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Edupunk on the radio – Sounds of the Bazaar LIVE

July 4th, 2008 by Graham Attwell

What is Edupunk?

Stephen Downes offers a definition: "edupunk is student-centered, resourceful, teacher- or community-created rather than corporate-sourced, and underwritten by a progressive political stance." And an anonymous commentator on his post says: "I can’t think of anything more punk than education. For the student, learning gives power to the individual. A society full of mindless drones trained to each do a single task doesn’t really have the mental ability to rebel in meaningful ways. For the teacher, every day is an exercise in punk. You’re almost completely under the control of your coordinator, your principals, your superintendents, your school board, the media. Often, "the man" passes down restrictive rules and decisions that don’t seem to align with what’s best for you or your students. Often, you’re only equipped with sparse resources you’re able to scrap together here and there."

Are you into edupuank. Or is this just a ludicrous social construction by white males the wrong side of 40. The next Emerging Monday Sounds of the Bazaar LIVE radio programme on Monday 7 July will explore the edupunk phenomonon. With interviews,music opinion, poetry and more. LIVE. Guests include Kathryn Greenhill, Michael Caulfield and Martin Weller.

And hopefully we will be welcoming resident edupunk granny Leila back to the programme. Make sure the show is in your diary. We will be broadcasting LIVE from 1900 – 2000 UK Summer Time, 2000 – 2100 Central European Summer Time. To access the programme just click on this link or go to http://icecast.commedia.org.uk:8000/emerge.mp3.m3u and it shoudl open in your favourite MP3 player. And please tell your friends.

Posted in Bazaar, Sounds of the Bazaar, Wales Wide Web | 2 Comments »

Learning to think: thinking about learning

July 3rd, 2008 by Graham Attwell

I don’t agree with centralised curricula and I think curricula should be developed by the community.

But I do agree with the spirit of this report from the Guardian newspaper.

“Children of all ages should study philosophy in school to develop their critical thinking skills, education experts said today….

The book Philosophy in Schools, edited by Dr Michael Hand of the Institute of Education and Dr Carrie Winstanley of Roehampton University, puts forward several arguments for including philosophy in the school curriculum.

“Critical thinkers are people who reason well, and who judge and act on the basis of their reasoning,” Hand says.

“To become critical thinkers, children must learn what constitutes good reasoning and why it’s important – and these are philosophical matters.

“Exposure to philosophy should be part of the basic educational entitlement of all children.”

In philosophy, the quality of arguments and the meanings of words are under constant scrutiny.

Winstanley said teachers could use popular books to initiate philosophical discussions. For example, Where the Wild Things Are could lead into debates on the existence of monsters, and why the main character’s mother sends him to his room without supper.

Winstanley said: “Better than any other subject, philosophy teaches children how to assess reasons, defend positions, define terms, evaluate sources of information and judge the value of arguments and evidence.”

Philosophy also allows younger children to engage in discussion and argument even before they know very much.”

Some funny ideas in the artcile. Children know a lot – even whan they are young. But yes, learninga bout ideas would be a usful start to education!

Posted in Competence Development, Media Literacy, Pedagogy, Wales Wide Web | Comments Off on Learning to think: thinking about learning

Talking about knowledge

July 1st, 2008 by Graham Attwell

I think I might have posted this some time ago. But it is worth looking at agin in teh context of developing Personal Learning Environments. I would argue that a central tole for a PLE is for knowledge development and sharing and the knowledge development involves different processes. Jenny Hughes has produced an analysis of different forms of knowledge based on the Welsh language. Whilst English has few words to differentiate knowledge, in Welsh there are at least six different terms for knowledge processes and six different terms for different types of knowledge, each with their own distinct meaning.
The general word for knowledge in Welsh – the translation from the English word knowledge is Gwybodaeth. Even this is not an exact translation. Gwybodaeth means something like ‘knowing-ness’, rather than knowledge.

However, the word Gwybodaeth – or knowing-ness comes in different forms defining different types of knowledge:

  1. Cynnull (gwybodaeth) – to gather knowledge (as in acquisition) ‘along life’s way’
  2. Cynhaeaf (gwybodaeth) – to harvest (purposefully) knowledge– or set up systems for harnessing knowledge or organise knowledge
  3. Cymrodedd (gwybodaeth) – to compromise what you know to accommodate the unknown
  4. Cynnau (gwybodaeth) – to light or kindle knowledge (in someone else) – can also be used to ‘share knowledge’ but implicit is that it is an active process not simply an exchange of information, which is an entirely different concept.
  5. Cynllunplas (gwybodaeth) – to design (new) knowledge, paradigm shift
  6. Cynyddu (gwybodaeth) – to increase or grow (existing) knowledge

I would argue that a PLE should support in some ways all of these different forms of knowing-ness and that such a list represents a useful starting point in defining what we want a PLE to be able to do.

Posted in e-learning 2.0, Mature, PLEs, Wales Wide Web | Comments Off on Talking about knowledge

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