

Wiki books is one of those free eBook download sites which is a collection of open-content textbooks that anyone can edit by clicking on the edit link that appears near the top of each Wikibooks page. If one is looking for non-fiction content, Wikibooks prove to be the best place to begin. As a part of the non-profit organization Wikimedia Foundation, the site hosts an extensive collection of eBooks on various subjects like Humanities, Engineering, Computing, Science, Languages, and other academic topics.

Wiki books Features:-

• • Any User can easily browse books based on any subject from the main page and also see the featured books that are the best books.

• Certainly, these materials can be used in a traditional classroom, an accredited or respected institution, a home-school environment.

Smashwords

Smashwords is an immense collection of the literary work by Indie authors. This online directory of books offers content created by independent authors and publishers globally. This is one of those free eBook download sites which includes several subject topics and genres such as Adventure, Business, Classics, Fantasy, Fiction, History, Religion, Philosophy and many more.

Smashwords Features:-

• • It is a collection of over 475,000 online eBooks to read and is for those who have a penchant for writing.

• They can publish their literary work on this platform.

EBooks are certainly the future of libraries. They are not only a collection of digital resources but are also accessible for retrieval over computer networks. They are not only user-friendly and portable but also store a great amount of data and information. Let’s see what technology has in stock for the development of eBooks in the future.

This article is an initiative to save our environment as well as time.

So, we strongly suggest now to use such free ebook download sites. This saves trees which are being sacrificed for paper production. Also many other benefits to us.

Education is one of the basic indicators of the prosperity of any social group. Connotations of the development process of any nation have historically focused on the improvement of standards of living people through activities leading to economic improvement. In this effort, education, in general, and science education, in particular, have attained high importance. Today we are seeing a lot of educators are making reference to Bloom’s Taxonomy. In 1956, Benjamin Bloom published a framework for categorizing educational goals: Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, popularly known as Bloom’s taxonomy, this revolutionary framework has been incorporated by school and higher education educators in their teaching method.

Benjamin Bloom didn’t anticipate inventing this doctrine. When he started developing his taxonomy of educational objectives, his main aim was to locate a common language that educational measurement connoisseurs could use to share findings and exchange test items.

Bloom taxonomy emerged from a series of informal discussions with his friends started at the American Psychological Association in 1948. During that period veterans enrolled in college graduated with more than just lower-level factual knowledge. Educators started considering assessment. Bloom tried to share ideas and test evaluations. Bloom identified four principles that eventually led to the development of the taxonomy. Categories should:

• Be based on student behaviors

• Show logical relationships among the categories

• Sheds a light on the modern understanding of psychological processes

• Describe rather than impose value judgments

The highest three levels of learning according to Bloom was Analysing, synthesizing and evaluating & The lowest three levels were knowledge, comprehension, and application.

The new version of Bloom’s Taxonomy has been converted from noun to the verb forms. Originally, Bloom’s cognitive taxonomy was one dimensional but with the addition of products the Bloom’s taxonomy becomes a two dimensional one. The revised Bloom’s taxonomy places stressed upon its application as a tool for the curriculum planning, Instructional delivery, and assessment. The new taxonomy is the biggest asset and is a sign of profound thinking and is perhaps more accurate.

Today it has become part of the language of teaching. Educators mainly talk about“lower-level “questions. According to them the hierarchy which puts knowledge at the bottom especially knowledge-based questions, especially via recall and retrieval practice are not so productive in nature.

In other ways, you need to teach a lot of facts to instill and reinforce knowledge enough to store it I long-term memory. or you can try them at the beginning but is going to be fruitless. Knowledge followed by recall and retrieval practice is the prime precondition

It was initially set apart in three domains

•  The Cognitive– knowledge-based domain

• The Psychomotor– skill based field which is also known as KSA (knowledge, skills, and attitude) or ASK (Attitude, skills, and Knowledge)

The cognitive domain includes knowledge and the development of intellectual skills (Bloom, 1956). This endorses the recall or recognition of specific facts, concepts, and procedural patterns that serve in the empowering of the intellectual abilities and skills. There are six major categories, which are stated below, initiating from the simplest behavior to the most complex.

