Hi i am minhaaj ur rehman from Pakistan. I have done MBA in Human REsource Management and Bachelors in English Literature. I teach business subjects and ESL. I got to know about this through Barbara Dieu a friend from FOC online. I am looking forward to productive discussion
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Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Getting to know each other
Posted: August 28th, 2008, 9:22pm GMT by minhaaj ur rehman
Janet Hawtin : Weblog
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In the real world
Posted: August 25th, 2008, 10:38am GMT
The world is sometimes a fearful place. I am sometimes struck dumb because my mind is out of gamut for the questions it poses. With a world mapped in black and white it is hard to express amber and not have someone think I am meaning some kind of sad grey. This is why I have been thinking about ternary systems. The idea that I could actually define a place which did not map to 1normal or 0epicfail.
Some kind of constructive starting point for an alternative learning journey.
Donna Williams has written some interesting work on system forfeiture: All individuals with autism find (consciously or subconsciously) their own adaptations to their pervasive developmental disorder. That is, they will find their own way of managing the relationship or non-relationship between their various systems and how they operate in interaction with "the world." This means that, for example, someone whose systems are not sufficiently integrated may ignore all emotional signals but can accumulate and process factual information in an unemotive, purely logical way. It may mean that auditory processing is "switched off" while visual or tactile processing is "switched on." It may mean that auditory comprehension is "switched on" but the processing of all "body messages" (such as need to use the toilet, hunger,cold, etc.) are put "on hold." It may mean that someone with difficulty holding awareness of two things at the same time, such as internal and external may switch awareness to one or the other but be unable to make sense of or interact at a functional level when required by the environment to use both internal and external awareness at the same time. These combinations of "systems forfeiting" are almost infinitely variable but help minimize "overload" (and its behavioral consequences). These combinations of systems forfeiting are also almost unimaginable to people without autism, in whom systems of functioning have a reasonable degree of working integration. This inability, on the part of experts (who don't have autism) to imagine (and thereby plan out how to work with successfully) this manageable (autistic) state of disarray can lead to (among other things) two unfortunate circumstances for FC: (a) use of inappropriate testing techniques that are based on misinformed premises and faulty assumptions and (b) misinformed assumptions (and proclamations) of how things work or don't work that undermine credibility. I am sometimes caught in loops.
Sometimes this is like sliding into a daydream and waking up to realise I am staring. This can happen with men, old people, women, horses, trees, whatever. Awestruck at life.
Sometimes it is a matter of looking someone in the face but visualising them at ages 5 through 80, with resolution which is too intense or impolite.
Sometimes my self is backgrounded and my eyes follow my fears. I care about the impact of my actions on others.
I am sensitive to how it feels for others when I get it wrong. This unfortunately makes a feedback loop where the fear has its own gravity and I will stare at someone's irregular teeth, at a mark, a wart or anything else which I am afraid of getting tripped by. I can be fearful of beauty because I can be tripped on it.Mostly I it is the fear of others that I am afraid of.
When this happens my self will be found running around inside my head frantically looking for the reset button.I realise that these things are not usual.
I sometimes look down or away from people if I am feeling whelmed.
It is a way of being careful of other people when I am feeling unsure of myself.
I need better strategies than that, and I am working on them, but for today that is roughly where I am at.
I do apologise to anyone for whom I have been difficult. I have not had the understanding to be able to map what was going on until recently and it has taken me a while to start thinking about it in ways which might be useful for other people and for myself in terms of finding ways to be more integrated.
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Discussion on EdTechTalk - #2
Posted: August 22nd, 2008, 7:50pm GMT by gsiemens
This last Sunday, EdTechTalk was kind enough to host the second conversation on how we’re developing the connectivism course. Our first session was more theoretical/conceptual in nature. The second session focused on more practical elements - tools, approaches, assignments, and so on. Thanks to EdTechTalk for hosting the discussion…and for Alec and Leigh for joining in.
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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Daily Bookmarks 08/20/2008
Posted: August 20th, 2008, 10:30pm GMT
August 20, 2008 ClassTools.net: Games for Education Free games, tools, and graphic organizers, including a Venn Diagram, priority chart, timeline, and timer. You can create your own casual games with questions, like a word game based on “Space Invaders.” tags: education, tools, flash, games Dipity Create a timeline by adding each event manually or by adding a source (Flickr, RSS, twitter, etc.) Images, music, and video can be included in events. Related services include Tickr, which lets yo
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Registering for the course - for credit
Posted: August 20th, 2008, 8:21pm GMT by gsiemens
As previously mentioned, this course is available for free (all content and conversations will be open and online) and this course is also available for credit. Those participants who are seeking credit for the course (which is now for credit in U of Manitoba’s Certificate in Adult and Continuing Education…but will also count as a course in our Certificate in Emerging Technologies for Learning - more info on that soon) are required to enroll and pay the usual course fee.
What’s different between taking the course for free vs. enrolling?
Participants who enroll in the course will be expected to complete a series of assignments, will receive personal feedback on those assignments, and will then be recognized as having completed the course through University of Manitoba.
If you would like to enroll, you can find more information here. Or you can go straight to the registration/payment page.
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Connectivism and Second Life
Posted: August 20th, 2008, 6:49pm GMT by gsiemens
Openness = innovation. It’s really a simple equation, but one that is the heart of what Stephen and I are attempting to promote in this course. Due to the openness of both course content and interaction, we’re hoping for many opportunities for multi-perspective interactions. We’re seeing this already with course translations and meetups.
Another valuable community is developing in SecondLife. Chilbo, under the activities of Chris Collins - or Fleep in SL - has organized a Second Life Cohort. It’s a great opportunity to extend the conversation. From the site: “Participants will meet weekly for synchronous discussion in Second Life and will have the opportunity to create a home or office in the Chilbo community for the duration of the course. Due to space limitations, this cohort will be limited to approximately 50 participants.”
Thanks Fleep!
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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Daily Bookmarks 08/17/2008
Posted: August 13th, 2008, 10:30pm GMT
August 13, 2008 Working from home « Design for Learning Natalie Kilkenny writes about how much more productive she is as a telecommuter than working in a cube farm and answers the question “How do they know that you’re working when they can’t see you?” tags: telecommuting, career, productivity x28’s new Blog » Blog Archive » My take on Connectivism An answer to the question “What is Connectivism?” Rather than going for a fixed definition within the framework of a learning theory, the author
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Assignments
Posted: August 12th, 2008, 6:11pm GMT by gsiemens
I’ve been thinking about assignments for this course.
We have two groups: those who are interested in enrolling and paying for credit (~30 - we’re technically full, but if you’re still interested, we could likely add one or two more) and those who are interested in taking the course for free.
Assignments for enrolled learners will include:
- Weekly reflections via blogs and/or podcasts.
