TLRP: Education 2.0

I quite liked the “Commentary by the Technology Enhanced Learning phase of the Teaching and Learning Research Programme” called “Education 2.0? Designing the web for teaching and learning"
Some useful stuff on social networking, socialising themes within Web 2.0, issues around cultures of trust, virtual worlds and the semantic web. Not enough on radical pedagogies though.

Johnny Lee: Creating tech marvels out of a $40 Wii Remote

Something I came across in my virtual travels, perhaps something that I remember our Richard Hall talking about that was demonstrated a recent conference:

is it really that wrong to use social networking sites for independent study?

well it would seem so in some parts of Canada according to this Reuters report about "Canadian university faces off with digital generation".

A simple search of student groups for Ryerson University reveals 269 groups - are their owners/admin all to be punished? Staff as well?

I like the following quote from news.yahoo from a Uni of Toronto Media Studies professor:

In an interview, University of Toronto philosophy and media studies professor Megan Boler said that all universities encourage collegiality and discussion and that meeting online is actually very transparent because there are traces and records of everything discussed.

"Of course we want to ensure academic integrity, but I think academic freedom and civil right are equally important, unless we expect students to study in total isolation," she said.

Maybe the real issue is progressive pedagogy and rethinking assessment to chime with post-Fordist working practices.

the technology of teaching

a BBC article about the way technology is shaping the way schools will work in the future: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7275127.stm

Nintendo DS shows educators the future

I attended Donald's session at the Learning Technologies Conference 2008, and found his address to be very entertaining packed with light-hearted humour and insightful judgements.

The below is a post taken from Donald Clark's excellent blog - Plan B.

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Nintendo DS shows educators the future
Consumer e-learning goes global
Over Christmas something quite extraordinary happened. E-learning became a global consumer phenomenon. Nintendo has been THE global success in games this year with learning product. So how did Nintendo do what educators have been trying for eons to achieve (unsuccessfully)? Simple, they went back to some basic principles in the psychology of learning around motivation, goals and spaced practice. They realised that one-on-one content, that becomes addictive for the learner, played a little but often, is the way ahead in learning. In designing a game that appeals to all ages they’ve literally created a massive consumer-led e-learning market.

Read more...

Economist Education Debates: part 2

We've had an email from The Economist about our posting on their Educational Debate Series...

==============================================================

Thanks for writing about The Economist Debate Series on technology and education. Since you’ve shown an interest in our debates, I wanted to tip you off to our second series of three debates which kicks off today. The first proposition raises important questions about civil rights and the trade-off between Privacy vs. Security. As a blogger and member of the community that The Economist aims to serve with this lively debate, we wanted to extend an invitation to you and the readers of DMU Pathfinder to join the debate by blogging or commenting to the debate floor. (No subscription is necessary).

Timing & Proposition:

Feb. 5 – Feb 15: “Privacy vs. Security – This house believes that security in the modern age cannot be established without some erosion of individual privacy.”

Should people sacrifice elements of our privacy for the sake of making our world a more secure place?

Expert Debaters & Moderator

Two global thought leaders in security and freedom will square off on either side of the issue.

• Pro: Neil C. Livingstone, Chairman and CEO of ExecutiveAction LLC

Livingstone is the chairman and CEO of ExecutiveAction LLC, an international business solutions and risk management company. In addition to serving on numerous homeland security advisory boards, Livingstone has written nine books and more than 200 articles on terrorism and national security and has appeared on more than 1,300 television programmes as a commentator on intelligence and national-security issues.

• Con: Bob Barr, Chair for Freedom and Privacy at the American Conservative Union

A former member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Georgia (1995-2003), Barr now occupies the 21st Century Liberties Chair for Freedom and Privacy at the American Conservative Union. In addition to teaching and practicing law, Barr serves as a board member of the National Rifle Association and heads a consulting firm, Liberty Strategies LLC. Dubbed by the New York Times as “Mr. Privacy”, Barr writes and speaks widely on civil liberties. Previously, Mr. Barr served as the U.S. Attorney in Atlanta, and as an official with the CIA.

· Moderator: Daniel Franklin, Executive Editor, The Economist & Editor-In-Chief, Economist.com & Editor, The World in 2008

Guest Participants

Additional leaders in this field are serving as guest participants through the course of the debate:

• Thomas M. Sanderson Deputy Director and Senior Fellow, Transnational Threats Project (CSIS)
• Scott Berinato, Executive Director, CSO Magazine
• W. Kenneth Ferree, President, The Progress & Freedom Foundation

Future Debates in the Series

• Feb 25 – March 7: Information Management. Is Technology succeeding at simplifying our lives, or is it just making things more complicated? Does the negative impact of information overload outweigh the positive impact of new tools and technologies?
• March 18 – 28: IT Governance. Should each country have independent control over its own cyberspace, or should a governing entity oversee the Internet and policies surrounding it?

