eCROP Blog

Seeing the relationship between textbook questions based on the reading of a chapter or a story and authentic problems is a challenge for the school classrooms. Answering the challenge is essential in giving students the motivation and confidence that they can tackle real world problems. See this link to T. Lowrie's solution to this problem using cultural artifacts which can easily be collected from the communities of learners. For those adults immersed in real world problems, this issue is different. The adult problem is more one of spotting and sharing the problem. Communication systems which tie adult abilities to find and share problems with teachers seeking classroom useable authentic problems would be helpful to both. iCROP uses its SUP (Still Unsolved Problem) database as one model of such a system.

Use iThink tools for remote sharing of field research questions. Scientists might ask: "What kind of plant is this? Leave responses using Comments." Click the above image for a larger picture. Writers might share images of entire web pages or scanned images of or within the article or book. This image posted using Google's free Picasa image collection management software to find and Hello software to online discuss and then autopost to blogs the thumbnails which are automatically linked larger size images. The larger size can include sizes much larger than this example.

http://ceap.wcu.edu/houghton/learner/basicidea.html iCROP is a web based problem processor useful for both educational and economic development. Enjoy. Comment.

Spectacles became the rage in the 13 century; telescopes and microscopes became hits in the 17th. These are but a few quick examples of a centuries long march in increasing human ability to discover, think about and apply new ideas. In the latter half of the 20th century a combination of ideas created the most significant hit yet for thinking, what might more aptly be called a complexityscope. Even now in the 21st century it is still referred to by tedious and obscure titles such computer network, electronic technology, World Wide Web or computer and the Internet. Is it still so close to us that we cannot yet see it clearly? The complexityscope is capable of using almost every form of expression and composition known to our species to magnify our ability to process finding, contemplating and solving problems. This blog will use a two syllable expression of this complexityscope idea, i-think or iThink.