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Vanessa Vaile

News: Technologically Illiterate Students - Inside Higher Ed - 0 views

  • definition of technological literacy needs updating. In the 1990s, she explained, the U.S. Education Department defined it to mean the ability to operate a computer. These days, computers are so user-friendly that being capable of operating one does not say much about a person’s competence.
  • a line between computer users who can handle only basic programs such as word processors and search engines, and those who understand the structures and concepts that underlie modern technology, and how to think critically within them
  • less about who has hardware, but who has access to information; who has those problem-solving skills
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  • sumption that today’s student are computer-literate because they are “digital natives” is a pernicious
  • task-specific tech savvy
  • tech-skeptical
  • not mean tech-negative
  • critical capacity to glean the implications, and limitations, of technologies as they emerge and become woven in
  • ethical use of technology
  • instructors might try to do their best to integrate discussions that might improve students’ tech literacy into existing units in the syllabus
  • more collaborative work
  • source-checking websites
  • real-world examples to support their idea
  • meta-discussions about the limitations of technological tools
  • Arguing that there should be new standards for tech literacy and that most students don’t meet them implies a third piece -- one that is likely to make course designers hem and haw: You need to teach them.
  • filtering the pertinent from the misleading
  • critical thinking skills that enable them to use various technologies wisely
Vanessa Vaile

The Hidden Center of the "Gutenberg Galaxy" - 0 views

  • McLuhan and the Gutenberg Galaxy
  • What if the social changes that result from these technologies are intended , rather than unintended
  • Marshall McLuhan wrote a good deal about the "Gutenberg Galaxy" - the 'constellation' of changes wrought on European society after the German of that name figured out how to turn a winepress into a holder for movable type - in other words, a printing press - in the 15th century.
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  • changes in the political, religious, and social landscape.
  • Gutenberg's press also made possible the Protestant Reformation - because, as Martin Luther came to realize, the wide translation and printing of the Bible meant "every man be a priest."
  • It's certainly hard to see how any of the changes which followed
  • could have occurred without the widespread literacy and education that the printing press made possible
  • what is now happening to our society in our second "Gutenberg revolution" - namely, the rise of electronic media
  • But what if there were a hidden center to the "Gutenberg Galaxy?"
  • fostering our current phase of technological change
  • cultural determinism of technology
  • And then, the Renaissance
  • The Dawn of Writing
  • obvious changes made possible by writing
  • technology of writing was ascribed to some mythic "culture-bringer" - Ogham, Thoth, Quetzelcoatl, etc
  • Most people are not aware, however, what writing had undone.
  • writing may have destroyed man's own prodigious mnemonic talents
  • Art of Memory also involved using tools and images
  • earlier technological revolution - one that occurred perhaps five millenia ago - the birth of writing
  • The spoken word is intimate
  • writing is impersonal, does not carry emotional intonations
  • The written word makes possible the autonomous survival of knowledge - with an oral tradition, it disappears when the oralists have all been killed
  • throughout the great breadth of the Dark and Middle Ages, literacy was not very widespread.
  • Was the printing press purely serendipitous? It does seem to have arrived at the right place at the right time.
  • mysterious traditions of the printers' and papermillers' guilds
  • heretical content of many of these watermarks
  • Bayley suggests it was Huguenot refugees that brought papermaking and the printing art into England
  • "Gutenberg revolution" as quite a Gnostic coup - destroying the literacy monopoly of both the Catholic Church and the feudal state
  • Today, the Arrival of the Electronic Word
  • any people are openly saying it: print is dead, the era of the printed word and the book is fading, and thus a new kind of literacy - "teleliteracy," ("the grammatology of video,") the reading of the moving image and multimedia barrage before us - is being propagated
  • death of civilization itself, since in their eyes we seem to be leaving the printed text behind and returning to the moving image or fetish
  • immediacy, presence, and participation lost through writing and print
  • whether some of the changes electronic media will bring were not intended,
  • would not think for you, but would help you think better and function as a "Knowledge (gnosis? ) Machine."
  • hypertext meant that the world's knowledge could be seamlessly woven together, much like the integrated unified system of knowledge imagined by the mystic Ramon Lull.
  • could be used to facilitate "Community memory" and community activism. It meant access to information
  •  
    shades of Dan Brown!
Vanessa Vaile

