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Technology Enhanced as taught by the Open University Masters in Open & Distance Education (MAODE)
End-of-module assessment question (EMA)
Length: 6,000 words. Cut-off date 26 September 2011
- consolidate and reflect on your experience this year
- pursue your interests within a specified framework.
EMA, Part A. Digital technologies: experience and evidence (about 2,500 words)
Choose two digital technologies that you have used this year as a learner.
If you have doubts about whether your choice of technologies is appropriate, please consult your tutor.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
For each technology that you choose, explain how it has been used for teaching and learning, and what you judge to be the strengths and weaknesses of such use(s) in one or more contexts that you specify.
- FORUMS
- MOBILE
Support your arguments by providing evidence from all of the following four sources:
- Your own experience of the technology within and/or outside H800 and, if possible, the personal experience of other learners – for example, H800 students, or others outside H800. Include examples and, where appropriate, brief quotations to illustrate your own and others’ experiences.
- Relevant ideas, arguments and research findings in the H800 materials – the web pages on the website and/or materials (readings, blogs, YouTube, webcasts and so on) linked from the site.
- Relevant ideas, arguments and research that you find outside the H800 website – through your own searching and/or through sharing with other learners inside and/or outside H800.
- Brief numerical evidence – for example, of the kind that is explored in the first paper in TMA04 – from within or from outside H800. Use it to back up your arguments about one or both of your technologies.
INTRODUCTION
‘The first decade of the 21st century is already on the wane and we stand at an interesting point as regards the use of technology to support and enhance learning and teaching. The fact that we still refer to much of this enhancement as e.learning (and still disagree about what the term actually means) signals that the relationship between technology and learning is not as yet an entirely comfortable one.’ (REFERENCE JISC 2007 (Introduction)
- High-performance computing and advanced networking are ubiquitous
- Internet has matured
- Becoming a viable educational platform
- Have cell phones
Report of the NSF Task Force on Cyberlearning June 24, 2008
FORUMS online may be synchronous or asynchronous, that is experienced in real time or not. They may, particularly when synchronous, be voice-led whilst asynchronicity lends itself to text. Increased speeds, experience, improving, competing and complementary technologies has produced and is producing a plethora of choices regarding the affordances and popularity of particular forums and even puts into question the way a virtual learning environment competes and complements a personal learning environment.
- Strengths
- Weaknesses
MOBILE online learning differentiates between static systems such as a desktop computers, whether at home, the workplace or educational institution, and devices, through increasing miniturisation have become more and more portable, from laptops, to increasingly ‘smart’ mobile phones and most recently tablets, touchscreen computers of A5 size or less. To be mobile implies away from a desk, unhindered by cables, with a device that is portable, even pocket portable rather than in a brief-case or shoulder carrier.
- Strengths
- Weaknesses
ONE
FORUMS online became possible as the technology, connections and broadening availability and use of computers allowed institutions to attempt to recreate what would occur face-to-face in terms of formal tutorials or peer-group gatherings. There has always been a dichotomy between institutional offerings and what students did themselves, on the one hand building on old practices in the new world of what was still called ‘new media’ a decade ago whilst developing innovative and new ways of doing things. At the forefront of developing computer-based learning the OU through the Institute of Educational Technology and Knowledge Media Institute began to offer ways for students and educators to meet and share online in the late 1990s, signed up for H801, the original Masters in Open and Distance Learning, I have first hand experience of the ListServe forum that in essence aggregated short messages in a feed that was ostensibly asynchronous unless people happened to be online at the same time (in which case we’d debunk to Microsoft messaging). A decade later the advance of computing, the increasingly seamless interaction online, the development of intuitive, playful, reliable tools with broadband speeds and robust devices has seen increasing successful recreation of the affordances of live, face-to-face tutorials, seminars, lectures and conferences from the intimate to the arena in scale, while also new ways of doing things are constantly being developed, trialed, used, improved, drop in or out of favour and funding. Crucially, longitutdinal research has been vital to understand and track the trends, but also we have moved from a decade in the 1990s where ‘change’ was becoming a corporate way of life, to an online experience today that is fluid and not just invasive but part of many people’s everyday lives – all day, wherever they maybe.
- Personal experiences of others in H800
Week 12 Activity 1. Interpretting John Naughton. In which Joanne Pratt tries again after reading Amanda’s blog, then offers examples of a lexigraphic explanation of the minutiea of John Naughton’s persuasive writing style. (2 May, 21:12 (accessed 7 May 2011) Identified, shared with further notes in my blog (Ecphonesis! Lots of work to do here – fun times ahead. 7 May, 06:45 In response to a fellow students H800 Week 12 blog entry)
I comment ‘This is why these conversations are so vital; it brings the exercise alive and takes you in directions the learning designers could never have imagined. My head hurts, yet there is no less a desire to understand the terms used to describe rhetoric as there is a desire to revisit quantitative and qualitative analysis, the various correlation techniques and interpretations used, in order to be able, eventually, to draw my own conclusions from Richardson’s research’. Having had
TO JANET AND JOANNE (12 May 2011)
<<For me, this is a key point relating to learner choices, ownership and boundaries. Should a learner be required to ‘open up’ their personal networks to include tutors/education institutions?>>
The idea of and value of ‘exposure’ has been debated since the early days of blogging. I could call up entries from 2001/2002. The feeling, amongst those of us who felt like blogging pioneers, was that by opening up we shared our common humanity and in many respects become less lonely souls as a result (not that I didn’t need additional companionship being happily married to my soul mate with two small children at the time!). This kind of blog is a genre in its own right amongst the thousands of genres on 120 million + blogs.
A formal forum discussion that engaged, running from the 8th to the 20th May, 67 entries, student initiate, 9 participants, over 12,000 words. (Wk 13: Activity 1c: The Learner Experience 9 May 2011, 17:48 Janet Gray Post 14 in reply to 8 ) http://learn.open.ac.uk/mod/forumng/discuss.php?d=470597
- Relevant ideas, arguments and research findings in the H800 materials
The world of work is increasingly collaborate driven by increasingly the global and cooperative nature of business. Horizon 2011
‘Consider this medium as like talking with your fingers – half-way between spoken conversation and written discourse.’ (Hawkridge, Morgan and Jeffs, 1997, quotes in Salmon 2005) REFERENCE Salmon, G (2005) E-moderating. The Key to teaching and learning online.
What matters is engagement.
Someone may need to act as the ‘eyes & ears’ for the group until it is established. Introductions have to be made, conversations started and moved along … if anyone is rude, they should be quietly put in their place; if anyone is being like a door-mouse, they need support.
‘The essential role of the e-moderator is promoting human interaction and communication through the modelling, conveying and building of knowledge and skills’. (Salmon, 2005:4)
- Relevant ideas, arguments and research findings outside the H800 materials
Discussion is the key. The tutor DOES NOT need to be a subject matter expert. See my interview with Oxford Senior Lecturer Dr Zbigniew
Pelczynski.H800 51 Wk11 Why this is like talking with your fingers
FROM MY BLOG (25 April 2011)
Why I participate in some forums and not others.
- Start the ball rolling
- to get through the week’s work
- no one else has made a start.
- I may fret about covering all bases
It can be like chosing a restaurant
- You want to go where there’s some buzz already, though not so much that you feel you will never be able to join in the conversation.
- This is an asynchronous beast. If I come in late I may read every post with care before I respond, which can result in a long response.
- People should feel just as comfortable simply answering the question, ignoring others at first .. or just reading the last couple of posts and responding to them.
- I might quote them in my own group. There have been times when lifting the thread of catalyst that got them going in another group will do the same in your own.
- It is tempting to respond to someone in a DIFFERENT tutor group
- At Harvard they use as system called ‘Rotisserie’ in some asynchronous threads/forums which, like playing pass the parcel (or pass the microphone) require people to take it in turns to say something.
- It matters that activities have been designed that get people engaged without the need for a tutor all the time.
‘Structured, paced and carefully constructed e-tivities reduce the amount of e-moderator time, and impact directly on satisfactory learning outcomes, adding value to the investment in learning technologies’.(Salmon, 2002a)
(Blog 19 January 2011) My interpreation, visualised, of what life-long means from H807.
‘Patterns of usage differ widely, and the fit between people’s lives and the devices they use can be very close.’ (Pettit and Kukulska-Hulme, 2007, p.28)
(Blog 25 September 2010) Why do the Plenck 2010 forums work?
