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Greg Williams

Connectivism - 1 views

  • Do we acquire it throu
  • These theories, however, were developed in a time when learning was not impacted through technology.
  • In many fields the life of knowledge is now measured in months and years.
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  • The amount of knowledge in the world has doubled in the past 10 years and is doubling every 18 months according to the American Society of Training and Documentation (ASTD). To combat the shrinking half-life of knowledge, organizations have been forced to develop new methods of deploying instruction.
  • Technology is altering (rewiring) our brains. The tools we use define and shape our thinking
  • learning as a lasting changed state (emotional, mental, physiological (i.e. skills)) brought about as a result of experiences and interactions with content or other people.
  • Objectivism (similar to behaviorism) states that reality is external and is objective, and knowledge is gained through experiences. Pragmatism (similar to cognitivism) states that reality is interpreted, and knowledge is negotiated through experience and thinking. Interpretivism (similar to constructivism) states that reality is internal, and knowledge is constructed.
  • Behaviorism states that learning is largely unknowable, that is, we can’t possibly understand what goes on inside a person (the “black box theory”)
  • Cognitivism often takes a computer information processing model. Learning is viewed as a process of inputs, managed in short term memory, and coded for long-term recall.
  • Constructivism suggests that learners create knowledge as they attempt to understand their experiences
  • Constructivism assumes that learners are not empty vessels to be filled with knowledge. Instead, learners are actively attempting to create meaning. Learners often select and pursue their own learning. Constructivist principles acknowledge that real-life learning is messy and complex.
  • learning that occurs outside of people
  • The ability to synthesize and recognize connections and patterns is a valuable skill.
  • In today’s environment, action is often needed without personal learning – that is, we need to act by drawing information outside of our primary knowledge.
  • An entirely new approach is needed.
  • How can we continue to stay current in a rapidly evolving information ecology?
  • We can no longer personally experience and acquire learning that we need to act. We derive our competence from forming connections.
  • Unlike constructivism, which states that learners attempt to foster understanding by meaning making tasks, chaos states that the meaning exists – the learner's challenge is to recognize the patterns which appear to be hidden
  • The capacity to form connections between sources of information, and thereby create useful information patterns, is required to learn in our knowledge economy.
  • A network can simply be defined as connections between entities.
  • Nodes that successfully acquire greater profile will be more successful at acquiring additional connections
  • Finding a new job, as an example, often occurs through weak ties. This principle has great merit in the notion of serendipity, innovation, and creativity. Connections between disparate ideas and fields can create new innovations.
  • Connectivism is the integration of principles explored by chaos, network, and complexity and self-organization theories.
  • Learning and knowledge rests in diversity of opinions.
  • Decision-making is itself a learning process. Choosing what to learn and the meaning of incoming information is seen through the lens of a shifting reality. While there is a right answer now, it may be wrong tomorrow due to alterations in the information climate affecting the decision.
  • The starting point of connectivism is the individual.
  • This cycle of knowledge development (personal to network to organization) allows learners to remain current in their field through the connections they have formed.
  • the internet leverages the small efforts of many with the large efforts of few.
  • example of a Maricopa County Community College system project that links senior citizens with elementary school students in a mentor program. The children “listen to these “grandparents” better than they do their own parents, the mentoring really helps the teachers…the small efforts of the many- the seniors – complement the large efforts of the few – the teachers.” (2002). This amplification of learning, knowledge and understanding through the extension of a personal network is the epitome of connectivism.
  • Implications
  • The pipe is more important than the content within the pipe. Our ability to learn what we need for tomorrow is more important than what we know today. A real challenge for any learning theory is to actuate known knowledge at the point of application.
  • acknowledges the tectonic shifts in society where learning is no longer an internal, individualistic activity
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    "Technology is altering (rewiring) our brains. The tools we use define and shape our thinking." . . . or so this fellow argues in a pretty detailed paper
Jake Corkin

Dreaming and reality - 0 views

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    This blogger (i think this is a blog) poses the question "are dreams extensions of reality?" she uses descartes philosophy "i think therefore i am" to prove they are.
Kevin Watson

