Siemen's (2008) article is not a recent publication; and given the technological advances made in the last eight years, it seems the Higher Education sector is lagging behind in developing an approach that fully satisfies its students' needs. In fact, the questions being asked by Siemens in this article, are still being asked in most HE course and program design meetings, with the answers still being discussed and stymied be change resistant debate. I have a similar vision of the future as the one described by Siemens; and what this article was able to for me, was to verbalise and rationalises the reasons why this vision may become a reality in our universities. What would be the role of the educator? How would we teach? Assuming that there has been a shift from institution controlled teaching to a more learner controlled model, the role of the educator is profound. Although most would agree that a more constructivist approach to learning is beneficial to both students and teachers, I suspect that many academics feel threatened by this shift. Furthermore, the concept of the fluidity of knowledge must alarm some, who have spent a life time building a reputation as an expert in their particular areas. Add to this, the emerging alternative modes of teaching and learning in the form of borderless education, private for profit organisations and corporate universities (Siemens, 2008). The new courses would contain content that is not communicated by one educator, but many educators, from different institutions, representing different points of view. Ideally, this situation provides more diverse resources, including a network of relationships providing fluid, multi-level knowledge. But the fact remains, that if Higher Education institutions wish to remain relevant, they need to operate in a way that enables their students to acquire the skills that will allow them to continually know more - as Angela also points out in "Adopting a different framework for education". One key element in achieving this is for the educators to be operating in synergy with the learning objectives. What would be the role of the learner? In Siemen's world, the learner would be more in control of their learning processes. Because learners are all very different, there would need to be a broad spectrum in terms of learning experiences offered. The two broad categories would include; 1) learners who would prefer a structured pathway leading to their learning objective; 2) Learners who prefer to self-regulate their learning journey by exercising a high level of choice. I don't think Siemens would have ever meant these two categories to be set in stone. I see students as falling into categories along a spectrum that spans the two categories; and also changing their position and preferences each time they pursue a different learning objective. How would the curriculum be created? Shared? One of the areas affected would be the design and content of learning experiences. Historically, courses in Higher Education evolved as a response to "non-experts" wanting to acquire knowledge from "experts" in a specialised field. These experts may struggle to remain experts in terms of content. However, one remedy would be to provide students with the means to independently search for and discover the knowledge they require. Adam picks up on this idea in his blog post "An end to Meaningless Jobs". Courses would need to be designed with a greater focus on skill, with Educators facilitating broad content parameters. Consequently, it would make sense for curriculum to be guided by the journeys of the learners, or at least flexible enough to accommodate each learner's personal knowledge acquisition within the broader curriculum. Ideally, this information would be organised, manipulated, modified and eventually shared, forming the basis future curriculum. I see the curriculum in HE being partially provided by multiple perspectives; the university educators, experts from outside the university and the students/learners themselves. Currently, the technology and advances in learning theory (Connectivism and Constructivism) supports a more participatory curriculum that enables greater participation, collaboration, creation and sharing; but, "The call for a new pedagogy to accompany new instructional technologies; however, has largely remained unanswered" (Davidovitch, 2007, as cited in Siemens, 2008, p. 8) This is the challenge that universities face, a challenge that needs to be met within for any meaningful change to occur. How would research be conducted? I think research has often been carried out in the spirit of collaboration and facilitated by the existence of networks. Researchers have always sort information and ideas from outside their institution; seeking the most current and relevant information form around the globe. They have also shared their work in academic journals and conferences in a collegial and truth-driven way. The positives of network learning is that this sharing and research is more accessible to a broader range of people. This has benefits such as lessening the costs involved in facilitating conferences and face to face networking. It may also increase the amount of information and networking, and while there will need to be a system of filtering the information, the probability of a richer and more complex understanding of the shared information is high. What would the role of the university in society? This question is one that I think some staff at universities ask with trepidation because they perceive that it affects their future,- and it does do this. To be fair, some are dubious about change because they have an affection for the way things have been in the past. The institutions need to reassure their academic staff that the central function of universities should not change. Universities should remain a hub of independent learning; but the sustainability of Higher education institutions also depends on their ability to evolve in to a connection forming organisation (Siemens, 2008) making relationships with sources, moderating information, facilitating research and engendering a spirit of inquiry and discovery in a neutral atmosphere. What would education look like? How would we mark? Accredit? Accreditation is one of the most important functions of a university. Most students seeking a degree probably still want to say they have completed their degree from a particular university. Some may also need to validate their credentials by completing a degree from a particular university with a area speciality. Siemens questions whether this accreditation translates into competence, and whether we need to widen accreditation to include the whole personal learning experience of a student. This sounds ideal, bit the practicalities of this type of accreditation need to be considered in relation the changing role of the educator. In a previous post, I talked about the different roles and functions that educators would need to fulfil in the future. Siemens also talks about the learning mentors and peer support, in addition to the main instructor. For accreditation purposes, there may need to be a significantly larger number of staff monitoring and gathering data from the enlarged student learning experiences. This appears to be an opportunity, rather than a problem. References Adopting a different framework for education. (2016). Angelamartlewedu8117. Retrieved from https://angelamartlewedu8117.wordpress.com/2016/08/25/adopting-a-different- framework-for-education/ An end to meaningless jobs. (2016). Adam Does NGL. (2016). An end to meaningless jobs. Retrieved from https://adamngl.wordpress.com/2016/08/24/an-end-to- meaningless-jobs/ Siemens, G. (2008). New structures and spaces of learning: The systemic impact of connective knowledge, connectivism, and networked learning. Actas Do Encontro Sobre Web.