Many themes. It is your choice to join. Updates are sent to your email. You read and add, return to the parent, and comment.
They are seasoned e-educators and lucid. It is more jamming around a piano.
You have three hours in which to return to your post and edit, add or delete.
People don’t question the set up, they just get on with it. Do we write about what it is to put words onto a sheet of paper with a pen? Or do we say something?
(Blog 9 September 2010) A tutorial works best one-to-one (like therapy), face-to-face, or in a small group, say six at most, discussing in an synchronous environment.
(James Turner, Policy Director at the Sutton Trust suggested supplementary tutoring of school students one-to-one was most common, two-to-one worked even better because of the collaboratory experience. BBC Radio 4 10.00 Tuesday 7th September 2010, Accessed again 16.00 Saturday 12th September 2010)
- Numerical evidence
MOBILE
“[Mobile learning involves the] exploitation of ubiquitous handheld hardware, wireless networking and mobile telephony to facilitate, support enhance and extend the reach of teaching and learning”
(www.molenet.org.uk/about)
The increasingly portable nature of computing hardware and technologies has progressed for three decades or more as the earliest efforts of mobile wordprocessing – the Microwriter, the popularisation of computing with the BBC micro-computer, then on to laptops that become ligher, smaller, faster and more robust, to palm devices such as the Psion and hand-sized PDAs, and the gradual merging of all manner of peronsonal, portable devices that carried music, organisers, phone technology and more, with MP3 players popularised by ipods, then the spread of mobile phones, in particular inexpensive communicating through text that brings us to 2011 and light, very powerful two-part keyboard and screen laptops, single part touch-screen tablets of various sizes that are becoming indistinguisable from smartphones. Uptake and support for various devices has been made possible as networks spread, the technology became faster, less expensive and widespread, and importantly a combination of content and communication made the devices increasingy appealing, powerful and personal.
- Personal experiences of others in H800:
Fig 2.1. Types and functionality of mobile devices. Kukulska-Hulme & Traxler (2005:07)
REF: Kukulska-Hulme, A. and Traxler, J (2005) Mobile Learning. A handbook for educators and trainers.
The mobile promise – “that individuals will engage in learning at times when formerly they would have been doing something else; that they will be motivated to learn partly because the devices are attractive; that the devices enable communication from places where formerly it wasn’t possible; that formal learning can mesh with existing patterns of self publishing and online participation; and that mobile devices are particularly suited to multitasking, said to be one of the strengths of the ‘millennial generation’ (McMahon & Pospisil, 2005).”
REF: MacMahon, M., Pospisil, R. (2005 pp421-431) Laptops for digital lifestyle: Millenial students and wireless mobile technologies.
http://www.ascilite.org.au/conferences/brisbane05/blogs/proceedings/49_McMahon%20&%20Pospisil.pdf
Attendance at Learning Technologies 2011 and subsequent use of a Sony Flip for itnerviews and surverys.
Armed with a Kindle with the Swim Drills book loaded I was poolside teaching and coaching swimmers for three hours.
For the last year I have run programmes based on drills in ‘The Swim Drills Book’ and have relied on lesson plans and sometimes laminated print outs.
Today I took the Kindle
From The Swimming Drill Book (2006:04) ‘Standing Streamline Ruben Guzman.
Never before have I found the swimmers so attentive, coming close to the side of the pool to look at the pictures.
Here is a great drill to develop streamlining
From The Swimming Drill Book (2006:06) ‘Streamline Float’ Ruben Guzman.
They start in what we call ‘Dead Swimmer’ then straighten up, arms first, then legs into the ‘streamline position.’ They then kick off, add a few strokes and continue up the pool.
They got, far quicker than my efforts to demonstrate and talk them through.
- Simple.
- The pictures say it all.
- Is this mobile learning?
- Whatever it is, this works.
- Producers
‘Our findings indicate that institutions planning to offer mobile apps should build on the existing preferences of students for social communication. Listening to audio, watching video and reading short texts if the apps are successfully to enhance the learning experience’. (Kukulska-HUlme 2011:32
Personalisation
“Learners can be active makers and shapers of their own learning. They should be supported in using technologies of their own choice where appropriate”. (JISC, 2009, p.51)
- Relevant ideas, arguments and research findings in the H800 materials
Mobile computing not just with laptop computers but also with cellular phones, internet-telephony, videoconferencing, screen sharing, remote collaboration technologies, and immersive graphical environments make distributed collaboration and interaction much richer and more realistic. Report of the NSF Task Force on Cyberlearning June 24, 2008 (REFERENCE wk21-22)
‘Patterns of usage differ widely, and the fit between people’s lives and the devices they use can be very close.’ (Pettit and Kukulska-Hulme, 2007, p.28) REFERENCE Pettit, John and Kukulska-Hulme, Agnes (2007). Going with the grain: mobile devices in practice. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 23(1), pp. 17–33.
- Relevant ideas, arguments and research findings outside the H800 materials
Many Open University students combine work and study; consequently learning in a number of places, or on the move, becomes a habit.
Informal learning and social interactions are also increasingly recognised as important components of a person’s ‘learning life’. Academic and support staff are part of this revolution.
Mobile learning is very flexible: it can be the sole mode of delivery, a significant learning activity, or just a small part of a print-based or online course.
The key points (largely from an IET Agnes Kukulska-Hulme Report Kukulska-Hulme, 2010:10)
Mobile learning is:
- Very flexible
- Appropriate/supportive
- New
- Convenient
- Contemporary
- Practical
- Beneficial
- Has its own unique affordances/advantages
- Personal/personalised
- Spontaneous
- Immediate
- Extends access to materials not replacement technology)
- Locational
- Universal (ish)
- Leap-frog technology in Africa
- Engaging
- Expected
REFERENCE LEARNING AND TEACHING GUIDES FROM IET. MOBILE LEARNING. Agnes Kukulska-Hulme, with case studies by Anna Page.
Kukulska-Hulme (2010) says “Mobile learning is here to stay, even if in a few years’ time it may no longer be distinguishable from ‘just learning’.”
‘E’ is a fact of learning life, Agnes Kukulska-Hulme (2010) is quoted thus in the JISC Mobile and Wireless Technologies Review, “Mobile learning is here to stay, even if in a few years’ time it may no longer be distinguishable from ‘just learning’.”
A distance learner’s mobile device (at the Open University) can be used as a way to:
- carry around study materials
- aces new or additional content
- build up a series of personal notes
- help make or maintain communications between different contexts
Supported by VLE 2.0 and Moodle 2.0
- organised personal learning schedules
- give feedback, opinions or answers
- get quick information or support
- communicate with other learners or tutors
The initial aim of the group is to develop applications around four key areas:
- Enhancing Open University brand and awareness
- Attracting students to new courses
- Making existing course material accessible for mobile study
- Prototyping innovative learning concepts
Woodill (2010:53) identifies seven main affordances of mobile learning:
1. Mobility
2. Ubiquity
3. Accessibility
4. Connectivity
5. Context sensitivity
6. Individuality
7. Creativity
Personalisation. user generated content. Bruns (2005) Produsers
- Numerical evidence
We agree with Kennedy et al (2008) that ‘an evidence-based understanding of students’ technological experiences is vital in informing higher education policy and practice.’ (p. 109)
(93% UK penetration by 2008, presumably more in 2011). More from Mobisite
More in Cloudworks
2% of OU students (4,000 or so) use tablets (not just iPads). 11% use SmartPhones (not just iPhones).
Smartphone Survey (http://testkitchen.colorado.edu/projects/reports/smartphone/smartphone-survey/)
Smartphone Stats, The Digital News Test Kitchen, August 2011
http://testkitchen.colorado.edu/projects/reports/smartphone/smartphone-survey
Martin Weller implies that a VLE constrains because ‘There are so many fantastic tools out there that are free and robust and easy to use.’ (WK21-22 Activity 2d VLE vs. PLE who wins? REFERENCE)
It is the combination of physically being ‘free’ to roam with a robust mobile device, as OU MBA students Lt. Col. Sean Brady put it, a ‘university in your pocket’ (REFERENCE) and a playful, personalisation and desired ‘freedom’ to do things your way at a time and place that suits you, that enables learning to take place away from the learning institution, library or desk, unfettered by a bag of books and files. Mobility and immediacy, exposure to new, or similar products and tools, fashion, peer group, nature of the subject they are studying, their ambitions, who they are, how much time they have, their kit, connection and inclinations, let alone the context of where they are going online and most importantly the means to communicate this instantly through microblogging, blogging, social networks, email and text facilitates and fuels further development, the millions of people online making development commercially viable.