- Several short opinion papers (~2 pages/500 words, can be produced as a blog post)
- Weekly personal concept maps of how ideas/concept relate (using CMAP - free download)
- Group work concept map summarizing distributed conversation (groups of 2 and 3 will each be assigned one week where they are responsible for maintaining/developing the concept map).
- Final presentation - using any tool. I’d recommend Articulate if you’re using PowerPoint(free trial download). This presentation will address the following: What is the quality of my learning networks: diversity, depth, how connected am I? How has this course influence your view of the process of learning (assuming, of course, that it has)? What types of questions are still outstanding? This presentation will be approx 15-20 minutes in length.
For other participants
Participants who are taking the course for personal interest, not enrolled, obviously don’t have formal assignment requirements. However, I’d encourage participants to provide comments through blogs tagged with the course tag (CCK08), contribute to the Moodle forum, create and share concept maps, and so on. I’m hoping that the availability of an open course will result in a higher level of dialogue for all learners - both enrolled and otherwise.
Is it a fair request to ask all participants to reflect/contribute to the conversation? Or how would you provide an assignment/assessment structure?
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Getting to know each other
Posted: August 8th, 2008, 1:51pm GMT by bdieu
Welcome Gutemberg and José Antonio.
I know Jose Antonio is a big fan of Connectivism and has been closely following all George Siemens' posts and articles. What about you, Gutemberg? What has made you join the Connectivism course?
I'd love to read how you will go about it and why in this thread.
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Narratives of coherence
Posted: August 6th, 2008, 4:00pm GMT by gsiemens
Grand narratives - such as provide us with a large umbrella that we can use to make sense of the world - have been besieged over the last several decades. Grand narratives in the form of newspapers, newscasts, and books are now augmented by blogs and YouTube videos. As discussed in a previous post, one of our key challenges in this course is to find a way to bring together the numerous ideas and viewpoints in a way that makes sense for participants.
Self-selection is one model (i.e. follow certain threads in Moodle and blogs). Centralization is another - bring the conversation to one central spot - as we’re doing with Moodle. Aggregation - in this case, with PageFlakes - is a third. Each of these approaches is an attempt to provide or create some type of a narrative - namely, a narrative of coherence. But coherence in this context is created by each learner. In a traditional course, the educator hacks the trails to complex information landscapes. The educator’s bias influences what is included and excluded. What we’re talking about here is the ability for each learner to create their own narrative of coherence.
While it is obvious that information shaping approaches such as we find in newspapers and books are fading in prominence, we still need some type of framework to make sense of it all. For example, while I don’t read newspapers (except when traveling and they magically appear on my doorstep each morning), even people who are avid newspaper readers find other ways to augment their interpretation. The comments on the online newspaper site, for example. Or blogs. Or a Google Alert. Or a Technorati search.
In a recent bizzare murder in Manitoba, I found information through traditional news channels online. But of greater interest were the extensive comments, Facebook group, etc. All of us are actively engaged in trying to bring together multiple voices in some type of coherent structure. Sometimes the coherence we seek is around a particular event. Other times it is more broad, such as when we are trying to make sense of what’s happening in society. Or politics.
We repeatedly hear how intelligence failures result in catastrophe. The information that was needed to find out what was happening - with terrorist attacts, for example - is later found to have been present. People viewing the information were simply not able to put the pieces together into some kind of a coherent whole. In a sense, the information wasn’t being connected in a meaningful manner.
I’m personally quite interested to see how the concept of a narrative of coherence will unfold in this course. We all face information abundance. We all face the reality that we will always be missing some key pieces of information. In our previous online conferences, we had large numbers enrolled, but I would say less that 5% were active contributors. A common concern voiced by many of the active participants: how do we assimilate/makesense of this information?!? There’s just too much of it.
Part of the solution is to rely on one’s learning network to filter out nonsense and to draw attention to key ideas. This is particularly effective when we can “plug in” to a network with high levels of diversity and with people we quickly begin to trust. Technological patterning is another - and in the long run, very promising - approach. ManyEyes, tag clouds, social interaction, word frequency and occurence analysis, and other ways of surfacing connections and interaction trails offer great opportunity. But these approaches are not yet commonly available. Or intuitive. For example, ManyEyes is great for visualizing word occurence. But, it’s not intuitive. I have to cut and paste text into the site. I’d like more of my sensemaking tools to function automatically. That is, I don’t want to explicitly add text to a site. I want the site to continually evaluate what’s happening and to provide information to the user. A learning management system often provides very useful analytics to faculty. Why not turn that around and make interaction information available to learners?
If you have ideas on how to increase the ability for individuals to form personal, coherent narratives, let us know…
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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Repost: Future of the Net & Anthropology of YouTube
Posted: August 4th, 2008, 4:30am GMT
If you haven’t yet seen these videos or haven’t made the time, do it. Kevin Kelly: Predicting the next 5,000 days of the web Another excellent TED Talk, I continue to be a huge fan. An anthropological introduction to YouTube From Mike Wesch, author of another internet-famous video, The Machine is Us/ing Us. I mentioned this presentation a month or so ago and the video was finally posted last week. It was presented to the Library of Congress back at the end of June. -
fleep: New blog post: Educators: CCK08 - Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Course http://tinyurl.com/5s6g8r
Posted: August 3rd, 2008, 2:17pm GMT
fleep: New blog post: Educators: CCK08 - Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Course http://tinyurl.com/5s6g8r -
Educators: CCK08 - Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Course
Posted: August 3rd, 2008, 8:45am GMT
In about a month, the Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Course will begin. From the course wiki: Connectivism and Connective Knowledge is a twelve week course that will explore the concepts of connectivism and connective knowledge and explore their application as a framework for theories of teaching and learning. It will outline a connectivist understanding of educational systems of the future. George Siemens and Stephen Downes – the two leading figures on connectivism and connective k
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Getting to know each other
Posted: August 3rd, 2008, 8:21am GMT by joseaokc
Hello Everyone,
My name is José Antônio da Silva. I am an EFL teacher in Brazil. I am happy to see so many familiar names in this forum. I am currently living in Brasilia. I work for a binational school here in Brasilia. I have been teaching for almost 20 years and technology nowadays represents a great part of my teaching and learning. I have been connected to Connectivism for the last two and a half years.
I am just starting a new semester and lookig forward to having my students use technology for learning.
All the best
Jose Antonio
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Getting to know each other
Posted: August 1st, 2008, 11:12pm GMT by Renard
Hello guys,
My name's Gutemberg Raposo and I'm a college student at UFT in Porto Nacional and English teacher at CNA here in PAlmas-TO. Oh boy! I'm really glad to be writting these lines right now.