Also, if you haven’t already, please join our Facebook group, “I’m Following The Economist Debate Series.”

Fashion websites creep up on Amazon

{Comment: Are some of us still in misconceptions like these fashion retailers were in that education is not heading online?}

Fashion retailers have long played down the significance of the internet, saying that no-one would chance buying a dress, let alone a pair of shoes, that they hadn't tried on first.

Now it seems the same convenience that helped Amazon garner a enormous chunk of the book market is threatening to change the way we buy clothes - even though there are no virtual cubicles just yet.

Read More...

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Cool CatTeacher Blog

Follow on from the Economist Education Debate on social networking and recent posts related to Facebook, Vicky Davies, author of the cool cat teacher blog hits the nail squarely and firmly on the head in making the point that for educators it is about educational not 'social' networking.
Educational Networking not Social Networking

Economist Education Debates

Just picked this up off the TK-newswire {man alive, TK is a fount of Web2.0 knowledge and is in the wrong job...}: The Economist Debate Series: Education

The third debate is running now on: "Social Networking: does it bring positive change to education?" There are bits of the propositions that I like, in particular on the Pro side, I like the propositions about Bebo-boomers and what they will think of their kids' educational experiences:

• "It's more about helping learners become more world-aware, more communicative, learning from each other, understanding first hand what makes the world go around"
• "ubiquitous social technologies help us connect to those who can help us learn when we're outside the domain of formal education"
• "The web turned sixteen last year, just as another generation of sixteen year olds left school with more knowledge of the web from outside formal education than from within it... Educational methods could continue on their merry, Victorian way, but that's unlikely to engage today's learners, and it's impossible to envisage tomorrow’s parents, the Bebo Boomers, accepting the 9am-4pm, timetabled, do the exams you're told to when you're told to, inflexibility of the 20th Century school"

On the Con, side there is an interesting line taken that "Technology has made us compliant."

• "Facebook or MySpace are programmed for revenue generation, especially the vending of marketing data and the advertising base that can be established because of that data. To do so, those networks rely on technology developed by military (to surveil) and industry (to sell)"
• "technology altered education in every conceivable facet. I have seen it used as delivery system, then as content in the classroom and finally as classroom, building and campus itself, and in every case, pedagogy changed to accommodate the interface. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? Unless we impose that logic on social networks, they will align educational methods with corporate motive"
• "What is the motive programmed in the interface, template or application involving use of social networks, and how can we adjust for that in the classroom, online or in-world? What are the risks—privacy invasion, online harassment, restrictive service terms, etc.—that might trigger controversy or code violations within the academic system?"

This debate, on the whole, drags us, kicking and screaming to face the educational realities of social networking tools and cultures. How do we align the possible (the affordances of connectivity) and the pragmatic (the uptake curve), with the clear, non-educational design and motive?

Critically, as the Cons would have it "How are technologies and pedagogies to be aligned?"

Your 'space' or mine?

I attended the first session of our e-learning dissemination event last Friday (11/01/08) on 'Session 1: what do our students think about the use of Web 2.0 tools in the curriculum?' - presented by Richard Hall- it was a good session and raised a number of lines of thought to be further explored.

One thing that stood out for me when we came onto 'peer online evaluation and support' - that as part of student learning we need to respect the fact that students need to have their 'own' online space where we (tutor) do not need to engage - this could be seen as part of the changing study habit/style of students. Before online supported learning we would reference our materials in various means, talk to a few friends including the tutor if need be and and write up our assignments - today we can do this process online, in a far much wider forum (of course this raises the stakes higher on issues of plagiarism, copyright etc) which we are aware of and have mechanisms in place. I don't think we should feel that we (the tutor) should always be the part of the process when informal learning is taking place just because students choose to 'work' and 'collaborate' online. Students need their 'space' and may choose to use other online spaces 'outside' of DMU so as not to feel that they are being monitored all the time. What we may want to consider is what kind of learning activities using web 2.0 would we (tutor) want to know and should be a part of (aside from the collaboration tools we already have) and this decision can be made by the tutor or with his/her students! There is a danger that if we attempt to 'engage' with 'students' in online spaces where they don't want 'us' it can pull them away and they will move onto another system where 'we' aren't there. On the other hand one could argue that this reflects on our current system - as from the presentation students did express that they wanted more informal feedback from the tutor. Could our current structure and nature of our main platform (Blackboard) be less inviting for students? Other online SNS have a more relaxed look and feel - and link with more of the social aspects in their lives, thus making this more an informal environment. Depending on the student (part-time, distance learner, international and your typical undergraduate) online 'spaces' may be accessed differently and for a number of reasons - some groups (distance learners) may want more online tutor input than others - Lots of interesting branches to follow up - for me the point of my post was to raise awareness that study habits of students online is their 'space' which we should not necessarily feel that we have to be engaged with.

