The midden » participation http://sumdy.edublogs.org education, technology, change Tue, 20 Oct 2009 12:02:44 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.2 en hourly 1 Half an Hour: The Future of Online Learning: Ten Years On http://sumdy.edublogs.org/2008/11/21/half-an-hour-the-future-of-online-learning-ten-years-on/ http://sumdy.edublogs.org/2008/11/21/half-an-hour-the-future-of-online-learning-ten-years-on/#comments Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:56:01 +0000 Will Stewart http://sumdy.edublogs.org/2008/11/21/half-an-hour-the-future-of-online-learning-ten-years-on/

  • This posting by Stephen Downes provides a useful summary of where we are at now and how we got here. He re-visits a previous article written in 1998, noting that many of his earlier predictions have been remarkably accurate. The main areas he discusses include:

  • new technologies in education – the teaching process remains relatively unchanged despite more than 10 years of the Internet
  • online conferencing – becoming increasing important as a way of understanding communication in an online environment
  • personalised learning – the importance of informal learning in the online environment is being increasingly acknowledged, where students are not restricted by the constraints of the traditional classroom model
  • time and place independence – as small, lightweight wireless devices become the norm, online learning and mobile learning become the same
  • learning communities – the internet has developed into an enabler of communities within which individuals can learn

    Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

    ]]>     http://sumdy.edublogs.org/2008/11/21/half-an-hour-the-future-of-online-learning-ten-years-on/feed/ 0     There are no natives – we’re all in the same boat http://sumdy.edublogs.org/2008/07/11/there-are-no-natives-were-all-in-the-same-boat/ http://sumdy.edublogs.org/2008/07/11/there-are-no-natives-were-all-in-the-same-boat/#comments Fri, 11 Jul 2008 10:43:23 +0000 Will Stewart http://sumdy.edublogs.org/?p=121 Portal to media literacy

    Mike Wesch’s latest Youtube video, A Portal to Media Literacy, is essential viewing for all educators. He describes so clearly why we have to change and challenge the present system of educating our young people. He is clearly a passionate teacher and someone who understands the world in which his students move.

    His dismantling of the idea that “to learn is to acquire information”, the basis of our exam-driven school and college system and our institution-centred university system, is a joy to listen to.

    He argues that our students might know how to use Youtube, Facebook, Blogger, Digg and MySpace for their own entertainment but they don’t know how to use them to learn or to create something interesting or new. So, in this sense they are no more “natives” than we are. We can’t assume that our students are media literate – even though they use Wikipedia all the time, many don’t realise it’s a wiki and can be edited.

    The challenge for Higher Education, and indeed our 5-18 system, is to create “platforms of participation that allow students to realize and leverage the emerging media environment”. Moving our school, colleges and universities out of their “content delivery” model to one where students are participating, collaborating, sharing, creating and evaluating is how we develop an education system that is relevant to the next generation of learners. As I have said before, we have undersold and largely failed the Google generation – those who are in the system at the moment. But it is not too late to do something about the ones who are coming along after them. Put aside some time and watch the entire 66 minutes of this video – in 67 minutes you’ll be inspired to do something!

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