0 Comments
Source: (Kurtzman, 2016) Source: (Morris, 2013) Brigitte's post, as always, raised some thought-provoking and slightly uncomfortable points about our collective experience with the NGL course blog. It was a timely read, as the lack of course participation and interaction had taken its toll on me, and my interest levels in the course had waned considerably. My motivation had become one of resignation that I would just get through the course as best I could, and move on. However, I felt buoyed by the increased activity of course participants. Perhaps it was prompted by the activity report - who knows? But what I did discover, was that other participants (Adam, Miranda, Angela) had experienced similar feelings about the lack of connectedness and interaction in this course. Brigitte also pointed out that some participants may have had limited experience using blogs; this may have affected their confidence about getting involved early. These developments got me thinking about the blog as a teaching tool, and motivated me to "seek" out more information about the psychology around blogs; what motivates people to create them; who uses them and for what purpose? These questions are important as blogs have become a popular tool of choice in education design. Why use blogs? According to Statista (2014, as cited in Duarte, 2015), there were approximately 173 million blogs on the world wide web. I suspect that number has doubled since those statistics were produced. Why are they so successful? The success of blogs is partly due to their ease of use and the interactivity element. The other element of their success - or failure - is influenced by whether they fulfill their purpose in reaching their audience. Blogs can be classified into different categories and groupings. Williams and Jacobs (2004, as cited in Duarte, 2015) identify five different types of blogs: group blogs, family blogs, corporate blogs, community blogs and blogs defined by their content. Edu blogs can include: school blogs, degree blogs, teacher blogs, course blogs, alumni blogs and student blogs (Sim & Hew, 2010, as cited in Duarte, 2015) Are they useful in the education setting? Blogs satisfy three elements that motivate people; expressing personal identity, creating community, and consciously structuring experiences. In the education setting, they can extend participation outside classroom time and space, as well as, facilitate reflective, collaborative and interactive practice by students (Duarte, 2015). However, using blogs as a teaching tool needs to be considered carefully in terms of what the purpose of the blog is, the audience for the blog, and the sustainability of the purpose. Duarte (2015) explored the use of blogs among Higher Education students and concluded that:
The quote below sums up what teachers need to consider when including blogs in the design of their course. "Instructors play an important role, as no technology becomes an effective learning tool without a lot of effort of the teachers. They need to do their best to match students interests with their instructional expectations and goals in order to increase the students' motivation to become and remain involved with blog activities" (Duarte, 2015). And finally, returning to some of Brigitte's concerns, I too have found it difficult to respond to posts, even though I have enjoyed reading them. That may be explained partially by the fact that we haven't established enough shared experience to feel connected, and so therefore feel inhibited to respond. I also feel that the personal blog has its limitations. The process of the public click is a useful one; one that I think is similar to keeping a journal or diary. Do some individuals overdo it, and become quite self-absorbed and insular? Is it important that other people read your blog? Isn't it like the proverbial tree in the forest? If no-one reads your blog, does it really exist? As a student, I have explored the blogs of a few of the "experts" cited in this course - Goodyear, Siemens, Cormier and Downs. It is interesting to see the difference in the approach and organisation of their own blogs. Here are the links again: David Cormier : http://davecormier.com/ Stephen Downes: http://www.downes.ca/ Peter Goodyear: https://petergoodyear.net/blog-posts/ George Siemens: http://www.elearnspace.org/blog/ References Duarte, P. (2015). The use of a group blog to actively support learning activities. Active Learning in Higher Education 16(2) 103–117. Brigitte's post "Learning Analytics and Beyond" raises some valid points about these tools. With regard to LMSs, I would like to see a balance between the use of LMS and a student’s personal cyber-infrastructure, rather than an eradication of LMSs. I’m sure you didn’t mean getting rid of them all together Brigitte. Both tools have advantages and disadvantages; and is there any reason why both can’t remain part of an individual learners’s toolkit? Personally, I enjoy using LMS and appreciate the analytic capability; although, I do concede that the data from LMS alone is limited. Suthers and Rosen (2011) claim that: Learning and knowledge creation is often distributed across multiple media and sites in networked environments. Traces of such activity may be fragmented across multiple logs and may not match analytic needs. As a result, the coherence of distributed interaction and emergent phenomena are analytically cloaked. This quote applies to some of my activity in this course. I posted a couple of questions in the forum of our course page about commenting directly on participant's blogs. David pointed out that I can do this, but these comments will not be captured and counted in my marks for Assignment 1. Hence, I am modifying comments that I made on Brigitte's page into a post.
