While online learning is more and more becoming a part of our lives, the technology used to deliver online lessons is often lagging behind. Take the virtual classroom for example.

I’ve tried many (free) virtual classroom applications over the years, but none really convinced me.

What is a virtual classroom?

It’s an application (mostly run within a browser) that facilitates online conferences or conversations with streaming audio and video. Sounds simple, doesn’t it?

Apparently, even in the year 2012 running a stable audio/video conference or group session in a browser across a variety of different devices and operating systems proves to be rather difficult.

I’d like to talk a bit today about \options, problems, and possible solutions to the Virtual Classroom issue.

The Standard Setting

I first came into contact with Virtual Classrooms through online teaching platforms such as Myngle, EduFire or WiziQ. The way it works is that for listing your courses on their platforms you get to use their Virtual Classrooms during your lessons (for a commission).

In the three examples quoted above, the Virtual Classroom software is proprietary. It’s far from open, in other words. Edufire, for example, used Adobe Connect last time I checked. Myngle and WiziQ have something of their own. The software needs to be licensed. Whether teachers pay for the licensing directly or through teaching platform commissions, someone’s got to pay – which wouldn’t be that bad if the classrooms were actually worth paying for!

Everyone’s trying their best, I know, and I don’t want to go around blaming people, but sometimes it seems to me that although there are millions of students and teachers learning together online, we still don’t have a technology that makes group learning convenient and stable enough to take it seriously. In my own teaching practice I stopped using Virtual Classrooms altogether because of these shortcomings.

More Open Alternatives

Besides the aforementioned teaching platforms and their licensed Virtual Classrooms, there are other more open solutions. Here are two examples:

blueteach.com

vyew.com

Within a few seconds anyone can quickly start a classroom, connect webcam, microphone and invite people. As far as I’m concerned there are no commissions involved (although you can pay for premium features such as being able to hold larger classes, etc) and the applications are relatively stable.

If it weren’t for one thing…

Yes. Flash.

Flash, My Problem Child

The late Steve Jobs caused a sensation two years ago when he claimed that “Flash is no longer necessary”. Up to this day, many Apple devices still don’t support it.

Regardless of Jobs’ reasons, it’s a fact that all of the above mentioned classrooms will not run on an iPhone or iPad! Correct me if I’m wrong, but apart from Adobe Connect which was converted into an iOS app, all the others won’t work.

Now, even if we ignore Apple’s distate for Flash, it’s not much rosier for PC/Android users.

Why?

While Flash works well for running little animations, banners, games, etc. it’s a total catastrophe when it comes to running fullfledged applications like Virtual Classrooms within a browser. (By the way: If you want to find out if something is Flash-based, right-click on it. It will tell you, if it is.)

With all the flash-based virtual classrooms that I mentioned above I experienced hiccups on different devices in different circumstances. All it takes is for the screen to freeze and the flash-plugin to crash. Ever seen this little fellow here?

I don’t want to bash Flash in general. It’s great for little apps. But as a productivity tool is rather … counter-productive.

The last thing a teacher needs is for his classroom to crash while in a lesson. A teacher needs to focus on communicating with people. If the screen freezes or he gets locked out of his own session (yes, that actually happens!) then there are serious issues that can’t be fixed by updating or adding more features on the mess which is already there.

Instead, I believe we need to wipe the slate before live online learning in a Virtual Classroom can be taken seriously. The novelty factor of e-learning has worn off. The fact that it work somehow is not enough.

As great as Flash is for other things, in the real of online learning we need something else, entirely!

The Virtual Classroom Of The Future

To better understand what needs to be done it can be helpful to look at the evolution of whiteboard technology.

They came in all shapes. The first ones were Java-Applets (rather unstable), then came the Flash variety (more stable) and now we have tools like Google Draw and Conceptboard, which use HTML-5 if I’m not mistaken. Even if this new generation is not perfect, either, it’s a lot better than what came before and as anyone who has ever used Google Docs before knows, it’s stable enough to be relied on as a working tool, plus they run on all mobile Apple devices, too.

Now, I ask: where is the Virtual Classroom of the Future that is not Flash-based? Is it even possible?

Conceptboard has just added live streaming video/audio to its features via tokbox, and while that too runs on Flash, at least it’s only the webcam/microphone component and if it crashes, the whiteboard continues.

I think this more modular approach is a step into the right direction. Instead of putting all your eggs into one basket (and making a mess when something goes wrong) having different (relatively independent) modules in a virtual classroom environment may just be the solution…

What are your experiences with Virtual Classrooms? Are they stable enough or not nearly so? I’d love to hear from you.

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 Some rights reserved by HikingArtist.com

About the author: André Klein was born in Germany, has grown up and lived in many different places including Thailand, Sweden and Israel. He has produced two music albums, performed and organized literary readings, curated an experimental television program and is the author of various short stories and non-fiction works.