Taking advantage of participation (Seely-Brown), learning on the periphery (Seely-Brown), vicarious learning (Cox) and if you can get your tongue around it ‘serendipitous learning.’ (me I think). (WK21 Activity 1c Web 2.0 Tools for learning REFERENCE) Conole (2011) invites us to use ‘metaphors for meaning making’.
- traffic light
- nurture
- swimming
- hub
- serendipity
- water-cycle
Expressed in various forms in charts from Dion Hinchcliffe.
Accessibility: Regarding the failure to turn a 4 day face-to-face course into a blended course of one day face-to-face, then online with four additional option. ‘Most of these problems seem to be rooted in bad connectivity which made communication difficult and audio discussions impossible’.
University of Derby, Online delivery of MSc Strategic management in Africa (Rachel Stern’s blog 5 March 2010)
(http://www.jiscinfonet.ac.uk/case-studies/tangible/derby/index_html1)
One in three of com 2011
10 % of all UK web traffic
100,000 in Indonesia learning English through SMS messages.
INEQUALITY
300 million fewer than male worldwide (women and mobile: a global opportunity
See issues of accessibility from H807 and H810.
Agnes Kukulska-Hulme, Inaugural Lecture, August 2011
‘Furthermore, since the use of a mobile device represents a new technological means of reading books, articles and news, this might have an impact on how, and how much, students read, however further research would be needed’. (2011:33)
This cover 20 benefits of mobile learning though.
‘We consider that learners who use handheld mobile devices (e.g., their phones and mp3-players) to support their learning constitute a minority at the present time. We agree that their age seems less important than their position as early adopters and instigators of change through their influence among their peers and through their networks’. (2011:19)
PART A CONCLUSION
Both Forums and Mobile
In an age when “communities are jumping across technologies” as needs and trends evolve (Wenger, 2010), educators and researchers also have to stay informed about how learners use personal technologies as members of communities that may be social, work-related or educational’.
REFERENCE
Belshaw (201) Mobile and Wireless Technologies Review 2010 Doug Belshaw, JISC infoNet
Brady, S. http://blogs.ft.com/mba-blog/2011/06/22/distance-learning-or-nearness-learning/#axzz1WbbnlExG
Bruns, A. (2005) ‘Anyone can edit’: understanding the produser. Retrieved from http;//snurb.info/index. php?q=node/s86
Guzman, R (2007) The Swim Drills Book
JISC. (2009). Effective Practice in a Digital Age: A guide to technology-enhanced learning and teaching. Retrieved from http://www.jisc.ac.uk/publications/programmerelated/2009/effectivedigital-age.aspx
Pettit, John and Kukulska-Hulme, Agnes (2007). Going with the grain: mobile devices in practice. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 23(1), pp. 17–33.
Kerfoot, B.P., Armstrong,E.G., O’Sullivan,P.N., (XXXXX) Interactive Spaced-Education to Teach the Physical Examination:A Randomized Controlled Trial
Rogers, E.M. (2005) Diffusion of innovations (5th ed.) New York, NY: Free Press
Traxler, J. (2009) ‘Learning in a Mobile Age’ (International Journal of Mobile and Blended Learning, 1(1), 1-12, January-March 2009)
Traxler, J. (2009) ‘Students and mobile devices: choosing which dream’ (in ALT-C 2009 “In dreams begins responsibility” – choice, evidence and change, Traxler, John (Professor of Mobile Learning, University of Wolverhampton)
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EMA, Part B. Digital technologies: your recommendations (about 1,250 words)
For each of the two technologies you have chosen, set out your key recommendations for other practitioners in terms of how they might use each one, making sure that you specify the context(s) you are referring to. Include some brief numerical evidence (as with Part A) to support one or more of your recommendations in Part B.
For each recommendation, indicate how confident you can be (‘high’, ‘medium’ or ‘low’) in the light of the evidence you have used in Part A, explaining your reasons. Conflicting evidence, for example, is likely to lead to a ‘low’ or ‘medium’ rating.
For each technology, state the areas where you consider additional research is needed into the ways in which that technology can be used.
EMA, Part C. Digital technologies: your design or specification (about 1,250 words)
For one of the technologies that you wrote about in Parts A and B:
- Design a learning activity, or create a specification for a module or training package, that uses this technology.
- Explain: the characteristics of the learners; their previous knowledge (as far as you can tell) both of the technology and of any subject matter; the context(s) in which they will be learning; and how (if at all) others will support these learners. The context does not have to be the one(s) you wrote about in Parts A or B.
- Explain any potential barriers your learners may face – including cost, accessibility for students with disabilities, issues of cultural diversity and convenience. Explain how your design or specification takes these into account.
- Set out the learning outcomes that you expect the learners to have achieved by the end of the module/package. (If you’d like guidance on what constitutes a learning outcome, please see H800’s outcomes and/or search the web.)
- Explain your reasons for your design or specification, drawing on the bullet points above and on your thinking in Parts A and B.
- Do not submit the learning material itself; instead, tell your reader what the activity consists of: you may provide a written description, sample text, screenshots, etc. You may use one of the tools introduced in Weeks 8 and 9, or another tool of your choice, to clarify your design. (If you take this route, you may insert the diagram in your main text or – cross-referenced – in the Appendix.) But you can also use text, provided that this will enable the markers to understand what you intend.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
‘The psychological conclusion demands a distribution of repetitions such that some of them should be produced at a later time, separated from the first repetition by a pause’. (Vygotsky, 1926:Location 2686)
OBJECTIVES:
The objective of the study is to investigate the efficacy and acceptability of a novel online educational methodology termed ‘interactive spaced education’ (ISE) as a method to teach the physical examination.
DESIGN:
Randomized control trial.
PARTICIPANTS:
170 second year medical students.
MEASUREMENTS:
- Spaced-education items (questions and explanations)
- Validated by two experts
- Piloted and 36 items selected for inclusion
- 6 spaced-education e-mails each week for a 6 week cycle.
- Students submitted answers to the questions online and received immediate feedback
- An online end-of program survey was administered.
Students do the training, but may still have poor recall a year later. Spacing works.
The spacing effect is the psychological finding that educational encounters that are spaced and repeated over time (spaced distribution) result in more efficient learning and improved learning retention, compared to massed distribution of the educational encounters (bolus education). (P973)
As Vygotsky expressed it 80 years previously:
‘It should also be emphasized that every person has his own customary rate of response, and that any change in this rate, either speeding it up or slowing it down, weakens the force of recall’. (Vygotsky, 1926:Location 2686)
Micro-learning is favoured over more substantial time being given to this. I can imagine many applications.
Mobile over web.
This finding is in stark contrast to the strong resistance we encountered when conducting a recent trial of web-based teaching modules among 693 medical residents and students. In this trial focusing on systems based practice competency education, trainees were expected to spend 20 minutes per week over 9 weeks completing web-based teaching modules (interactive web-pages and online narrated slide presentations). (p977)
And a finaly word from Lev Vygotsky.
‘Rhythm plays a decisive role in the learning process, unifying some of the material, conferring on it a sequential symmetry, and, finally, organizing the various elements into a unified whole’. (Vygotsky, 1926)
REFERENCE
Kerfoot, B, P (2006) SPACED EDUCATION. Interactive Spaced-Education to Teach the Physical Examination: A randomized Controlled Trial.
Vygotsky, L (1926) Educational Psychology
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
EMA, Part D. Digital technologies: individual and collaborative learning (about 1,000 words)
As your conclusion to your EMA and to your work on H800, think back across your experience of H800 and give your answer to the following:
- To what extent do you find the concepts of ‘individual’ and ‘collaborative’ learning useful in understanding your experience of learning this year – whether on H800 or elsewhere?
Give brief examples to illustrate your experience, and draw on some of the debates and theories in H800 to explain your position (for example, the work of Sfard, Brown, Engeström, Wenger, Säljö). If possible, indicate how your ideas have changed since you wrote TMA01.
______________________________________________________________________________________
Week 20: TMA03 (1000 words) Jonathan Vernon (T7400886)
Part A. Digital technologies: experience and evidence
Which two technologies do you currently expect to choose, and why?
