Learners as Experts

Hank recently turned me onto Kirsten Winkler’s blog, which is full of thought-provoking material for modern educators. One article I especially enjoyed recently was Leaving the Stage: Teaching and Learning in the Digital Age. It totally resonated with both my experience at ChinesePod as well as what I’m doing now at AllSet Learning.

Some choice quotes:

The impact of digital learners on twenty-first century learning environments—including the traditional classroom—highlights the changing role of teachers who, in teaching

Hank and the Taobao Tea Trail

CEO Hank Horkoff over at ChinesePod has been drinking a lot of tea lately. He calls what he’s doing the Taobao Tea Trail. He’s bought a lot of Chinese tea on Taobao, and he’s sampling it all, learning as he goes. He explains:

Armed with the Chinese-language 茶叶地图 ["tea leaf map"] and 百度百科 ["Baidu Encyclopedia"] I am sampling my way through the spectrum of Chinese teas – more than 85 in all, one a week. I am using

Buying the HTC Hero in Shanghai

Photo by louisvolant

On Thursday I went with coworkers Hank and Jenny to get an HTC Hero. Jenny’s Taobao research had revealed lots of vendors advertising the new Google Android smartphone, but with fluctuating prices and changes in stock. (The phone has not officially hit the Chinese market yet, so these are all unofficial imports, or 水货 in Chinese.) Anyway, we finally settled on a vendor near Shanghai Train Station.

When we found the shop on the sixth floor, …

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