According to the process one needs to master in the first one in order to go to the next one.

Knowledge

The knowledge level, which is slated at the lowest level of the hierarchy, is defined on the basis of retrieving previously studied material. It often includes key terms, repeating something seen or heard, listing steps in a process.

Comprehension

Comprehension serves the largest category of cognitive skills and abilities. The key proficiency that can be learned at this level is processing new information.

Application

At the application level, a learner should have reached a position to solve a new problem by applying information without having to be assisted. At this level, learner requires to interpret information, demonstrate mastery of a concept, or apply a skill learned.

Analysis

At the Analysis level, learners should have learned to recognize relationships among parts. At this level of the hierarchy, learners are requiring to learn to differentiate, contrasts and compare, criticize, or experiment.

Synthesis

At the synthesis level, learners yearn for creative behavior as learners produce newly constructed and, many times, unique products. At this level of the hierarchy, learners are requiring to create a plan, propose an innovation, design a product, or organize information.

Evaluation

At the evaluation level, learners learn to make judgments about value. At this level of hierarchy learners are required to measure, value, estimate, choose, or revise something, perhaps information, a product—or solve a problem.

The next sphere of learning is effective which speaks about growth in feeling and emotional area. They are in sync with affective is valuing, internalizing, responding and receiving phenomena.

And the third and final sphere of learning is psychomotor which refers to the physical skills, the categories adapt to psychomotor skills are adaptation, origin, perception to name a few.

 Bloom Taxonomy in its various forms represents the process of learning. It has been classified in some case like the Three Story Intellect (Oliver Wendell Holmes and Art Costa), but it still essentially represents how we learn.

Prior understanding a concept, we need to remember it

Prior to applying the concept, we must understand it

Prior to analyzing it, we must be able to apply it

Prior to evaluating its impact, we must have analyzed it

Instructional object analyzing or learning objectives are statements which determines what learners will be able to achieve after completion of a unit of instruction. They help us to decide what learners should learn and how we will know whether they have learned that content. Whenever we write any content, at the outset, we write these objectives to guide the design of the instruction.

These objectives can be aligned with educational outcomes. Suppose that a University is planning to start a training programme to improve the creativity of their students. If the students meet only lower- level objectives, their skill is unlikely to innovate and improve. They might be able to learn a few things about creativity, but to do their job effectively, they must develop the higher order skills to plan and design any new thought.

The significance of Bloom’s Taxonomy lies in its verbs. The verbs associated with each cognitive level establish learners can do to demonstrate what they have learned. The secret of this level is to select verbs that correlate instructional goals with content and assessment. Suppose a university develops a program to improve facilitators skills. If the learning objectives are “List the steps in the methodical process” and “Define training,” the program has a fatal flaw: its objectives are limited to the knowledge level, but its aim includes mastery of higher-order skills that participants may not have learned or practiced. If the objective is limited to the knowledge level and participants must turn to higher-order skills to show mastery.

But there will always be a debate, some will say that you do not require all the stages for each and every task, some will argue about the necessity to reach the apex level for all activities. This should be left to the individual choice. Before we create anything, we must have remembered, understood, applied, analyzed & evaluated.

Implications

Educational implications of Bloom’s Taxonomy include the following:

1. Bloom’s taxonomy provides a universally effective strategy for delivering all type of content to impart learning.
2. The taxonomy assists teachers to make decisions about the classification of content.
3. Bloom’s taxonomy also helps educators to map content tasks that students need to perform.
4. Bloom’s taxonomy guides educators to instill higher levels of thinking process for critical thinking or creative thinking.
5. By facilitating taxonomy, a teacher develops questions or projects that require the development of cognitive thinking and reflection from the knowledge level to the evaluation level.
6. An educator or a syllabus designer designs a curriculum as well as classroom assignment using Bloom’s taxonomy to advance the learning process from recalling learning materials to a higher level of thinking.
7. An educator motivates the class by assisting his lectures based on Bloom’s Taxonomy.