Well, I'm in the beginning of my carrer as an English teacher comparing to you even because I'm so young, but I love technology and I also love teaching just like learning and I have to say I have so much courage to be here right now writing to you, because we have so many Teachers here, but I never saw any of them talking about this online world. I mean they know how to use a computer and stuff, but projects, conferences, lectures, online? Forget it! I just know one thing. As I have never had opportunity I'm giving the opportunity to me and that's the way things work to me.
So, last semester I started working with blogs. Now I have some of them. As I'm into a researching project I decided to put it on online ( www.krahoproject.blogspot.com) and last semester we introduced some people to the internet and developed some online skills with the monitorship in the subject of pragmatics, so as a monitor I taught the students how subscribe since e-mail accounts til blogs and we finished with google reader, because I tought of doing something collaborative, then they had to create theid blogs and comment the topics posted by each mate on their blogs. P.S. Topics which were discussed in class by the professor. Well, it's here (www.monitoria2008.blogspot.com) . As last semester I worked with writing and reading on blogs, I plan to use skype for online conversations in class. What do you think about that?Regards,
Gutemberg
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Tools
Posted: August 1st, 2008, 1:47pm GMT by sdownes
Thinking aloud about what tools we want to use, drawing from George’s post on the weekly activities.
> Each week will have a clearly defined topic. The topic will be introduced by a short article or introduction (in this case, a two page description or opinion piece)
OK, I would like to actually distribute these, and not just passively hope that people will visit the website. Thus I would like people to have to option sign up for a mailing list or to sign up for an RSS feed.
The more I think about this, the more I am inclined to want to use my own gRSShopper tool for this. It allows both types of subscriptions. And we will be able to include other content with the mailouts. And I have experience using it with thousands of subscribers. See [grsshopper.downes.ca] for more information.
Also: note that george says that each week begins with the clearly defined topic. I actually think we should have a mailout each weekday. More on this below.
> or podcast, or whatever. Some weeks both Stephen and I will post an introductory piece, other weeks only one of us will.
I had originally thought I would want to longer talks, but on second thought, posting a one-hour video is probably not very effective. We want people to be able to actually view these, and people mostly won’t view a one-hour video.
That said, my intention is to provide content for each week - certainly an introductory piece at the beginning of each week, and likely some follow-ups. I will offer (more or less) the same content through various media, including:
- Slideshare (with slide downloads)
- YouTube or Google Video (with video download)
- Odeo (with audio RSS download, and enclosures in the RSS feed)
- Text, as articles posted somewhere (either here or in gRSShopper)> Links to external resources for additional reading/viewing will be provided weekly as well.
Again, gRSShopper provides this; the format could be similar to OLDaily’s (we can adapt the template for this course if we desire).
These links will appear as posts in the daily mailout, as well as the RSS feed, and will be provided by both George and I.
> Short podcasts and opinion pieces will be presented - i.e. “Stephen’s views” “George’s views”. Stephen and I share many overlapping views of knowledge and learning. But a few core disagreements exist. We’ll try and provide a diversity of thought - complimentary and at times in conflict - for you to consider.
See above.
> Discussions will be held in asynchronous forums like blogs, moodle, and wikis. Use of the course code - CCK08 for tagging posts or sharing del.icio.us resources will be helpful.
This is a key point. I don’t think it will be helpful to try to provide some sort of common discussion forum or content management system. It would mean that everybody had to learn the system and that they would be constrained by the limits of the system.
We want people to be able to discuss things wherever they feel comfortable. That’s why George talks about blogs, Moodles and wikis, and recommends a course code.
We want to encourage people - either as individuals or groups - to establish whatever web presence they want for the course. We can throw up an open wiki or Moodle for people who want that, perhaps. But those will not be the course and we will not favour any locally hosted system.
Basically, what we will be asking is for: people who would like to participate in the course discussion to send us their RSS feed. We will aggregate the RSS feeds and post links and summaries to the daily mailout. Most of this can be done automatically by gRSShopper, organizing discussion around links or topics.
> Assignments and activities for participants who have enrolled “for-credit” will be required for completion/reflection on a weekly basis as well. Full assignment details will be provided to all enrolled learners.
Basically, what we’re looking at here, I think, is for enrolled students to complete assignments by creating summaries and perspectives on the course discussion. Again, there is no need to create a centralized platform for this; students can use blogs or whatever.
> Weekly live lectures and presentations will be held as well. These lectures will likely be delivered in Elluminate.
This will be a challenge as the course enrollment exceeds the Elluminate license by a factor of ten. We may want to reconsider how we conduct live events.
I would like to explore using a set-up similar to that used by Ed Tech talk (or maybe even their actual tools - we could discuss this). They have a lot of experience with the live show and we should draw from that.
> They will be recorded for participants who are in different time zones and prefer not to get up in the middle of the night to listen to two Canadians presenting :).
Also, the Ed Tech Talk recordings don’t require proprietary players… :p
> We will likely have a series of guest presenters through out the course…more information soon.
What is key to me, I think, is that our interactions during the course be more like conversations than presentations. More like talk radio than National Geographic. The reason for this is that it’s more interesting and allows us to integrate diverse voices more easily.
> Mind maps of key discussion topics will be co-created with participants at the conclusion of each week.
Not a bad idea, though I am not a mind-map person. George can siggest a technology here…?
That said, I’d like to see other artifacts created by participants. What would really interest me, for example, are photo-slides created by participants and stored as a Flickr group. Like this (there’s a better example out there but I can’t find it).
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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MOOC: Massive Open Online Course
Posted: July 30th, 2008, 10:21pm GMT
There has been a lot of buzz about the free and open Connectivism and Connective Knowledge course to be facilitated by George Siemens and Stephen Downes in September. To date, over 1,200 people have signed up for the course prompting a new label, Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), to describe this super-sized open education course. Over the weekend, George and Stephen joined the folks at EdTechTalk.com to discuss the design and facilitation of such a mega-course. Linked here is the recording o
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Recognition of skills and experience
Posted: July 30th, 2008, 3:18pm GMT by bdieu
This thread was started by Violeta Cautin, who mentioned GRE and her learning projects in the getting to know each other forum.
I have been thinking of doing some kind of formal course again but I would not be officially accepted at the university here in Brazil because I would need to sit the entrance exam again, which I find ridiculous. I sat it in 1970 for Social and Political Sciences (at that time my interest was Anthropology - still is) but as I did not finish the course, I am required to do it again.
Now what is paradoxical is that I was allowed to do the 2 last years of graduate studies in English Language and Literature (as I could speak/understand/write the language better than some of my professors, I was exempted of the first two years which are, in Brazil, basically learning the language). Although I graduated with honours (ten out of ten in linguistics) and I am allowed to teach at secondary school, I cannot postulate for a masters or a PhD (well, I could eventually, as a listener, but would not receive accreditation or have my papers commented). Instead of sitting some kind of GRE, I would need to sit the entrance exam and do the 4 college years, a rule I refuse to comply with - even though it has already caused me unpleasant situations.
