Ratings on Moodle Forums - thought from TEAP and student feedback - use to allow non-verbal engagement with forum. Numerical rating possible at least - maybe can have a like, agree, disagree, good point etc rating? Adding more opportunity for the lurkers?

Humanistic education - Good overview at wikipedia.

Humanism - Carl Rogers - "best known contribution - the 'core conditions' for facilitative (counselling and educational) practice - congruence (realness), acceptance and empathy)." "We cannot teach another person directly; we can only facilitate his learning"

Seemingly considerable resources to support use of multimedia in education. 

Whole blogresource from George Siemens (I think?) about Connectivism.

The original Connectivist MOOC. Would be interesting to explore the site properly - not sure how much is accessible... 

- I can't remember who posted this from our TEAP class or where! :( I like it's practical stance and it's useful starting points for truly integrating video and media into teaching design.

Another study looking at the relationship between social media use and academic achievement/engagement. Interesting that here some activities are more likely to have a positive impact. Are these the kind of interactions we could encourage by embracing learners' connectedness and engagement with social media? ► Students who spent more time on Facebook scored lower on an engagement scale. ► There was no relationship between time spent on Facebook and time spent studying. ► Students who spent more time on Facebook spent more time in campus activities. ► In general, Facebook activities were more strongly predictive of engagement. ► Some Facebook activities were negative predictors, while others were positive.

The findings indicated that young people who had used Facebook (but not YouTube) for more than a year had higher scores in tests of verbal ability, working memory, and spelling, compared to their peers who had used it for a shorter time period.  - FB and other social media as a 'practice ground' for data sorting, communication and social connectedness - Also some interesting details on survey methods used. 

Paper presented at 2013 Moodle Research conference - part of final year undergraduate research at Cass. I think it's important to look at data directly from students. Can we make them real partners in the design and experience of courses?

Note it is 'How' - no longer a question of 'is it'!

A short but long-sighted, wider perspective on how we view technology, how 'ordinary' it becomes, how challenging it can seem to current ways of being etc... All with DA's usual wit!

Changing the context for learning can really stimulate learners to engage with a subject, critically and personally.