Resolved to Get Your Education on Track in 2012? Gatlin International Can Help!

January 17th, 2012

We are half way through the first month of 2012 and time is flying by as fast as ever. The turn of the new year signifies new beginnings and fresh starts to lots of people and many of these people participate in the age-old tradition of making  “New Years Resolutions”.  Resolutions are as varied as the people who make them, but one thing is true no matter what:  you will never reach your goals if you do not take action.  If any of your new years resolutions are related to education, training, or career advancement, Gatlin International may be the first action step you are looking for to make your dreams a reality.

Gatlin International offers a vast array of distance learning courses in the areas of Business and Professional, Healthcare and Fitness, Hospitality and Gaming, IT and Software Development, Media and Design, Sustainability, and much more.  A few of Gatlin International’s most relevant and inspiring courses are highlighted below.

ACCA Qualification

Last year, Gatlin International began offering Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) qualification courses.  Gatlin International offers seventeen ACCA courses which will give you all the tools and knowledge you need to complete your ACCA membership.  The ACCA distance learning courses offered by Gatlin International are 100% online to give students the opportunity to advance at their own pace, from the comfort and convenience of their own homes.  If you are thinking a career in the accounting field might be for you, you can read full course descriptions of Gatlin International’s ACCA program in the course catalog.

Computer Game Design

Gatlin International offers a wide range of eLearning courses in the Media and Design category, from AutoCAD courses to Website Design.  Towards the end of 2011, Gatlin International announced an exciting new addition to their Media and Design course lineup: Video Game Design.  This award winning Video Game Design and Basics of Programming online computer game design course is ideal for working professionals and full time students looking to begin a rewarding career as a computer game design and development professional. Enthusiastic amateurs and computer gamers looking to explore this exciting field will also find this course extremely worthwhile and rewarding. This video game design course combines computer graphics concepts, computer aided instruction and marketing, Students are given the freedom to focus their work on any phase of the computer game design process, including initial planning, the design of computer-generated characters and environments, as well as computer programming. You will also learn the technical skills needed to go from the basic computer game concept to finished product.

Sustainability

Careers in the field of Sustainability are growing steadily year by year and if this is an area that interests you, Gatlin International is a great place to begin your training.  Gatlin International offers several courses in the Sustainability field:  Green Business and Sustainability Professional, Green IT – Information and Communications Technology for a Sustainable Future, Solar Power Professional, Wind Power Professional, and many more.  Visit the Gatlin International website and click on the Sustainability link in the course catalog to view a full list of Sustainability courses or to read detailed information about any Sustainability course that interests you.

The Education For All Crowdsourcing Challenge Update

January 12th, 2012

Perhaps some of you remember reading our article about the Education for All (EFA) Crowdsourcing Challenge a few months ago.  This is an ongoing contest in which the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) partnered with Nokia and the Pearson Foundation to launch a challenge designed to produce ideas for using mobile communication technology to assist Education for All (EFA) in reaching its goals.  The challenge began in October of 20111 and will last for eight months.  Each month will focus on one specific EFA goal.  If you would like to read the details about these six goals, you can view them on the UNESCO website . The EFA’s Crowdsourcing Challenge hopes to capitalize on the collaborative nature of “crowdsourcing” to uncover creative solutions to the task incorporating mobile communication technology into realizing the EFA’s educational goals.

Two of the sub-challenge monthly winners for the EFA Crowdsourcing Challenge have already been announced.  The sub-challenge winner in the category of Literacy was Sanjith Yeruva with an idea called TOT (Test on Text).  TOT is a mobile application for students that aims to fairly evaluate a student’s knowledge using text questions and suggesting content in an intuitive manner.  For example a student would be sent a conceptual text question and further educational content would be suggested for the user based on the answer given to the question.  The following question would be based on the suggested content.  If you would like to view a brief YouTube video explanation of this challenge winning idea, you may access the video here .