1. Forums
2. Tablets
Forums as asynchronous and near-synchronous places to listen, comment and contribute have become the online equivalent of the one-to-one, face-to-face tutorial, the face-to-face tutor group, small class, even those moments of serendipity when you meet someone in a corridor, Junior Common Room or by the water-cooler.
Mobility is just one facet of the affordances a tablet offers to the learner; the fascination is to understand how the devices are used, rather than what they were designed to do. From research, blogs and forums the experience of the ‘tablet enabled’ learner suggests that unlike almost defunct hand and palm-held devices, this format will endure.
2. Which of the two technologies (if any) have you used on H800, and which (if any) have you used outside H800?
Forums
Since their development and my being active online since 1999 and starting the MAODL in 2001.
Tablets
Through their proposed exploitation with the new OU MBA and so having a tablet for the last month to explores its educational and other values to learners and the Faculty.
3. Briefly: how has each of these two technologies been used for teaching and learning?
My experience is both as an OU student, primarily for the last 18 months, but including a valuable dip into this environment for seven months in 2001 and now as a member of staff with the OU Faculty of Business and Law.
Regarding the use of tablets for learning, not only using one to do the MAODE it also holds OU MBA course content and incidentally it greatly facilitates the engagement in forums through RSS feeds, email alerts, near instant uploading to forums and the qualities of the tablets themselves in relation to screen size, speed reading, ease of response and so on.
4. For which context(s) will you be discussing the strengths and weaknesses of each technology?
The value to postgraduates working in international organisations on the OU Business School part-time MBA.
5. Briefly: what material will you provide in relation to your own experience of each technology?
Regarding Forums I have both the written record (research, papers, blog entries from 2001) to compare to 2011, as well as the experience of working in both the formal institutional setting, and as a student, embracing and engaging in external forums – all for teaching and learning purposes and blogging about this throughout.
Regarding tablets I have one device and can speak to others using different devices about their experiences with them. Some of this qualified by my blog and forum entries of others regarding their learning experiences with them.
6. Briefly: what material, if any, can you draw from the experience of other learners?
There are fellow students on the MAODE whose permission can be requested regarding their blogging on the use of tablets, indeed these postings informed my request to have such a device. There is research published in 2011 that provides a sound basis for discussion, though the rapidity of change requires something current this can in part be informed, with permissions, by asking specialists in the field of versioning content for Tablets for e-learning in Higher Education.
Where permissions are possible and confidentially isn’t compromised questions can be put to Faculty members regarding the way in which the use of forums for learning online has been conceived.
7. Which H800 materials do you expect to draw on? And which numerical evidence will you draw on, either from within or from outside H800?
Reports can be referred to as they are published. The desire is to draw upon evidential research, both qualitative and quantitative reports, particularly those from the OU Institute of Technology. Resources offered in H800 will be reviewed and the most recent publications identified.
8. If you have already found materials from four sources outside H800: which materials do you expect to draw on, and – in a sentence or two – what is their significance to your EMA? If you have not yet found (all of) them yet, where do you expect to look for them?
Forums
Linkedin Forums on e-learning and social media. Various publications on use of Forums in education including reports from JISC. Research of OU Library current papers.
Tablets
Reports and discussions in various forums, such as NMK (Westminster Metropolitan University) and eLP (Linkedin, moderated by Epic), as well as new publications.
Part B. Digital technologies: your recommendations
9. Briefly: which area(s) of additional research do you think are needed?
The interplay between the Tablet (part Smartphone, part Laptop) and therefore the ease with which it can be used as a communications device enabling live and as-live (synchronous and asynchronous) participation in Forum discussions.
Longitudinal studies of a cohort with these devices coming from undergraduate and postgraduate study.
Niche research on the use of forums and devices in business, particularly collaboration in multi-nationals.
Part C. Digital technologies: your design or specification
10. What type of learning activity or specification do you currently envisage, for which learners and in which context? What do you intend the learners to have learned when they have carried out the activity?
A useful resource would be a specific learning activity related to the management of projects carried out across different cultures with differing management systems.
11. How, in outline, will your design or specification deal with any potential barriers that your learners might face (including cost, accessibility for people with disabilities, cultural diversity and convenience)?
‘Device Agnosticism’ as The OU puts it is as important as other issues regarding access; neither affordability nor disability should be insurmountable barriers.
Part D. Digital technologies: individual and collaborative learning
12. What is your current response (possibly very tentative at this stage) to the question: ‘To what extent do you find the concepts of “individual” and “collaborative” learning useful in understanding your experience of learning this year – whether on H800 or elsewhere?’
Engestrom via Vygotsky.
Digital Technologies : Experience and evidence.
Fig. 1. My conception of lifelong learning building on Elliot (2008)
Why I participate in some forums and not others.
- Start the ball rolling
- to get through the week’s work
- no one else has made a start.
- I may fret about covering all bases
It can be like choosing a restaurant
- You want to go where there’s some buzz already, though not so much that you feel you will never be able to join in the conversation.
- This is an asynchronous beast. If I come in late I may read every post with care before I respond, which can result in a long response.
- People should feel just as comfortable simply answering the question, ignoring others at first .. or just reading the last couple of posts and responding to them.
- I might quote them in my own group. There have been times when lifting the thread of catalyst that got them going in another group will do the same in your own.
- It is tempting to respond to someone in a different tutor group
- At Harvard they use as system called ‘Rotisserie’ in some asynchronous threads/forums which, like playing pass the parcel (or pass the microphone) require people to take it in turns to say something.
- It matters that activities have been designed that get people engaged without the need for a tutor all the time.
‘Structured, paced and carefully constructed e-tivities reduce the amount of e-moderator time, and impact directly on satisfactory learning outcomes, adding value to the investment in learning technologies’.(Salmon, 2002a)
‘Patterns of usage differ widely, and the fit between people’s lives and the devices they use can be very close.’ (Pettit and Kukulska-Hulme, 2007, p.28)
(Blog 25 September 2010) Why do the Plenck 2010 forums work?
Many themes. It is your choice to join. Updates are sent to your email. You read and add, return to the parent, and comment.
They are seasoned e-educators and lucid. It is more jamming around a piano.
You have three hours in which to return to your post and edit, add or delete.
People don’t question the set up, they just get on with it. Do we write about what it is to put words onto a sheet of paper with a pen? Or do we say something?
James Turner, Policy Director at the Sutton Trust suggested supplementary tutoring of school students one-to-one was most common, two-to-one worked even better because of the collaboratory experience. BBC Radio 4 10.00 Tuesday 7th September 2010, Accessed again 16.00 Saturday 12th September 2010)
- Numerical evidence
“Mobile learning involves the] exploitation of ubiquitous handheld hardware, wireless networking and mobile telephony to facilitate, support enhance and extend the reach of teaching and learning” Molenet
The increasingly portable nature of computing hardware and technologies has progressed for three decades or more as the earliest efforts of mobile wordprocessing – the Microwriter, the popularisation of computing with the BBC micro-computer, then on to laptops that become lighter, smaller, faster and more robust, to palm devices such as the Psion and hand-sized PDAs, and the gradual merging of all manner of personal, portable devices that carried music, organisers, phone technology and more, with MP3 players popularised by iPods, then the spread of mobile phones, in particular inexpensive communicating through text that brings us to 2011 and light, very powerful two-part keyboard and screen laptops, single part touch-screen tablets of various sizes that are becoming indistinguishable from smartphones. Uptake and support for various devices has been made possible as networks spread, the technology became faster, less expensive and widespread, and importantly a combination of content and communication made the devices increasingly appealing, powerful and personal.
Fig 2. Types and functionality of mobile devices. Kukulska-Hulme & Traxler (2005:07)
The mobile promise – “that individuals will engage in learning at times when formerly they would have been doing something else; that they will be motivated to learn partly because the devices are attractive; that the devices enable communication from places where formerly it wasn’t possible; that formal learning can mesh with existing patterns of self publishing and online participation; and that mobile devices are particularly suited to multitasking, said to be one of the strengths of the ‘millennial generation’ (McMahon & Pospisil, 2005).”
Attendance at Learning Technologies 2011 and subsequent use of a Sony Flip for interviews and surveys.
Armed with a Kindle with the Swim Drills book loaded I was poolside teaching and coaching swimmers for three hours.
For the last year I have run programmes based on drills in ‘The Swim Drills Book’ and have relied on lesson plans and sometimes laminated print outs.
Today I took the Kindle
From The Swimming Drill Book (2006:04) ‘Standing Streamline Ruben Guzman.