A Teacher’s Role

The role of teachers everywhere is to guide their students to not only learn basic information but also to them improve cognitive ability. In other words, educators want to help improve their students’ ability to think. They should never promote students to just memorize information. After all, memorizing something is not the same as thinking or understanding or creating any new thing. Helping students to improve their thinking skills isn’t easy, but educators can follow

Bloom’s Taxonomy to help us reach our goal.  Teachers can follow Bloom’s taxonomy by asking questions and delivering assignments that directly correlate with specific learning objectives in each stage of the process, formulating the objectives clear to the student.

Bloom’s Taxonomy can benefit not only academia but also workplaces. From financial models to optimization, students should be nurtured and encouraged to create new ideas. Tonnes of group activities and team-work can promote the exchange of ideas and brainstorming.

Follow this model in the everyday task you undertake and let your hidden talent bloom!

Indians have contributed immensely in the field of science and technology. This article takes us down the memory lane of some of the brilliant minds in India.

Looking around you will find Indians reaching heights in every area. With the ease of accessibility of information, improvement in technology and the growth of quality institutions, Indians are able to use their capability and mind to its best. But even during British India, Indians were responsible for contributing and developing in the field of science and getting honors and awards for the same. Amongst the many here is a list of 10 Indian scientists who succeeded in changing the world.

Jagadish Chandra Bose:

(30th November 1858 to 23rd November 1937)

About:

• Bose was born on November 30th, 1858 in Bikrampur, Bengal Presidency, British India (Now Munshiganj District Of Bangladesh).
  He started his education from a vernacular school moving to St Xavier’s, Kolkata. attended the University of Cambridge to study natural science.
• He was a professor of physical science until 1917 when he established the Bose Institute at Calcutta, initially for the study of plants.

Research:

He was the first Indian scientist who proved that animal and plant they both are very common and share the same feelings. Along with the research of life and feelings in plants, he also researched there response to fertilizers, light waves, and wireless waves. He also wrote two illustrious books; ‘Response in the Living and Non-living’ (1902) and ‘The Nervous Mechanism of Plants’ (1926) and research on the behavior of radio waves.

Prafulla Chandra Ray (Father of Indian pharmaceuticals):

(2nd August 1861 to 16th June 1944 )

About:

• Prafulla Chandra Ray was born on 2nd August 1861 in Khulna.
• He completed his schooling from “ Albert School”, higher education from ‘Vidyasagar College’.
• He completed his graduation from ‘Edinburgh University’ in Scotland and then worked on his Ph.D.

Research:
He was known as the “Father of Indian pharmaceuticals”.
He was recognized for his work of mercury. He discovered compound of mercurous nitrate.
He also established a manufacturing company known as ‘Bengal Chemicals and Pharmaceuticals Works Ltd.’
He also established awards like Nagarjuna Prize’ for chemistry and ‘Ashutosh Mukherjee Award’ for biology.

Srinivasa Ramanujan:

(22nd December 1887 to 26th April 1920 )

About:

• Srinivasa Ramanujan, a brilliant mathematician, was born on 22nd December 1887 in Erode, Madras.
• He did not complete his degree because he was interested and dedicated to only one subject, mathematics.

Research:
His work included the study of the partition function (Pn) along with Hardy to give a non-convergent asymptotic series that permits exact computation of the number of partitions of an integer.
He was the first Indian to be honored by being elected a Fellow of Trinity College.
He was honored by Google o his 125th birth anniversary and India declared that day as “National Mathematics Day”

C.V.Raman:

( 7th November 1888 to 20th November 1970)

About:

• Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman was a Brahmin born on November 7, 1888, in the city of Trichinopoly now known as Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu, in a very low-income family.
• He completed his under graduation and masters from Presidency College, Madras.