The most influential blog of the year - Edublog Awards 2007

Is It Okay To Be A Technologically Illiterate Teacher?

An excerpt from the blog:

If a teacher today is not technologically literate - and is unwilling to make the effort to learn more - it's equivalent to a teacher 30 years ago who didn't know how to read and write.

Extreme? Maybe. Your thoughts?

DIY Education

Nick spotted this on the Guardian Unlimited site and thought we should see it...

The shape of things to come: Around the world, an elite band of trend-spotters spend their days providing businesses with glimpses of the future. So what do these 'futurologists' predict for 2008? By James Harkin, Tuesday December 18 2007, The Guardian.

I was especially taken by the section on DIY education, and the "burgeoning demand among people to learn new skills, not from professional educators but from their peers." For me this is the true power of the read-write web - its ability to mix things up - to transform social frameworks and structures by giving people space for praxis and informal learning (c.f. Paolo Friere), that is not necessarily controlled by professionals (c.f. Ivan Illich) and where the democratising nature of education can be brought forward (c.f. John Dewey).

I think the point made by Sue T below also connects here, especially in that quote about "a constellation of functions and roles" in education. Such a constellation can be seen more generally across the boundaries of formal and informal learning, where the spaces and technologies that are demarcated for the "purpose" of education are no longer clear and separate.

Future forces affecting jobs in education

A while ago Richard invited me to guest blog here and I apologise that it’s taken me some time to decide what to do. I hope the following is of interest.

In November I was invited to the Institute for the Future in Palo Alto to talk about transliteracy, which they see as a 'disruptive innovation' coming out of DMU. The IFTF is an independent thinktank which reports on future trends (they work very closely with Howard Rheingold, which is how I got to know them) and in 2006 they did some very interesting research for the KnowledgeWorks Foundation on the forces likely to affect education in the future. The IFTF gave me a print copy of the map they produced and I was especially interested in the section on Educators and Learning, particularly the kinds of jobs people like ourselves might be doing in the future.

Interestingly for me in relation to transliteracy, they say that mobile geocoded technologies mean that learning will get increasingly physical, and this digital-physical fusion will enable the community to truly become the classroom, very much echoing my own belief that the separation of learning from life that happened in the late 19^th century can now be remedied via technology.

They anticipate that learning will change massively. Urban communities will be become VUCA focal points (VUCA = Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous) and that in VUCA communities young people will become the mentors for older members in new methods of urban survival such as urban computing, urban agriculture, and new literacies for building cooperative strategies (this last is their work with Rheingold). Public places will become personal spaces, which of course we are already seeing, and educational content will become context-specific, aligning personal learning needs with physical spaces. We can expect new forms of networks supporting the aggregation and remixing of knowledge and they are quite insistent, rightly I think, that brain research will soon be very instrumental in designing learning experiences based on individual needs.

And who will facilitate all of this in the education environment? Where will the e-learning jobs be?

IFTF say that the new approaches derived from these changes will challenge many teachers because they require ‘unlearning’. This process will cause disruption at all levels including trade unions, who will have to decide whether or not to support the diversification of educational roles. They write:

“As education is unbundled into a constellation of functions and roles to meet the needs of the emerging learning economy, the teaching profession will experience a creative breakout. New administrative, classroom and community roles will differentiate educational careers (providing new jobs) such as content experts, learning coaches, network navigators, cognitive specialists, resource managers and community liaisons”.

I’m curious to know how much of this is already recognizable at DMU, and whether the new roles described above are already happening here or in other HE institutions. Everyone reading this is involved in e-learning, a role that didn’t exist 10 years ago, but what kinds of ‘e-learning’ jobs do you expect to see at DMU in 10 years time, or even in 5?

Something to ponder on as you transit through the winter solstice this year.

Season's Greetings!

Food for thought - don't talk with your mouth full!

A conversation at work got me thinking, it was about 'food and children' - how children/young teens are increasingly eating finger foods and packed lunches (sandwiches) and most children don't fully have the opportunity to use cutlery (knife & fork) at all meal times and thus don't know how to use them properly or need to be corrected at a skill which should have been attained at a young age. I know we have to go with the times ...but this got me thinking about how our younger generation is shaping up in other areas which do have an influence in how they interact with others - their communication skills. (Without trying to sound like a minister) as we are getting increasingly digital in most aspects of communication (mobile phones, gaming, personal and social and in education) it concerns me that the essential value of face-to-face interaction is not undermined.

