The annual TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design)
prize, inaugurated in 2005, is now worth $1 million.
In 2013 it went to educator and physicist Sugata
Mitra, who is Professor of Educational Technology at
Newcastle University in the U.K. The award will allow
him to build a learning lab in India called the School
in the Cloud, where cloud-based approaches will explore
and facilitate online learning. Also integral to the
new project is a SOLE (self-organizing learning environment)
toolkit that will benefit educators, children,
and parents.
Mitra’s interest in self-directed learning, or what
he calls MIE (minimally invasive education), began
when he noticed, through his famous “Hole in the
Wall” experiment, that children were good at learning
on their own, even when they came from impoverished
families and had little exposure to education.
What they needed was support. Reportedly, diplomat
and author Vikas Swarup found inspiration in this experiment
when he wrote Q & A, a novel that became
better known as the film Slumdog Millionaire.