Author: July Arp

Read for the Record, an annual celebration of reading and learning, highlights the need for high-quality early education in America by bringing young people and adults together to set a new world record for the most children reading the same book on the same day.

This year, record-breakers will be reading Penguin’s Ladybug Girl and the Bug Squad, by David Soman and Jacky Davis, which has been selected as the official book of Jumpstart’s Read for the Record campaign in 2012.

For the first time this year, Jumpstart’s Read for the Record will take place over a full week — September 27 through to the record-setting day on October 4 — giving record breakers across the country even more opportunity to read and to support Jumpstart’s mission to work toward the day every child in America enters school prepared to succeed. Again this year, record breakers will also be able to take part by reading the book for free at We Give Books (http://wegivebooks.org), the free digital reading initiative created by Penguin and the Pearson Foundation.

Last year on October 6, 2011, Read for the Record engaged a record-breaking 2,185,155 people, who read Llama Llama Red Pajama by Anna Dewdney in homes, schools, libraries, community centers, and online. In conjunction with the 2011 campaign, We Give Books also donated more than 200,000 copies of this wonderful book to young people so that they could easily take part in the record-breaking day.

Click here to learn more about the event and how you can get involved!

Your semester is coming to a close, your final exams are just around the corner, and the hint of summer is smiling at you through the window. Whether you are preparing for that last exam, or gathering your final course grades, we have gathered timely resources to answer your burning questions around finals and the end of your term!

CommunityTV: Check out the tutorial videos available on the CommunityTV section of the Community site. Below is just a sample of the great selection of videos we have that not only answer your questions, but also show you how to use the program!

Looking for further instruction on how to create an online test, or create a printable test? Check out these two videos!

How-To Create an Online Test or Quiz

How to Create a Printable Test or Quiz

Do you have questions about how to run a report or export grades from your grade book? Our videos have step-by-step instructions to get you started!

How-To Create and Run a Report

Export Grades

Need to speak one-on-one with a MyNursingLab expert?  Sign up for one of our webinar sessions on Creating Tests and Using the Gradebook in MyNursinglab – we’re running these sessions twice per week through the month of May. Check out this page to sign up.

Your Customer Experience Team is here to help!

Teaching students in a virtual environment is a challenge, in that you often don’t have the typical “first day of class” where many expectations and questions are answered. Consider using a technique with which most of your students are very familiar – develop an FAQ list!

When planning your course, think about all the questions learners usually have the first week of class. Compile a list of these questions and responses and post in the course before the first day of class. This can be a Word document that is linked from the syllabus. Encourage all students to read the FAQ list prior to the start of the course. Continue to add to the list as learners pose new questions and update periodically. Over time, you will be surprised as to how comprehensive this list will become. Not only will it cut down your workload during the course, it will be available to your students at all times. What you will find in fewer e-mails and more time to focus on the real issues, such as student learning and performance!

Remember, encourage independent behavior. When a student asks a question that is on the FAQ list, refer him to the document. Don’t be tempted to answer!

Be sure to check out my last blog post where I talked about setting assignment expectations for your students.

You might be the “cool” professor who has students requesting to be your Facebook friend… or maybe they aren’t ready for you to see photos of them passed out on their front porch last Saturday night. Either way, social networking between students and teachers hangs in a delicate balance – either being too accessible or being unapproachable.

The challenge faced by all is how to find an effective method to connect students, teachers, learning materials, and many other forms of social or education engagement to keep the many lines of communication open and comfortable.

The Chronicle interviews the CEO of a new academic social-media network called GoingOn, which may be coming to a campus near you. Check it out here and add your thoughts below!

Who doesn’t love the Apple iPad?  It’s fun, interactive and stimulating – and now it will host a variety of textbooks, according to a recent Apple announcement. The textbooks will be interactive and provide students with another medium to learn.

What’s even more exciting is Pearson has announced it will be publishing some textbooks just for the iPad! To learn more about Pearson’s plans, click here.

Teaching students in a virtual environment is a challenge, in that you often don’t have the typical “first day of class” where many expectations and questions are answered. Consider using a technique with which most of your students are very familiar – develop an FAQ list!

When planning your course, think about all the questions learners usually have the first week of class. Compile a list of these questions and responses and post in the course before the first day of class. This can be a Word document that is linked from the syllabus. Encourage all students to read the FAQ list prior to the start of the course. Continue to add to the list as learners pose new questions and update periodically. Over time, you will be surprised as to how comprehensive this list will become. Not only will it cut down your workload during the course, it will be available to your students at all times. What you will find in fewer e-mails and more time to focus on the real issues, such as student learning and performance!

Remember, encourage independent behavior. When a student asks a question that is on the FAQ list, refer him to the document. Don’t be tempted to answer!

Be sure to check out my last blog post where I talked about setting assignment expectations for your students.

There’s been a lot of buzz in the last few years about college education and how much it costs — and we may see a new trend emerge as a result: MIT announced it will begin to offer a free online learning experience to people.  Students in the program will not earn a traditional MIT degree but a certificate stating they have mastered certain subjects.  Will other colleges/not-for-profits follow suit?

Check out this article and let us know your thoughts below!

• Brenda Boyce RN, EdD, Pearson Education
• July 17, 2012

Is your program one of the 90 percent of nursing programs looking to incorporate an electronic health records (EHR) learning system into the curriculum? If so, will your students be able to demonstrate competency in utilizing EHRs to help provide safe and effective care for patients?

Today’s nursing students are under pressure to be ready for practice once they graduate and pass the licensure exam. Yet clinical time is not always available, which means that realistic learning experiences throughout the curriculum are more important than ever.  That is why we are so excited to announce our partnership with Cerner Corporation, one of the world’s leaders in health care technology, to create RealEHRPrep with Cerner. This partnership has resulted in an electronic health records learning system that moves students “beyond the clicks” and helps them to learn how EHRs can be used to provide safer and more effective patient care – making its users even more ready for practice upon graduation.

Combining Pearson’s proven learning technology with Cerner’s Academic Education Solution will help create an authentic EHR learning experience that features a guided learning path that prepares students to demonstrate competency. RealEHRPrep can provide students with a realistic learning experience, starting with basic simulations and electronic documentation, to help them develop clinical judgment and become more practice ready.

The Health Information Technology for Economic Clinical Health Act has accelerated automation in healthcare, which has created a growing demand for nursing programs to graduate students who can demonstrate competency in electronic documentation.  RealEHRPrep with Cerner’s Academic Education Solution reflects the sophistication of EHR systems used in today’s health care facilities, offering a defined pedagogy, alerts and comprehensive data needed for clinical decision-making. More than 9,000 facilities worldwide currently use Cerner’s powerful EHR systems to advance patient care, increase efficiencies and improve access to critical patient information.

“Automation brings a tremendous number of benefits to patient care and hospital operations. However, these benefits are lost if the nurses and clinicians are not able to fully embrace the technology and use it effectively,” says Rob Campbell, VP and chief learning officer at Cerner. “Through our collaboration with Pearson, we have a real-world learning solution that will ensure nursing students and educators fully understand how to leverage the technology used in practice. This will help eliminate the need to get acquainted with the technology on the floor and support better patient care.”

For more information on RealEHRPrep with Cerner, click here.

Introducing Teacher Talks!

• The Pearson Team
• December 13, 2012