Second Life ™ - 0 views

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    I never knew that Second Life was being used to this extent. People are using it for educational and occupational purposes. It is quite amazing, but I wonder if we lose a sense of reality, or gain something more from it?
Kristi Koerner

Wilfred Owen - Dulce et Decorum Est - best known poem of the First World War - 0 views

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    Wilfred Owen is one of the most famous WWI poets. As a young solider he wrote of the contrast of the heroic ideals of war and the stark reality.
Gideon Burton

Things as They Really Are - Ensign June 2010 - ensign - 0 views

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    A key talk about the digital realm from the point of view of an LDS apostle.
Gideon Burton

My So-Called Second Life: Are You Your Avatar? | Cocktail Party Physics, Scientific Ame... - 1 views

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    An account of a science writer broadcasting a podcast from Second Life. Includes brief and helpful background on the history of avatars and their social function and best practices. A good intro to avatars.
Mike Lemon

Calls for longer school years face budget reality - Yahoo! News - 0 views

    • Mike Lemon
       
      Is lengthening the school day or year the answer?
  • Education reformers have long called for U.S. kids to log more time in the classroom so they can catch up with their peers elsewhere in the world, but resistance from leisure-loving teenagers isn't the only reason there is no mass movement to keep schoolchildren in their seats. Such a change could cost cash-strapped state governments and local school districts billions of dollars, strip teachers of a time-honored perk of their profession, and irk officials in states that already bridle at federal intrusion into their traditional control over education.
  • Texas already forbids school from starting before the fourth Monday of August, a provision designed to save money on utility bills and increase business for tourist destinations and other summer attractions. "Ultimately the states, not the federal government, should have the final word on this and other public school decisions," said Lucy Nashed, a spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Perry. In Kansas, sporadic efforts by local districts to extend the school year at even a few schools have been met by parental resistance, said state education commissioner Diane DeBacker.
Margaret Weddle

Grasping Reality with Both Hands: Economics - 0 views

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    An interesting blog about various aspects of Economics by a Berkeley professor - also has links to his classes
Andrew DeWitt

BYU Devotional: The Most Important Three Things in the World - Brett G. Scharffs - 0 views

  • Dr. Haught introduced theologian Paul Ricoeur’s concept of the three stages of religious faith
  • The first stage, childlike faith, may be likened to the clear, unimpeded view that one enjoys standing atop a tall mountain.7 As children, our faith is simple and uncritical, and we can see clearly in every direction.
  • The second stage Ricoeur calls the desert of criticism. At some point, often during adolescence, we descend from the mountain of childlike faith and enter the critical world. We might label this world “high school” or, better yet, “college.” Here we find that others do not share our faith. In fact, some openly disparage what we hold dear. We learn that the very idea of faith is thought by many to be childish or delusional. We may become skeptical, perhaps even cynical.
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  • The desert of criticism is akin to being in the midst of a blinding sandstorm, where you are forced to lean into the wind and take one step at a time without a clear view of where you are going. Walking by faith becomes difficult. Some of our former beliefs cannot survive the desert of criticism.
  • Ricoeur did not malign the desert of criticism, for some childish beliefs are incorrect and should be abandoned
  • Furthermore, it is only in coming down from the mountain that we are able to enter into the world and engage others who are different from us. To a great extent this is where life is lived and where we can make a difference in the world. Some people never leave the desert of criticism, and in time the memory of their childlike faith may dim. After prolonged exposure to the desert of criticism, some even lose their faith altogether. Ricoeur maintained that once one has entered the desert of criticism, it is not possible to return to the mountain of childlike faith. It is a little like leaving Eden. Something has been lost; life and faith can never be quite so simple again
  • But he held out the possibility of a third stage of religious faith. On the other side of the desert of criticism lies another mountain, not as tall as the mountain of childlike faith, with views that are not quite as clear and unobstructed. But we can, as Dr. Haught explained it, remove ourselves periodically from the desert of criticism and ascend this somewhat less majestic mountain. Ricoeur calls this possibility of a second faith “postcritical” naveté or a “second naveté.”
  • Here the truths and realities of our childlike faith can be reaffirmed or revised
  • Our faith will not be as simple as it once was, but it need not be lost. In fact, I believe our faith may become more powerful than before, for it will have weathered and survived the assaults of the desert of criticism.
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    My favorite part of this talk is his description of the three stages of faith which I have highlighted.
Brandon McCloskey

