Learnstream Plus.page

Ok, this isn't so much a full-fledged idea as just a suggestion to leverage the new google+ hangouts. There have been plenty of studies showing group work/collaboration to be effective learning tools (too lazy to dig up links, but trust me!). There was also a study we talked about in an AE staff development re: watching videos of someone else being tutored and then collaborating/discussing with another student (paper in Dropbox -> Research -> Cognitive Science & Learning -> Collaborative tutoring.pdf). The study showed almost identical gains in understanding between the one-on-one tutoring group and the "collaborative watching of a tutoring session on video" group.

Anyways, google has developed this very cool group-chat feature. Not sure how long it'll last before the penises start coming out, or if people will even buy in to this kind of collaborative learning with strangers, but I'm envisioning something where groups of 2-4 students are matched up (in the "Learnstream" circle!), they watch a youtube video in the hangout room about concept X, and then discuss some followup problems.

This is all very plug-and-play, but lacks some larger-scale facilitation as it currently stands. Another idea: match up volunteer tutors with needy students. There seems to be some precedent with using skype to do similar things... http://education.skype.com/about