[1.] Aleks : http://www.aleks.com/

[2.] Ibm's "The classroom will learn you" : http://www.research.ibm.com/cognitive-computing/machine-learning-applications/decision-support-education.shtml#fbid=6ztQEyyCPcu

Hi! I would definitely include simulations on that list. See the link below:

www.iconsproject.com

My all time favorite site is the National Library of Virtual Manipulatives....  It is marvelous at bridging the gap between hand-on and abstraction.  You can think of it as somewhat of an "active-sketch" environment...

http://nlvm.usu.edu/en/nav/vlibrary.html

Best wishes!

Michael

1. DragonBox (Mathematics - Algebra)

2. Code.org (Computer Science - computer programming) 

THANKS you wonderful people for helping out, so far! I intend to share the compiled list with everyone eventually - when I have worked out some more of the criteria - as I believe that more people would be interested. Again, I'm primarily looking for software that offers feedback and scaffolds to support the student's understanding of the material and that enables (visible) progression towards a specific learning goal. Many games would qualify, were they only more educational and more informative (...just having played a "math game" which teaches me that 8*3 results in a dead dinosaur!) ... Look forward to even more good examples! :-)

An online concept mapping website can be an example. The website provides immediate feedback through formative use of SAK (structural assessment of knowledge)

Here is some of my studies:

Article Exploring the Mobile Structural Assessment Tool: Concept Map...

Conference Paper How a computer-based concept mapping can be used in statisti...

Conference Paper Analysis of how well a concept mapping website conforms to p...

For language learning, I would suggest the following tools:

https://en.duolingo.com/

http://quizlet.com/

http://se.babbel.com/?locale=sv

ClueFinders titles

Delta Drawing

GCompris - free software (GPL)

JumpStart titles

KidPix

Reader Rabbit titles

Tux Paint - free software (GPL)

Zoombinis titles

Accelerated Reader

Compu-Read

DISTAR

MindPlay

Langueage learning:

http://www.sanako.com/

For lecture video capture you can use Eco 360.

For students MCQ preparation and online grading AKINDI is a good software.

This is a very difficult question to answer, because there are so many possible answers to the question "What makes educational software 'good'?" I worked on a national evaluation of what were termed 'Integrated Learning Systems' in the 1990s (Harrison, 1995) and the most telling remark I recorded in teacher interviews was "If this system works, thank a teacher", because it was how the teacher mediated, monitored and used the data on students' use of software that was supposedly generating 'independent learning' that determined how much they learned, and therefore how 'good' the software was.

Harrison, C. (1995) Evaluation of ILS among students who for whom English is a Second Language: Final Report to National Council for Educational Technology. Coventry: NCET. 

Colin,

thanks for your comment; I completely agree. I initiated this question for the purpose of approaching the answer scientifically - i.e. what would be the (in my case cognitive-)scientific grounds for assessing whether particular software brings "added value" to the learning process, compared to other teaching material? The fact that the teacher directs the learning process is true also when using a text book, lectures or group work; still there are qualitative differences that enable us to judge one book as better than another, one kind of assignment as more efficient or engaging than another, etc. Looking at reviews of educational apps on the net, I reacted against that there is hardly any coherence whatsoever in terms of what makes the app "good"; e.g. some say because it is cheap, easy to install, contains lots of excercises, etc, whereas "pedagogical value" can apparently mean anything. My starting point (which I hope to follow up) is that the "good" in educational software pertains to the things that tehnology can do that books or humans cannot (or with great difficulty only), e.g. individual adaptivity to each pupil in a class, endless patience, implication feedback, and/or interaction with virtual beings that allow social role-playing that is impossible in rea life. Unfortunately, >90% (at least!) of the apps I have found so far provide little but drilling exercises or provides no direction towards the learning goal (e.g. simulations, which can be great but even more dependent on a good teacher!). Ideally, I think the software should manage things that the teacher cannot. The simple examples are easy. That's why I need more good examples, so we can find what is (potentially) *really good* with using software in school. (In fact, if there aren't some really good things, I see no point in why we should use it at all?). Thanks again all for your contributions!! 

