7 Things You Should Know About...

7 Things You Should Know About… from the Educause Learning Initiative (ELI) is a series of briefs, each focusing on one emerging learning technology. The pieces cover topics such as Google Wave, VoiceThread, e-readers, or microblogging, and offer a quick overview written with busy educators in mind.

To the Point
The 7 Things You Should Know About… briefs summarize the research to date using these seven guiding questions:
     1.  What is it?
     2.  How does it work?
     3.  Who’s doing it?
     4.  Why is it significant?
     5.  What are the downsides?
     6.  Where is it going?
     7.  What are the implications for teaching and learning? 

Each piece has a short introduction on the ELI website with a description of the emerging technology; there are links to related resources from Educause, and the brief is a downloadable PDF.

ELI encourages educators to use the 7 Things You Should Know About… briefs to enhance faculty development activities, open a dialogue with senior administrators about emerging technologies and their implications for your institution, and stay up-to-date on emerging technologies.

About The Educause Learning Initiative (ELI)

The EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI) is a community of higher education institutions and organizations committed to advancing learning through information technology (IT) innovation. ELI specifically explores innovative technologies and practices that advance learning.

You may know of ELI from their work with The New Media Consortium in creating the annual Horizon Reports. The 7 Things You Should Know About… series presents a selection of the research gathered for the Horizon Reports in an abbreviated format.