|
BOSTON, MA - MAY 07, 2013 - The Immersive Education Initiative today announced that keynote speakers from the Smithsonian Institution and the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab will join opening keynote Cynthia Breazeal, founding director of the Personal Robots Group at the MIT Media Lab, at Immersive Education 2013 (iED 2013) in Boston next month:
- The Literacy Moonshot: Learning to Read Beyond the Reach of Schools
Cynthia Breazeal, MIT Media Lab Personal Robotics Group
- The Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum: Crossing Borders/Mixed Realities
Melissa A. Carrillo, Smithsonian Latino Center
- Sowing The Seeds For A More Creative Society
Mitchel Resnick, MIT Media Lab Lifelong Kindergarten Group
The Literacy Moonshot: Learning to Read Beyond the Reach of Schools
Cynthia Breazeal, MIT
DAY 1 KEYNOTE, JUNE 3
 In her opening keynote address, The Literacy Moonshot: Learning to Read Beyond the Reach of Schools, Cynthia will share a personal and provocative example of the power of child-driven learning with iED 2013 attendees. She will present findings and learning outcomes from the first year of deployment of tablet computers in two remote Ethiopian villages, where children live beyond the reach of school and the villages are entirely illiterate. This ground-breaking work harnesses the power of mobile technology to foster literacy learning for children who live where school is not an option and no adults can teach them how to read.
Cynthia Breazeal is an Associate Professor of Media Arts and Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where she founded and directs the Personal Robots Group at the Media Lab. She is a pioneer of social robotics and Human Robot Interaction. She has authored the book “Designing Sociable Robots”, has published over 100 peer-reviewed articles in journals and conferences on the topics of autonomous robotics, artificial intelligence, human robot interaction, and robot learning. Dr. Breazeal is recognized as a prominent young innovator. She is a recipient of the National Academy of Engineering’s Gilbreth Lecture Award, Technology Review’s TR35 Award, and TIME magazine’s Best Inventions of 2008. In 2013 she was appointed Senior Advisor of the Journal of Immersive Education (JiED), the publication of record for the international Immersive Education Initiative.
 MORE DETAILS ABOUT THIS KEYNOTE
The Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum: Crossing Borders/Mixed Realities
Melissa A. Carrillo, Smithsonian Latino Center
DAY 2 KEYNOTE, JUNE 4
 In her keynote address, The Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum: Crossing Borders/Mixed Realities, Melissa will share with iED 2013 attendees her experiences developing and disseminating immersive learning strategies from within a transmedia virtual museum model. She will share key milestones and current trends in digital curation from the vast body of work established under the Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum (LVM).
As the virtual museum’s creative director, Melissa developed the core conceptual framework for the project and orchestrated the development of a strategic plan in 2007 with a team of media experts from the Smithsonian Institution and external partners. The initiative is in its sixth year of development and has emerged as a bilingual resource virtual museum model for cross-platform accessible content created to meet a wide range of user experiences and related contexts.
Her vision and implementation of a virtual museum model as a transmedia experience has contributed to the Smithsonian's efforts in meeting 21 Century challenges and needs for reaching diverse audiences in innovative and meaningful ways. During her iED 2013 keynote address Melissa will be joined by LVM partners in STEM: The University of Texas at El Paso, and the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. (SERC). Other guests include Dr. Juana Roman and transmedia artist Stacey Fox, members of the LVM Advisory Council.
Melissa A. Carrillo is the Director of New Media & Technology for the Smithsonian Latino Center (SLC) and co-chair of the Immersive Education Initiative’s Libraries and Museums Technology Working Group (LAM.TWG). Ms. Carrillo has directed and designed interactive and immersive (bilingual) online experiences for the SLC for thirteen years that encompass representing and exploring Latino cultural identity through the lens of new media and emerging technologies. Ms. Carrillo spearheads the Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum (LVM); an online and immersive transmedia virtual museum model for exploring and representing cultural identity in the age of the social web. These shared experiences augment and showcase Smithsonian Latino collections and resources, opening new possibilities for distance learning applications and reaching remote target audiences.
 CERTIFICATION: Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum (LVM) is an official Immersive Education (iED) collaboration for which a number of professional development (PD) iED 2013 hands-on workshops are offered for iED teacher/trainer certification.
Sowing The Seeds For A More Creative Society
Mitchel Resnick, MIT Media Lab
DAY 3 KEYNOTE, JUNE 5
 In his iED 2013 keynote address, Sowing The Seeds For A More Creative Society, Mitchel will discuss new technologies and activities designed specifically to help children learn to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively so that they are prepared for life in the Creative Society.
Mitchel's keynote will have a special focus on Scratch, an authoring tool and online community developed by the MIT Lifelong Kindergarten research group that he directs.
Scratch is an official Immersive Education (iED) learning environment for which a number iED 2013 hands-on workshops are offered by the iED Scratch Technology Working Group (SCR.TWG).