Thanks for your gracious reply, Björn. Perhaps what is also needed is more teacher awareness of the research data that we DO have: for example, the Owen paper in Nature (2010) showing that 'brain training' has no cognitive gains, or the Coffield review (2004) of 'learning styles' showing that the concept so beloved by many teachers has little or no empirical support....

Owen, Adrian M., et al. "Putting brain training to the test." Nature 465.7299 (2010): 775-778.

Coffield, F., Moseley, D., Hall, E., & Ecclestone, K. (2004). Learning Styles and Pedagogy in post-16 learning: A systematic and critical review. Learning & Skills research centre.

Some of the best ones that I use as examples for my students include:

Frog Guts (interactive dissection lab)

Google Body (now Zygote Body) (explore the human anatomy)

Re-Mission (first person shooter game for learning about cancer and treatments)

Re-Fraction (factional math, bit drilly but good)

NASA's So You Want to be a Martian (planetary features)

Colin, sure, there are many misconceptions out there. I don't want to digress too far from the original question, but isn't it ironic that the research data we do have are about what educational software don't do?

It seems almost self-evident that one cannot "prove" much scientifically about such vague and general concepts as "brain training" or "learning styles". Again, that's why I'm after software whose learning efficiency can be assessed much more specifically, with respect to a well-defined knowledge goal, given a strategy to reach that goal and feedback that helps maintaining that strategy. In other words, I think good educational software should require a minimum of instruction from a human teacher: Let the software do what technology does better (as mentioned above) so as to free resources for what teachers do better -  such as using their judgment of what software to use in which situations. And I think science can bring more to increase teacher awareness of what makes good software than what makes good teaching. (But now I'm already into another discussion!)

Terence, thanks for your examples too, I'll check them out. Keep'em coming... 

We have designed a tool called SIENA SOCIAL based on conceptual maps and adapative tests working students either individual or  colaborative ways. Now, I have an students who wants to use the tool for an English course.

Information about this tool can be found at:

LORENZO MORENO RUIZ; CARINA GONZÁLEZ; EVELIO J. GONZÁLEZ; BEATRICE POPESCU; CLAUDIA O. L. GROENWALD. Teaching Computer Architecture using a Collaborative Approach: The SIENA Tool, Tutorial Sessions and Problem Solving. International Journal of Engineering Education. 29 - 2, pp. 510 - 519. TEMPUS

Publications., 20/03/2013.

Well, my acid test to select an educational software is ask the questions: what does the learner do? What artefacts will the learner produce as demonstration of deep learning? If learners mainly watch and read, then if the artefact is the result of a test, just drop it. It's not learning, it's drilling.

Best educational software are places where the learners can create meaningful artefacts, i.e. that are congruent with what they want to learn. One of the most undervalued piece of software is modeling software, such as Ithink (or Stella). This is what you need if you want to invite learners to understand what is system thinking and complexity.

So, one of the criterion for selecting an education software is: does it convey the message that the world is complex (which is not to be mistaken with 'complicated'!) and that it is a place to experiment. Virtual labs are another interesting piece of software as well as the modern versions of the Lego Tortoise.

Last criterion (but there are others) is: are they inviting to conversations with oneself (reflection) and others (reflection too!). Learning is about creating conversations, unfortunately, too many so-called educational software are about drill and practice, matching against externally defined standards and creating silos  where there is no place for the construction of self-narratives.

This still leaves us with probably less than 1% of what is called "educational software" which is plenty to create meaningful learning environments.

Dear Björn, I was wondering whether a tool/service such as App Ed Review may also be of value. 

http://www.emergingedtech.com/2015/04/app-ed-review-relaunches-best-educational-app-reviews/

Hi Colin,

I have recently reviewed 143 mathematics apps - some of which are even educational. The link to the full review is http://tinyurl.com/ACARA-Apps and the details of the article where I report on what I did is 

Larkin, K. (2014). Ipad Apps that promote mathematical knowledge? Yes, they exist! Australian Primary Mathematics Classroom, 19(2), 28-32.

