EDTECH at Boise State University

This covers all the basics of computer networks from the perspective of an educator.

Standards for teachers to follow as performance indicators for implementing, designing, and assesing learning experiences using digital technology.

This site allows for users to upload find, share, and create amazingly visually informative and creative infographics for free without the use of expensive software or design know-how. It can also act as a portfolio for your designs.

Resources for all sciences

Includes links to valuable classroom websites for General Science, Physics & Mathematics, Chemistry, Biology, Environmental & Earth Sciences, Space Science - Astronomy & Astrophysics, Medicine & Nanoscience, and iPad Apps.

This is my website where I seek to educate, engage, and empower teachers, students, and parents. Enjoy!

This is one of my favorite social networking sites for education. It looks like a pre-timeline Facebook account but is just for education. I use it with all my high school classes. Check it out!

Edmodo provides a safe and easy way for your class to connect and collaborate, share content, and access homework, grades and school notices. Our goal is to help educators harness the power of social media to customize the classroom for each and every learner

Edmodo is an easy way to get your students connected so they can safely collaborate, get and stay organized, and access assignments, grades, and school messages.

Because connectivism framework is relatively new, it needs to be based in research and its models needs to be tried and tested in a variety of educational contexts; this article explores research framework to support connectivism in online learning; online communities of practice facilitate meaningful and connected learning; a well-written look at the research framework behind connectivism and its applications

In Edtech 504 I did a paper on connnectivism. If more research is done on connectivism and with a little more time I think many will finally come to accept connectivism as a true, real learning theory.

This site provides ideas on different technologies that can be integrated into the classroom. I like how it also address adminstrators, as all school personel should be on board with supporting technology integration.

This is a great resource for those trying to integrate more technology into their classrooms. When everyone is not on board with technology integration then it makes it hard on those one or two trying to integrate it.

Suggests that understanding how members of a learning community converse is an important component of understanding connectivism. The tone of the interactions in a forum rely on the design and management of the space. Furthermore, learning depends on sharing in conversations and interactions which themselves can be meaningful activities. During communication among learners, there is a balance of what is good for each individual and the ability to move towards a common purpose.

In this article, Andrew Ravenscroft explores a "dialogue rich view of connectivism" and how we can develop learners that can "think, reason and analyse." He takes inspiration from social constructivist theory to focus on dialogue as a vehicle for learning. Ravenscroft begins by detailing Siemens 8 principles of connectivism. He then asks 3 questions: how can we understand the dialogue processes of a networked world, what dialogue features make for quality connections and how do we design to promote quality connections. He starts to explore the questions with Socrates and the Socratic method. This method has applications for 21st century learning. He reviews Hegel's dialectic as well. Ravenscroft maps these positions to connectivism because dialectic helps refine knowledge from a diversity of opinions, supports the capacity to know more, consideration of alternative viewpoints, fosters a constant evolution of knowledge, and promotes critical and collaborative dialogue. Then he discusses dialogic processes and how they map to connectivism. Dialectic and dialogic can work, not in opposition, but together in different aspects. Dialectic focuses on the epistemic and cognitive dimensions of learning, while dialogic focuses more on emotional and interpersonal aspects. The author then details dialogue game interactions and how they can foster learning. To be successful they need to balance orchestration and openness. This article proposes that language and dialogue remain a "most powerful semiotic system."

What a fascinating article. Ravenscroft's discussion of a scaffolded system to build a learner's dialogic skills reminds me of research I did for my EdTech504 class on self-regulated learning. Roger Azevedo is developing and experimenting with a similar game, MetaTutor, which scaffolds student learning as well. I think self-regulation is complex and difficult to teach in the classroom, and am amazed that researchers are creating software to build self-efficacy!

Etienne Wenger discusses elements of Communities of Practice, with a focus on the private sector. Though the discussion is pertinent to all uses of CoP. Noted as a crucial component is how the community is managed by facilitators, for that is who is ultimately responsible for caring for the domain of information. And who must know what the group needs in order to prosper. Where the information is being shared by peers to address questions and challenges in common. While interactions among community members include cultural and structural components, there is space for each participant to realize their identity through connections and engagement

This blog post discusses the role of the teacher in the light of a connected world.  Beginning with a look at how the teacher's role (and curriculum) become fragmented, the post then discusses the "new" role of teachers in such a connected environment.

Alyssa, I appreciate that fact that you highlight the role of the teacher here. I sometimes feel lost in the world of learning theory as I tend to teach between them. That is, my teaching is a mixture of many different theories. I really like the idea of the teacher being the filter.

This is a great article. It starts with business and but then moves into teaching and how connectivism changes out roles. I love how it states that learners are not confined to one person's beliefs. It brings up outcomes/assessment and relates them to real-life. Thank you!

The authors state the the use of blogs as aggregators for student Personal Learning Networks (PLN) is an effective tool to help organize the many fascists of unique environments. They point out that in order for students to successfully create and use their own PLNs there must first be a successful example by an instructor for the students to model. They point out that although students may be using several of the tools that will ultimately comprise their PLNs, it is a fallacy to assume that students inherently understand the power and connectedness of these environments.

This article explores connectivism as a learning theory, then discusses how to use personal learning networks in your communities of practice. The author quotes from many experts in communities of practice and connectivism. Much detail was given to blogging.

Although this article is focused specifically on public affairs education, it is relevant to all learners. The author discusses professional learning networks as methods to connect and build communities of practice. Using personal experiences teaching a college course, the author's creation of communities of practice took learning for students to the next level.