Working with children taught me that whenever I need to understand (or explain) something, it’s best to start at zero. There’s no need to bring former knowledge, opinions or experience. For adults this is more difficult than children, so it may help to pretend not knowing anything.

This wiping of the slate can help to generate a more natural approach to understanding through simplicity.

Recently, I became aware again of how powerful this is.

Last Friday, my friend and colleague Sylvia Guinan started a new online course for English learners in which she discusses books and movies with her students.

I was glad to see that the first book she picked was my recent children’s book “Brian The Book”.

Unpacking Analogies

While watching the recording, I was amazed how she unpacked layer after layer of this very simple story. I won’t give any spoilers of the story, you can download it here, but it was interesting to see how Sylvia unfolded a whole galaxy of paradigms from this super-simple story, some of which I didn’t even consciously embed into the narrative.

Maybe simplicity is a bit like a vessel which ferries unconscious materials back and forth across the streams of consciousness…

Sometimes, a simple analogy in an image can express more than 4,000 pages of academic prose.

If you want to watch a recording of Sylvia’s conversation class on Friday, click here (the recording is free, but you need a WizIQ account to access it)

here’s a small snippet:

 download

img: CC by Alexander Steinhof

About the author: André Klein was born in Germany, has grown up and lived in many different places including Thailand, Sweden and Israel. He has produced two music albums, performed and organized literary readings, curated an experimental television program and is the author of various short stories and non-fiction works.

The blogosphere has been on fire for the last few days, ablaze with articles, comments, rants and promises, all regarding this simple question: If it’s really possible to make a full-time living teaching online, why isn’t it working out for so many?

It was almost as if a wormhole had opened up in time and space, because as this fiery debate was unfolding over various blogs and platforms, I was busy addressing the same issue working on the re-release of a book about exactly this topic originally published in May 2011.

Spurred on by the impression that this question was still a pressing one, I kept on writing and enjoyed the discussions from afar.

It all started with a simple question by one of my colleagues who posted that he was looking for alternatives to a well-known online teaching platform in order to make his teaching activities economically viable.

Kirsten Winkler dedicated an article to this question, titled The Ant and the Grasshopper – Why (most) Teaching Platforms fail  in which she wrote:

I said it a thousand times: the key is to build your own brand on your own turf. Get a domain, start your own website and online shop. Lead social media efforts to your own home, not to your platform accounts, they come and go.

To many teachers starting out this seems tough. And, well… it is. You’ll have to learn to build a (semi)-professional homepage, create something appealing and set up a way to handle lessons and payments, but even if you’ve done all that technical stuff, the real work only begins: attracting students and promoting your service.

And yet, whatever work you invest into this process, you own it.

There’s No Easy Way Out

If you sign up for a teaching platform, they will never force you to grow. Instead, they will tell you to drive traffic to your profile on their site, because their business models are built on the commissions they receive from students taught through their platform.

Teaching platforms promise an easy way out, based on (at least) three false claims:

• you’ll get lots of students by teaching on a platform: It is true that you might “get” more students, but many of them were lured into the platform by offers of free or highly discounted lessons, as Kirsten points out in her article. Even if some of them are willing to pay, it will be tough to accumulate enough to to pay the rent, especially if you live in the Western world!
• they’ll do marketing for you: They don’t. They will market their site as a whole.  In fact, they couldn’t care less about you as an individual. At least this is the feeling that I had when working on several of these platforms. You’re just a number, generating commissions, an exchangeable gear in a complex machine.
• you can use their classroom technology: almost all virtual classrooms I’ve seen up to this day are running on Flash and are either highly complicated and/or buggy. In other words: you don’t need them. If you want to make a living online, it’s best to focus on 1-1 sessions and handle all of this through a free Software like Skype.

Starting The Journey Or Delaying It Indefinitely

Now, to be fair, if you want to experiment with online teaching, experience a virtual classroom session or do voluntary work, these platforms are interesting. But if you need to make a living by teaching online, it will be hard to pay the rent by relying solely on these platforms. Due to the competition of teachers from all over the world, prices are in a rush to the bottom, and in order to make this viable, you’ll have to teach so many hours per day that it won’t be worth it.

Becoming an independent online teacher is not easy. As Kirsten pointed out in yet another article:

If you start building your brand right now (or after you finish reading this post) it will probably take you at least six months of hard work every single day (no weekends) before you’ll see any kind of relevant traction.

No matter how long it takes, you’re not working for a company that doesn’t care about you! Instead, you’re investing into the future with each line of code, each blog post you write. And it’s so much more than just being a teacher. It’s the beginning of an adventure, a completely new lifestyle which first of all pushes you to grow and secondly opens up endless opportunities.