Hope this is of some assistance and keep an eye out for a more comprehensive treatment in a book chapter which I will make available shortly. Regards, Kevin.

Bjorn

Looking at the replies and your lengthy reply to Colin in particular, it seems you are not looking here for the standard 'here is a piece of content, now do a quiz' tool or app which dominates educational software.  Instead you seem to be asking for something more adaptive that responds to the needs of the individual student based on their progress and gives individualised feedback and learning - A big ask I think for any software as I'm not sure these teacher's 'soft skills' of patience, intuition and very personalised feedback can be replicated. The only thing I have seen which comes close is Knewton http://www.knewton.com/

http://www.knewton.com/

Hello, everyone!

Study Island and Success Maker are two tools that districts in the U.S.often purchase to help teachers and students. Both tools are designed by large for profit companies. Both tools are web-based.

I do not know much about the Success Maker, but both tools  should be adaptable to student levels and provide formative feedback to the student. The scores are kept in the database that a teacher can access and, if necessary, adjust the difficulty levels manually and provide additional assignments. There is a test mode and game mode, at keast in Study Island. Both tools focus on ELA and Math, but there is a science component in Study Island. Both tools are designed with thinking about eventually doing well on (what else?) high stakes tests.... 

I hope this is somewhat helpful in your quest.

Thanks.

Hello- the work of Yelland and Kilderry (2010) is useful in this regard. The authors draw attention to the importance of educational technology that enables 'multidimensional' (or creative thinking) as opposed to 'unidimensional' (or the opposite of creative thinking). Perhaps it's a point that is initially obvious- like clever children learn better with clever teachers- but the reality appears to be that both of these examples (technology inducing creative thought and clever learners being situated with clever teachers) are not always occurring within educational contexts! I hope this helps.

Duolingo & Dragonbox are the best educational apps I know. 

I really like the designed tasks of Code.org where you start to learn "Scratch" by solving puzzles. Through feedback and levels kids learn a lot.

Dear colleagues,

I think these are very good examples for what you are looking for. We put some examples in our mathematics textbook for 4th grade in Serbia, publisher Kreativni centar (Dejic et al., 2006, 2009, 2012):

http://www.fisme.science.uu.nl/publicaties/subsets/rekenweb_en/ and

http://figurethis.nctm.org/challenges/math_index.htm

http://www.kcskola.rs/edicija.php?e=600

Good morning!

I would encourage you to take a look at the following:

http://nlvm.usu.edu/

The National Library of Virtual Manipulatives is in my mind a stellar site and I have used it successfully as a part of my math methods courses for years.  There is a caveat, however, in that the users must be confident in their own pedagogy to use it to the fullest extent. 

I LOVE the manner in which the opening screen serves as an advanced organizer as well as providing easy access to such a variety of powerful teaching tools.

Best wishes,

Michael

Dear Björn,

I would recommend Dynamic Geometry Software (e.g. GeoGebra, Cabri, Geometer's Sketchpad, Cinderella) for mathematics education.

In this occasion, I mention at least one advantage. Compared to a single-static visualization of a mathematical concept in a maths textbook, these can offer a multiple-dynamic representation of the same concept. This contributes to easier learning of representations (mathematical competence usually stated in the curricula for primary and secondary education). Representations are sometimes called modes of description (arithmetic, geometric, abstract-structural) and contribute to development of three different modes of mathematical thinking.

If interesting, please see (or some of the references)

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/281399561_Conceptual_Understanding_of_Dot_Product_of_Vectors_in_a_Dynamic_Geometry_Environment

Best wishes, Ana

Article Conceptual Understanding of Dot Product of Vectors in a Dyna...

I agree with Olivera Đokić