This kind of system, the bureaucracy which blocks participation (nobody is responsible for it - nobody can do anything about it, nobody can solve this), and the multiple barriers to learning and access to knowledge are the main reasons I am observing with much interest the wave of change brought by ICTs towards openness, deobstructing the pipes and making the energy, exchanges and communication flow. The connectivism course will be an interesting experiment and experience in architectures of participation and how people organize themselves to make this happen.
Dekita Kitchen - All Discussions
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Recognition of skills and experience
Posted: July 30th, 2008, 3:18pm GMT by bdieu
This thread was started by Violeta Cautin, who mentioned GRE and her learning projects in the getting to know each other forum.
I have been thinking of doing some kind of formal course again but I would not be officially accepted at the university here in Brazil because I would need to sit the entrance exam again, which I find ridiculous. I sat it in 1970 for Social and Political Sciences (at that time my interest was Anthropology - still is) but as I did not finish the course, I am required to do it again.
Now what is paradoxical is that I was allowed to do the 2 last years of graduate studies in English Language and Literature (as I could speak/understand/write the language better than some of my professors, I was exempted of the first two years which are, in Brazil, basically learning the language). Although I graduated with honours (ten out of ten in linguistics) and I am allowed to teach at secondary school, I cannot postulate for a masters or a PhD (well, I could eventually, as a listener, but would not receive accreditation or have my papers commented). Instead of sitting some kind of GRE, I would need to sit the entrance exam and do the 4 college years, a rule I refuse to comply with - even though it has already caused me unpleasant situations.
This kind of system, the bureaucracy which blocks participation (nobody is responsible for it - nobody can do anything about it, nobody can solve this), and the multiple barriers to learning and access to knowledge are the main reasons I am observing with much interest the wave of change brought by ICTs towards openness, deobstructing the pipes and making the energy, exchanges and communication flow. The connectivism course will be an interesting experiment and experience in architectures of participation and how people organize themselves to make this happen.
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Linking to specific posts
Posted: July 30th, 2008, 3:06pm GMT by bdieu
Is it possible to link to single posts or extract the feeds of single members in the forum?
Dekita Kitchen - All Discussions
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Linking to specific posts
Posted: July 30th, 2008, 3:06pm GMT by bdieu
Is it possible to link to single posts or extract the feeds of single members in the forum?
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Getting to know each other
Posted: July 30th, 2008, 2:48pm GMT by bdieu
Hello Violeta,
Nice to have you here!
I have no formal course in tech or computing either and have learnt all I know today basically by surfing the web, experimenting and tinkering both on my own and with friends and tutors, to whom I am immensely grateful for their dedication, availability and most of all - patience.
I'm almost 55 - a Leo... birthday next Sunday :-) and although I have been involved in ELT for some 35 years now (I know, I do sound like a dinossaur) I had not heard of GRE, which would be an interesting solution for me - but like for you, Math would be a challenge. Recognition of prior learning and accreditation of relevant life experience and skills is a must- but should not become an industry. I am going to move this thread to a specific forum so we can continue there.
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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Facilitating Online Courses 08 - Personal Goals
Posted: July 30th, 2008, 2:02pm GMT
My personal goals for this course are: To make time for the course. To understand how to generate a fluid learning experience. Practice working in groups online. To better understand how you can work to a goal as you define the goal. To purposefully connect with others and making sure I make time and space to make those connections visible through linking to my blog and posting things on Twitter. To understand how to better communicate the processes and benefits of working in online communitie
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Getting to know each other
Posted: July 29th, 2008, 2:20am GMT by vcautin
Hi All
Violeta Cautin from Chile here. I'm and EFL teacher since 2001.
I'm 29 years old. I'm a single mother and a socialist.
My projects this year are all related to applying for scholarships to enter grad school so I'm really busy trying to learn math for the GRE :( I do not have any formal course in technology or computing but I been learning from all of you. I wish I had more time to accomplish more tasks during the day, but I decided that this year I was going to concentrate on my couses and preparing for the tests.
This course seems promising :) I'm looking forward to it!
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Getting to know each other
Posted: July 28th, 2008, 6:44pm GMT by bdieu
Welcome, Doris and Janet. Interesting to learn about the projects you are into and thanks for the links. Make yourselves comfortable by exploring this environment, throwing your two cents in the other discussions or opening new ones :-)
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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MOOC or Mega-Connectivism Course
Posted: July 28th, 2008, 5:19pm GMT by gsiemens
Two separate individuals - Dave Cormier and Bryan Alexander - have named our upcoming course as a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course). As far as names go, it works for me. We currently have 1200 signed up. As a side note - I post numbers of enrollment to obviously provide a sense of how many have expressed interest, but also to document progress for subsequent publications. This blog will serve as field notes.
Last night, in my time zone at least, a group of us got together and discussed the challenges and dynamics of running an large open course (the recording is now available). Our conversation was largely focused on the theoretical aspect of the course: the motivation for offering it, logistics of interaction, challenges expected, what we hope the course will achieve, etc. Even though our meeting ran 70+minutes, we only scratched the surface of what needed to be addressed. We decided to have another online discussion sometime in mid-August.
A few thoughts stayed with me:
- Many people have at least a partial interest in observing how this course turns out. I associate innovation and creativity with edubloggers. Ideas we were talking about 5+ years ago are only now being explored by the academy. Alec Couros’ course in spring was a great proof of concept. As was David Wiley’s course last fall. And the LTC online conferences in winter and summer of ‘07. As a group, we all share in the success (and failure) of MOOCs.
- We have to walk a line between innovating teaching and learning while still keeping things at a level that permits the ideas we’re presenting to translate into the realities of educators and administrators
- We’ve largely hit the growth curve or impact of edubloggers on changing the system from the outside. Bridges with educators in the more traditional sense are critical if we want to continue to influence the shape of education.
- While Stephen and I are facilitating this course, I think it’s critical that the larger community identifies with it and takes ownership of it. Our course isn’t happening in a vacuum - we’re building on our own previous work and the work of others. And once our course is done here, others will hopefully learn from our experience and build on it. Spiralling innovation. But I’m hoping we won’t only see people building on our work. I hope we’ll see others building with us.
- We’re already seeing the early effects of multiple contributors shaping and enlarging the course beyond what we could personally conceive. Numerous translations, meetups planned, SecondLife component in the works, Facebook groups, etc.