To give you an example, when I started out as an online teacher I had no clue that I would one day write books and produce language learning materials that would sell in major ebook stores all over the world.

I had no clue that I would write a blog with a growing followership which would open up all kinds of interesting connections and opportunities.

Little did I know that with the experience gained along the way I would one day help people build their own businesses and websites.

And if I  had continued searching my luck on a teaching platform, I would still be searching and wouldn’t have stumbled onto any of this.

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img:  Some rights reserved by HikingArtist.com

About the author: André Klein was born in Germany, has grown up and lived in many different places including Thailand, Sweden and Israel. He has produced two music albums, performed and organized literary readings, curated an experimental television program and is the author of various short stories and non-fiction works.

Benefits of Online Programs

• Designed for the Working Individual. You can access most lectures and other course materials and complete your assignments at any hour of the day or night. Depending on your personal habits, you may prefer to study early in the morning, on your lunch break or on weekends.

• Relevant Training. Your program should provide the training and skills you need to be an entrepreneur in your field. An online MBA program, for example, might teach effective communication using the latest technology, marketing strategies and negotiation techniques.

• Easily Accessible. All you need is an Internet connection and basic software which means you can do your coursework on the move, whether you are traveling for business or spending time at home.

• Flexibility. E-learning allows you to focus on your interests. Choose a program that offers the range of courses you want. You may want a program with a global focus that lets you develop and use your language skills and knowledge of different cultures.

Keep Up and Excel

The incredible freedom of online programs permits you to study while working and caring for your family. Still, you want to be careful not to let this freedom become a disadvantage. These simple tips can help you keep up:

• Make and follow your own schedule. Determine when you will devote time to your studies, and record the times in your personal agenda. Think of them as mandatory appointments.

• Focus. Avoid distractions, such as email, text messages and phone calls. A shorter amount of focused, dedicated time is more valuable than extra hours of studying when you are sidetracked by multitasking.

• Be Flexible. This may seem contradictory to the schedule you set, but you need to be flexible if you want to maintain your sanity while going to school and working. Life can and may get in the way of your plans. You may need to work late to finish a project for your supervisor and be unable to study in the evening, as planned, or you may need to pick up your daughter early from school, so eliminating your lunchtime studying. Don’t let small setbacks throw you off track. Just be flexible and go back to your usual schedule as soon as you can.

• Communicate. Stay in contact with your professors. They are likely to allow you to turn in work late or postpone an exam if you let them know as soon as possible that you are having unexpected difficulties at work or home. To avoid accidentally missing deadlines or getting behind on your work, regularly communicate, via email or telephone, with one or more of your classmates in each class.

• Plan Your Program. Many online degree programs have some degree of leniency in the number of courses that you take each semester and the amount of time you have to complete your degree. Think ahead to make sure you know what classes to take to finish your program when you want.

E-learning is clearly here to stay, and you can take advantage of virtual higher education opportunities. An online program allows you to complete your degree while working as long as you stay focused and are committed. Choose the program that suits your needs, and embrace the training that will help you adapt to the modern business world.

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img:  Some rights reserved by Domiriel

About the author: Henry Fitzgerald is a technology consultant located in Seattle. When he isn’t geeking out over the latest social media platforms and Apple gadgets, he enjoys spending his time sailing and attempting to cook. Follow him on Twitter or read more about the latest tech news at technected.com

While the entire semester is filled with lessons of conjugating verbs, learning vocab and grading exams, the holidays are the perfect time to pack in a special learning experience. Use the time leading up to finals to focus on holiday cultures in other countries, celebrate American culture and have a glass of eggnog.

Here’s what to include in holiday language lessons and how to make it relevant for your course and your students!

• Terminology: Compile a list of must-know holiday vocabulary for whichever language you teach. Be sure to include traditions, food, decorations, greetings, common gifts, religious terms and even popular winter or holiday activities. Encourage students to read holiday-themed blogs in the language they’re learning to learn more about holiday jargon.

• Culture and Traditions: The web is the best way to learn about culture, especially around the holidays. Everything from winter styles, to Christmas music to favorite desserts can be easily found on the Internet. Find out about holiday traditions in other countries and try to find recipes to re-create foreign holiday goodies. Learning about Germany’s Christmas markets or nativity scenes in France is great for European languages and represents much of the Christmas culture. Learning about New Year’s traditions is also another great holiday lesson. Find out which movies are most popular during Christmas time and have a look at the holiday favorites! Movies are always a great peek into culture, especially animated flicks!

