Google Honours Sally Ride

I opened up Google's search page today and found myself faced with the latest in Google Doodles, a montage of animated images honouring famed astronaut Sally Ride. Sally Ride was the first female American in space and later started her own organization to foster education in children with an emphasis on girls and minority students. She wanted to overcome the issue of kids being turned off by science, technology, engineering and math because society sends a false message about who you have to be to be an astronaut or a physicist like Sally Ride.

Today would have Sally’s 64th birthday. She passed away on July 23rd, 2012 from pancreatic cancer. Check out this video from the animator explaining her process for making the Google Doodle. 

Adobe eLearning Suite 2

I recently purchase the Adobe eLearning Suite 2 to not only keep up to date but to replace some earlier versions of software that was not compatible with my new laptop.  My new laptop uses Windows 7 which is a 64 bit operating system.  My copies of Acrobat, Captivate, and Dreamweaver were not compatible with this system so I was forced to make the jump to the latest versions of these.  By choosing the eLearning Suite I was also able to get the latest versions of Flash, Photoshop and few other lesser known applications from Adobe.

Normally this software would run about $1800; however I took advantage of an educational discount available to me as a student.  Earlier this year I had completed an adult training certification which entitled me to this discount.  I ended up paying only $600 for the suite.  This proved to be less than purchasing any two of the more known applications within the suite.  If you are taking even a single course at your local college you can take advantage of this offering.  The Adobe eLearning suite is extremely useful to anyone within the Instructional Design field.

A Learning Revolution is Needed

Sir Ken Robinson is an author, public speaker and an international advisor on education.  Earlier this year he spoke at TED about the need for an education revolution.  He states that education in it's current form is similar to manufacturing.  Students are all treated the same and put through a system where the expected results are all the same as well.  When a student doesn't fit into this mold they are usually left by the wayside.  He suggests that an organic approach is better.  Like a farmer creates an environment for his crops to grow, education should simply create an environment that is conducive to allow the student to flourish.  Here is the video: