Education Archives - Page 4 of 4

DC TechEd Startup Grade Ninja Revolutionizes Grading With ScanTron

Grade Ninja was born when Daniel Kleinman noticed that his sisters were spending their nice weekend days not going outside, jogging, shopping or even relaxing. His sisters are school teachers and they were constantly using up their free time grading Scantron sheets, something that ideally was supposed to be a fast process because it’s Scantron. That wasn’t the case and Kleinman wanted to do something about it.

Kleinman created an iPad app that uses the iPad’s camera to take a picture of the Scantron sheet and check it against a master. Kleinman, a self-taught Objective C programmer was able to refine the app so it has a margin of error of, at best, 1%. Things like how fast the sheet is fed and if the sheet is still perfectly in tact can swing the margin of error far greater when using a Scantron machine to grade.

I noticed it first with my sisters and my mom. Why are dedicated teachers spending so much time outside of school grading? Teachers spend about a day a week grading, roughly 8 hours. What if we could give this time back? This is why I created Grade Ninja. Kleinman told Carl Pierce of InTheCapital.com

In addition to freeing up teacher’s valuable free time Kleinman’s app will link back to gradebook apps making the grading process seemless and far more accurate than having to transpose anything. From their website:

GradeNinja can cut grading and recording time down to a fraction of what you spend now. Instantly scan multiple choice tests and input scores directly into your gradebook. Use the ultra fast grid to enter all your scores in a flash for any assignment types.

Kleinmann is sneakerstrapping this startup but we’re sure it’s going to become a hot commodity as TechEd continues its nationwide explosion. As for ScanTron grading, there are so many other issues our public schools need to work out before they make a move away from traditional ScanTron machine.

source: InTheCapital

Start Up Hearty Spin Releases iOS App For Autistic Children

A Singapore start up called Hearty SPIN has released a new app meant for helping autistic children communicate to the Apple app store. The SPIN in Hearty Spin stands for Solutions for People In Need. Hearty SPIN’s website describes them as a “social enterprise that creates special education, learning and communication assistive technology apps for individuals with autism and other special needs worldwide”.

Their first app for autistic children, called Picture ACC, and uses visual learning strengths to help children communicate more effectively. The app, which is available in English and Chinese, is designed for iPads and iPhones.

ACC stands for augmentative, alternative communication. This app allows autistic children to communicate by using the pictures on the screen.

“Picture AAC app enables children with autism to learn effective communication by utilizing their visual learning strength.” said KhengWah Koh, Founder of Hearty SPIN

Parents of autistic children are very aware of the PECS binder which allows autistic children to pick from a number of pictures to help communicate with friends, family and loved ones. The Picture ACC app effectively takes the idea behind the PECS binder and puts it into a touch screen app format.

You can find out more about the Picture AAC app here

New Start Up DimensionU Incentivisis Social Gaming For Kids And Injects Education

There’s a big challenge with large scale multi-player social games with themes aimed at the under 18 set. Capcom’s Smurf Village game felt the biggest pinch with the challenge which is monetization. Kids were playing Smurf Village on their parents iOS devices and draining their parents wallets until Apple intervened.

This issue is particularly challenging because kids make a great audience for these kinds of games. Enter Ntiedo Etuk and his start up DimensionU. DimensionU has found a way that should be ok with parents to let kids enjoy social gaming. What’s better is Etuk has focused on providing games that are age appropriate and interject educational elements as well.

According to this story at betabeat, DimensionU incentivisis learning by setting up a reward system, with the parents involvement, where the kids can earn prizes both tangible and virtual for learning accomplishments.

More after the break
Read More…

BUILD Entrepreneurship Program To Honor Reid Hoffman At Gala Tonight

Reid Hoffman (photo: Crunchbase_

The BUILD Entrepreneurship Program was established in 1999 with a goal of propelling disengaged high school students academically through entrepreneurship. Build started in Silicon Valley. It’s a four year college prep program that helps high school students develop, build and run their own small businesses. The program currently serves 1,000 students and has expanded to Oakland, the San Francisco Peninsula and Washington DC. It was initially funded by Franklin “Pitch” Johnson and his wife Catherine.

Tonight at a gala dinner and award reception at the computer history museum in Mountain View California, build will honor Linked In co-founder Reid Hoffman with it’s coveted “Pitch Prize” named after Johnson. Last year’s recipient, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, will present the honor to Hoffman.

More after the break
Read More…

Turnitin Curbing Plagiarism In College Admission Essays

If you’re applying to colleges right now and think that you’re going to get by with turning in someone else’s essay you could be dead wrong. Turnitin is a software program that over 100 colleges and universities across the country are using to curb plagiarism.

Turnitin has been around since the 1990’s however two years ago they developed a version of the software specifically for admissions essays. Before that it was used at the high school and college level to curb plagiarism in essays written by students about a myraid of topics. Long gone are the days you could go to the frat house file cabinet and slap your name on an essay that’s been turned in five times.

UCLA’s graduate program is one of the institutions that has implemented the software on the admissions level. According to school officials they found a dozen plagiarized admissions essays among the 870 submitted. It seems that copying admissions essays isn’t that big a problem with that percentage. Penn State’s Smeal School of business is also using the software and reported just 3 to 5% of their admissions essays were copied.

The prospective students who turn in plagiarized essays are of course not admitted to the school. It’s unclear whether or not they are told why.

source: BI