• Real-Life (Or World) Application: Using your newfound skills in real-life, or world, in terms of other languages, is part of the fun of learning a new tongue! Most sites and postal service providers offer cheap international shipping over the holidays, so that might be the perfect time to order some foreign goodies. Find out what the country is known for around the holidays and place an order! Be careful when ordering anything perishable or fragile and be sure to place your order early enough so that you’ll receive it before finals. If possible, communicate with someone in that country about the holidays, their favorite memories, traditions and celebrations. Even if it’s just over Skype, it will be great for students to hear first hand! Have your students share about their favorite American holidays as well to create en excellent dialogue.

These holiday lessons will keep your students interested clear up until finals, a feat that’s not often easily accomplished. You can still work in your regular curriculum with these lessons and test students over whichever material you deem necessary. This lesson will be especially useful for students that have friends or family who are international, or who will spend a holiday abroad!

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img:  Some rights reserved by stopthegears

About the author: Henry Fitzgerald is a technology consultant located in Seattle. When he isn’t geeking out over the latest social media platforms and Apple gadgets, he enjoys spending his time sailing and attempting to cook. Follow him on Twitter or read more about the latest tech news at technected.com

When you’re teaching online you have the whole world wide web at your disposal: an endless array of interactive exercises, articles, videos, podcasts and so on and so forth. As a rule of thumb: There’s always more than you could possibly use. And: There’s new stuff every day.

So, when there is no excuse of inadequate or not enough, there’s nothing that could possibly go wrong, or is there?

Well…

The Overabundance of Awesome

Often I find myself browsing through the net and saying: “Hey, wow, you could use this and that in your lesson with X,Y,Z.” but ask me a day later about it and I forgot the source.

In order to avoid this moment of seeing the perfect worksheet in front of my eyes but having no clue how I got there the day before (it’s just no fun scrolling for hours through your browsing history) – I use bookmarks.

Nothing new, right? Well, yes. On the other hand it’s important to have some kind of system. If, each time I find something related and just hit bookmark, it’ll be a disorganized mess after a while. So, what I do is twofold:

1. Keep those bookmarks organized: Create folders and subfolders with meaningful (?) descriptions
2. Stick to the system: In the heat of the moment I often just “dump” my bookmarks in the general bucket. So, then I do the sorting and structuring, later.

Sounds boring? Well, maybe it is. But there’s nothing like a student saying: “I always wondered about the use of Konjunktiv II irrealis” and being able to respond with a salvo of pinpointed exercises within miliseconds.

Many times people asked me: “Where do you get all that stuff from so quickly?” and my answer is always the same: “I got them bookmarks sorted out!”

Dive-In, Build-Up, Wrap-Up!

Okay, so let’s say we got a well-organized little bookmark library that we can always restock and draw from when preparing lessons. But how do I cope with setting up and preparing the actual session in terms of sequence?

There’s a plugin.. I mean extension for that.

Really? A browser extension just for preparing lessons online?

Well, not officially. But it does the job! Here’s what I used to do before:

1. Open up browser. Load all the learning materials, whiteboard apps, mindmaps and whatnot in tabs, arranged from left to right with the stuff I want to start with at the beginning and homework/further materials at the end.
2. Leave the browser window-open and DO NOT close it. If your browser crashes or you suddenly go on an unrelated browsing-spree and close everything: START AGAIN!

Especially if you like to prepare hours or even days before a lesson, this method is obviously not the best . What to do? Simple: Browser Sessions!

You get the idea?

Instead of having to keep my window with all the tabs open all the time I simply do it once and save the session. Whenever the meeting starts I simply pull it up again.

Some browsers support this natively but there are a few benefits in using an extension:

• Manage multiple sessions/students and quickly save/retrieve them
• replace or overwrite a session as you go along. This is very helpful when things went differently than you planned and you want to bring the materials over into the next session. Simply close what you’ve already done, add a few more things and replace/overwrite the session.

If you’re using Chrome I recommend this extension here. For Firefox there’s this and for Safari you can check this out.

UPDATE: For even more control (ability to edit existing sessions) see also this Chrome extension recommended by Glenn Weidner.

Bottom Line?

It might seem like overkill to do this in the beginning but I’ve actually experiences a few benefits from this practice:

• saves time and energy (that can be invested in other things)
• reduces redundancy (nothing like having to do the same over and over again…)
• makes me go into a lesson with a sense of being fully prepared
• even in emergency situations (no time for preparation) there’s always something that you can build on

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images: success kid meme, still from 10 commandments with C. Heston, extension screenshot and a messy table via morguefile.

About the author: André Klein was born in Germany, has grown up and lived in many different places including Thailand, Sweden and Israel. He has produced two music albums, performed and organized literary readings, curated an experimental television program and is the author of various short stories and non-fiction works.

Many people these days complain about not being able to find jobs and blame it on the economic crisis. Everyone would like to work in an advertising agency or design that next Mac super product. But there’s only so many advertising pen-monkeys and etch-a-sketchers the world needs.

Other dream jobs include: game-design, film and photography or working for a high-profile tech company like Facebook or Google.