Never before have I found the swimmers so attentive, coming close to the side of the pool to look at the pictures.
Here is a great drill to develop streamlining
Fig.3. From The Swimming Drill Book (2006:06) ‘Streamline Float’ Ruben Guzman.
They start in what we call ‘Dead Swimmer’ then straighten up, arms first, then legs into the ‘streamline position.’ They then kick off, add a few strokes and continue up the pool.
They got, far quicker than my efforts to demonstrate and talk them through.
- Simple.
- The pictures say it all.
- Is this mobile learning?
- Whatever it is, this works.
- Producers
‘Our findings indicate that institutions planning to offer mobile apps should build on the existing preferences of students for social communication. Listening to audio, watching video and reading short texts if the apps are successfully to enhance the learning experience’. (Kukulska-HUlme 2011:32
Personalisation
“Learners can be active makers and shapers of their own learning. They should be supported in using technologies of their own choice where appropriate”. (JISC, 2009, p.51)
- Relevant ideas, arguments and research findings in the H800 materials
Mobile computing not just with laptop computers but also with cellular phones, internet-telephony, videoconferencing, screen sharing, remote collaboration technologies, and immersive graphical environments make distributed collaboration and interaction much richer and more realistic. Report of the NSF Task Force on Cyberlearning June 24, 2008 (REFERENCE wk21-22)
‘Patterns of usage differ widely, and the fit between people’s lives and the devices they use can be very close.’ (Pettit and Kukulska-Hulme, 2007, p.28)
- Relevant ideas, arguments and research findings outside the H800 materials
Many Open University students combine work and study; consequently learning in a number of places, or on the move, becomes a habit.
Informal learning and social interactions are also increasingly recognised as important components of a person’s ‘learning life’. Academic and support staff are part of this revolution.
Mobile learning is very flexible: it can be the sole mode of delivery, a significant learning activity, or just a small part of a print-based or online course.
The key points (largely from an IET Agnes Kukulska-Hulme Report Kukulska-Hulme, 2010:10)
Mobile learning is:
- Very flexible
- Appropriate/supportive
- New
- Convenient
- Contemporary
- Practical
- Beneficial
- Has its own unique affordances/advantages
- Personal/personalised
- Spontaneous
- Immediate
- Extends access to materials not replacement technology)
- Locational
- Universal (ish)
- Leap-frog technology in Africa
- Engaging
- Expected
Agnes Kukulska-Hulme (2010), with case studies by Anna Page.
Kukulska-Hulme (2010) says “Mobile learning is here to stay, even if in a few years’ time it may no longer be distinguishable from ‘just learning’.”
‘E’ is a fact of learning life, Agnes Kukulska-Hulme (2010) is quoted thus in the JISC Mobile and Wireless Technologies Review, “Mobile learning is here to stay, even if in a few years’ time it may no longer be distinguishable from ‘just learning’.”
A distance learner’s mobile device (at the Open University) can be used as a way to:
- carry around study materials
- aces new or additional content
- build up a series of personal notes
- help make or maintain communications between different contexts
Supported by VLE 2.0 and Moodle 2.0
- organised personal learning schedules
- give feedback, opinions or answers
- get quick information or support
- communicate with other learners or tutors
The initial aim of the group is to develop applications around four key areas:
- Enhancing Open University brand and awareness
- Attracting students to new courses
- Making existing course material accessible for mobile study
- Prototyping innovative learning concepts
Woodill (2010:53) identifies seven main affordances of mobile learning:
1. Mobility
2. Ubiquity
3. Accessibility
4. Connectivity
5. Context sensitivity
6. Individuality
7. Creativity
Personalisation. user generated content. Bruns (2005) Produsers
- Numerical evidence
We agree with Kennedy et al (2008) that ‘an evidence-based understanding of students’ technological experiences is vital in informing higher education policy and practice.’ (p. 109)
(93% UK penetration by 2008, presumably more in 2011). More from Mobisite
More in Cloudworks
2% of OU students (4,000 or so) use tablets (not just iPads). 11% use SmartPhones (not just iPhones).
Smartphone Survey (http://testkitchen.colorado.edu/projects/reports/smartphone/smartphone-survey/)
Fig. 5. Smartphone Stats, The Digital News Test Kitchen, August 2011
http://testkitchen.colorado.edu/projects/reports/smartphone/smartphone-survey
Martin Weller implies that a VLE constrains because ‘There are so many fantastic tools out there that are free and robust and easy to use.’ (WK21-22 Activity 2d VLE vs. PLE who wins?)
It is the combination of physically being ‘free’ to roam with a robust mobile device, as OU MBA students Lt. Col. Sean Brady put it, a ‘university in your pocket’ (REFERENCE) and a playful, personalisation and desired ‘freedom’ to do things your way at a time and place that suits you, that enables learning to take place away from the learning institution, library or desk, unfettered by a bag of books and files. Mobility and immediacy, exposure to new, or similar products and tools, fashion, peer group, nature of the subject they are studying, their ambitions, who they are, how much time they have, their kit, connection and inclinations, let alone the context of where they are going online and most importantly the means to communicate this instantly through microblogging, blogging, social networks, email and text facilitates and fuels further development, the millions of people online making development commercially viable.
Taking advantage of participation (Seely-Brown), learning on the periphery (Seely-Brown), vicarious learning (Cox) and if you can get your tongue around it ‘serendipitous learning.’ (me I think). (WK21 Activity 1c Web 2.0 Tools for learning REFERENCE) Conole (2011) invites us to use ‘metaphors for meaning making’.
- traffic light
- nurture
- swimming
- hub
- serendipity
- water-cycle
Expressed in various forms in charts from Dion Hinchcliffe.
Accessibility: Regarding the failure to turn a 4 day face-to-face course into a blended course of one day face-to-face, then online with four additional option. ‘Most of these problems seem to be rooted in bad connectivity which made communication difficult and audio discussions impossible’.
University of Derby, Online delivery of MSc Strategic management in Africa (Rachel Stern’s blog 5 March 2010)
One in three of com 2011
10 % of all UK web traffic
100,000 in Indonesia learning English through SMS messages.
INEQUALITY
300 million fewer than male worldwide (women and mobile: a global opportunity
See issues of accessibility from H807 and H810.
Agnes Kukulska-Hulme, Inaugural Lecture, August 2011
‘Furthermore, since the use of a mobile device represents a new technological means of reading books, articles and news, this might have an impact on how, and how much, students read, however further research would be needed’. (2011:33)
This cover 20 benefits of mobile learning though.
‘We consider that learners who use handheld mobile devices (e.g., their phones and mp3-players) to support their learning constitute a minority at the present time. We agree that their age seems less important than their position as early adopters and instigators of change through their influence among their peers and through their networks’. (2011:19)
Forums and Mobile
In an age when “communities are jumping across technologies” as needs and trends evolve (Wenger, 2010), educators and researchers also have to stay informed about how learners use personal technologies as members of communities that may be social, work-related or educational’.
REFERENCE
Belshaw (201) Mobile and Wireless Technologies Review 2010 Doug Belshaw, JISC infoNet
Brady, S. http://blogs.ft.com/mba-blog/2011/06/22/distance-learning-or-nearness-learning/#axzz1WbbnlExG
Bruns, A. (2005) ‘Anyone can edit’: understanding the produser. Retrieved from http;//snurb.info/index. php?q=node/s86
Guzman, R (2007) The Swim Drills Book
JISC. (2009). Effective Practice in a Digital Age: A guide to technology-enhanced learning and teaching. Retrieved from http://www.jisc.ac.uk/publications/programmerelated/2009/effectivedigital-age.aspx
Pettit, John and Kukulska-Hulme, Agnes (2007). Going with the grain: mobile devices in practice. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 23(1), pp. 17–33.
Kerfoot, B.P., Armstrong,E.G., O’Sullivan,P.N., (2008) Interactive Spaced-Education to Teach the Physical Examination:A Randomized Controlled Trial
Kukulska-Hulme, A. and Traxler, J (2005) Mobile Learning. A handbook for educators and trainers.
MacMahon, M., Pospisil, R. (2005 pp421-431) Laptops for digital lifestyle: Millenial students and wireless mobile technologies. http://www.ascilite.org.au/conferences/brisbane05/blogs/proceedings/49_McMahon%20&%20Pospisil.pdf
Pettit, John and Kukulska-Hulme, Agnes (2007). Going with the grain: mobile devices in practice. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 23(1), pp. 17–33.