- Research opportunities are enormous. MOOCs are uncharted, largely undocumented, territory. This course will produce a significant amount of data - both quantitative and qualitative. Short version: this’ll be a lot of fun. I’m not sure if the model we are working with is the future of education. If not, at least we’ve found one more model that it isn’t. I’ll confidently state that some view of learning as networked - whether conceived as connectivism or an alternative theory - is the future of education. It’s getting those details right that’s the problem…
As a group, we’re having important conversations about the course, moving to some sense of shared awareness of what we are trying to achieve and the different roles indivduals will want to take. This is critical. We don’t have a shared sense of how to learn more formally in this environment. Leigh asked a good question during our talk: how is this different from the internet as a whole? What will this course offer that the edublog space doesn’t? I answered by stating it will serve as a stake-in-the-ground or proof of concept, sustained focus for deeper exploration (we do have a rather fickle blogspace), and the ability to bridge our informal ideas into the formal aspects of education. We’ll see…
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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Commentaries to the course
Posted: July 27th, 2008, 8:13am GMT
Four students provided a translation in english of their commentaries to the course, so far. They have been published in this wiki page.
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Going through the motions of planning…
Posted: July 25th, 2008, 1:57pm GMT by gsiemens
Stephen Downes and I had a chance to sit down and chat about this course while we were both in Memphis earlier this week (isn’t that where all Canadians go to chat? Really, what could be more enjoyable than Elvis, BBQ, blues, and smokin’ hot weather?). Needless to say, we’re both impressed with the interest in this course to date and excited about the opportunity to apply some of the key concepts of connectivism in a very practical manner. In a very real sense, this course is what this course is about.
We expect this course will introduce, explain, and enlarge on our views on connectivism. Of partial necessity, we will provide critical evaluation of existing theories of learning and build a case for why a different model of learning is required. I certainly don’t expect we’ll come to a consensus of the validity of connectivism, or even the failings of constructivism or other theories of learning. Such aspirations are too noble! I do hope, however, that the course will give participants an opportunity to think deeply about how our interactions with information are changing, the role of technology in society, and the role of education as an agent of service to society.
If you’re following along on our wiki, you’ll notice information on dates and draft weekly schedule: [ltc.umanitoba.ca]. Weekly activities will consist of: readings, 2-page summary overview of weekly topics, podcast/recording on the topic, discussions held in Moodle (or on your own blogs), and live class sessions. Stephen and I talked about doing a debate/discussion format where we each build our case, challenge each other (in the most civil way possible, of course), and extend our perspectives. The other option is to prepare individual lectures as recordings. Not sure about best approaches. Travel schedules will likely play a key role in determining approach.
We’re a bit unsure about how we’ll handle the live sessions. The current group size may make live sessions a bit chaotic if we’re taking questions/comments from attendees. Should we take questions in the discussion forum in Moodle and answer them in the live session? Seems a bit presumptive. I think it would give the feel of “radio talk show host” reading off email questions.
As you can tell, we’re still working our way through the best approach. Our goal in documenting decisions we’re making and questions we’re asking as we move through the process is to provide a record for what will eventually become a series of publications. We similarly expect weekly lectures will provide publication opportunities (i.e. in a journal or as a book) as well.
Dave Cormier and the fine folks at EdTechTalk Weekly have agreed to host a discussion for planning details on July 27, 2008, 8 PM Eastern time. Feel free to join in here. The planning page is also available.
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Getting to know each other
Posted: July 25th, 2008, 1:14am GMT by lucychili
Hi Doris
Yes we need more amazing Bees in the world =)
Bolivar is an interesting person to learn about.
It is interesting to find out about people who have made much change
because our world feels like it needs a lot of change at the moment.
Is there much information in English about his teacher Don Simon Rodriguez?Cheers
Janet
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Getting to know each other
Posted: July 25th, 2008, 1:02am GMT by lucychili
Hullo team
My name is Janet Hawtin. I often use the name lucychili online.
I am a designer working on web and print materials for education in Australia.
I am interested in the ways that society is changing regarding collaboration and sharing ideas.
I have a blog at http://eduspaces.net/janeth/weblog/There have been some interesting perspectives about changes in education including from
Gardner Campbell captures some key points which are causing contention.
http://www.gardnercampbell.net/blog1/?p=618Michael Wesch's world Sim is inspiring
http://mediatedcultures.net/worldsim.htm -
Getting to know each other
Posted: July 24th, 2008, 11:34pm GMT by doris3m
Hi, there! My name's Doris molero and I am an EFL professor at Universidad Rafael Belloso Chacin in Venezuela. I teach at undergraduate level to students from different schools. I hold a master degree on educational informatics and I'm in my third semester at doctorate level. My research interest is on multiliteracies and web 2.0 tools as change agents in the EFL Class at the university. I have been on Line since 2003. At that time I have the luck to find the webheads and join them in their adventures all around the virtual world. Now, I am a blogger and my students are blogging, too. Our class blog is Doris3m EFL Center, there you can see some of my work and as well as my students' work, too. I also have a blog in Spanish for my doctorate classes.. Blogeando en Ciencias de La Educacion. Last year I met Nelly Deutch, a great friend who invited us to her Ning social network... International Collaboration where we have participated and have created a group ... URBE is here.... Last but not least, we are also participatig in the Writingmatrix project with Vance Stevens, Nelba Quintana, Rita and Sasha. This project is about blogging, tagging and aggregating.
Well, I hope I can learn and share a lot to keep on shining!
A hug from Maracaibo to you all and to my good friend Bee! We need more bees in the world...
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Finding people
Posted: July 24th, 2008, 1:49pm GMT by bdieu
How do I know who is participating in this forum? Is there a page (besides the polite conversation introductions) with a list and links to their profiles? Could we have a tab on the main page for this?
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Introducing yourself and tagging your posts
Posted: July 24th, 2008, 1:39pm GMT by bdieu
Please fill in the personal information on your account page. You may also add a photo /icon and values (urls/IDs of your blogs/messenger/twitter/flickr and other social media accounts - see example ) so that when other participants click on your profile they can also see where else they can reach you. Introductions go in the polite conversation forum and give us an idea of your teaching/learning context and interests. Forward your technical questions and suggestions to improve this forum to the service desk.
All our discussions have an atom feed so you can bookmark them in the feed reader of your choice. Our child tag for the Course will be cck08_elt, so use both CCK08 (main course) and cck08_elt (side dishes) in your blog posts, delicious, etc. The Dekita Orchard will aggregate participants' blogs and Connectivism course feeds.
Dekita Kitchen - All Discussions
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Introducing yourself and tagging your posts
Posted: July 24th, 2008, 1:39pm GMT by bdieu
Please fill in the personal information on your account page. You may also add a photo /icon and values (urls/IDs of your blogs/messenger/twitter/flickr and other social media accounts - see example ) so that when other participants click on your profile they can also see where else they can reach you. Introductions go in the polite conversation forum and give us an idea of your teaching/learning context and interests. Forward your technical questions and suggestions to improve this forum to the service desk.
All our discussions have an atom feed so you can bookmark them in the feed reader of your choice. Our child tag for the Course will be cck08_elt, so use both CCK08 (main course) and cck08_elt (side dishes) in your blog posts, delicious, etc. The Dekita Orchard will aggregate participants' blogs and Connectivism course feeds.