Research:
Raman has conducted a lot of research and experiment and the most known discovery was his “Raman effect”.
He was awarded Noble Prize in 1930 for “work on the scattering of light”.
Raman showed that the energy of photons scattered inelastically serves as a ‘fingerprint’ for the substance the light is scattered from.
Apart from Noble prize he also received the prestigious Bharat Ratna Award for the Raman Effect.
He became the director of the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India’s first National Professor and founded the Raman Research Institute, Bangalore.

Satyendra Nath Bose:

(1st January 1894 to 4 February 1974 )

About:

• Satyendra Nath Bose was born on 1st January 1894, in Kolkata India.
• He got the opportunity to be taught by Jagadish Chandra Bose and work with Albert Einstein.
• He completed his B.Sc in mathematics from Kolkata and then served as a lecturer in the physics department.

Research:
He was known for his work in quantum mechanics and one of the two classes of particles in quantum mechanics was named “Bosons” after him.
He also worked on the Planck’s blackbody radiation law.
Later he also worked with Albert Einstein and they formed some ideas which were known as Bose-Einstein Statistics.
He was given the title of Padma Vibhushan in 1954.
Further Rabindranath Tagore dedicated his only book on science, ‘Visva–Parichay’, to Bose.

Homi Jehangir Bhabha:

(30th October 1909 to 24th January 1966)

About:

• Homi Jehangir Bhabha the “Father of Indian nuclear programme’’ was born on 30th October 1909 in Mumbai, India
• He set up the foundation for nuclear research in India.

Research:
His major worked involved helping India with the nuclear programme
He helped in conducting nuclear research and experimenting extracting power from thorium instead of uranium reserves
The government of India honored him with Padma Bhushan for contribution to science.
He built a research center now known as Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC)

Dr. Subramanyan Chandrasekhar:

(October 19th, 1910 to 21st August 1995)

 

About:

• Dr. Subramanyan Chandrasekhar was born on October 19th, 1910 in Lahore, British India (Now a part of Pakistan).
• He completed his high school from Hindu High School, Madras and went to the University of Cambridge along to pursue Ph.D.

Research:
He has identified a lot of theories that includes the theory of white dwarfs, theory of Brownian motion, the theory of radioactive transfer, the theory of relativity and relativistic astrophysics, the mathematical theory of black holes etc.
He is known for “ Chandrasekhar Limit” which was a theory of maximum mass supported against gravity.
He was given the title of Padma Vibhushan in 1968 for his services towards science and research by the government of India.
He was also awarded Noble Prize along with Willian A. Flower in 1983 for his work on star structure and evolution.

Vikram Sarabhai:

(12th August 1919 to 30th December 1971)

About:

• Vikram Sarabhai, Father of the Indian Space program, was born on 12th August 1919 in Ahmedabad, India
• He studied in Gujarat and went to England for higher studies.

Research:
Vikram Sarabhai is the founder of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs)
The government of India honored him with Padma Bhushan and the Padma Vibhushan for his contribution.
He was behind the launch of “Aryabhatta” India’s first satellite.

Dr. Har Gobind Khorana:

(9th January 1922 to 9th November 2011)

About:

• Dr. Har Gobind Khorana born on 9th January 1922 in Punjab, India.
• He completed his High school from D.A.V High School in Multan, studied chemistry from Punjab University, Lahore and completed his Ph.D. degree from the University of Liverpool.

Research:
Dr. Har Gobind Khorana’s work involved research in the field of genetics and DNA. He was the first person to demonstrate the role of nucleotides in protein synthesis.
He was awarded Noble Prize along with, Robert W. Holley, and Marshall W. Nirenberg “for their interpretation of the genetic code and its function in protein synthesis”.

A.P.J. Abdul Kalam:

(15th October 1931 to 27th July 2015)

About:

• A.P.J. Abdul Kalam also known as the “Missile Man Of India” was born on 15th October 1931 in Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu. He served as the 11th President of India.
• His contribution to India is immense in the field of science.
• He completed his high school from Schwartz Higher Secondary School, graduation from Saint Joseph’s College, Tiruchirappalli and studied aerospace engineering in Madras Institute of Technology.

