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by Stephen Downes
December 7, 2007

Educamp Colombia - Medellin

So here we are at eduCamp Colombia in the beautiful city of Medellin. As I type Diego is at the front of the room as we are finished brainstorming and about to enter into discussion groups. Various Authors, Flickr December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Flickr] [Comment]

Games and Education
George Siemens links to a Slashdot discussion of games and learning and comments, "Games fit the typical profile of academic envy, namely the condition where we see many people doing something and desire to then use the same tools or processes for teaching and learning." As usual I comment at this juncture that the effort should be to put learning into games, not games into learning. George Siemens, elearnspace December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Connectivism, Academia] [Comment]

Communities / Social Networking and LMS Merger
Once again we're leading the way. Here's a quote from Gartner: "Enterprise social software will be the biggest new workplace technology success story of this decade." I guess their definition of 'successful' is taking something that's widely available for free and convincing money-ladejn enterprises to pay for it. Related: This stuff is freaking me out. Tony Karrer, eLearning Technology December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

Habermas Relevant to a Wired Public Sphere?
I have never been a Habermas scholar - I differ from many commentators in this sphere in my philosophical orientation, which owes much more to Russell, Ayer, Quine, McLuhan and Wittgenstein than to continental philosophers like Heidegger, Husserl, Foucault and Habermas. But I certainly recognize the influence of Habermas - at philosophy conferences in the 80s when I was a grad student people would stop talking about him. So it's not surprising to see him surfacing here. Short post; follow the links for deeper discussion. Ron Lubensky, eLearning and Deliberative Moments December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

Flat Classroom Student and Teacher Summits
Julie Lindsay summarizes the discussion that took place at the Flat Classroom Project 2007 Student and Teacher Summits held yesterday. 'There were a number of visitors to these two sessions including Yara, a student of mine from Qatar Academy, and John Maklary, one of the sounding board teachers for the project." Julie Lindsay, E-Learning Blog December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Project Based Learning] [Comment]

Swiftboating Higher Education On P2P: Why Higher Education Is Not the Real Problem, and Technology Is Not the Real Solution
What is important about this presentation (Adobe PDF) is that it focuses on the misrepresentations made by music and film companies about file sharing - especially when the same activity occurs on their own networks. One wonders, why do they go after universities and not commercial internet providers? Maybe bulk licensing agreements (and the institutions' legendary tendency to fold under legal pressure) have something to do with it? Realted: Higher education funding controlled by RIAA/MPAA? Kenneth C. Green, EDUCAUSE Connect December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: File Sharing, Networks] [Comment]

Blearning - Yes It's New, It's Exciting, It's Cheap, It's Free
Somebody in Bogota on Wednesday was talking to me about 'Blearning' and it had me scratching my head - until we collectively realized that it's 'blended learning'. Which, of course, is not new - just rebranded. That said, we had a pretty good discussion about the idea of 'blended learning' as classes supplemented with e-learning resources, and the sort of thing we were doing, where there is an on-site in-person component, but it certainly does not resemble a class. And that if we wanted to talk about a newer form of blended learning, we should be talking about online learning supporting real-world activities (not classes). Related: discussion of Buzzlogic as a measuring tool for informal learning. Discovery Through eLearning, Tracy Hamilton December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Online Learning, Blended Learning] [Comment]

For Your Listening Pleasure...
This is the change we're seeing happen: "The last few weeks have been amazing at my school. The Learning 2.0 Conference started it last September. Then the Laptop/Wi-fi pilot in the high school helped key people start seeing the shift that needs to happen." Yeah. But... the video attached to the post is what it's really all about, when you think of it. Susan Sedro, Adventures in Educational Blogging December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Schools, Video, E-Learning 2.0] [Comment]

Facebook Privacy Basics...
One of the rules of eduCamps - and bar camps in general - is that there is a lot of online participation - photo sharing, content sharing, more. It's like the tour we took in New Zealand last year, which was an extended bar camp. Everything went online. It is with this in mind that I link to Brian Lamb's post on Facebook privacy basics. Case in point: I saw my Facebook profile on public display at the conference today. Everybody walking by stopped to look at it. It makes me think twice about what I'm posting there (well, not so much, because I knew it was pretty tame - but you know what I mean). Related: Alan Levine complains about Facebook bacn. Totally agree. Though I will add, I noticed that my Facebook messages are coming as full-text in my email now - it's soooo nice to not have to go to Facebook every time I get a message. Brian Lamb, abject learning December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Privacy Issues, Books] [Comment]

Students 2.0 Edublog Pre-Launch: Help Spread the Splash
One of these things I'd like to see succeed. Clay Burell writes, "I have watched this handful of impressive students young adults from around the world working tirelessly for the last three weeks on an endless Skype chat to prepare the launch of the new Students 2.0 edublog. And I've been amazed at how much more they know than any adult I know about many things technical and pedagogical." There's a list of things you can do to participate in the launch, which takes place in a couple of days. Clay Burell, Beyond School December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Audio Chat and Conferencing, Chatrooms, Adult Learning] [Comment]

Educamp Ireland
Here is a link to an Irish eduCamp, from last June. "It will focus less on bitching about the Department of Education and Science and more on getting free technology, leveraging local ITexpertise and exploring low-cost effective information technology for schools without money." Also, here's the Stanford eduCamp, which tool place in September, with a large number of proceedings, notes, pictures, whatever. Various Authors, Website December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Schools] [Comment]

NYC eduCamp
Speaking of educamps - I wanted to link to this educamp that was held a few days ago in New York. The New York rules were slightly different, more in the 'camp' tradition: "Attendees must give a demo, a session, or help with one, or otherwise volunteer / contribute in some way to support the event ("Contributing" something to EduCamp can mean many things. You can attend someone else's workshop and simply engage in discussion, or help clean up the breakfast plates! We just want to make sure people are actively involved.) All presentations are scheduled the day they happen." More here. Various Authors, Website December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

Children Promised Rubbish Lessons
A classroom is being set up within a recycling centre to teach children about what happens to rubbish. Rubbish! Unattributed, BBC News | UK News | Education | World Edition December 7, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

 

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