Archive for 2008

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Trainers in Europe Conference

November 4th, 2008 by Graham Attwell

It os certainly a busy online time. Last night was a great Evolve seminar with Dave Cormier about Massively Online Open Courses (MOOCS). I will post a few ideas about that later.

Tomorrow and Thursday is the the first annual on-line conference on the Training of Trainers, sponsored by the Network to Support Trainers in Europe and Evolve.

When we first launched the conference I was rather doubtful of how many would come. After all this was not an event targeted at the EdTech community. Most researchers and practitioners working in this field have never been involved in an online conference before. I have been overwealmed by the response. To date some 110 articticapnst have registered from I guess about 20 countries. I don’t suppose all will turn up for a free event but I still expect a sizable turnout. For me this represnets two things. The first si the mainsteaming of online conferencing technologies which are now being embraced by researchers and practitioners in many diverse dicplines and subject areas. The second is to reinforce the idea of open events – I huess you could say this conference in a mini-MOOC!

We have been fairly conservative in the conference programme for which I am grateful. One issue which arose in the conversation with Dave Cormier last night is that size matters! It is not easy moderting discource with 100 peole online. I am sure we will hit some technical problems but we will juts have to overcome these as we go.

If you would like to attend the conference please register as soon as possible. The registration page is online here. It is free and open, but we need some record of who came for our project reporting.

We also have created a conference exhibition on wikispaces. Have a look – there is some neat stuff there. And if you would like to contribute to the exhibition please get in touch.

Posted in Eurotrainer2, teaching and learning, trainers, ttplus, Wales Wide Web | Comments Off on Trainers in Europe Conference

Moocs and Open Course Models

November 2nd, 2008 by Graham Attwell

Don’t miss this months Evolve seminar on Moocs and Open Course Models

When: 3rd November 2008, at 1800 UK Time (check your local time here)

Where: Elluminate (enter here)

Speaker: Dave Cormier, University of Prince Edward Island, Canada

You can find out more in this blog entry.

Posted in News | Comments Off on Moocs and Open Course Models

Moocs and Open Course Models

November 2nd, 2008 by Graham Attwell

Its a busy time for events – tommorow is the latest of our on-line Evolve seminars.

This month it’s about Moocs and Open Course Models

When: 3rd November 2008, at 1800 UK Time (check your local time here)

Where: Elluminate (enter here)

Speaker: Dave Cormier, University of Prince Edward Island, Canada

Dave will be speaking about his experiences, so far, of the CCK MOOC and touch on the technological platforms being used to support participants, the tensions that exist within the course design and the peer support models that are being embraced. Within this discussion he will interweave some of his perspectives and theories around education and attempt to place the course into the context of other open courses being taught around the world.

More about our guest speaker:

Dave is well known as an innovative thinker, active researcher and practitioner in the field of the technology enhanced learning. His major research interests include the tracking and development of educational technology, the examination of planned and unplanned online communities, and open-source multiuser virtual environments (MUVEs). His most recent work has been the development of the concept of rhizomatic education and the community as curriculum. He is also one of the main discussion leaders on the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) – Connectivism and Connected Knowledge (CCK) – with George Siemens and Stephen Downes.

Posted in e-learning 2.0, Wales Wide Web | 3 Comments »

Our take on the US election

November 2nd, 2008 by Graham Attwell

Its time for Pontydysgu to take our position on the US election – and here’s our view.

Posted in Multimedia | 1 Comment »

More about learning 2.0

October 31st, 2008 by Graham Attwell

Another post on the IPTS seminar on Learning 2.0 in Seville. This workshop was interesting becuase it brought togther researchers and practitioners from all over Europe. And, somewhat to my surpise, there was a fair degree of consensus. We agreed social software provided many opportunties for creating, raher than passively consuming learning. We agreed that learnng opportunities were being developed outside the classroom. We even agreed that the locus of control was switching from institutions to the learners and that this might well be a good thing. We agreed we were moving towards individual learning pathways and that learners needed to be supported to finding their pathways.

We agreed that the context of learning was important. Mobile learning would become increasingly important with the development of context sensitive devices. (Also see Serge Ravet’s post on User Generated Content or User Generated Contexts).

But there were also limits to the consensus. Whilst there appeared agreement on new roles for teachers, no-one was sure what that role was?

Much of the discussion centred on the scaffolding of learning. How much support did leaners need and how much of that support would come from teachers?