What do all these job descriptions have in common except that everyone wants them?

They are about self expression, creativity and communication.

Everyone knows the “creative industry” is tough to get into, the competition is huge and the waiting lists are long. But what if the creative industry isn’t the only place to get that buzz of collaboration and changing the world to be a better place?

Going Social And Ditching The “Industry”

What makes Facebook so popular? They are a tech company that sells “social products”, meaning they come up with creative solutions for the way humans connect and communicate (at least that’s what they say). And, according to their huge success, the time is ripe for these kinds of approaches.

But social doesn’t just mean clicking “like” and joining virtual groups about bacon and peanut-butter-jelly. Facebook didn’t invent social. It just rides the wave. So can you, and anyone else…

What many people don’t realize is that one of the most social and creative fields out there is actually education. It’s not an industry: we’re talking about people here and how they learn, not about mechanical spare parts. But there’s a problem,or … let’s say misunderstanding.

Not many people want to work in public education these days, anymore. The payment is bad, students are nervous and the methods are the same like 100 years ago (yes, they still use blackboards in many countries: with chalk!)

This is what most people think of, at least, when they imagine becoming a “teacher”. But teaching comes in a million different forms.

And what they all have in common is finding creative ways to communicate knowledge and learning!

One of my favorite ways, as some of you may know, is teaching languages online in private 1:1 sessions. I can work from wherever I like, students are more relaxed sitting in the comfort of their home and learning accelerates like nothing I’ve ever seen in the physical world.

And, as I’ve mentioned before, the cool thing about it is that I still have tons of spare time to do other things like writing books, making music and spend time with friends and family.

There are many ways to teach online, if you are interested in my particular approach and want to learn how to do it, I’ve decided to bundle two of my recent books about the topic as a special offer for the holiday season.

-> Click here to find out more.

P.S: I’m not sure how long this will be active, so if you want copy, grab ‘em while their hot.

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 Some rights reserved by Lizette Greco

About the author: André Klein was born in Germany, has grown up and lived in many different places including Thailand, Sweden and Israel. He has produced two music albums, performed and organized literary readings, curated an experimental television program and is the author of various short stories and non-fiction works.

I was on the road to becoming a writer, so I started helping kids with their homework to keep myself from fulfilling the “starving artist” stereotype.

It was supposed to be only a part-time job until I won the Pulitzer. Well, okay I didn’t really aim for it, but as a teen fresh out of school I was living under an amorphous cloud of Great Expectations. At first it was weird. I was only a few months older than some of the kids I was supposed to teach. What could I possibly teach them?

I planned to stay for only a while. But then things turned out to be very very different.

The kids liked the way I shared with them my experimental knowledge of present progressive, German declensions and Passé Composé.

And I became rather fond of them, too. The cool thing was that it didn’t interfere with my writing. On the contrary, when I wasn’t writing I was still constantly engaged with language, preparing lessons, correcting homework or discussing nuances in textual expression.

I stayed in this job for about 8 years!

And I would have continued if the time-waste of commuting hadn’t gone on my nerves, after a while. And even while I was getting ready to jump ship, I was already teaching somewhere else: Namely, The Internet. Yep, after 8 years of brick & mortar teaching I switched to teaching languages online.

And guess what: I’m still writing. And teaching still isn’t interfering with it, on the contrary: it shapes and develops my craft.

Why Being A Teacher Doesn’t Mean Being Poor

Some people think teaching is a bad career choice. I always point them to the Shanghai Tutors. But even if teaching doesn’t turn you into a millionaire, it’s still one of the most rewarding career-choices I’ve ever made. Whenever I think of all the kids that went through my classroom years ago, it still puts a smile onto my face.

Another misunderstanding is that teaching = teaching. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

If you think being a teacher essentially means standing in front of a blackboard and 30 screaming pupils, think again.

Teaching isn’t a fixed occupation. It’s a lifestyle choice.

And there are many ways to do it.

Thus, to encourage and enable more people to teach (does the world really need another stock broker?) we’ve set up a job-board here on the site. You can find there a variety of different teaching and teaching-related jobs both online and offline. Also, if you’re looking for teachers, you can post your jobs directly onto our site. How cool is that?

Click here to visit the job board now.

Happy Learning!

P.S: If you don’t like the idea of working for someone else and would rather be your own boss, check out this book.

About the author: André Klein was born in Germany, has grown up and lived in many different places including Thailand, Sweden and Israel. He has produced two music albums, performed and organized literary readings, curated an experimental television program and is the author of various short stories and non-fiction works.

For instance, students learning English may learn English as Shakespeare would have spoken it, and may be completely confused by terms like “quitting cold turkey” or “right off the bat.” Likewise, students learning French, German, Italian or any other language will need to venture outside of the textbook to have a full grasp on the language, and the Internet can be a great learning tool.