How I use LMS data I use LMS data primarily for course design purposes – to understand what the students do not participate in and where an alternative may need to be included. I’ve mostly used the data in a general way to diagnose issues relating to a cohort as a whole, rather than issues relating to individuals. However, I must admit I have found data pertaining to individual student activity useful when combined with other data; meaning the LMS data is never enough to complete the picture on its own. References Learning analytics and beyond. (2016) BeeLearningBlog. Retrieved from https://beelearningblog.wordpress.com/2016/08/12/learning-analytics- and-beyond/ Suthers, D. D., & Rosen, D. (2011). A unified framework for multi-level analysis of distributed learning Proceedings of the First International Conference on Learning Analytics & Knowledge, Banff, Alberta, February 27-March 1, 2011. David's post Exploring Moodle Book Module usage – part 1 – background and planning threw up some questions for me about the future of e-books and their role in Higher Education. Generally, I have come to view e-books as a possible solution to a number of issues that I deal with as a teacher.
Anecdotally, a significant number of students referred to our team for poor academic performance or learning issues, do not own the relevant course textbook. Reasons for this vary: "I can't afford it" "The lecturer told us not to bother buying it" "The bookshop doesn't have it in stock" "The library doesn't have enough copies" "It's too big to carry". My initial reaction is always: Wouldn't it be great to have a whole swag of e-books, that the students could borrow for a reasonable price each semester? Better still - a course e-textbook with the cost built into course fees. Ideal - yes; probability - low. The Moodle book module that David discusses in this post appears to provide a compromise - something between a detailed study guide and textbook, but with the capability of a workbook. In my imagination, I can see students using the Moodle book module in similar ways to a print book, but with the opportunity to engage in learning opportunities more appropriate to the digital environment. I've come to think of our course blog in a similar way - as our core learning platform that provides enrichment opportunities to deepen understanding (links, readings, activities, graphics, videos). Whether the Moodle book Module is a suitable network learning resource could be determined by whether the participants from each course group meaningfully contribute their experiences and learning to build on existing knowledge. The same could be said for our course Blog. References Exploring Moodle book module usage- Part 1 - background and planning. (2016). The Weblog of (a) David Jones. Retrieved from https://davidtjones.wordpress.com/2016/08/13/exploring- moodle-book-module-usage-part-1/ According to Goodyear (2014), one of the most significant trends has been the introduction and proliferation of mobile learning networks. This makes NGL more flexible in its application as participants are not restricted to fixed physical places. This aspect also facilitates another trend identified - taking the physical world into the digital world. Goodyear refers to a previous study (Goodyear & Carvalho, 2013), where a paramedic training activity used mobile devices, learning collaboration and physical circumstance to successfully carry out a simulation; and most importantly, leave experiences that became learning. The other development in recent years has been Web 2.0 tools and less need to be dependent on one platform. There is a multitude of different tools available, but the challenge is to select the ones that can best facilitate the learning objectives. Not unlike the proliferation of mobile devices and networks, the tools to support these networks grow daily. Finding a framework to evaluate these tools in a time-efficient is equally as challenging. Perez-Sanagustin et al. (2008) provide a simple framework, which of course has its limitations, but uses generic terms that most people can understand without having to have an ICT background. This evaluation involves sorting learner activities into three activity contexts:
Each activity context comprises primitive activities, which are generic activities that Web 2.0 tools perform. Knowledge mining
Educators can use a table/checklist to evaluate whether the Web tools being considered for inclusion can perform these functions and how well. Web tools can be compared, using these categories. Often there is criticism that teachers, lecturers and educators alike, do not embrace technology to the extent that is required by students and the demands of the future. Sometimes, demystifying and clarifying complexity can provide the breakthrough. This framework attempts to do that. References Goodyear, P. (2014). Productive Learning Networks: The Evolution of Research and Practice. In L. Carvalho & P. Goodyear (Eds.), The Architecture of Productive Learning Networks (pp. 23–47). London: Routledge. Perez- Sanagustin, M., Santos, P., Moghnieh, A., Hernandez-Leo, D., Blat, J. (2008) A conceptual framework for the integration of Web Tools in Lifelong LearningScenarios. Barcelona: University of Pompeu Fabra. Retrieved from http://dspace.ou.nl/bitstream/1820/1567/1/perez-agustin-et-al-tenc-ws- oct08.pdf Reddit
Watching the Sunrise program on Channel 7 this morning, I saw an interview with a gentleman who was the first person to successfully complete the new Pokemon GO game. I don't know very much about this game, but I gather that participants need to find individual Pokemons located around the world. The gentleman said that he used Reddit frequently to help him in this quest. For me, it raised the possibility of using Reddit in the classroom to facilitate discovery through participation and collaboration. This successful Pokemon quest involved a network of people in different locations, who most probably didn't know each other, contributing knowledge to a common project, participating and collaborating together to formulate new knowledge, and ultimately achieving success in that project. www.reddit.com/r/pokemongo/ |
Archives |