Neither were participants agreed on the future role of institutions. More critically, was Learning 2.0 something which happened outside the school, and had only a limited impact on institutional practice, or did it pose a fundamental challenge for the future of schooling?

There was even greater disagreement over curriculum. Should there be a curriculum for basic skill and knowledge that everyone should learn? Did learners need a basic grounding in their subject before theyc oudl develop their own learning pathways? Who should define such a curriculum? What was the role of ‘experts’ and who were they anyway?

And perhaps the greatest disagreement was over assessment and accreditation. Many of us felt that we needed to move towards community based formative assessment. Employers, we said, would be more interested in what people were able to do than formal certicates. Others, pointing to occupations such as doctors and plumbers felt there should be some form of standards against which people should be assessed and accredited.

A final comment on the form of the project. Although the work is about Learning 2.0 the present form of the work is decidedly Research 1.0. This research is important enough that it needs to be opened out to the community. It seems a wiki is being d veloped and when it is up I will blog here about it. In the meantime here are some of the photos of the flip charts used for brainstorming around different issues at the workshop. I will pass on any comments on this post to the project organisers.

Posted in Assessment, e-learning 2.0, Social Software, Wales Wide Web | 2 Comments »

The web is the platform

October 30th, 2008 by Graham Attwell

I am still at the IPTS seminar on Learning 2.0 in Seville. Much of interest and I wil write a few more blogs on this. But  one issue, which has just come up, is this of platforms. The director of IPTS has asked us what platforms we see being used in the future.

And we have said – we know the platform. It is called the World Wide Web. I think that is very important. We do not need more and more platforms. We do need control over our own data and the ability to be able to develop and use that data.

Posted in e-learning 2.0, Wales Wide Web | 1 Comment »

What technologies change people’s lives?

October 29th, 2008 by Graham Attwell

There are some interesting issues kicking around at the IPTS workshop on the impact of Web 2.0 innovations on Education and Training in Europe.

there are plenty of examples of innovative practice. But there is little example of any findamental change at either a systems level or even at the level of the institution. This raises a whole series of questions:

  • is it possible to change pedagogic processes and improve opportunities for learning through the use of social software within the present system?
  • or as Roberto has just said what is the disruptive technology which can spark such chnage in peoples lives.

It may be that such change will not origin within the education system but will happen from human interactions in the wider communities through different ‘value propostions’ – through ideas, approaches and technologies which add value to people lives.

Posted in Social Software, Wales Wide Web | 1 Comment »

Are we hung up with systems approaches?

October 29th, 2008 by Graham Attwell

As always it is the extra curricula activities which are the highpoint of conferences. And i don’t just mean in the bar. I had an interesting lunchtime conversation with Martin Owen where we were talking about the problems with the classificatory systems being put forward for analysing a database of practice examples developed for the IPTS study on the impact of Web 2.) innovations on education and training in Europe.

One issue we discussed is the continued use of systems approaches for defining research design and analysis. All too often findings which do not fit into a pre-defined system are just viewed as ‘noise’ and therefore ignored. But it may be in that noise that cannot be analysed in a systems driven approach that the real issues lie. It is how learners are using social software that is critical to me and not how the system adapts or more often rejects the use of such software.

Posted in e-learning 2.0, Innovation, research, Social Software, Wales Wide Web | Comments Off on Are we hung up with systems approaches?

Teaching or learning?

October 29th, 2008 by Graham Attwell

I am at a workshop on Learning 2.0: The impact of Web 2.0 Innovations on Education and Training organised by the Institute of Prospective Technology Studies in Seville.

They have done a lot of work. however, I feel that in focusing on the use of technology for learning within the existing educational organisations they miss the main issues. How do we bring together informal learning and learning from formal sources? How do people not enrolled on courses use technologies for learning? How do we transform institutions? How can we empower learners to structure their own learning? How can we open up educational resources – materials but not just resources – to the wider community.

How also can we develop research designs and methodologies to address these issues?

Posted in e-learning 2.0, Social Software, Wales Wide Web | 2 Comments »

New url for Sounds of Bazaar

October 27th, 2008 by Graham Attwell

We have chnaged hte url for todays LIVE radio broadcast – it will now be on http://radio.jiscemerge.org.uk:80/emerge.m3u

Posted in News | Comments Off on New url for Sounds of Bazaar

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