Group items tagged

Mark Brown reminds us not to get carried away extolling the power of technology in a post based around Neil Selwyn's critiques of technological determinism.

We envision communications infrastructure that is owned and operated cooperatively, by the whole of humanity, rather than by corporations and states.We are using the power of peer-to-peer technologies to create a global network which is immune to censorship and resistant to breakdown.We promote freedoms, support innovations and advocate technologies that enhance and enable digital self-determination.

Australian report from Ernest and Young. Some good points about 'drivers' of change but maybe a little too much weight placed on the theme of technological determinism i.e. change is inevitable. 

"Much has been written about wikis' reliability and use in the classroom. This research bulletin addresses the negative impacts on institutional welfare that can arise from participating in and supporting wikis. The open nature of the platform, which is fundamental to wiki operation and success, enables these negative consequences. A finite user base that can be determined a priori (e.g., a course roster) minimizes the security implications, hence our discussion in this bulletin primarily concerns open or public wikis that accept contributions from a broad and unknown set of Internet users."

"How often do we read about the importance of teachers in education? It must be every day, it seems. We are told about 'strong empirical evidence that teachers are the most important school-based determinant of student achievement' again and again."

"As learning technologies are now integral to most higher education student learning experiences, universities need to make strategic choices about what technologies to adopt and how to best support and develop the use of these technologies, particularly in a climate of limited resources. Information from students is therefore a valuable contribution when determining institutional goals, building infrastructure and improving the quality of student learning. This paper draws on a survey of student experiences and expectations of technology across three Australian universities. Analysis of text responses from 7,000 students provides insight into ways that institutional learning technologies and academic-led technologies are influencing the student experience. This paper also discusses how the three universities have used this information to develop strategic initiatives, and identifies a need for new strategies to support academic-led use of the available tools."

Post on how to design PD so we can determine if it worked.

"A universally frustrating experience for undergraduates is the struggle to determine the prerequisites they need to graduate in their chosen fields. But help is close at hand."

A group looking to extend education beyond testing and into life skills. "A gulf has opened up between what education systems provide and what children and young people need. Our schools and colleges rightly try to to ensure that young people are literate, numerate and gain academic qualifications. But the emphasis on testing and passing exams often squeezes out other skills that are just as vital in today's world. The leading non-political and non-profit-making organisations that have come together to form Whole Education are determined to change this. They want all young people to receive a well-rounded education that they can relate to. They want all to learn practical skills such as communication and teamwork, to develop qualities such as resilience and empathy and to acquire knowledge that goes beyond literacy and numeracy to an understanding of our culture. A Whole Education will combine practical skills with theory, vocational and academic study for all young people whatever their ability."

"RecentChangesCamp is an Open Space Technology format unconference focused on wikis and collaborative practices. The conference is named after the "Recent changes" feature that is found in most wikis. Recent Changes Camp follows an unconference model of being free to participants and an Open Space model in having a program that is determined on-site by participants. Check out the session ideas people are thinking about for Boston and Canberra."

"This paper defines and examines three generations of distance education pedagogy. Unlike earlier classifications of distance education based on the technology used..."

This paper defines and examines three generations of distance education pedagogy. Unlike earlier classifications of distance education based on the technology used, this analysis focuses on the pedagogy that defines the learning experiences encapsulated in the learning design. The three generations of cognitive-behaviourist, social constructivist, and connectivist pedagogy are examined, using the familiar community of inquiry model (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 2000) with its focus on social, cognitive, and teaching presences. Although this typology of pedagogies could also be usefully applied to campus-based education, the need for and practice of openness and explicitness in distance education content and process makes the work especially relevant to distance education designers, teachers, and developers. The article concludes that high-quality distance education exploits all three generations as determined by the learning content, context, and learning expectations.

George Siemens catches the mood that Audrey Watters, Jim Groom and others have been pushing out. Technology is too shiny and we forget the humans that we work with at the peril of developing automatons and throwing away people and creativity.