Siemens introduces connectivism as a theory for the digital age. He discusses the shift in learning theory that led to the creation of connectivism due to the need to make connections between specialized communities. He emphasizes the rapidly changing foundations of learning and information transfer and suggests that "creating, preserving, and utilizing information flow should be a key organizational activity." Ultimately, he suggests that connectivism is the way that education can meet the changing environment of learning.

This 2004 article by George Siemens discusses learning theories in general--what they are and their limitations. Siemens then goes on to discuss an "alternative theory"--that of connectivism. He specifically explores the fact that connectivism is part of the digital age because of the rapidly changing technology which enables more and more information flow. Siemens then goes on to briefly discuss the implications of connectivism.

This article investigates the beneifts and downfalls of behaviorism, cognitivism, and constructivism. Then, it dives in to the idea of connectivism, and how we use it to develop new knowledge and skills. The article states that, "This cycle of knowledge development (personal to network to organization) allows learners to remain current in their field through the connections they have formed."

"Only student who have a desire to learn will learn". We strive to make students life-long learners. This article defines the main characteristics of CoP as "The Domain", "The Community", and "The Practices". It gives examples of strengths and weaknesses, how it associates with the Constructivism Theory, and how to integrate with technology.

Debi, the initial quote really got my attention. I am more interested in getting my students interested in learning than almost anything else I do as a teacher. I think making them life-long learners through Communities of Practice might be the best way to get them to value learning over a lifetime.

Mostly poses questions about learning networks, and how technology tools and context influence learning. An intriguing notion of comparing the wisdom of a crowd with the stupidity of the mob is presented, but hardly explored.

Very nice slideshow. The author touches on communities of practice, connectivism and PLNs all at once. On a slightly different note, I simultaneously find Slideshare stimulating and frustrating. It is frustrating because of its one dimensional nature. Too bad there isn't a way to hear and/or see the speaker too.

This article is fairly specific.  It helped understand the difference between a CoP and a PLN.  Primarily it talks about what learning is and how a PLN can help and how learning can come in a PLN.  It elaborates that a PLN is something that we have.  It is our connections that we make and, while not explicit, it emphasizes that we feel ownership in the PLN.

PLNs are a necessity. Even when we are learning in a formal situation, we take the information and go to apply it in our jobs. However, we typically do not have access to the original resources for information. This is where the PLN comes in. In many cases we may not know some or all of the members personally, but they are still a very valuable resource!

This article addresses setting up a PLN in the corporate workplace. When reading this article it reinforced the need to expose students during their formative years to this type of collaboration.

Personal Learning Network for educators in action. Interesting example of a living, breathing learning network in use today by teachers from the United States to Sri Lanka and Greece, 13,576 members strong.

A great collection of blogs, videos, resource (including an alphabetical list of Twitter Hashtags) for education.

This is a great PLN for educators. I found videos and blog postings that were extremely interesting. What a cool resource!

This article from the University of Illinois describes in depth a PLN and discusses why teachers need to have one online. It also discuses getting your students to build their own.

I think that this is a great idea. Teachers need to model the behavior so that students can see appropriate behavior. Teachers will also be prepared to recognize when students are delving into places that might be dangerous for them and can even teach best practices to students from a wealth of experience.

Great set of slides. Gives a good overview of the benefits of Personal Learning Networks and simple ways to create one. It seems that the intended audience was teachers, but I think this would be especially useful for instructors to share with their students. The link to the Will Richardson youtube interview was very interesting and thoughtful. I had never heard of him before, but his remarks were quite insightful.

This blog describes some differences between social learning and communities of practice. While it is written by an instructional designer in the corporate sector, many of the details and examples are still applicable to education.

This post aims to distinguish between social learning and communities of practice. It offers an interesting take on the two sides. What I really got most out of it was actually from the first comment from another reader who offers an amazing example of a community of practice. The author of the comment uses Professional Chefs as an example of a community of practice which was one of the best real world and simple to understand explanations I have seen. "My favorite example of a community of practice is professional chefs. They are a community in every sense of the word even though no one maintains a membership list. Chefs identify with one another. They spend time together. They share their knowledge and swap secrets with one another. They enrich the practice of the profession. They nurture people entering the professional and guide their professional development. They set and maintain standards. You can even spot them by the clothes they wear. What brings them together is the "practice." That's terrible term, for it's subject to misinterpretation. We're talking practice as in legal practice or medical practice, not as in piano practice or football practice." Their goal is not making profits; it's furthering the practice.

CoPs are becoming much more popular with the use of technology. Etienne Wenger and Jean Lave are two of the most respected names when it comes to communities of practice. CoPs are groups that are focused on collaboration of common interests while having a purpose and motivation.

Wasko and Faraj discuss the phenomenon of shared knowledge in the digital world; why communities of practice emerge and the motivations of the participants to share knowledge. As they state, "People often behave altruistically and pro-socially, contributing to the welfare of others without apparent compensation."

Very interesting paper. It's an investigation into electronic communities of practice, especially as to "why people contribute time and effort to the provision of knowledge as a public good given the propensity for people to act out of self-interest." I think the authors results are intriguing. They find that people in these electronic communities of practice behave out of a sense of moral duty; feel that sharing knowledge and helping others is `the right thing to do'; desire to advance the community as a whole; and often make contributions in order to have the favor returned one day. In the end, the authors find that within these electronic communities of practice, people contribute time and effort through a combination of altruism and self-interest.