College Student’s Guide to Computers in Education






 * “The wisest mind has something yet to learn.” (George Santayana.)

This document is is based on the following book:


 * Moursund, D.G. (May 2007). A College Student's Guide to Computers in Education. Access at http://uoregon.edu/~moursund/Books/CollegeStudent/CollegeStudent.html. Self-published. Contains small editing corrections June, July 2007.

The original version of this book is available free (under a Creative Commons license) as a Microsoft Word file and as a PDF file. The version available here on this Wiki is open to editing (additions, deletions, and corrections) by readers.

The Contents (see box below) contains links to the sections of the Title Page.

Chapter Titles and Links to the Book Chapters
Title Page

Preface

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: Inventing Your Future

Chapter 3: Expertise and Problem Solving

Chapter 4: Human and Artificial Intelligence

Chapter 5: Computer-Assisted and Distance Learning

Chapter 6: Learning and Learning Theory

Chapter 7: Increasing Your Expertise in ICT

Chapter 8: Brief Introductions to A number of Key Ideas

Chapter 9: On the Lighter Side

References

Abstract of the Original Book
This short book is for undergraduate and graduate college and university students, and for others thinking about enrolling in higher education courses. The information and ideas presented will help you to obtain an education that will be useful to you throughout your life in our rapidly changing Information Age world.

Change is an underlying theme of this book. You are living at a time of a rapid technological change. The rate of change is increasing. Such change brings with it both threats and opportunities. You can shape your informal and formal education to diminish the threats and increase the opportunities. Gaining a competitive advantage is another underlying theme of the book. Whatever your areas of interest, you can gain a competitive advantage by developing a higher level of expertise in the areas and by developing an increased level of expertise in using computers in the areas. Computer technology is a powerful aid to representing and helping to solve problems and accomplish tasks in every academic discipline.

This book is a companion to A Faculty Member’s Guide to Computers in Higher Education, which is available free on the Website http://uoregon.edu/~moursund/Books/Faculty/Faculty.html. The two books share many of the same ideas, but these ideas are presented from two quite different points of view.

Reader's Comments and Suggestions
Please feel free to add general comments and suggestions.

Article suggested by David Burrowes.

Study Uncovers Memory Aid.

Carey, Benedict (3/9/07). Study Uncovers Memory Aid: A Scent During Sleep, The New York Times. Quoting from the article:


 * Scientists studying how sleep affects memory have found that the whiff of a familiar scent can help a slumbering brain better remember things that it learned the evening before. The smell of roses — delivered to people’s nostrils as they studied and, later, as they slept — improved their performance on a memory test by about 13 percent.


 * The new study, appearing today in the journal Science, is the first rigorous test of the effect of odor on human memory during sleep. The results, whether or not they can help students cram for tests, clarify the picture of what the sleeping brain does with newly learned material and help illuminate what it takes for this process to succeed.


 * Researchers have long known that sleep is crucial to laying down new memories, and studies in the 1980s and ’90s showed that exposing the sleeping brain to certain cues — the sound of clicking, for instance — could enhance the process. But it is only in recent years that scientists have begun to understand how this is possible.