Rogers, E.M. (2005) Diffusion of innovations (5th ed.) New York, NY: Free Press
Traxler, J. (2009) ‘Learning in a Mobile Age’ (International Journal of Mobile and Blended Learning, 1(1), 1-12, January-March 2009)
Traxler, J. (2009) ‘Students and mobile devices: choosing which dream’ (in ALT-C 2009 “In dreams begins responsibility” – choice, evidence and change, Traxler, John (Professor of Mobile Learning, University of Wolverhampton)
University of Derby online survey (http://www.jiscinfonet.ac.uk/case-studies/tangible/derby/index_html1)
Related articles
- Activity designed to provide an insight into scripting content that is image rich for the visually impaired (mymindbursts.com)
- Call for papers – Learning, Media and Technology (hastac.org)
- James and Jane Bond learn to swim slinky, silent and smooth front crawl (mymindbursts.com)
- 25 benefits of mobile learning (mymindbursts.com)
- Tablets pushing other technology to evolve (lenovo.com)
- Learning in the Mobile Age (slideshare.net)
- What is Deep Understanding? | Learning Zone (sharingtree.wordpress.com)
- Summary of ISTE 2012 (academicbiz.typepad.com)
Virtual Learning Environment vs. Personal Learning Environment. Who wins?
- John Petit
- Martin Weller
- Niall Sclater
Stephen Downes – Students own education
·How much do they actually differ in their views?
·What is my perspective?
·Freedom is lack of choice
·Parameters work
·Creativity is mistakes
·Have rules, the mischievous or skilled will break them anyway
·The end result counts.
a)This isn’t a debate. Neither takes sides and the chair interjects his own thoughts. A debate, whether at school, university or in a club, or in a court of law or the House of Commons, is purposely adversarial, people take sides, even take a stance on a point of view they may not wholly support, in order to winkle out answers that may stand somewhere between the two combatants.
b)During the MAODE this might be the second such offering as a ‘debate,’ the last being as weak. What is more I have attended a Faculty debate which shilly-shallied around the issues with at times from an audience’s point of view it being hard to know whose side the speakers were on?
c)As well as deploring the lack of rigour regarding what should or should not be defined as a debate, the vacuous nature of the conversations means that you don’t gain one single new piece of evidence either way. Generalities are not arguments, neither side attempts to offer a knock-out blow, indeed Martin Weller seems keen to speak for both sides of the argument throughout.
When Martin Weller implies that a VLE constrains because ‘There are so many fantastic tools out there that are free and robust and easy to use.’ I would like a) example b) research based evidence regarding such tools, which do offer some compelling arguments, these commercial and branded products have to offer something refreshing and valuable.
Unlike some university offering they are therefore not only effective, but vitally, they are fun, tactile, smartly constructed, well-funded, give cache to the user, are easy to share, champion and become evangelical about, explored, exploited and developed further. Here I compare Compendium with the delight of bubbl.us.
Here I compare blogging in the confines of the abandoned cold-frame that is the Victorian OU student blogging platform compared to the Las Vegas experience of WordPress.
I can even compare how WordPress performs externally compared to the shackled version provided by the OU. On the one hand there is a desire to treat students like sheep; there is even a suggestion in this chatty-thing between Niall Sclater and Martin Weller than OU undergraduates ought to offer the most basic environment in which to operate. Access is an important point, but you don’t develop players in an orchestra by shutting everyone in a hall and giving them a kazoo. And if that Kazoo requires instructions then it deserves being ignored. Having lived with it for a year the OU e-portfolio My Stuff might best be described as some kind of organ-grinder with the functionality and fun-factor of Microsoft DOS circa 1991.
Martin Weller makes the point about tools that might be used this before, during and after their university experience. There is a set of ICT tools covering word-processing, databases, number manipulation, calendars and communications that are a vital suite of skills; skills that some might already have, or partially have … or not have at all. The problem is in the accommodation of this widely differing skill set.
JV Exposure to new, or similar, experience of better as well as weaker programmes/tools, fashion, peer group, nature of the subject they are studying, their ambitions, who they are, how much time they have, their kit, connection and inclinations, let alone the context of where they are going online.
In this respect Martin Weller is right to say that ‘some kind of default learning environment’ is required first of all.
Caveat: You are going to need people to use the same kind of things in order to be able to communicate.
·University blog vs. their own bog.
·University e-portfolio vs. their own portfolio.
·Elluminate vs. Skype.
·Mac vs. PC,
·Tablet vs. laptop.
·Desktop vs. smartphone.
·Paper vs. e-Reader.
·University Forum vs. Linked in or others.
·Twitter vs. Yammer.
Swimming analogy: training pool, leisure pool, main pool, diving pool, Jacuzzi.
Niall Sclater makes a point about a student using an external blog that doesn’t have a screen reader. Do browsers not offer this as a default now? Whilst I doubt the quality of translation I’ve been having fun putting everything I normally look at into French or loading content onto an e-reader and having it read to me on long car journeys. The beauty of Web 2.0 and Open Learn is that developers love to solve problems then share their work. Open Learn allows these fixers to crack on at a pace that no institution can match.
Perhaps issues regarding passwords is one such problem which is no longer a problem with management systems. Saving passwords etc.: Other problems we have all see rise and fall might include spam. The next problem will be to filter out spam in the form of ‘Twitter Twaddle’ the overwhelming flack of pre-written RSS grabbed institutional and corporate messages that should without exception be ‘flagged’ by readers as spam until it stops. I never had a conversation with a piece of direct mail shoved at me through my letter box, or spam come to that matter. Here largely the walled, university environment in which to study, is protected from the swelling noise of distraction on the outside,
Niall Sclater talks about the Wiki on OU VLE, in Moodle ‘comprises what we consider is the most useful functionality for students. The OU ‘cut out a lot of the bells and whistles you find in MediaWiki’. New to wikis I enjoyed being eased into their use, but like a keen skier, or swimmer, having found my ‘legs’ I wanted incremental progressions. Being compelled to stay in the training pool, or on the nursery slopes, to return to by Kazoo metaphor, is like having Grade 5 flute, but having to play with six novice recorder players in Kindergarten. We move on and therefore what is offered should move with us.
Universities fail abysmally to sell their products to their captive audiences.
Commercial products are sold, invitingly to everyone who comes within earshot. There is a commercial naivety and intellectual arrogance sometimes over stuff created that must be great, because it is the invention of brilliant minds … and that its brilliance will be self-evident even if it sits their within its highly branded overcoat waiting for some time to take an interest and take it out for a test drive. Creators of these tools forget that a quick search using some of the terms related to the affordances of the product being offered will invariably produce something more appealing from the likes of Google, Adobe, Apple or Microsoft.
Nail Sclater points out that some students can be confused by too much functionality. I agree. If there is a product that has far too much functionality, it is Elluminate. And even for a library search, it ought to be as simple as the real thing … you go to a counter and ask for a title. Google gets it right. Keep it simple. Others are at last following suit. Or is the Google God now omnipresent?
Martin Weller stumbles when he says that Nail ‘hits on two arguments against decentralised PLEs by
a)Giving three arguments
a.Authentication
b.Integration
c.Robustness
b)He is meant to be in favour of PLEs.
i.e. academics are incapable of debate because they are, to use of Martin Weller’s favourite terms ‘contextualised’ to sit on the fence. A debate should be a contest, a bullfight ideally with a clear winner, the other party a convincing looser.
You wouldn’t let a soldier chose his weapons then enter the fray. There has to be a modicum of formal training across a variety of tools, and in a controlled, stepped fashion in order to bring people along, communally, for retention and to engender collaboration and participation and all that benefits that come from that.
Who at a time of change is going to declare their role, or department redundant? Brought into a new role, Social Media Manager, I feel I will have succeed in 12 months if I have handed over the keys to others, spread some of the glory about. That’s how I see it, a little bit of everybody’s lives. You can wordprocess, you can do some aspect of Social Media. There are other functions though that long ago were circumvented by clever software. Web 2.0 deplores the gatekeeper. It wants to put everything ‘out there,’ enabling everyone and anyone to make of it what they need and please.
Personally I’ve been loading content, text and images, in diaryland since Sept 1999 and have never had an issue with access, yet I have repeatedly found my OU e-portfolio failed, or that while composing a response in a forum the system fell-down and I lost what I was doing.