Research:
The government of India honored him with Padma Bhushan, Bharat Ratna and the Padma Vibhushan for his contribution.
The government of India honored him with the Indira Gandhi Award for National Integration.
His 79th Birthday was given the title of World Students’ Day by United Nations.
He has developed the Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV 3) at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre.
Dr. Kalam has received many more honor and awards for his contribution in the field of science. He has also authored many books.
He was loved and followed by a lot of youths in India.

With Government investing more in the development of institutes, dedicated for research and discoveries, many Indian scientists are returning to carry on their research. Attractive avenues are being provided to researchers mainly conducting their research abroad. A lot of improvement in technology has taken place. Information is easily available for researchers. India is full of brilliant minds, now with the support of Government funding the future of science in India is very bright.

If we evaluate engineering colleges in our country, the IITs (Indian Institute of Technology) are bound to be on top of the list. The Indian Institute of Technology, country’s premier Institute has fallen flat in its attempt to do a more global outlook after it failed to attract quality students from abroad. Having got the tag of the institution of eminence from the Centre, the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, has decided to double its intake of foreignstudents in the coming year. It is also looking at increasing the number of foreign students to 10% of its strength in five years.

Several IITs have been signing MoUs and establishing academic and research collaborations with foreign-based universities. But is it wooing more foreign student’s enrollment? certainly not. Fret not! Here’s the answer-

A CUMBERSOME ADMISSION PROCESS

Indian Institute of Technology (IITs) is one of the most famous Indian higher education brands outside the country. They are autonomous public institutions under the Ministry of Human Resource Development and are branded as the best Institutions in the country for engineering education and research in terms of quality and standards. While IITs have a global reputation for quality, they are nowhere on the international map. To increase our ranking around the world, drastic steps are being taken by the government.

Any candidate yearning to pursue a course at an IIT have to undertake either the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE), for undergraduate students, or the Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) for masters and Ph.D. applicants. To attract foreign students, IITs holds entrance tests in eight countries, including Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Singapore, and Dubai, (all SAARC countries) to select students for their undergraduate and postgraduate courses. Both these tests are considered as the toughest admission tests in the world. These admission processes for the IIT requires extensive preparation and is not conducive to attract foreign students. The Indian should be given the opportunity to compete globally with foreign students in the global market to show their worth and their talent to the world. Many foreign meritorious students are missing the opportunity due to this criterion, which is absolutely wrong from their point of view. Not only it is an injustice to these students but is also a loss for IITs and NITs; because they are missing global cream of students because of this criterion.

For more information regarding the current admission process, you can click on https://www.iitm.ac.in/content/foreign-national-admission-procedure.

The Institute needs to penetrate better among schools abroad to draw more candidates. They need to allocate funds on publicity.

 

A LOWER FELLOWSHIP FOR FOREIGN SCHOLARS  

IITs have collaborated with 200+ foreign-based Universities but that does not guarantee higher foreign enrolment. The funding from the ministry is not enough to provide competitive fellowship for foreign scholars. You must provide a higher amount of fellowship to woo foreign scholars. The funds provided to international Ph.D. candidates will be similar to those given to domestic students – about 28,000 rupees ($407) per month and free accommodation. The institution is also reportedly forming a delegation to attract faculty from eastern Europe and Russia.

 

SHORTAGE OF FUNDING FROM THE GOVERNMENT

Several IITs is aiming to sign MOU to bring in foreign students and teachers to India via dual and joint degrees and exchange programs. But to implement this they will need a surplus amount of funding. They are also devoid of separate funding to send students or teachers abroad. In a recent report of the Reserve Bank of India, it has been seen that though the spending on overseas education by Indians have increased by many folds, the investment by foreign students in India has declined substantially.

