Understanding Meaning: "Meaning seems at its root to be about connections: between individuals, between groups of individuals, and, also, within individuals, in that it can be experienced powerfully as new or better links between previously disconnected internal bits of us. A powerful sensation, this reduction in personal fragmentation. And of course, we also experience meaning as new or better connection between hitherto disparate ideas."
Why This is Going to Take Longer Than I'd Hoped: "First, the fact that over 50% of high school teachers are planning to retire in the next five years is a big, big issue. 42% of all teachers are over 50, and it’s been my experience, stereotypical as it might be, that by and large, technology is not something older teachers come easily to. In fact, I did a training this morning where the frustration level among the older teachers was palpable, while the younger teachers were much more at ease.
Second, very few upper level administrators have the technology experience necessary to see the potential nor the vision necessary to see how it all works together."
Storytelling is a tremendously underutilized resource in communicating ideas and concepts in education. Storytelling is a conduit - it permits the sharing (and reception) of resources that might not be received through traditional channels (i.e. lecture). Good story telling overcomes fatal logic flaws is a short exploration of the power (and perhaps downside) of storytelling, logic, and emotions.
Conversation is the Kingdom: "Schools used to own the content they delivered, but no longer. There is better content, in most cases, to be found on the Web than in standard texts. There are richer databases of information, more knowledgable experts, and more diverse sources of uniquely pertinent material that we can draw upon now. And that renders the one-textbook-for-all approach basically irrelevant."
Online learning and Web 2.0 "The idea is to someway end the separation between learning and living". (The quality of the audio varies in stages, but it's still a good listen).
Simple, short podcast from Diana Oblinger: "Students may be unafraid of technology, but the don't necessarily understand it".
In Praise of Ecosystems: "Innovation doesn't occur in a vacuum -- which is why Apple's iPod will eventually be eclipsed by rivals that can cooperate and compete together."
Google releases a not-so well kept secret: Google Talk. Really simple install, great sound quality. It integrates text, email, voice. Very clean interface.
Why Knowledge Management is So Important: "I am convinced that the current deemphasizing of KM is a tragic mistake that will have serious long-term consequences..."
New Learning Environments for 21st Century(.pdf) - I really enjoyed reviewing this presentation. John Seely Brown's view of learning in today's society is very similar to what I've been advocating about connectivism. In particular, he presents the urgent need to rethink how we provide learning in an effort to compete at a global level. Stephen Downes also links to an audio file of the presentation.
Next Generation Networks: "Over the past few months, it has become increasingly obvious that the mobile phone is going to become the personal device owned by more than half the world's population in 5 years."
David Tosh posts a powerpoint presentation: Computing Means Connecting. If you want a bit of a glimpse at how integration is occurring within the eportfolio space, this presentaion will help. Blogs, wikis, RSS, tagging, etc. - all these elements are "speaking" to each other in platforms like Elgg. As a platform, it's also able to link and draw in resources from other platforms (like flickr). In my opinion, the more informal, connection-based, integration-focused, and socially-designed these tools are, the greater the benefit to the end user (and ultimately, adoption levels).
I'm in Victoria for the last several weeks. One of the first things I did on arrival is get in touch with Scott Leslie. We had an enjoyable conversation last night - largely focused on the social implications of the changing dynamics of education. Most notably is the view that higher education's main task is to serve the needs of corporations. Largely ignored in many colleges/universities today is the notion that "education makes better people, society and quality of life". The Economic and Social Foundations of Collaborative Innovation addresses this indirectly: "Professor Benkler is essentially saying that collaborative innovation is a serious mode of economic production that has arisen because the Internet and related technologies and standards now permit large numbers of individuals to organize themselves for productive work, in a decentralized, non-market way...Professors Benkler and Weber address the questions of what motivates people to work together as a community for the common good with no direct fiscal gain, as well as how such communities organize and manage themselves."
Simple application of social network analysis - as I've stated before, the flow of knowledge and information in an organization needs to be understood and utilized: Have You Heard? Gossip Turns Out to Serve a Purpose: "Gossip has long been dismissed by researchers as little more than background noise, blather with no useful function. But some investigators now say that gossip should be central to any study of group interaction."
Unacknowledged Convergence: Open Source, Open Access, Open Science: "A number of open initiatives are actively resisting the extension of intellectual property rights. Among these developments, three prominent instances — open source software, open access to research and scholarship, and open science — share not only a commitment to the unrestricted exchange of information and ideas, but economic principles based on (1) the efficacy of free software and research; (2) the reputation–building afforded by public access and patronage; and, (3) the emergence of a free–or–subscribe access model."
Elgg.net Radio Launches ...David and Ben continue to innovate and add new functionality to Elgg. I was interviewed yesterday for one of the podcasts. David threw out some fairly hefty questions relating to technology, theory, and learning. It was an enjoyable conversation. They are planning additional interviews in the future, so it's a space worth following.
I've published a new article on elearnspace - Connectivism: Learning as Network-Creation - the paper is an extension of ideas I've expressed in previous publications, but the emphasis is strongly on how the very act of learning is best expressed through a network conception. The act of learning involves acquiring and encoding new nodes within our existing learning network. Learning is much more dynamic than assumed by higher education and corporate training.
The search for learning community in learner paced distance education: Or, 'Having your cake and eating it, too!' (via Ray): "University distance and e-learning programs generally follow one of two models. Most dual mode institutions and some open universities follow a model of cohort learning. Students start and terminate each course at the same time, and proceed at the same pace. This model allows for occasional or regular group based activities. The second model, referred to as learner paced, is based on increased student independence. Students may start their courses at many points during the year, and complete these at their own pace, depending on the learner's circumstances and interests."