Nial Sclater argues in favour of VLEs to ensure usability, access, extension to students, common ground on terms of tools, opportunity and form an assessment point of view, use of content too.
While Martin Weller wants to ‘Support’ – an argument for VLEs. (I’ve now made the point several times that Martin Weller seemed unsure of which side he was on, and by personality and from experience, will never take a side in any case).
We DO want people going away being able to use package X. Do we turn out Roy Castle types who can play loads of instruments not very well, or a virtuoso performer who can at least play the cello well?
JP stepping in ‘as my confidence grew I got to know that and my confidence grew across the year as I got to know that and one or two other very limited and well-supported tools’
Nial Sclater’s point that the same tool is required for collaboration and assessment. This applies also to reading the materials provided and doing the activities so that these are the points of reference for assessments (as currently practised). How can a Tutor mark an assessment that is based on vegetables from a walled Victorian kitchen garden, when the student offers flowers grown from seed in a tub? To return to my sporting analogy, how might I judge a person’s ability to swim after 12 weeks if they’ve been learning how to sail?
Parameters have a purpose.
The greatest resistance to a writer is having no sense of purpose, no goals, no parameters, no set pieces, no one to be on their case. A free for all, perhaps as the new London Business and Finance School is finding, is that just giving students the lot and telling them to get on with it is not conducive to a viable learning experience. (Nor do I think it’ll deliver someone is able to work with others).
Why I recommend Linkedin and WordPress above all others but fear for Twitter as excessive twaddle ruins its potential
It isn’t for lack of overwhelming, immersive and engaging content online, especially ‘how to’ movies and ‘clips’ in YouTube, its how you as an individual copes with this inexhaustible choice. Armed with an 3G tablet and sim card will we find we are learning more on the fly, taking it with us, much of it free, some of it guided and paid for?
Taking advantage of participation (Seely-Brown), learning on the periphery (Seely-Brown), vicarious learning (Cox) and if you can get your tongue around it ‘serendipitous learning.’ (me I think).
I’m finding that 18 months in, and having really started this gig in 1998 when from the agency end we were migrating interactive DVD based learning to the Web, that I of necessity must balance the tools I can play (musical instrument metaphor), compared to those I play with (sandpit, training pool metaphor) … and I suppose those ones I am obliged to master whether I like it or not (prescriptive tools for work and study – in at the deep end metaphor?!).
Conole (2011) invites us to use ‘metaphors for meaning making’. I always have, often visualising these metaphors. Just search this diary on ‘Metaphor’ to see what comes up. Also try words or phrases such as ‘traffic light’, ‘nurture’, ‘gardening’, ‘swimming’, ‘spheres of influence’, ‘hub’, ‘serendipity’ as well as ‘water’ and ‘water-cycle’.
I therefore offer the following:
Linkedin (For Forums, like this, in groups and networks)
WordPress (for blogging, sharing, wiki like affordances, training, updates)
iPad (or Tablet) (Whilst PCs and Laptops have considerable power and versatility
I also suggest that we all take a close interest in Google +1 which may replace all of these.
Twitter (only for niche/target live discussions or quasi-synchronous conversations.
The rest of it is ‘Twitter Twaddle’ – spam of the worst kind being pumped out by pre-assigned links as CoTweets or random disconnected thoughts. This is killing some forums where RSS feeds of this stuff overwhelms any chance of a conversation).
I’ve seen two Forums killed, temporarily I hope, by this stuff, the largest victim being the Oxford University Linkedin Alumni group. I believe it is simply the case of a new moderator niavely permitting Twitter feeds in on a discussion, ie. having the conversations between 30 disrupted by the disconnected chattering of 300.
How do we cope with this inexhaustible choice?
It isn’t for lack of overwhelming, immersive and engaging content online, especially ‘how to’ movies and ‘clips’ in YouTube, its how you as an individual cope with this inexhaustible choice.
Armed with an 3G tablet and sim card will we find we are learning more on the fly, taking it with us, much of it free, some of it guided and paid for?
Taking advantage of participation (John Seely-Brown), learning on the periphery (John Seely-Brown), vicarious learning (Cox) and if you can get your tongue around it ‘serendipitous learning.’ (me I think).
I’m finding that 18 months in, and having really started this gig in 1998 when from the agency end we were migrating interactive DVD based learning to the Web, that I of necessity must balance the tools I can play (musical instrument metaphor), compared to those I play with (sandpit, training pool metaphor) … and I suppose those ones I am obliged to master whether I like it or not (prescriptive tools for work and study – in at the deep end metaphor?!).
Conole (2011) invites us to use ‘metaphors for meaning making’.
I always have, often visualising these metaphors. Just search this diary on ‘Metaphor’ to see what comes up. Also try words or phrases such as ‘traffic light’, ‘nurture’, ‘gardening’, ‘swimming’, ‘spheres of influence’, ‘hub’, ‘serendipity’ as well as ‘water’ and ‘water-cycle’.
I therefore offer the following:
Linkedin (For Forums, like this, in groups and networks)
WordPress (for blogging, sharing, wiki like affordances, training, updates)
iPad (or Tablet) (Whilst PCs and Laptops have considerable power and versatility
Twitter (only for niche/target live discussions or quasi-synchronous conversations.
The rest of it is ‘Twitter Twaddle’
Spam of the worst kind being pumped out by pre-assigned links as CoTweets or random disconnected thoughts. This is killing some forums where RSS feeds of this stuff overwhelms any chance of a conversation).
I’ve seen two Forums killed, temporarily I hope, by this stuff, the largest victim being the Oxford University Alumni group.
I believe it is simply the case of a new moderator niavely permitting Twitter feeds in on a discussion, ie. having the conversations between 30 disrupted by the disconnected chattering of 300.
Cloudworks
Grainne Connole is the ‘star turn’ in Cloudworks. She is Oprah. This is a channel, a network, a show. To stand out, let alone to be attractive to users, it requires this kind of ‘ownership.’
This ‘online filing system’ is weak because of how it is presented NOT for what it does and can do.
It has the potential to be a social educational campus/network. The key is to overlay ALL assets with an image of the person who composed the material, i.e. the entry into the content is the person or if not an image, then at least the opportunity to add a ‘book cover/sleave’ i.e. something visual, relevant to the content, personal and engaging.
Facebook has the right balance between form and functionalty. There is a caareful balance of personalisation and prescribed layout/design. (Like a good TV channel, you know where you are when you’re in Facebook).
Often I see ideas screaming out for the input of a designer
Here I mean a visualiser, an art director kind of designer, someone who can take the excellent functionality, the problem solving, engaging, satisfying programming/sites – and add some feeling.
We are emotional beings, we respond and are motivated for subjective reasons. We chose one thing over another because we ‘like’ it, not necessarily because it is better than another product or service.
In time it won’t just be an art director that is required, you’ll need a producer
… someone who can run the ‘channel’ as a living entity, as a live-show, that will include video. Am I describing the librarian of the 21st century, an ‘asset manager’ who is not working in the City of London?
If you give the new bubbl.us a go I promise that some of the things it does, and how it looks, makes it a joy. Every time you create a new node or bubble it automatically offers a different, though matching, graded shade of the previous colour.
(Six months ago it was more child-like – you deleted a bubble you didn’t want and it bursts into flames! Now they fade away like mist on a Spring morning).
There is a war going on out there.
Make yourself attractive. People haven’t time to compare sites, they’ll just run with what looks right and if it delivers they’ll stick with it.
See Visualising the Learning Design Process, A. J. Brasher, below.
See Information is Beautiful, David McCandless.
How do you learn anything in a forum?
Fellow students are expressing understandable views regarding the way forums work; I wonder what the answer is?
If everyone is an active participant you could miss a day and find you are 40 thread behind the conversation. If you, understandably, are away for several days (work, holiday, crisis, illness) you could be 100 threads and 40,000 words behind.
I wonder if the approach, using an analogy I’ve already suggested regarding whether or not you speak to fellow commuters on a train (or bus) might be (or should be) to ignore all but the last 20% of posts, pick up the thread here and continue.
What I know you CANNOT do is try to pick up a thread that has gone cold; you may feel you want to respond to the way things developed since your departure … but everyone has moved on, may feel the question/issue has been dealt with and may not even come back to look at this page.
Over the year I’ve commented on lack of entries in blogs and threads from fellow students; the issue (an exciting and interesting position to be faced with) in H800 2011 may be the opposite – along comes a cohort that does Facebook and Twitter and may keep a blog, who can type at a million miles an hour and feel they have something to say.
