The Horizon Report: An introduction to trends in educational technology

This week we were asked to read the 2013 K-12 Horizon Report which is published by the New Media Consortium.  The purpose of the Horizon report is to indicate which  key trends in educational technology tools are on the horizon.  Trends such as social media, educational analytics, cloud computing, 3D printing and many more are presented in this report.  I found I was excited about some of these ideas coming into my classroom.  Ideas such as 1:1 Chromebook computing in the cloud and mobile device use in classroom are exciting but two ideas really captured my interest.  Learning analytics and open content are two areas I would like to investigate further.

To guide us through the report, we answered five questions.  My answers to these questions can be found here:

Plastow_Brian_GuidingQuestions

We were also asked to comment on what did we found interesting or provocative in the report.  This is what I posted in our discussion forum:

"I'm not sure I really grasp the full potential of open content in education.  I think this is why I am drawn to it.  I want to learn more about it.  From what I understand, this may allow all schools to have access to high-quality educational materials.  In my mind, this increased access will help democratize education by allowing students from all communities access to the highest quality resources available."

I quite enjoyed reading the Horizon Report.  It allowed me think about the future for a moment and I feel optimistic that  education and educational technology is moving in an exciting direction.