Principles of Distributed Representation (.ppt) - Stephen presents some provocative thoughts on knowing and learning. He ends with a discussion of "distributed resource description" (i.e. metadata). While the PowerPoint is very interesting, I sense the real value will be in the audio version (which I haven't heard yet).
The more I use search engines, the more I find this to be true (and I'm glad Google understands it) - Future of Search: "Sometimes one wants to use a search engine to find a very specific piece of information rather than to learn about a topic. If search engines were truly intelligent, you could just pose a question the same way you would ask a person."
Berners-Lee on the read/write web: "For years I had been trying to address the fact that the web for most people wasn't a creative space; there were other editors, but editing web pages became difficult and complicated for people. What happened with blogs and with wikis, these editable web spaces, was that they became much more simple."
As I've stated previously, we are in the beginning stages of explosive exploration of learning as influenced/interpreted by neurological research - 'Thoughts read' via brain scans (via Ray Schroeder): "Scientists say they have been able to monitor people's thoughts via scans of their brains.
Teams at University College London and University of California in LA could tell what images people were looking at or what sounds they were listening to."
Information Literacy Competency Standards - I received a link to this site from Stewart Brower on the connectivism email list: "information literacy is a set of abilities requiring individuals to "recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information." Information literacy also is increasingly important in the contemporary environment of rapid technological change and proliferating information resources. Because of the escalating complexity of this environment, individuals are faced with diverse, abundant information choices--in their academic studies, in the workplace, and in their personal lives. Information is available through libraries, community resources, special interest organizations, media, and the Internet--and increasingly, information comes to individuals in unfiltered formats, raising questions about its authenticity, validity, and reliability." I'm quite pleased with how strongly it relates to concepts of connectivism...I'm looking forward to exploring the field at greater depth.
I've introduced Elgg in this forum before. In a conversation today with Elgg creators David and Ben, I revisited the platform. I'm very impressed. It's one of the most integrated "web 2.0" applications for learning I've encountered. They currently include blogs, wikis, communities, tags, and more. Elgg is described as "a personal learning landscape with the goal of connecting learners, instructors and resources creating communities of learning."
Simply: If you are an educator looking at new ways to enlarge the learning opportunities of your learners...or if you're a corporate trainer looking for ways to extend learning beyond courses, have a look at Elgg.
I just had a chance to view Will Richardson's powerpoint presentation on New Internet Literacies. A great overview of what's happened with how we approach knowledge creation and use. Will accurately captures the shift to "end user in control" (he terms it as the read/write web), and introduces the tools that have made the shift possible.
Fifty-One Competencies for Online Instruction (.pdf) (via Jane Knight) - While I'm generally not a big fan of checklists (I'm more fond of "guiding principles" - they are intentionally less prohibitive at the application level, giving the educator greater freedom), this is a useful paper for new online instructors. Some of the competencies are quite vague (like "harness technology"), and measurement criteria is not included.
Sharing Knowledge (.pdf) has been receiving quite a bit of attention in various knowledge management blogs. It's essentially a case study of how to create a knowledge sharing environment in smaller organizations. Most of the suggestions are basic and should be familiar to those who have been following KM developments. The document does provide a nice overview of wikis, communities of practice, and general (physical) workspace design.
An extremely useful introduction to the subject of mobile learning technologies (I expect that the subject of mobile learning, which was in fashion about three years ago, will become the new "hot" domain of learning development. And it should. I've encountered some criticism of mobile learning as limited (largely due to screen sizes of phones and other devices) in application. However, whenever a tool has wide adoption, new uses of the existing tool have a high chance of success. There may be better avenues for learning...but the dominance of mobile phones will make them a seamless learning tool for many) - Literature Review in Mobile Technologies and Learning (via Smartmobs): "Newer developments in mobile phone technology are also beginning to offer the potential for rich multimedia experiences and for location-specific resources.
The challenge for educators and designers, however, is one of understanding and exploring how best we might use these resources to support learning. That we need to do this is clear – how much sense does it make to continue to exclude from schools, powerful technologies that are seen as a normal part of everyday life? At the present time, however, the models for using and developing mobile applications for learning are somewhat lacking."
Functions of mobile phones - a simple graphic detailing what people do with mobile phones. Of particular interest to educators/trainers is the second most common use - receiving location-specific information (a slight modification of this use would enable the inclusion of context-specific learning).
Elearning industry consolidations (via Learning Circuits) - a graphic portraying the consolidation of elearning (in US) dating back to 1997. A handful of big players are emerging...
RSS feeds college students' diet for research (via Weblogg-ed): "Ediriwickrema is part of the growing number of on-the-go, sleep-deprived students who recognize the value of an Internet technology called RSS and are milking its benefits for use in the classroom."
Similar to the concept of knowledge foraging I discussed in Learning Development Cycle - Information scent: helping people find the content they want: "The term information scent was first coined by researchers at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Centre (PARC).
Their research revealed similarities between the way humans search for information and the way animals hunt."
A critical evaluation of social networking services (like LinkedIn) - Six Degrees of "Who Cares?": "The connections we remember the most are the ones we've made in person where we've exchanged cards and conversation..."
The August/September issue of Innovate focuses on "the role of video game technology in current and future educational settings."
Meaningful metrics beyond ROI : "We spend way too much time trying to placate financial people by contorting our world to fit their frame of reference, and we allow them to judge and often condemn our endeavors according to criteria that are irrelevant or inappropriate...We need to widen the focus. While learner satisfaction, test results, and average cost of butts-on-seats are useful metrics, it is only after our learners have returned to work that we can begin to see how effective the learning experience really was."
Useful listing of critical thinking resources. I find that it's increasingly important to acknowledge not only the construct of logical/critical thinking...but to provide a balancing anchor that reflects the influence of emotions on creating cognitive constructs.