In the second EFA sub-challenge category, Primary Education, the winner was I-Learn by Swaroop John.  According to the Ideas Project website, the I-Learn idea “is about picture based learning to complement radio broadcasts: A good blended learning approach, which brings real-time notion of text and images to the phone.  Even though idea needs some more work on it, the concept of combining radio with mobile has enormous potential and can be very powerful.”  Special honors went to Helping Hands by Ejas Mudar.  This is an application designed to assist with the education of hearing impaired children.  Prassad Sherlekar also received special honors for his Mobile School idea, as did Hubin Liao for a speech based questioning and auto-reply system for students.

If you would have an idea for using mobile communication technology to support education and would like to participate in the EFA Crowdsourcing Challenge, there is still time!  The third sub-challenge category is related to finding solutions on how mobile communication can contribute toward meeting youth and adult learning needs. To submit your idea in the Youth and Adult Learning Needs category, you can visit this address: http://www.ideasproject.com/community/en/efa/learning .  You may also still submit ideas for the Primary Education and Literacy sub-challenges.  All sub-challenge categories will be open for submissions for the remainder of the contest, which closes on May 31, 2012.  For full details on the EFA Crowdsourcing Challenge, you can visit the challenge’s main page.

eLearning Resources Recap

January 10th, 2012

Quite often on our blog, we like to share interesting and useful eLearning resources with our readers.  We found a number of great eLearning tools and shared them with you here in 2011, so today we are rounding up the best resources and presenting them to you here in one handy spot.  Make sure you bookmark this page so you will have easy access to all of the greatest education and distance learning finds of the past year!

Twitter

Just about everyone knows what Twitter is and how this social media powerhouse can be the portal to a wealth of information.  We wrote two articles about great Twitter feeds to follow last year.  If you are looking for Tweets in the realm of education and technology, check out our article entitled Twitter’s Education Technology Feeds.  Here you will find 14 great Twitter feeds to follow that cover everything you would want to know when it comes to information and communication technology as it applies to education.  For those of you looking for Tweets on the general topic of education, our article Thirteen Great Twitter Education Feeds For Education Buffs is a great place to start as well.

iNACOL

The International Association for for K – 12 Online Learning (iNACOL) is a “non-profit organization that facilitates collaboration, advocacy, and research to enhance quality K-12 online teaching and learning.” Several months ago, we shared an article on our blog detailing the most useful features of the iNACOL website including their How to Start an Online Learning Program resource.  If you are involved in online learning in anyway, you will find something useful on the iNACOL website.

Teach.Us

Teach.Us is an Internet based community dedicated to assisting and supporting teachers who are interested in integrating Web 2.0 and other eLearning elements into their classroom curriculum.  As you may recall, Web 2.0 refers to Internet applications that have a user participation component such as social networking sites (Facebook, MySpace, Twitter), blogs, wikis, and other various types of web applications.  If you are thinking about incorporating any of these valuable resources into your curriculum, you will find our article about Teach.Us very valuable.

Childnet International

If you are the parent or care giver to a child or young adult who uses technology in any form or fashion, you will not want to overlook the great resource that is Childnet International.  Childnet International is an organization based in the United Kingdom whose goal is to help make the Internet a wonderful and safe place for young people. This organization provides several excellent tools for educators, parents, and care givers to help them navigate a safe existence in the online community.  If you have not done so already, check out our article about the great things Childnet International has to offer today.

Open Educational Resources Commons

The most recent eLearning resource we have shared on our blog is the Open Educational Resources Commons website.  Open Educational Resources or OER are essentially educational resources that support teaching and learning that anyone may use (and reuse) free of charge.  The Open Educational Resources Commons, or OER Commons, is a website that was created to assist teachers, students, and others in the field of education in finding these OER that exist somewhere on the Internet.  If you are an education professional looking for useful, peer reviewed OER, read our article about The OER Commons for a great place to start.

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