Wearable Week Summary
Hi Everyone, Thank you for an amazing response especially with all you had on your plate. We weren’t surprised by all the innovative designs made by the group (there’s so much talent!) and appreciate your willingness to dive in and think like a designer, an investor and an educator! Here’s one final mission with some […]
A3: SOOCs4Learning
Hi Everyone, After several false starts I decided to to focus on a (possible) real venture. In a previous UBC course I wrote a paper called: A Pedagogical Framework to Support Online Teacher Professional Learning. This got me thinking about creating an online course based on the research I did. Together with two colleagues, I […]
Wearables Google+ Community
Hi Everyone, When posting in the community, you will both post a comment and create a post. For the Introductory activity and Think Like an Investor you comment within an existing post. For Think Like a Designer and Think Like an Educator you create your own post.
Welcome Everyone to Week 12 – Wearables!
If you haven’t experienced wearables yet you soon will! The rapidly expanding area of wearable computing is, if the forecasters are correct, about to explode across multiple markets especially in the health and fitness categories. As of yet, beyond some exploration with Google Glass, wearables have had little impact on day-to-day teaching and learning. That’s where […]
Is your company worth investing in?
I thought this post from Arc Capital Development was good advice to keep in mind as we develop our pitch. – http://arccd.com/is-your-company-worth-investing-in/ I also like the comment “Investors will pay what it is worth to them, not what it is worth to you.” Determining your value is always tricky, clouded by all the 80 hour weeks […]
Quite the Kickstart
This company raised 400% over their initial ask of $100,000…in one day. I think they might be applying the house selling strategy of under valuing to get a big response. None the less the technology is very interesting and the pitch video definitely works. https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/jibo-the-world-s-first-family-robot
Startup Advice from the Founders of WikiSpaces
I often go back and reread this article by James Byers and Adam Frey called “How to Succeed in EdTech”. It’s worth a read – and the links at the bottom are valuable as well. https://www.wikispaces.com/content/topic/how-to-succeed-in-education
Blog Post on Vendors’ focus
I came across this blogpost summarizing ISTE 2014. If anything the ISTE conference is as much about teachers coming together to learn and share as it is vendor’s hawking their wares. This blogpost focuses on a pet peeve of mine and that is the never wavering focus on technology, the latest gadget, rather than teaching […]
Hacks
I love the idea of hacks. In this case if you can’t think of new, revolutionary ideas you can hack another product/idea – in this case PayPal. This hackathon had people creating apps to find lost children (and fund through Paypal), crowdsource funding app for children (really) and a mobile app to pay for parking. https://www.paypal.ca/blog/paypal-battle-hack-toronto-packs-the-house-at-mars-discovery-district/
Microsoft – BizSpark – More Startups
Hi! Here is the site for Microsoft’s startup incubator. At the bottom of the page are featured startups You might find a company to focus on for your pitch here. http://www.microsoft.com/bizspark/
Canadian Start-ups
If you are still considering a company to focus on for your A3 assignment I just finished my MaRS monthly meeting with a few suggestions. The following are startups with MaRS that you might want to learn more about or use for your pitch assignment. Raise Your Flag – https://raiseyourflag.com/?skip_landing – Just saw their pitch – great […]
ETEC 522 – Assignment 1 Venture Analysis – Helping Boys Learn
I chose to review Helping Boys Learn as I am working with the founder, Ed Dixon, to build online, mLearning modules for schools districts and parents. The modules are created with Articulate Storyline so I used it to create my presentation as well. Right now Ed has his MVP (Parent modules) and he is receiving positive feedback. The […]
Solar Freakin’ Roadways
This is very cool. Check out the IndieGoGo overview on solar roadways. https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/solar-roadways
If you’re looking for crowdfunding sites
I recently supported a startup – big money $30 🙂 – on Indiegogo and in their follow-up survey they listed other fundraising sites. I thought this list might help people get ideas for their assignments. RocketHub CrowdTilt GoFundMe Fundly CrowdRise KickStarter
Duolingo – Luis van Ahn
As an investor I believe many of the startups using free and freemium models aren’t finding the success they thought they’d find so I wanted to explore Duolingo’s model. Luis van Ahn is Co-Founder and CEO as well as a professor at Carnegie Melon Company – DuoLingo Duolingo is a dual language learning and text translation […]
Singspiel
I saw this pitch and thought I’d put it in the pool. Company: Singspiel Team: Arian Rahbari, Ivan Cheung Industry: Education technology, music, learning software Founded: 2012 Elevator pitch: Singspiel is music education software that makes regular music practice more effective by leveraging mobile technology to provide coherent feedback to students. Vision: Organize the world’s […]
Silicon Valley – HBO
In keeping with the spirit of the course there’s a new show on HBO called Silicon Valley. A bit rude (as only HBO can be) but very funny. The show is all about a tech start-up who seem to pivot a lot. The scene in this week’s episode where various companies pitch their product is pretty funny. […]
MindShare Learning Report
The following three links come from MindShare Learning based in Toronto. The first is the EdTech Teacher Survey which isn’t actually a projection source but it does give you a Canadian perspective. The second is Top Ten EdTech Predictions. This brief list give a general overview of the Canadian technology landscape. MindShare Learning works […]
Augmented Reality
Although many people have voted already I wanted to include Augmented Reality. This category encompasses Google Glass and also wearable technology. The idea of layering digital information over your visual environment has huge potential in education. Whether used to provide support or enhancement by layering links, video and resources on top of (inside?) posters, papers and […]
My MVP (Minimal Viable Product) Introduction :)
Hi Everyone, My name is Kendra Grant. This is my 5th course in the MET program. I live in Mississauga with my husband and two sons (one of which is in Teachers Collage!) I was a teacher for 23 years in a variety of positions with a focus on SPED, AT and IT. About 10 […]