It's great that we have these avenues of communication which allow those who prefer to express themselves in this way can, but I feel in a learning environment in particular that we do not undervalue face-to-face real time interactions which are vital so that core essential communication skills are developed and reinforced.

Do small firms really need a website?

OK so this article is about small-businesses and not HE, however it indicates to some valuable points about having some sort of web presence for any luddites that may be lurking in DMU! ;-) Mohamed
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As far as web-literate consumers are concerned, internet search engines generally offer the best way to track down a local plumber or find out where the local pet shop is based.

Martha Lane Fox and co-founder of Lastminute.com Brent Hoberman pose to promote the website. The boundaries of internet and traditional start-ups have blurred. After all, a reputable company will have its own website, right?

Read More...

Learner experiences

So the Guardian education section appears to have picked up on the JISC's learner experiences report. Under the banner of trendy academics get out of MySpace the report focuses upon the separation of the academic and social life of students.

Part of our project will involve evaluating the student experiences of particular Web2.0 software, in particular to enhance retention and progression, and to attemptto understand how specific technologies, like podcasting, can integrate with the student's technological expectations.

Using wikis to promote colloborative learning - Seminar

I’m reporting back from a seminar presented by Steve Wheeler (University of Plymouth) – ‘Using Wikis to promote collaborative learning’ at Leicester University. This was a two hour seminar and I feel after going is intended for those who are ‘new’ to the coined concept Web 2.0 - I think were stuck with the term as it’s a way of defining how we can and are engaging with the internet as participants as opposed to merely being passive recipients of information (in Web 1.0!). In his introduction we had the brief about ‘new technology’ (ipods and the social collaborative tools available); and an attendee noted that these technologies are not really that new, people have been sharing photos, videos and views on the web, what is ‘new’ is that today these technologies are more accessible to us. The question for us (involved in higher education) and I’m sure will be evident soon in our ‘projects’ – Do these new technologies create new opportunities in education? Is this a passing trend? Or is there genuine potential to improve the quality of the educational experience and learning outcomes? These are not easy questions to answer, to the first I can say ‘yes’ on the grounds that these technologies enable us to ‘reach’ a much wider audience and allow us to deploy a range of tools in doing so to enhance the learning experience - I do think there is genuine potential in that these ‘new tools or social platforms’ (as well as our existing ones!) are only as valuable if used in a practical manner targeted toward specific goals/pedagogy. If they're used without rhyme or reason, their value - educational or otherwise - is null.

I found the following description of ‘web 2.0’ useful in what these new technologies encapsulate “we are the web, we teach the machine, we render the internet as a living organism. Rather than searching for information by a pre-determined algorithm, we give meaning and order to the multitude of websites by arranging and organizing it in a way that better suits us and can better serve us. That is web 2.0. By that rational the website and service mash-ups for example are web 2.0 because we found new and better ways to organize the information and platforms, in a way that makes more (human) sense” (Source ‘Shay’ – a contributor to the debate of web 2.0 “ . http://www.somewhatfrank.com/2007/02/video_explains_.html#comments
)
[Back to wikis in the educational context]. Steve reported on his experience with using wikis with his students (we were informed that we will be given the link to his presentation which I will add once they have put it up!). Steve’s wiki findings:

‘The good’
· Encouraged critical awareness
· Encouraged more accurate referencing and ‘focus’ of study (i.e. instead of making say a premature judgment in a class environment, more time was given to reflect on views and preparing (for some) on their own comments).
· Deliberating complex ideas

The ‘not so good’
· Assessment of individual work in a collaborative wiki
· Some students do not ‘like’ editing contents of friends, and do not warm so much to idea that ‘others’ can change their work
· Motivating students for continued engagement, someone mentioned the term ‘assessment’!

Steve views wikis as ‘ephemeral’ – the possibility of having the wiki archived as a repository for other students ‘may not have the same impact (heat!) for the ‘learner’. My hot/cold analogy - the more involvement (warm) you have rather than simply passive receiver (cold) the more likely it is to be meaningful and therefore retained. On the otherhand if the passive receiver (cold) does something with the information - the more of value it will be to them. To get the benefits of an aerobic excercise video - you have to particpate , simply watching from your couch won't reap the same rewards.

What is the difference between the wiki and the discussion board?

A Discussion board: read by everybody (within context), written by everybody, only own contributions can be edited.
A Wiki: read by everybody (within context), written by everybody, edited by everybody.