Weaving a Personal Web: Using online technologies to create customized, connected, and ... - 0 views

  • Abstract: This paper explores how personal web technologies (PWTs) can be used by learners and the relationship between PWTs and connectivist learning principles. Descriptions and applications of several technologies including social bookmarking tools, personal publishing platforms, and aggregators are also included. With these tools, individuals can create and manage personal learning environments (PLEs) and personal learning networks (PLNs), which have the potential to become powerful resources for academic, professional, and personal development.
  • This paper explores personal web technologies (PWTs) and their learning applications.
  • Connectivism and the need for continuous learning In today’s world, learning needs extend far beyond the culmination of a training session or degree program. Working adults must continually update their skills and behaviours to conform to the constantly changing demands of the workplace (Lewis & Romiszowski, 1996). In times of rapid change, it is not always prudent or possible to offer formal training for each individual’s every need, and some needs may best be addressed by the individual him/herself. Using freely available personal web technologies, employees can create a personal learning environment (PLE) to manage their own learning resources; whether these are wikis, news feeds, podcasts, or people.
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  • Overview of Personal Web Technologies
  • Visualization of a web-based Personal Learning Environment
  • PWTs allow learners to expand their capacity for knowledge by connecting to external resources (other people, online databases, reference sites, etc.). If individuals can sufficiently develop their ability to find, organize, and manage these connections, their available knowledge does not have to be limited by the confines of their own skulls.
  • To navigate the Internet more efficiently, individuals can assemble a virtual toolbox from an ever-growing list of free, and often open-source, technologies to aid in aggregating, organizing, and publishing information online.
  • Social Bookmarking and Research Tools Social bookmarking and research tools allow users to save web pages, articles, and other media (usually to an online storage location) and organize them in personally meaningful ways.
  • Tools that are geared more towards social bookmarking (e.g., Delicious, Diigo, and Twine) place greater emphasis on features that allow users to easily share their bookmarks with friends, colleagues, or the public
  • Tools that are geared more towards academic research, such as Zotero or Connotea, include bibliographic features, such as citation generators and reference list management.
  • Personal Publishing Tools A variety of free and user-friendly tools are available to publish oneself on the Internet. Iskold (2007) sees the range of personal publishing options as a continuum, ranging from content-focused, formal blog posts to socially-focused, informal messages posted on social networking sites, with micro-blogging falling somewhere in the middle.
  • blogging offer learners the opportunity to explore topics in depth and reflect, while the speed and simplicity of micro-blogging lends itself more towards posing questions and collaborative brainstorming
  • more than online diaries.
  • individualized content management system that publishes, organizes, and archives
  • easy to go beyond basic text and incorporate other media, such as photographs, videos, and audio
  • Micro-blogs,
  • 'follow' other members to receive a stream of their posts
  • allow them to easily "ask and answer questions
  • Aggregators Individuals who follow multiple blogs and/or regularly visit news or media sites may find juggling the disparate streams of information overwhelming.
  • tools filter online information and collect articles, media, and conversations customized to the user's needs
  • Metagators, also called portals or start pages, can aggregate feeds, social networks, and widgets to create a central, personalized location for an individual's Internet usage
  • Two of the most popular metagators are Netvibes and iGoogle
  • Widgets are small, adaptable, programmable, web-based gadgets that can be embedded into a variety of sites or used on mobile phones or desktops
  • Using Personal Web Technologies to Create PLEs and PLNs
  • PWTs can be combined by the individual to make a personal learning environment (PLE) and to create and manage a personal learning network (PLN). Due to the fact that they are user-created, there is no exact definition of a PLE
  • In general, a PLE is the sum of websites and technologies that an individual makes use of to learn. PLEs may range in complexity from a single blog to an inter-connected web of social bookmarking tools, personal publishing platforms, search engines, social networks, aggregators, etc.
  • Users can create an online PLN of colleagues and friends from around the world by joining social networking sites, following and commenting on relevant blogs, sharing resources on a social bookmarking site, or by using a micro-blogging platform.
  • Learning Applications of PWTs Because these are open-source, free, adaptable, and user-friendly, PWTs can be of great value to teachers, trainers, and students. However, there is a catch: PWTs may clash with traditional, linear, teacher-centered instruction
  • critical media and information literacy skills, so that students can effectively navigate the online maze and avoid being fooled by false or misleading information.
  • Five Potential Disadvantages of Using PWTs for Learning Although personal web technologies have the potential to support all types of learning, they also have potential disadvantages, ranging from distractions to security concerns.
  • Connection Addiction.
  • Work Interrupted.
  • Popularity Contests.
  • Echo Chambers.
  • Privacy and Security Concerns.
  • Conclusions When learners adopt personal web technologies, it enables and requires them to discard their roles as passive consumers of information and to take on new roles. To successfully use PWTs, learners must become editors who critically question content and sources, librarians who organize and archive resources, and also creators who add their voice to the online chorus by engaging in discussions, collaborating on projects, and contributing their own ideas and media
  • he true quality and effectiveness of a PLE or PLN depends on the learner him/herself
Vanessa Vaile