THE CURRENT FEE STRUCTURE 

The current fee structure of the foreign students is fixed Rs. 6,00,000 per annum, is 3 times that of the Indian students which is not competitive enough. In a recent meeting, the IIT Council, headed by the HRD (Human Resource Development) Minister, has come to the decision that the IITs will now be allowed to fix the fees for foreign students. It is not viable do demand such an exorbitant fee when your main plan is to attract quality students from middle and low- income countries like Africa and Asia.

However, in a recent meeting, The Indian Institute of Technologies in a move to improve international rankings and lure in students from abroad have proposed to cut the fees for foreign students. To revamp the education system and to improve the Global ranking of the Indian Institutes, the Government of India is taking steps to attract more foreign students in the next few years. Hence, the current stand to reduce the fees was the need of the hour. Beside tuition fees, the lack of adequate institutional support had always been a deterrent to attract foreign students to study in India.

Let us ponder at some important advantages of the IITs welcoming international students

1. The induction of foreign students is being seen as a necessary move to improve the global ranking of institutions, as the Institute of eminence status is aimed at helping Indian institutions break into the global league. The various IITs should try to increase the number of foreign students and they should set a target to reach in the coming years. The QS ranking of higher education institutions across the world ranks them on five parameters — foreign faculty, foreign students, student-faculty ratio, research, and perception.

According to Department of Higher Education figures, a total of 46,144 students from 166 countries studied at Indian HEIs during 2017-18, with 63.4% hailing from just 10 countries and Nepal constituting 24.9% of the total.(http://mhrd.gov.in/sites/upload_files/mhrd/files/statistics/AISHE2017-18_0.pdf)

The move will also draw quality foreign professors in these institutes, which will be helpful in boosting the number of international faculties. The proportion of international students and faculties plays a crucial parameter in the International Ranking of Engineering Institutes.

2. Internal Placements will increase as International companies will show a keen interest in these colleges.
3. With the arrival of foreign nationals, the overall quality of research will improve. The government is quite keen on having many foreign students at IITs as it will instantly boost the country’s international academic rankings.

The government is quite keen on having many foreign students at IITs as it will instantly boost the country’s international academic rankings. So, in order to blossom as an Institute of Global Importance, IIT need to rethink their strategy and take necessary steps to woo foreign students.

If you wish to be the best in the game, then you need to keep technology close to you, in fact, one should make it your best friend. In the 21st century, a wise teacher is one who is capable enough to use technology in his/her classroom. Why do this? The integration of technology into the classrooms makes the classroom more engaging and is an effective way to connect with students and help them with learning new things. Not only this, it will help the teacher to be updated with tech-savvy students and ensure that the students don’t make a fool out of them. And to keep your chase short. Here are Top 5 Educational websites that will keep you updated:

EdTech:

The best about this site is the easy navigation. You can easily get access to articles related to higher education. The main focus of EdTech is to explore technology and educational issues related to  Higher education.

Website – https://edtechmagazine.com/higher/

Bw Education:

This website is the sister page of the website called “Business World”. It is a community for every stakeholder in the education sector. It aims to break the invisible walls between the K-12 and Higher Education and the responsibility of the society. The website provides rich insights and articles about the Higher education sector. It will help you to question things and have a new perspective.

Website– http://bweducation.businessworld.in/

EdSurge:

The website started in 2011 by Betsy Corcoran, Matt Bowman, Nick Punt and Agustin Vilaseca to connect the emerging community of Higher Education. They share information on various technologies, news and trends in the Edtech industry. They support teaching and learning through the use of emerging technology. Not only that, they also connect people with new job opportunities through there job boards and networks.

The website also has various investors called “Angel Investors” :

Nancy Peretsman, Judy Estrin, Dale Dougherty, Steve Blank, Gillian Munson, Kelly Pope and David Bulfer, Joe Gleberman, George Anders, Bud Colligan, Jennifer Fonstad and Martha Ehmann Conte, John Katzman, Alan Louie, Tim Ranzetta, and Lynda Weinman

Website – https://www.edsurge.com/

Hechinger report:

The website is an independent nonprofit, nonpartisan organization based at Teachers College, Columbia University. To carry out there work they take support from donations from various foundations or donors. Their goal is to push the levels of the education sector, bring clarity, depth and explain the new policies and what effects they have on people.