The seminar was going to cover Second Life - 3D wiki! but we ran out of time!

http://web2booklet.blogspot.com/

This blog explores the use of Web2.0 in various educational contexts.

Facebook versus Ning

We have a discussion running on our Facebook group about Facebook versus Ning. In essence this boils down to "the use of the social networking tools for short bursts of learning, where participants are expecting [and expected] to contribute and debate" [Steve Mackenzie] This is an interesting way of getting our staff to think about synchronous and asynchronous conferencing. We would like them to think about task-driven, time-limited activities, where it is the task that shapes the use of a tool, rather than the tool becoming omnipresent.

Ning enables you to manage videos, break-out groups, photos, discussions for specific communities, as well as for oneself. Facebook has a cleaner interface and is more fun. I wonder whether we will see a growth in Ning for "task-driven, time-limited academic activities"?

Web 2.0 and me: a sordid tale of attraction and fear.

Now I don’t want to appear like one of those retired colonels sitting in his leather wingback chair snorting with derision into his Daily Telegraph but I am beginning to feel that the brave new world of my students and my own children is just plain incomprehensible. Just like your Grandad wearing jeans and white trainers, I feel that I ought to keep up and know what’s going on but I know I will probably look rather ridiculous in the process. I am never going to be “down with the kids” but I ought to try…hadn’t I?

So, I have been reading quite a lot recently about Web 2.0 and social networking. I am interested in the way that a new generation of users is taking the technology and bending it to their own needs rather than using a pre-packaged product that Bill Gates provides for us. It strikes a chord with me; it is a new high-tech version of do-it-yourself – a reminder of the freedom and anarchy of punk. Yet it also raises interesting pedagogic questions for us as teachers and educationalists: what can our students already do as they sit before us on day one of a new academic year? What are they used to regarding access to technology? What do they expect us to provide and use? Importantly these questions raise challenges for us: How are we to respond to these expectations? Indeed should we respond at all?

Michael Wesch, Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University is a cultural anthropologist and media ecologist who, according to his website (http://www.ksu.edu/sasw/anthro/wesch.htm), has been “exploring the impacts of new media on human interaction”. He has posted an interesting and thought-provoking video on YouTube called The Machine is Us/ing Us
( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLlGopyXT_g) which illustrates the power of Web 2.0 technologies and the way that it is different from the previous incarnations of the WWW. What is equally interesting is the response that there has been to this posting. It is, according to his webpage, “the most popular video in the blogosphere”. It is true that the postings on Youtube are many and various but there are also an increasing number of video responses – fellow enthusiasts or detractors using the technology as a vehicle for talking creatively about the technology; all very post-modern I am sure.

The British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (BECTA) has produced a range of publications on the way in which technology impinges on education in general and schools in particular. Their 2006 report Emerging Technologies for Learning (http://publications.becta.org.uk/display.cfm?resID=25940&page=1835) uses a series of case studies to illustrate the ways in which Web 2.0 technologies are starting to impinge on the learning environment. In one case study Geoff Stead describes a near future in which advances in the hardware allow students to have wider access to mobile technology and where, as a consequence, there will be a greater pressure on those in education to use this facility in the delivery of provision. In another Leon Cych discusses the growth of social networking, a development which Web 2.0 technologies easily facilitate. This second idea is taken up and discussed at greater length in a 2006 JISC funded report by Paul Anderson, What is Web 2.0? Ideas, technologies and implications for education (http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/techwatch/tsw0701.pdf)

Now I can see that such advances will allow those students who are traditionally hard to reach or for whom physically attending college or university is not always possible or appropriate more easily access to educational provision and their fellow students and that has to be a good thing. But I also worry about two things: for the student there appears to be an opportunity to replace the face-to-face experience with a remote, isolating experience and I am not sure that is always the best way to learn; and for the tutor there appears to be an unspoken pressure to use the new technologies just because they are there rather than because they are appropriate.
For me this new technology should be regarded in the same way that the biro was or even laptops and data projectors – they should be used when they prove to be better than what went before. I fear that we may be caught in the same trap that resulted in the classic disease, Death by PowerPoint: a pressure to use something just because everyone else does. Not to use it seems to imply incompetence whereas poor or inappropriate use publicly shows the very thing we are trying to avoid! So I heartily recommend the three sources mentioned briefly here, they provide a stimulus for an interesting debate. For me though it is the debate that is of primary importance, for out of that will hopefully come a conscious decision to use the technology or not because it is appropriate for the subject matter and the students involved; in other words it will be a decision based on pedagogy – now that does sound old-fashioned, even reactionary!



Nick Allsopp