How therefore to manage this explosion of content?
How about we ditch text in favour of a 3 minute webcam ‘update.’
Then again, 40 missed threads x 3 minutes equally a heck of a lot of viewing!
Putting Personal Development Planning (pdp) at the centre of things
I had an interview in London that by fortuitous timing ties directly into the H808 ECA (end of course assessment) that I have to complete and upload in the next 13 hours. What is more, every part of the MA in Open in Distance Education with the OU would have some application to the role for which I’d applied. Personal Development Planning (PDP), the subject of the ECA, would be important too, indeed it is a vital component of ‘learner-driven’ or ‘learner-centred’ education. Successful, engaged, pumping PDP is at the heart of e-learning – people must be motivated to take the initiative, to drive their learning while others support them in every way they can with appropriate resources, many of which will be ‘electronically enabled,’ i.e. ‘e-learning’.
I have a draft of the ECA written, the choices of evidence have been made, collated and labelled.
I’ve already uploaded a draft so feel confident that the ETA system will handle whatever else I do.
I had the file, rather more chunky printed out and clipped into an Arch-Lever Folder than on a memory stick or zipped on the laptop so that I could review it on the train journey in and out of London. I like paper; things need to be expressed in other ways that via a QWERTY keyboard. It helps to talk, to discuss, to animate your thoughts with your hands even … as we shall see.
On the way into town I find myself sitting with a friend who is 18 months into the Creative Writing course at Sussex University and was having a second interview with a literary agent; our respective career paths were shared. He is a professional photographer who has an online resource of stock photos targeted at UK Councils. I don’t look at the ECA.
The interview, like so much I now do, is duly reflected upon, though for reasons of privacy not here as an open blog. This debrief, this self-assessment, served a dual purpose, at the front of my mind, of course, is the possible outcome and responses to the interview. And notes on how and where I felt it went well, or not so well, for future reference and to judge what improvements I might make when attending such interviews in future and how to compose my written thanks when I reply.
I recognise the purpose and value of reflection and make the time to do so
At the back of my mind, of course, as we talk, is the ECA.
Coming to the end of the interview process I felt compelled to share this sketch to add conviction to my belief that Personal Development Planning is ‘at the heart of things’.
I did this earlier today to get a handle on how in one shot I now see PDP, not as a self-contained ‘do it and move on unit’ at the start of a course, but at the heart of what you do: at the beginning, the end, everything in between … and beyond. (And yes, you should hear Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) saying it!).
It was somewhat evangelical of me, but I feel passionate about it. I believe it as a consequence of my own personal experience and from others who take this approach.
Reflection with a second person can help; it is natural that my wife would take an interest in the day’s events. This is invaluable, and is a form a assessment. However, where I find I become increasingly animated regarding PDP is that I felt I still hadn’t got it right, that had I seen myself in that meeting what was I doing with my hands? What else was I trying to express? Sometimes recording an interview to look over it afterwards has advantages. You need to be winkling away to find ideas and inspiration.
I’d mentioned life-long learning, that PDP can benefit both your career, how you organise a hobby, even family life.
And then I remembered this:
My interpretation, visualised, of what life-long means from H807.
The problem I have with my sketch of ‘PDP at the heart of things’ is that it loops back on itself, there is no suggestion of improvement, of advancement.
I toss around further ideas like a board game, the PDP process being, for example, what happens every time you ‘Pass Go’ in Monopoly. Then I imagined climbing up a helter-skelter, or fairy-lights around a tree. I thought too about Kolb’s cycle of development … and then, as I was standing up waving my hands about I got it … a great analogy would be of a glider catching a thermal and rising in a series of circles.
‘A load of hot air.’ My wife remarked, laughing.
And yes, I could imagine giving a presentation and a heckler saying exactly that – so I’d have to have a reply prepared. (Be prepared for anything)
With this in mind I set to work.
Earlier this week I threatened to photograph myself standing next to the family washing-line with my evidence pegged out. This is how I said I would make my choices and write the assignment. As it was raining instead I got a roll of wall-paper backing paper and stuck it to the bedroom wall with masking tape; I would draw my washing line. I have just taken this down and taped it vertically.
At the bottom I draw this.
Then I go for this.
In a live presentation I would draw this from scratch on the largest sheet I could find, talking my way through it, seeking input, offering explanations.
As a video-asset I would lock off an overhead camera and draw it onto a sheet of A3 paper, possibly over a lightbox, and then use EFX to speed it up. I would then add a voice over.
There are many other ways to play with it to varying degrees of simplicity (authenticity) or elaboration. Not least by using stock footage of a glider or Condor or some such catching a thermal with labels tagged onto the video archive footage as it played out. Indeed, going from the basic sketch it might be better still to invite course participants to create their own expression of this PDP as an ascending cycle – say playfully spinning around in front of camera with a balsa-wood model glider with the person’s name on it! Fun is good. Originality is good. personalization is good. This makes it memorable without needing it as an APP or an electronic alert.
The conclusion I find as convincing as the process.
The process here includes reflection, blogging, collaboration … and could in due course include video, podcasting, presentation and moderation.
As I was able with ease to add every aspect of H808 onto this simple diagram I felt I had reached an important point, not least vindicating my methodology that might look as if it is depends on technology, but does not. Often the route to get an idea from the mind into the public domain is via face-to-face discourse, a few movements of the arms, then reaching for pen and paper.
This diagram can be draw it up differently depending on the context.
This implied versatility suggests it effectiveness.
PDP as indicated here suggests a set period to repeat or revisit the process … this ought to be expressed to occur every quarter, rather than after every cycle as suggested here with loops that might represent a typical OU unit of two weeks and the activities one engages with along the way.
A productive day then.
Collaboration in e-learning with a team divided across three continents
Of the six or seven in the group only four have made their presence known, while three have done all the reading which is meant to be shared across the group. People seem to think it is easier to get on with the task alone, rather than expect others (strangers) to do their bit.
Whether and when we should populate our Wiki wasn’t decided, or was … and then someone started posting anyway. I then added something and so did another.
Sharing notes with anyone fails, either they are too busy or not reading their emails. In any case, they should be making their own.
A few hours in the dead of night were spent refreshing our Group Wiki to cut out duplications and to create some order in the information.
It matters that you don’t feel coy; whatever you do can be undone and is visible in any case. I liken this to building a snowman,though instead of a family and neighbours in the park together, we are inclined to do a bit more in passing.
I then posted data from two further reports, BECTA and the JISC reports.
Is this a blog?
I think not.
You can keep it private, or share it with the OU community or the wider world, but you can’t personalise it.
Nor do you get to keep it afterwards.
Perhaps the OU should offer a blogging platform along the lines of EduBlog or WordPress and treat it as a worthwhile piece of PR, marketing and goodwill.
Afterall, why encourage people to blog for the first time and quickly lose them to another platform?
So what is this?
I don’t mean for this to sound derogatory, but dwelling on this through the night, as you do (it is 02.53), I liken this to writing on a piece of loo roll. OK, it lasts a little longer (two years) and can be reused.
Well, I won’t stretch that analogy any further.
Scroll is the world I am looking for.
Like a papyrus scroll from Egypt 4000 years ago. Slung up over a line for all to see (or not).
Not a blog though.
Few, if anyone, posts an entry every day, as you would in a journal. Even if you go down the private route, it doesn’t feel private, somewhere to disclose private thoughts, health, financial, family and political problems and views.
A learning journal? Part of the e-portfolio package? For reflection.
Yet again, if I am holding up a mirror to consider my experiences this public arena is surely NOT the place to do it?
Somewhere to paste stuff that is over 500 words long … somewhere to link extended musings when you approach the 500 word mark in a Forum?
Some think 200 words in a Forum is about right.
So how many words for a blog entry?
Blogging mates from a decade ago struck on 1,000 words per entry. We also ran with the idea that is must all spew forth in one go. So in some respects perhaps my lavatorial analogy was the correct one.
I know exactly how you academics and intellectuals and non-obsessive journalers view this kind of thing.
How many characters in Twitter? I forget.
Perhaps the OU should set some parameters in forums and Blogs, as it does for assignments and limit us to 300 words in a forum entry and 600 here?
Or not.
Parameters serve a useful purpose. Give a sculptor a mountain and look what they do. Give me a e-scroll and look what I do.
Mind Bursts 