They cover rising topics and stories of people from the education sector. The website has insights on the higher education as well.

Website:https://hechingerreport.org/specialreports/higher-education/

Education Dive:

The website has many tabs to access and Higher Education is one of them. They cover news about the education industry and provide an original analysis of the situation. They also have another separate tab for technologies to assist you with. The website is self-explanatory and easy to use. They also publish feature articles, events and job options, etc.

Website:https://www.educationdive.com

Teachers have a huge responsibility on their shoulder, they have to not only teach the students but also ensure that with the changing times they are maintaining the level of education. To make the Higher education in India better and maintain its mark globally, teachers need to advance the level of learning and they can only do this if they are updated with the new methods of teaching available across the globe.So read on our article for our list of Top 7 online courses websites.

Udemy

One of the best websites in the world for online courses, Udemy offers over 80,000 courses which are taught by the expert instructors. It is a global marketplace which helps people to master new skills and achieve success in their respective fields. As it is providing best service out their, the courses a little more expensive than the others. Despite this, Udemy offers schemes which you could watch for in which it gives a huge discount for joining those courses. It is best known for its varied Business and Technology courses.

Coursera

Coursera dates back to 2012 and was founded by two Stanford Computer Science teacher who had the visions to share knowledge with everyone across the globe. This idea breaks all the barriers of distance and gives everyone the opportunity to be the better version of themselves, improve skills, have degrees from esteemed colleges in the world and learn new exciting courses according to your likings. The best part about this website is the huge diversity of subjects that it offers courses on. Some courses are also available for free, while others have cheap fees. Only degree courses with official certifications from the colleges are expensive.

edX

With more than 130 global partners, edX is one of the largest online learning platforms which provides courses from the world’s best universities. It was founded by Harvard University and MIT in 2012 and aims to enhance the level of learning by providing high-quality education for everyone from anywhere. It also provides advance learning through leaning. Not only that it also offers free courses with open edX feature.

Udacity

Udacity, a well known online platform for learning, initially started as an experiment by two Stanford Instructors Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig. It is platform well known for its technological courses, therefore, a lot of companies has collaborated with it. Although the number of courses is limited they are well crafted. Data science is the most famous course of the website which has instructors from Salesforce and Facebook etc. Recently, it also partnered with Google to give free Scholarships for courses on the growing technology and skills.it has also launched certain new courses for this project. A good factor is that the payment structure is convenient and pocket saving, as it is monthly based hence if a person wants to leave a course mid-way they can stop paying for it from next month. Udacity’s mission to teach and democratize education by providing the high level of learning is growing day by day.

Lynda

The veteran in the online teaching, Lynda has been working from past 20 years to help students, leaders, teachers, IT, designers etc. in developing new skills according to the need of the modern generation. It offers a subscription at a reasonable cost of $25 per month and more than 80,000 videos to learn from on a broad range of different subjects. Not only that it serves more than 10,000 organizations. Furthermore, now its part of Linkedin and all the courses are now available on Linkedin too.

Skillshare

Skillshare is the growing community that provides online education on more than a thousand courses. The membership costs $9.95 per month and the advantage of getting this membership is that without availing for any course particularly, 20% of the videos are available for all classes. Despite that, you can learn some courses without membership at $20-$ 30.It offers a wide range of subjects with video catalogue format for leaning, in addition, it also gives a workshop in some cities.

Simplilearn

With topping the charts in one of the leading websites globally with 8th rank in 2016, it has helped more than 150 countries to get trained, acquire certifications, and upskill their employees. It is based in San Francisco, California and Bangalore, India and has more than 20,000 connections with companies across the globe. It follows a blended learning approach to provide a high level of education for the learner and improve their skills. It has also been named the 8th most influential group globally on LinkedIn.

So what are you waiting for ? Go look for your preference and learn new skills to re-polish your knowledge with the changing technology!