Guidebooks

Your foreign language curriculum probably doesn’t include a vast study of slang or commonly used improper grammar. Your students will certainly learn the language the way it’s meant to be spoken, but when they move to or travel to the country, they might be a bit lost by the more colloquial speech. Suggesting a slang guidebook to help familiarize your students with the idioms of the language will help them recognize figures of speech that aren’t included in your formal curriculum.

Tumblr, WordPress or Social Media

If you’re teaching an online French course, incorporating blogs, Facebook pages or Twitter accounts that are written in French into your curriculum is an excellent way to help students recognize figures of speech and learn how they’re used in every day life. Try to find pages or blogs that are less formal. Fashion blogs, shopping sites, community pages, personal blogs and Twitter accounts are an excellent way to start picking up on commonly used slang. Reading through Facebook comments or discussions will provide even more exposure to slang and everyday vernacular.

Movies, Music and News

Reading and aural comprehension don’t always come hand in hand when learning a language. Even if your students can recognize written slang, they might not be able to understand it in every day speech. Foreign movies, music and news are a great way to get the ear used to hearing the language spoken in daily life and these mediums, especially music and movies, contain plenty of everyday jargon and will quickly familiarize students with the most common figures of speech. Additionally, movies, music and news will help familiarize students with the culture, which can help ease a transition into a new country. Keeping up to date with current news, popular music and classic movies of a country are a great way to learn slang and culture all at once.

Skype or Video Chatting

Once your students learn to recognize slang, they should also learn to use it. Having students type or chat with one another student in the language they’re learning will help establish and informal setting and will make using the slang seem much more natural. They can also learn to mix the more formal version of the language with the informal and become used to switching back and forth with ease.

With these tools, your students will be able to learn the language well enough to communicate both formally and informally. For students than plan to move or travel to another country, these experiences will be excellent preparation for successful communication and mastery of another tongue.

About the author: Henry Fitzgerald is a technology consultant located in Seattle. When he isn’t geeking out over the latest social media platforms and Apple gadgets, he enjoys spending his time sailing and attempting to cook. Follow him on Twitter or read more about the latest tech news at technected.com

So, how do you go about capturing the attention of students? With everything going on, you may feel that education takes a back burner, but studies show that people are attending online school in unprecedented numbers and that this trend will only continue.

Capturing and holding students’ attention is more vital now than ever. Here are a few tips for how to gain plenty of engaged students

1. Online Presence: Potential online students probably already spend a lot of time online. Seems simple. To find them, try using a mix of conventional and unconventional methods. Facebook is the undisputed king of the Internet, so you can bet that each student-to-be is on the site nearly every waking moment. But, Facebook is not a magic genie for spreading your information. If you want to use Facebook to capture students’ attention, you’ll have to put time in on your end.

Avoid spamming anyone’s Facebook walls with links. Instead, check out pages and groups that are related to your subject and see which people are engaged. If you’re teaching an online French course, aim for French language and culture pages. Tastefully spread the word about your course. People are at differing levels of course, but there are likely beginners who are interested in learning a language.

You can also use less conventional online tools like email marketing to spread the word. Email is still an influential tool when used correctly. Do not send more than one or two emails a week to recipients, and send them during times that are convenient and when people are likely to check (work hours during weekdays, or daytime hours over weekends).

2. Twitter

Twitter is a fantastic tool for holding someone’s attention. Once you’ve gathered students for your Intro to French course, encourage them to interact with French-speaking Twitter accounts. Classroom learning can be dry, but hopping on Twitter and reading 140 characters written by French-speaking persons is both simple and exciting. This is an excellent way to learn basic words, slang and pick up on aspects of French culture.

Encourage your students to tweet in French to each other, or to those they follow. They can also use Twitter to find other great French websites, as tweeted by whomever they choose to follow.

3. Keep Looking Forward: Losing interest in a class that feels like it’s going nowhere is easy to do. Use social media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube) to show students French sites and videos they can interact with once their skills are up to par. Have Skype conversation days set aside to help students develop their writing and reading skills. Show students where their skills could one day take them.

Though everyone seems to be competing for our attention, people are still making time for online learning. Using these tools and tricks, you can build a strong, committed and attentive group of students.

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img:  Some rights reserved by robotson via flickr

About the author: Henry Fitzgerald is a technology consultant located in Seattle. When he isn’t geeking out over the latest social media platforms and Apple gadgets, he enjoys spending his time sailing and attempting to cook. Follow him on Twitter or read more about the latest tech news at technected.com

Like many other tutors, I soon found out that simply being listed was not enough.

It was not even close to enough.

Administrators of marketplaces advise to promote oneself. But teachers are not marketers.

So, what to do?