#etmooc Session 1: Idea Burrs « Beyond These Walls - 1 views

  • Open Movemen
  • 5 (Connected Learning, Digital Storytelling, Digital Literacy, and Digital Citizenship) thatwe will be exploring further in #etmooc
  • Larry’s blog
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  • Ted Talks
  • Where do ideas begin and end? Can ideas be ever completely “owned” as we do we property? Does it all come down to control of resources as a means to be powerful
  • Maybe ideas are like DNA, that can change and evolve, mutate and be of someone but never completely “theirs”. Maybe ideas, as DNA evolve in spite of us, rather that because of us.
  • This reminded me of  Kirby Ferguson’s Embracing the Remix
Vanessa Vaile

The eXtended Web and the Personal Learning Environment « Plearn Blog - 0 views

  • developments in their relation to Personal Learning Environments as several people over the past months have asked me why I think there is a need to develop a Personal Learning Environment at all.
  • Applications and aggregators of information are freely available and people can take their pick of their preferred ones and create their own network
  • easy it is for conglomerates to take over the development of tools and applications
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  • three issues that I find important in this respect.
  • 1. Intelligent data connections are one exciting option for PLE development and networked learning,
  • Recommender systems of information, resources, critical friends and experts could form part of the access options
  • the challenges of an open online networked environment for learning.
  • The reality, however, is different and research is available to show that not all adult learners are able to critically assess what they find online and might prefer to receive guidance
  • difficult it is for anybody to reach and access a deep level of information by using search engines
  • need for critical literacies while learning informally on networks
  • Learning in my view is not synonymous with accessing information, and requires a level of reflection, analysis, perhaps also of problem solving, creativity and interaction
  • 3. Access to technology
  • trends in access and digital divides
  • reasons for their non-participation. Some are related to age and socio-economic group, but some are also related to relevance, confidence and skills set.
  • people least likely to use the Internet are also the least likely to participate in adult education.
  • could PLEs that would provide help with Internet use and might be used on mobile devices be the answer to making the Internet relevant
  • What components would be needed?
  • 1. A personal profiler that would collect and store personal information.
  • 2. An information and resource aggregator to collect information and resources.
  • 3. Editors and publishers enabling people to produce and publish artifacts to aid the learning and interest of others
  • 4. Helper applications that would provide the pedagogical backbone of the PLE and make connections with other internet services to help the learner make sense of information, applications and resources.
  • 5. Services of the learners choice.
  • 6. Recommenders of information and resources.
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    although not specifically stated, this is also about gate keeping and controlling / monitoring information flow
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