Twitter chat on Tech Tools June 16th 2016

A detailed article on connectivism, written by one of the biggest promoters of Connectivism- George Siemens. There is a lot of great information on how this impacts organizations which was particularly interesting. We struggle with this all the time at my company- "Connectivism addresses the challenges that many corporations face in knowledge management activities. Knowledge that resides in a database needs to be connected with the right people in the right context in order to be classified as learning".

Downes & Siemens are the primary promoters of connectivism and say learning rests in the diversity of options, is a process of connecting specialized nodes, and may reside in non-human appliances. They believe that the capacity to know is more important than what is currently known and that nurturing relationships is needed to facilitate continuing education. They say the ability to see connections between fields, ideas, and concepts is a core skill. Up to date knowledge is the goal of all learning activities in this model and decision making is in itself a learning process.

This article summarizes Siemens article on Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age. In this age where so much information is at our finger tips, it is the role of the teacher to help the learner access the best information and make sense of what they access. Dr. Marquis brings up a good point that there isn't much research to implement connectivism or what affect it actually has on learners.

A PLN can be online or face to face connections but the virtual opportunities do not require your physical presence like attending a conference, a live master's degree program, etc. There are 2 distinct advantages to being online: 1. it's completely personalized to what each person is seeking 2. It can easily be modified based on changes in needs. Social media sources like Facebook, Twitter, and Wordpress blogs can be customized so that teachers can follow one-other and share the latest tools and information.

A PLN is personal because you choose who is in your group and if you want to lurk or comment. A PLN is what you want when you want it- reminds me of the Burger King slogan- "your way right away"

Connectivism is controversial as a learning theory. Many people don't see it as one of the majors like behaviorism, cognitivism, or constructivism but those 3 are falling short in terms of describing what is happening in the digital age. Connectivism can be described as distributed learning or using information outside of your primary knowledge. The author thinks that connectivism should be the new constructivism.

This is a great article especially for those of us that are new to Twitter. I'm getting a better understanding of how it can be used for collaboration and conversations. Nice find and thank you for sharing it!

This article talks about the evolution of Twitter and how recent enhancements like the hashtag (#) and the @ sign have made it a good tool for collaboration and conversations. The article gives a great overview of CoPs and Personal Networks as well. Twitter can now be used for what's trending in education and is more that only what is trending in social media news.

Lave & Wegner are the originators of the idea of 'Situated Learning' which is described as being fully engaged and "learning to talk instead of learning from talk." Within CoPs, participants engage in frameworks with structure. Alcoholics Anonymous was a good example from this article.

This article looks at corporations that are encouraging CoPs like Google & Apple. Xerox was able to save $100 million by collecting tips that repair men were sharing over breakfast and sharing them on a larger level. CoPs can enhance organizational effectiveness and profitability by increasing knowledge sharing.

3 crucial elements that make a COP: Domain, Community, and Practice. A domain is a common interest among members. A community means that members engage in activities and discussions and share information to help one another. Members practice by sharing tools and resources.is something that individuals do.

I use this site all the time to create custom rubrics. It gives suggestive language and diverse point options.