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Tagging, filtering and piping
Posted: July 24th, 2008, 1:23pm GMT by bdieu
I'd like to know how to pipe out the discussion in the various sections of this forum so that a media wiki page (or other) can receive what is being said here.
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How will you engage in the course?
Posted: July 22nd, 2008, 8:19pm GMT by bdieu
More than 1000 participants have already enrolled in the Connectivism course, the aim of which is:
1. address the questions about value points in education and the role of learners and faculty in large scale open courses
2. model alternatives to existing course design and delivery models. These alternatives are defined by openness, innovation, active participation, connectedness, and learner autonomy.
3. expound connectivism as a learning theory and provide a forum for critical thought, debate, and consideration of future steps in research and implementation.Although it has not yet been officially launched, participants have already started making connections, coordinating efforts and suggesting how to foster interaction with others on ways to improve delivery. How?
- by volunteering translation services. The course site is being translated into Spanish, Portuguese and Chinese;
- by using tools to coordinate and organize local f2f meetups in other languages;
- by opening parallel google lists and interacting in communities of practice to reach their specific groups or areas of interest;
- by opening spaces (like this one) to discuss connectivism and ideas that emerge from the course from the perspective of their own field of practice, cultural and organizational contexts;
- by suggesting tags to narrow and filter the content.
What tools will you be using to organize yourself and how will they serve you? Why have you enrolled and how are you planning to go about the course? Besides the kitchen talk here, are you already participating or planning to do so in other events linked to the course (local meetups in your native language, translation, etc)?
Dekita Kitchen - All Discussions
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How will you engage in the course?
Posted: July 22nd, 2008, 8:19pm GMT by bdieu
More than 1000 participants have already enrolled in the Connectivism course, the aim of which is:
1. address the questions about value points in education and the role of learners and faculty in large scale open courses
2. model alternatives to existing course design and delivery models. These alternatives are defined by openness, innovation, active participation, connectedness, and learner autonomy.
3. expound connectivism as a learning theory and provide a forum for critical thought, debate, and consideration of future steps in research and implementation.Although it has not yet been officially launched, participants have already started making connections, coordinating efforts and suggesting how to foster interaction with others on ways to improve delivery. How?
- by volunteering translation services. The course site is being translated into Spanish, Portuguese and Chinese;
- by using tools to coordinate and organize local f2f meetups in other languages;
- by opening parallel google lists and interacting in communities of practice to reach their specific groups or areas of interest;
- by opening spaces (like this one) to discuss connectivism and ideas that emerge from the course from the perspective of their own field of practice, cultural and organizational contexts;
- by suggesting tags to narrow and filter the content.
What tools will you be using to organize yourself and how will they serve you? Why have you enrolled and how are you planning to go about the course? Besides the kitchen talk here, are you already participating or planning to do so in other events linked to the course (local meetups in your native language, translation, etc)?
Dekita Kitchen - Getting to know each other
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Getting to know each other
Posted: July 22nd, 2008, 6:09pm GMT by bdieu
I'm Barbara Dieu or Bee as people call me online. I am presently on a sabbatical from the Franco-Brazilian secondary school, where since 1983 I have been teaching English to middle/high school teens preparing for the French baccalauréat. Before that I worked at the Cultura Inglesa, a language institute in São Paulo, as an advanced level assistant coordinator, teacher and oral examiner for FCE and CPE (Cambridge Certificate and Proficiency Exams).
I have been online since 1997, involved in collaborative projects with my classes and more recently, organizing professional development workshops/courses for teachers using open and social media tools and platforms. I am a member of a number of national and international communities of practice, coordinate the EduTech SIG for BrazTesol and co-run Dekita.org, whose aim is to showcase, highlight, discuss and promote open and participatory uses of the Web in ELT.
I'd like to welcome you to one such moment in the Dekita kitchen and hope you will enjoy preparing and sharing the meal :-)
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Getting to know each other
Posted: July 22nd, 2008, 6:09pm GMT by bdieu
I'm Barbara Dieu or Bee as people call me online. I am presently on a sabbatical from the Franco-Brazilian secondary school, where since 1983 I have been teaching English to middle/high school teens preparing for the French baccalauréat. Before that I worked at the Cultura Inglesa, a language institute in São Paulo, as an advanced level assistant coordinator, teacher and oral examiner for FCE and CPE (Cambridge Certificate and Proficiency Exams).
I have been online since 1997, involved in collaborative projects with my classes and more recently, organizing professional development workshops/courses for teachers using open and social media tools and platforms. I am a member of a number of national and international communities of practice, coordinate the EduTech SIG for BrazTesol and co-run Dekita.org, whose aim is to showcase, highlight, discuss and promote open and participatory uses of the Web in ELT.
I'd like to welcome you to one such moment in the Dekita kitchen and hope you will enjoy preparing and sharing the meal :-)
Dekita Kitchen - All Discussions
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Getting to know each other
Posted: July 22nd, 2008, 6:09pm GMT by bdieu
I'm Barbara Dieu or Bee as people call me online. I am presently on a sabbatical from the Franco-Brazilian secondary school, where since 1983 I have been teaching English to middle/high school teens preparing for the French baccalauréat. Before that I worked at the Cultura Inglesa, a language institute in São Paulo, as an advanced level assistant coordinator, teacher and oral examiner for FCE and CPE (Cambridge Certificate and Proficiency Exams).
I have been online since 1997, involved in collaborative projects with my classes and more recently, organizing professional development workshops/courses for teachers using open and social media tools and platforms. I am a member of a number of national and international communities of practice, coordinate the EduTech SIG for BrazTesol and co-run Dekita.org, whose aim is to showcase, highlight, discuss and promote open and participatory uses of the Web in ELT.
I'd like to welcome you to one such moment in the Dekita kitchen and hope you will enjoy preparing and sharing the meal :-)
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Courses vs Classes
Posted: July 16th, 2008, 3:56pm GMT by sdownes
My thinking on these concepts may change as we engage with the materials, but probably not by much.
There are two perspectives at play here:
- the ‘course’, which was in its initial inception nothing more than a series of lectures and associated discussions, and
- the ‘class’, which is an administrative unit organized for (among other things) marking and grading, and managing access to courses.
I am I confess terribly uninterested in the ‘class’ aspect of the process. I don’t perceive my grading of materials to add a lot of value (though my comments may be relevant) and I don’t see a particlar need to manage access to the course, over and above the necessary use of logins.
Though as George might say, as the course is being offered in the institutional context, the class management aspects must be attended to. Which is fair enough. To me, this will have the epistemological status of reviewing papers for journals, which is something I also do.
