DonorsChoose challenge

Check out donorschoose.org for a list of sustainable education projects that encourage
sustainable thinking

Projects are proposed by teachers, and we are challenging readers to donate to support projects.

Visit our challenge page

Futures Studies in education

What is "futures studies"? 

In short, it is an academic discipline concerned with tools, techniques, for:

• analyzing possible futures through trend analysis
• assessing probable futures through forecasting techniques
• pursuing and shaping preferred futures (through education, development of scenarios, activism, and strategy and policy formulation)

Happily, these ideas are very much aligned with the current emphasis on increasing critical thinking skills in our educational institutions, part of the "21st century skills" movement.

This is especially in trying to determine the short-term and long-term consequences of a set of decisions and actions.  Here are some other resources to consider to aid in professional development:

1. Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_studies 
2. Futures in Education project - Wetpaint forum - http://foresighteducation.wetpaint.com
3. Map of future forces affecting education: A collaboration between the KnowledgeWorks Foundation in Cincinnati, OH, and the Institute for the Future in Palo Alto, CA.
4. University of Houston: History of futures education - now at http://web.archive.org/web/20100416184226/http://tech.uh.edu/futureweb/fieldhist.html
5. LinkedIn group:

netLogo

While searching for modeling and simulation software, I found netLogo at Northwestern University.

While it's not open source, the team is purported to be working on it

buckminster fuller challenge

October seems to be challenge month.

There's another challenge we found via stumbleupon - a buckminster fuller institute
challenge for contributions to ecology, with a prize of 100,0,00

Google Code now has CS curriculum and lectures

Thanks, Google!

Google Code for Education http://code.google.com/edu/ has the education resources helpful in computer science courses.


(KidSim is an example of content you can find on this search)


BTW, when will amazon have ratings for open reference material and courseware sites?
It seems complimentary to their mission of selling books (and everything else)

If you can review the play value of toys, why not the value of web content?
(based on quality education)

Sample activity - the Consumer Price Index

The US Government uses the Consumer Price index to measure inflation.
The 'core' CPI excludes food and energy prices.

Is this fair? By excluding gasoline and food from the calulation, is inflation
being underestimated?

What would an economic model based on the CPI lead to? If it underestimates inflation, what will that do to the future economy?

Resources:

Consumer Price Index:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumer_price_index

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_regression

Tools for the future of education

I was fortunate to have an excellent education through our public school system.

I've come to realize how valuable it was to have committed, passionate teachers who worked to convince the school administration to let them experiment.

30 years later, the amount of change in the world demands an integrated approach to thinking about the problems we face, and we must empower citizens to think about the future, about the whole system, and their place and actions in it.

Every student and citizen should have a chance to learn what these ideas are about.
So they can think for themselves about complex systems, and plan for a preferred future.

More information on these ideas may be found in an article by Geoff Fletcher:

Dr. Geoffry Fletcher, Editor-in Chief, "Focusing on the Future," T.H.E. Journal, 11/1/2003, http://www.thejournal.com/articles/16500