Here are 5 ways to promote your tutoring services online, whether you are listed on a marketplace or work independently with your own website and blog (highly recommended!)

1. Free Classified Ads

Free classified ads can be a great way to attract the attention of potential students.

One of the best known classified ads sites online is probably Craigslist.

But there are many others. Simply google “free classified ads” or the equivalent in your language, i.e. “Kostenlose Kleinanzeigen” in German or “petites annonces gratuites” in French, etc.

The principle is simple.

You post…

• a short description of your service, e.g. Physics Tutoring
• a bit of info about who you are, what technology you use (Skype, virtual clasrooms, etc.)
• what are the prerequisites for students to participate (working microphone, Flash-based browser, etc.)
• price per hour, 45 minutes or half an hour

And then whoever is interested can contact you through the website, email or telephone number you listed under contact options.

Note: Many of these sites are built to connect people locally and you have to select a certain radius like a city, state, etc. where you want to be listed. Since, as an online tutor you can connect world-wide it might be useful to list yourself in several areas if the directory is highly location-based.

2. Social Media

Using Social Media is a must for anyone trying to generate serious business nowadays, whether one person home-businesses or huge corporations.

The question is just: How?

Obviously, mass-adding people on Facebook and spamming your network of “friends” with offers for private tutoring won’t do the trick.

There’s a lot of advice on this all over the Net, so I’ll just say one thing: Social Media is obligatory. But is has to be tied in with other efforts and will fail if not supported by a blogging and/or serious community engagement. See also: Why You Shouldn’t Base Your Business or Your Online Experience on Facebook Only

3. Tutoring Directories

There are many directories online where tutors can list their services.

Basically, this is similar to posting free classified ads, with the only difference that it’s focused on teaching and tutoring.

Acadam.com is one example.

NOTE: There are many old and shady websites promising to hook you up with students. Don’t pay any upfront fees. Check if you can find other people talking about their experience with these sites.

Basically, don’t sign up for anything that you wouldn’t use yourself to find a tutor.

4. SEO-Optimization

Search Engine Optimization: This is a topic that many non-technically minded people will shy away from.

Part of the problem is that there’s too many self-appointed gurus and prophets in the field who claim to know what works and what doesn’t while in reality, it’s a) the search-engines themselves and b) the millions of people searching everyday that determine the ever-changing parameters.

Nevertheless, there is a common sense approach to this: Finding your keywords.

Let’s say I’m a French tutor. What is the name of my blog or homepage?

What keywords do my blog post titles contain?

It might seem strange at first, but offering “French lessons” is not all that clear-cut from a search-engine perspective.

The search results for “French lessons online” – “online French tutor” – “teaching French on Skype”  or “learn French with private tutor” highly differ.

Theoretically, all you have to is find a phrase that describes what you do and which not millions of others are already using.

This can prove to be rather difficult, especially in the online tutoring field,because market place providers and other companies with lots of money dominate the first positions on many keywords due to paid advertising and armies of SEO-specialists.

Instead of trying to compete with the giants find the roads less traveled and stick to your phrase until you get results. If your page stays buried under other search results, try a different phrase, keyword combination and research online what you can do from a technical perspective. (make sure whatever resources you find are new, since the rules are changing quickly)

5. Blogging

I’ve already hinted at blogging throughout this article. But if there’s anything that will truly work, then it’s this.

Here’s why:

• Write articles about your professional topic -> When people like them, they will share them with their friends and friends and friends of friends and discover your tutoring services.

• Each article you write is another potential entrypoint through the  search engines, even through unexpected and unrelated searches people can stumble onto your site. Think of it as building a maze of interconnected doors that all lead people to the center. Even if you’re keywords are highly competitive, you can use blog posts as back-doors and shortcuts. In the example of our French teacher, above that could maybe be a highly informative and well written article about a French author or a certain wine, drawing attention of Francophiles all over the world.

img:  Some rights reserved by K.Hurley

About the author: André Klein was born in Germany, has grown up and lived in many different places including Thailand, Sweden and Israel. He has produced two music albums, performed and organized literary readings, curated an experimental television program and is the author of various short stories and non-fiction works.

The promise of new – of magical improvement due to technology, dressed up as the Redeemer of Broken Education, painted in broad messianic brush strokes.

And in between here and then, a leap of faith.

Facebook is supposed to become a transformative force in education. Twitter will replace traditional teaching. Learning by video will connect synapses effortlessly. Digitizing textbooks will make students more interested in the learning process. And so on and so forth.

The Denial Divide

The only problem, according to technologists is the fact that there are too many schools and too many students who aren’t yet fully connected, geared up to the maximum extent – and therefore the education revolution isn’t here, yet.

But rather than an absence of hard- or software, the real issue is an ever-growing denial regarding real world learning.