 In today's rapidly changing society, people must continually come up with creative solutions to unexpected problems. More than ever before, success and happiness are based not on what you know, but on your ability to think and act creatively. In short, we are living in the Creative Society. But there is a problem. Most activities in children's lives, whether it's lessons in the classroom or games in the living room, are not designed to help children develop as creative thinkers. In my iED 2013 keynote address I will discuss new technologies and activities designed specifically to help children learn to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively, so that they are prepared for life in the Creative Society. I will focus particularly on Scratch, an authoring tool and online community that enables children (ages 8 and up) to create their own interactive stories, games, animations, and simulations -- and share their creations with one another online (http://scratch.mit.edu). In the process, children develop skills and ways of thinking that are essential for becoming active participants in the Creative Society.
Mitchel Resnick
Professor of Learning Research, MIT Media Lab
Director, Lifelong Kindergarten Group, MIT Media Lab
Mitchel Resnick, Professor of Learning Research at the MIT Media Lab, develops new technologies and activities to engage people (especially children) in creative learning experiences. His Lifelong Kindergarten research group developed ideas and technologies underlying the LEGO Mindstorms robotics kits and Scratch programming software, used by millions of young people around the world. He also co-founded the Computer Clubhouse project, an international network of 100 after-school learning centers where youth from low-income communities learn to express themselves creatively with new technologies. Resnick earned a BS in physics from Princeton, and an MS and PhD in computer science from MIT. He was awarded the McGraw Prize in Education in 2011.
CERTIFICATION: Scratch is an official Immersive Education (iED) learning environment for which a number of professional development (PD) iED 2013 hands-on workshops are offered for iED teacher/trainer certification. The corresponding iED Scratch Technology Working Group (SCR.TWG) is open to all attendees and iED members.
iED 2013 Overview
The world's leading experts in virtual worlds, learning games, educational simulations, and mixed/augmented reality convene June 03-06 in Boston for iED 2013. The four-day Summit is open to the global academic community and experts in immersion, simulation, learning games, virtual reality, robotics, 3D printing and full, augmented and mixed reality (FAM).
Building on the success of the previous seven years of Immersive Education conferences, the four-day iED 2013 event will feature 3 tracks (Practitioner, Research and Business tracks) and an entire day dedicated to hands-on workshops. iED 2013 is open to the global academic and business communities and experts in immersion, simulation, learning games, virtual reality, and augmented/mixed reality.
 iED Summits are official Immersive Education Initiative conferences organized specifically for educators, researchers, and administrators.
iED Summits consist of presentations, panel discussions, break-out sessions and workshops that provide attendees with an in-depth overview of immersive learning platforms, technologies and cutting-edge research from around the world.
These unique events feature new and emerging virtual worlds, learning games, educational simulations, mixed/augmented reality, and related teaching tools, techniques, technologies, standards and best practices.
Thousands of Members Worldwide
The Immersive Education Initiative is a non-profit international collaboration of universities, colleges, research institutes, consortia and companies that are working together to define and develop open standards, best practices, platforms, and communities of support for virtual reality and game-based learning and training systems. Thousands of faculty, teachers, researchers, staff, administrators and students are members of the Immersive Education Initiative.
About Immersive Education
Immersive Education (ImmersiveEducation.org) combines interactive 3D graphics, commercial game and simulation technology, virtual reality, voice chat (Voice over IP/VoIP), Web cameras (webcams) and rich digital media with collaborative online course environments and classrooms. Immersive Education gives participants a sense of "being there" even when attending a class or training session in person isn't possible, practical, or desirable, which in turn provides educators and students with the ability to connect and communicate in a way that greatly enhances the learning experience. Unlike traditional computer-based learning systems, Immersive Education is designed to immerse and engage students in the same way that today's best video games grab and keep the attention of players. Immersive Education supports self-directed learning as well as collaborative group-based learning environments that can be delivered over the Internet or using fixed-media such as CD-ROM and DVD. Shorter mini-games and interactive lessons can be injected into larger bodies of course material to further heighten and enrich the Immersive Education experience.
Immersive learning and immersive teaching ("Immersive Education") are enabled by the Media Grid.
About the Media Grid
The Media Grid is a public utility for digital media. Based on new and emerging distributed computational grid technologies, the Media Grid builds upon existing Internet and Web standards to create a unique network optimized for digital media delivery, storage, and processing. As an on-demand public computing utility, a range of software programs and Web sites can use the Media Grid for delivery and storage of rich media content, media processing, and computing power. The Media Grid is an open and extensible platform that enables a wide range of applications not possible with the traditional Internet alone, including: Massive Media on Demand (MMoD); Interactive digital cinema on demand; Immersive Education (immersive teaching and immersive learning); Truly immersive multiplayer games and Virtual Reality (VR); Hollywood movie and film rendering, special effects, and composition; Real-time rendering of high resolution graphics; Real-time visualization of complex weather patterns; Real-time protein modeling and drug design; Telepresence, telemedicine, and telesurgery; Vehicle and aircraft design and simulation; Visualization of scientific and medical data.
The Grid Institute leads the design and development of the global Media Grid through the MediaGrid.org open standards organization in collaboration with industry, academia, and governments from around the world.
To learn more about the Media Grid, Immersive Education or the Education Grid visit:
MediaGrid.org, ImmersiveEducation.org and TheEducationGrid.org
|