My greater interest is in the course, and (I think) this is the university’s greater interest as well (provided there is enough of a class to pay at least some of the bills). And my attitude toward the course is a traditional one, well removed from what passes for courses in contemporary education.
In traditional post secondary education, there were no classes or courses per se. Students would ‘read’ for their masters or their doctorate, which would be granted after the publication of a work and an oral exam defending that work (the oral, in my estimation, guaranteed to ensure that the student was the author of the work and knew enough about it to discuss it intelligently).
It was the responsibility of university professors to take on individual students, to guide them in their readings, and to act as their mentor and advocate in front of the examination committee. This was a process that would take some years of work on the part of both the professor and the student.
The professor, moreover, was a practising researcher. What this meant varied according to the different professions, but one of the consequences was that, when a professor had achieved some results believed worth sharing, a lecture would be scheduled, which may or may not be followed by a discussion.
Sometimes students would form a club or society, and arrange for a series of such lectures, often from a number of different professors on the same theme, but also often from a particular professor, in order to explore a topic in more detail. These series were described as a ‘course’ of lectures.
Over time (and probably for the purposes of ‘efficiency’ and ’standardization’) we have taken more and more of the students’ influence over this process out of their hands, and replaced it with a regimented ‘educational’ pocess that combines the presentation of materials, conduct of discussion and activities, and testing of students.
These ae very different things; I have always thought of these as different things, and it is most appropriate in a course such as the curent enterprise to treat them as different things.
With regard to the ‘class’, with which I have agreed to help, there will no doubt be assessment activities, but these will take place as personal conversations between professors and students. They need not concern the larger population, and in fact, are none of their business.
George may set up some of this assessment activity in a common place. But from my perspective, I will countenance only two types of communication: person to person, privately with a student, for the purpose of mntoring and assessment, which is what they have paid for; and pubic communications, which occur in front of the larger group, and in which are in all cases optional, and idealy organized so far as possible by the student him or her self.
And as for myself, my intended contribution is, primarily, a course of lectures, which I currently plan to video (but may offer live instead, depending on how it works out) and participation in the discussion that follows. I would like to see these lectures published as a monograph, which it may make sense to co-author with George (or it may make as much sense to offer two companion volumes; we haven’t discussed this).
I want to explore the principles of connectivism in this course of lectures. But I want to enact the conduct of the traditional academic education, and to use that as the starting point, rather than the more usual process of trying to orchetrate some educational activity for a group of coordinated students.
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On splitting worlds
Posted: July 15th, 2008, 4:59pm GMT by gsiemens
One aspect of this course that I haven’t fully wrapped my head around is how we’ll manage the small group that registers for credit (and thereby receives recognition and feedback from instructors) and those who are taking the course for personal interest.
Universities have an obligation to protect the privacy of learners. We can’t force individuals to participate in an open forum. And we don’t fully understand how learners interact when they have a sense of existing in a fishbowl. Transparency and openness are very personal affairs.
We have a challenge. How do we foster effective learning and interaction at two levels: 1) open for all, 2) those enrolled for credit. How do we foster interaction between the two groups? We obviously don’t want to create a class-structure (no pun) in the course. Much of the interaction in C&CK will be distributed. People will post on their blog, wikis, etc. We have a few masters level courses that will be directing students to participate at certain stages. While we have a significant amount of interest, I suspect most will observe activities in stages (legitimate peripheral participation) and a smaller portion will actively participate. But even if that smaller portion is about 150 people, it still produces an almost overwhelming amount of dialogue.
My typical approach would be to say: “here’s the content, here’s the space of interaction”. My obligation is to make things as open and transparent as possible in order to allow as many opportunities for participant use of content and interaction as possible. That’s my role as an educator, right? Well, it is if you’re posting things online for free. Things change when people are charged a fee. It’s no longer about only providing content and spaces of interaction. The obligation becomes one of ensuring certain targets and expectations are achieved.
Any ideas on how to manage two groups, while not making them appear as two groups? We’ll be hosting an open forum in Moodle for interaction with those who don’t have a blog. We’ve considered also adding a closed forum for those who are enrolled in the course. Not sure of the impact that would have. The enrolled students then only receive feedback from instructors, which partly defeats the purpose of breaking down classroom walls..
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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Connectivism and Connective Knowledge Online Course
Posted: July 15th, 2008, 12:12pm GMT
I am planning to attend this fall’s Connectivism and Connective Knowledge online course, that runs from September 8 - November 29, 2008. With instructors George Siemens and Stephen Downes, it is sure to be an interesting and exciting experience that can be taken for credit through the University of Manitoba or free without the credit. Interested in joining over 1000 (at recent count) people in this MOOC (Massive Online Open Course), then you may want to do some background reading that George ha
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Certificate in Emerging Technologies for Learning
Posted: July 13th, 2008, 8:58pm GMT by gsiemens
As previously stated, Connectivism and Connective Knowledge (C&CK) will run for 12 weeks starting September ‘08 (the wiki now has an updated schedule).
For those participants who wish to take the course for credit, the course can be taken as an elective in the CACE program. C&CK will also count as a core course in a proposed Certificate in Emering Technologies for Learning (CETL). The certificate program is slated for delivery starting January ‘09.
Courses in CETL include:
Core Courses:
- Introduction to Emerging Technologies
- Instructional Design and Networked Learning
- Digital Literacy
- Connectivism and Connective Knowledge
Electives:
- Making Sense in Abundance: information visualization
- Mobile Learning
- Immersive Worlds, Avatars, and Second Lives
- Open Educational Resources
- Future Directions and Trends
UPDATE: I’ve had a few questions about the medium of delivery for the certificate program. All of the courses will be offered fully online.
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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Preflection on Connectivism and Collective Knowledge
Posted: July 12th, 2008, 5:15am GMT
I first must admit that at this point in early July I have done little to no actual reading provided by the CCK08 Course Blog. Yes I am lazy, but I am doing everything I can to enjoy my ever growing family. However I will admit that I have skimmed some of the articles and have a growing sense of the need of connectivism (below explains my opinions). Many teachers feel overwhelmed by the pace of technology, and even when find time to explore a new or established piece of hardware/software, and -
Connectivism course draws night, or behold the MOOC
Posted: July 10th, 2008, 9:57pm GMT
The Connectivism online class is drawing closer, as we can see from their wiki, the blog, and email announcements. I'm excited about the idea of a "massive online open course".
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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A few thoughts about design
Posted: July 10th, 2008, 7:44pm GMT by gsiemens
As stated in my previous post, the arrangement of this course will be less structured than many instructional design processes dictate. This is largely due to our discussion topic lacking clear definition - i.e. there is much talk about different technologies, learning theories and related subjects, but the concepts have not solidified to the point where we can definitively say “these are the boundaries of this idea” or “this idea is different from that one based on these variances”. At the conclusion of this course, I hope those understandings will have been achieved collectively. At this stage, things are too unsettled in the conversation to boldly make those claims.