BBC News - Why companies watch your every Facebook, YouTube, Twitter move - 0 views

  • These days one witty Tweet, one clever blog post, one devastating video - forwarded to hundreds of friends at the click of a mouse - can snowball and kill a product or damage a company's share price.
  • It's a dramatic shift in consumer power. But what if companies could harness this power and turn it to their advantage?
  • At the most basic, these tools measure the volume of social media chatter. Researchers at Hewlett Packard showed that they can accurately predict a Hollywood movie's box office takings by counting how often it is mentioned on Twitter before it opens.
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  • One European clothing company, popular with inner city youth in the United States, admits privately that its social media team is baffled by its customers' ever changing slang, and even the online Urban Dictionary provides little help.
  • Social media is quickly becoming a customer relationship management system, as companies have "for the first time access to people's minds in real-time," says Jorn Lyseggen. The tools on offer provide companies with dashboards that show trends, hot topics, the reach of brands, customer mood and how competitors are doing.
  • Social media may be all the buzz, but in reality "only a few firms get it [and use it], it's of peripheral interest for most", says Tom Austin at technology consultancy Gartner. Few realise that using social media has become much more than customer service and reputation management.
  • many social media tools are poorly integrated into the corporate workflow
  • But there are dangers. Financial Times columnist Lucy Kellaway warns that the obsession with social networking can make management lose focus.
  • To survive the world of social media, companies have to throw away their old marketing playbook.
  • "don't push... and don't pretend you are hip"
  • "Once companies have worked out that they should do something with social media, they usually don't know how to do it,"
  • "If you want to influence the people who influence your customers, that's a very powerful game, but it's also very dangerous if you get it wrong."
  • it's not about how many friends or followers somebody has, but whether they make an impact.
  • When Virgin America recently launched new routes from California to Toronto, it used Klout to identify a small group of social media "influencers" and gave them free flights. This generated thousands of tweets, triggered press coverage and delivered more immediate impact than traditional advertising.
  • "Consumers are spending their attention on social media," he says, but firms don't know how to repay them properly. "There's no manual for that yet."
  • Social media are dynamic, and today's Twitter may be tomorrow's forgotten website. "Don't assume that what works today will work tomorrow," says Tom Austin at Gartner. "Your model has to be continually adapted."
Katherine Chipman

Fear! Living Under a Mushroom Cloud, a collection at the Museum at the Wisconsin Histor... - 0 views

  • America's post-World War II period is often portrayed as a time of affluence and contentment, but fear of atomic war and Communist infiltration also marked the era and affected the decisions Americans made about their lives and futures. Fear of atomic bomb attacks on the nation's cities helped motivate people to move to the relative safety of the suburbs. Some Americans built fallout shelters to protect their families while others, shocked by the prospect of nuclear annihilation at any moment, sought to live for the present.
  • Once the first atomic bomb was dropped on Japan, Americans realized a new era in history, one defined by the ability of humans to destroy their world.
  • Positive portrayals of atomic bomb blasts, along with toys and games that made light of atomic bomb destruction like those in the case below, may have helped diffuse some of the fear the American public felt about the bomb by desensitizing them to the devastation an atomic bomb could cause.
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  • While "atomic fiction" depicted possible fearful scenarios using atomic bombs and radiation, documentary sources illustrated the reality. Newspapers, magazines, books, and pamphlets described in vivid detail the effects of nuclear bombs on the Bikini Atoll, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki, kept Americans abreast of the latest atomic developments and their destructive forces, and explained the devastating results if a bomb were to be dropped on the United States. All combined to reinforce the fear Americans had about anything atomic
  • Atomic Age fears provided science fiction writers with the inspiration for hundreds of stories, many of which conveyed political and moral messages as they shocked and entertained American readers and movie audiences. Three story types had emerged by the mid-1950s: the first dealt with atomic warfare; the second showed dinosaurs or fantastical beasts awakened or created by atomic blasts; and the third type depicted human deformities resulting from atomic experiments gone awry.
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