And, yes, education start-ups know what they’re doing, in a business sense. They’re building and selling products.

In the end someone has to buy them.

Therefore, the question whether their expensively marketed tools will really help people remains shrouded under the veil of glossy copy-writing.

And, as the NYT reported:

School officials, confronted with a morass of complicated and sometimes conflicting research, often buy products based on personal impressions, marketing hype or faith in technology for its own sake.

The Emperor Has No Clothes

We have two trends here.

• The education technology evangelists inflate the importance of technology in learning for either a) marketing purposes or b) an almost messianic belief in polished boxes and code regardless of context

• Faced with budget cuts, distracted students and not enough teachers, educators are desperate for change – so much that they are ready to throw caution to the wind and believe almost anything that “technology consultants” and the marketing people of the next big thing from Silicon Valley tell them.

This exploitation of educational issues and the unwillingness and/or impossibility to cause any serious change without major budget increases is problematic enough.

What’s even more problematic are the effects of these trends on the students, the learners, from kindergarten to university to adult students.

Should education serve the needs of students or should students serve the needs of marketing departments and the blind hope of principals and education policy makers?

Part of the Occupy Wall Street Protest is the issue of rising student debt. It has become harder and harder for students to acquire a higher education without sliding deeply into debt in the U.S.

Selling more iPads to schools and aggressively marketing new apps or software will not change the fact that the education system and its general approach as a whole is not adequately tuned to the requirements of our situation, today.

In the current climate around education, it is easy to fall prey to quick and shiny new solutions, both for educators but also for students and their parents.

Here are three ways which can be used as an indicator when evaluating the next “transformative education technology”:

1. Proof, Evidence And The Lack Thereof

Unfortunately, as described in the NYT article quoted above, many of these new technologies aren’t subjected to effective studies before they are deployed in the classroom.

The start-up culture encourages the bending of truth towards customer benefits, even if there is no real proof that their system or software really delivers what it claims to do.

Some firms misrepresent research by cherry-picking results and promote surveys or limited case studies that lack the scientific rigor required by the clearinghouse and other authorities.

The only real evidence would be studies conducted by independent third-party researchers who are impartial to the outcome of their test. Those are rare, unfortunately – And there are so many start-ups and software companies in the education sector that noone could possibly test all of them.

Therefore, 99% of education technology providers force people to buy the pup in a poke.

Again, their marketing copy will not present it like this. They will have concocted their own studies, complete with their own desired results. But there is still a difference between perceived value of a limited case study and actual objective research. Educators should be aware of this, shouldn’t they?

2. Promising The Moon And Delaying Delivery Indefinitely

The second way to identify whether you’re dealing with just another vaporware is to look at the promises its copy makes.

The more outrageous, the more wildly speculative – the higher the likelihood you’re dealing with people who want to succeed very much but might not be able to deliver even an iota of what they promise. (Often this is because IT people and business majors never once worked with learners directly.)

Next, let’s look at the pricing.

If it’s just a $0.99 app for vocabulary drills, ok. But if educators spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on iPads or software licenses for whole schools, one has to marvel at the willingness of people to see time-tested proof where there is only anecdotal evidence and reckless wishful-thinking.

3. The Best Teacher Is Still A Human Being, Not A Machine

This is the point it always boils down to, in the end.

Here’s an example: Everyday I see new technologies that claim to have revolutionary features such as “real-time feedback” and I wonder how we can advertise technology for the fact that it imitates (very rigidly) human core characteristics.

No machine (at least none currently existing) can replace a human being’s real-time feedback system because computers and software lack two absolutely fundamental capacities for dealing with people: empathy and understanding.

And this is where we can ask the question: Is the start-up, advertising or technology consultant offering you a technology which empowers the teacher’s and student’s human capacities or does the app or hardware force students to comply to its way of handling things.

All too often I see headlines on education technology blogs and Twitter time-lines that count the chickens before they’re hatched and jump to conclusions about what will be the next big thing without even bothering about the fact that people aren’t machines and do have particular non-quantifiable needs!

As a rule of thumb I’d say: If a technology promises to get you in touch with people more effectively and then doesn’t intrude on the conversation with pop-ups or esoteric settings, it’s worthwhile to consider.

If it’s just another brain-dead app or clumsily “interactive” video-format, there’s no need to get over-excited.

It’s just a machine. A piece of software devoid of compassion and care.

And in the end we all have to ask ourselves:

Would we rather do an “interactive” physics quiz with our refrigerator, complete with text-to-speech, learning-progress graphs and crowd-sourced recommendations or - have a conversation with someone like Nikola Tesla?

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About the author: André Klein was born in Germany, has grown up and lived in many different places including Thailand, Sweden and Israel. He has produced two music albums, performed and organized literary readings, curated an experimental television program and is the author of various short stories and non-fiction works.