You might be thinking, “oh, that’s lovely, what you’re saying is you don’t know what you’re talking about”. While that is up for debate, the real value in taking a fluid design approach stems from the need to explore the nature of change we are seeing without first putting it into existing containers of what we know. Categorization is valuable after observing, discussing, and analyzing phenomena. Not in advance. If we approach an emerging field with too many existing assumptions, we run the risk of failing to see what, if anything, is unique.
What does an average week look like?
Here is what I currently envision the weekly activity to be:
- Each week will have a clearly defined topic
- The topic will be introduced by a short article or introduction (in this case, a two page description or opinion piece) or podcast, or whatever. Some weeks both Stephen and I will post an introductory piece, other weeks only one of us will.
- Links to external resources for additional reading/viewing will be provided weekly as well.
- Short podcasts and opinion pieces will be presented - i.e. “Stephen’s views” “George’s views”. Stephen and I share many overlapping views of knowledge and learning. But a few core disagreements exist. We’ll try and provide a diversity of thought - complimentary and at times in conflict - for you to consider.
- Discussions will be held in asynchronous forums like blogs, moodle, and wikis. Use of the course code - CCK08 for tagging posts or sharing del.icio.us resources will be helpful.
- Assignments and activities for participants who have enrolled “for-credit” will be required for completion/reflection on a weekly basis as well. Full assignment details will be provided to all enrolled learners.
- Weekly live lectures and presentations will be held as well. These lectures will likely be delivered in elluminate. They will be recorded for participants who are in different time zones and prefer not to get up in the middle of the night to listen to two Canadians presenting :). We will likely have a series of guest presenters through out the course…more information soon.
- Mind maps of key discussion topics will be co-created with participants at the conclusion of each week.
Time required by learners: minimum 5 hours per week (reading, assignments, etc). Max 10-15 hours (depending on their expertise with online environments and familiarity with subject matter.
At this point, I would appreciate feedback on:
How can we make this more effective? How can we make it more engaging? What types of tools and procedures can we adopt to increase opportunities for learners to participate and contribute? What challenges to you foresee in a large open course (we currently have over 1,000 signed up)? How can we make it personal, yet effective in capturing varied discussions?
CCK08 Participants (Technorati search)
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Ever Hopeful
Posted: July 7th, 2008, 4:47am GMT
Image via Wikipedia As an educator nearly reaching the milestone of 10 years in the game I have had my highs and lows. I have seen promise and despair and have gone through the endless roller coaster more times than I can imagine. I started with hope for technology in education when I graduated from the University of Alberta, then I entered reality. The underfunded always hopeful public education system, where in many rooms current technology is a 30 year old overhead projector (Don’t laugh, I -
Connectivism
Posted: July 5th, 2008, 9:08am GMT
Spring in Alexandra This section will be about a course that I am embarking on in July 2008. It is called: Connectivism and Connective Knowledge offered by George Siemens. This is mainly for my reflection, but I am interested in any comments - once I have something to say! The course wiki is here: Connectivism Wiki The course blog is here: Connectivism and Connective Knowledge Blog The course email list is here: Connectivism Google Group Resources: An article on Connectivism Website o
Connectivism & Connective Knowledge Blog
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Calvinball and instructional design
Posted: June 25th, 2008, 9:35pm GMT by gsiemens
My all time favorite comic is Calvin and Hobbes. No one has to date been able to provide a suitable replacement to Watterson’s ability to brilliantly mix humour, social commentary, blending of idealism/reality, personality of children, and the nuances of life. Calvin and Hobbes served as a wonderful lens, reflecting back a mirror image of ourselves, through which to view the sometimes absurd, but always philosophical, antics of a 6 year old. Many significant themes were addressed - religion, destiny of humanity, role of bugs in diets, GROSS secret organization, and friendship and betrayal. Most significant for me, was the constant thread of the role of order vs. disorder, authority and power vs. autonomy and creativity.
No where was this distinction more evident than in Calvinball. In one encounter with Calvinball, Calvin refuses to sign up for baseball until mocked by Susie as the “only boy” who didn’t. While he has no interest in signing up, he does so to appease social norms (leading him to draw the rather wry conclusion of “who’s a wimp” - the person who stands firm or bends to certain perceptions of social organization or gender roles). His baseball career is a disaster. He is happily daydreaming when a ball is hit in his direction. To his, and the readers, shock, Calvin catches it. With suitable pride he approaches the bench and informs the team he caught the ball. He is then, not entirely politely, informed that he caught his own team’s hit. Calvin, it seems, forgot to come in during the batting change. With numerous insults, including his coach calling him a “quitter”, he leaves the game.
In the next scene, Calvin is happily playing Calvinball with Hobbes (his stuffed tiger). Calvinball is a game without rules. Well, that’s not entirely true. It’s a game with changing rules. It is never the same game twice. The game, in contrast with baseball, is about autonomy, creativity, and plain old fun.
While not obvious, I think a parallel can be drawn between Calvinball and instructional design - at least for the purposes of this course.
For all the instructional designers out there, I would like to start by declaring my affection for the discipline and the intent the discipline advocates. I like learning outcomes (though, in all honesty, I’m not aware of well regarded research that says having clear learning outcomes results in better learner performance…if you’re aware of this research, please post in the comments section). I also like the rigour that ID contributes to the somewhat messy space of learning designed by higher education faculty. Messy, in this instance, refers to having a bunch of resources that don’t consider the experience of the learner or that don’t demonstrate some type of connection and integration to teaching and assessment. I personally wouldn’t dream of starting a large program revision without including instructional designers are critical team members.
But…ID is often rigid. Structured. Rule based. It’s like baseball. It appeals to people who like order and coherence and content that is amenable to categorization and organization. For those of you taking this course, I’ll state up front that our instructional design approach will be much closer to Calvinball than to baseball. Our goal is to foster conversation with people, not only conversation around content. Will everyone “get the same thing” out of the course? No. Those who have enrolled for credit will be expected to complete activities and will be marked (according to something that will vaguely resemble outcomes :)).
Learning has a dual reality of art and science. We can structure, chunk, plan, organize, and design materials in a very coherent manner. Many academics would likely argue this is particularly important at the undergraduate level where learners have not yet formed some type of framework of the field as a whole. At a masters level greater autonomy exists, and at the PhD level, autonomy is yet again extended. Learning also has the art dimension. I absolutely love listening to people who are informed and passionate expound their world views. I love the sloppy serendipity of a conversation that the educator didn’t plan. Or the contributions of learners taking the course in new directions because they are excited about what and how they are learning. Sure, some structure is needed. Fun, however, has a way of organizing itself.
If it’s baseball rules you seek, you’ll likely not enjoy this course. If your game is Calvinball, welcome!