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by Stephen Downes
September 24, 2008

CCK08: Valdis Krebs On Networks
Valdis Krebs gave us a fascinating presentation this morning on Elluminate as part of the Connectivism course - I took part from my hotel room in San Jose (I am here for the Brandon Hall conference) and took down these notes, mostly for my own reference, but also as an aid for students, and also, of course, as a practical demonstration of note-taking. Which you keep doing even when you think you've learned it all (because, of course, you haven't). See the PDF slides from the talk. Stephen Downes, Connectivism & Connective Knowledge, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: Connectivism, Silicon Valley] [Comment]

25 Edublogs You Simply Don't Want To Miss
Very nice presentation and slide show from Zaid Ali Alsagoff. Many of the 25 listed are people you would expect. But I also found a number of people I hadn't seen before - such is the always-changing nature of the blogosphere. Can you guess which of the 25 they were? Zaid Ali Alsagoff, ZaidLearn, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: Web Logs] [Comment]

OCWC Logan 08: News and Reflections
The proponents o open learning are meeting in Logan, Utah, jut about now, and this is a set of reflections from that conference, including information from OpenCourseWare, Connexions, Open University of the Netherlands, iTines University, Universia, Japanese OCW, Johns Hopkins and Open University UK. Stian Haklev, Random Stuff That Matters, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: Great Britain, Connexions, OpenCourseWare] [Comment]

I Only Use Email to Talk to Old People
"I have two teenage sons," writes Derek Keats. "They spend a lot of time in solitary social situations...i.e. they are physically alone, or in a room watching TV, listening to music or doing homework, but are socially connected to their friends via Mixit and Facebook on their cell phones. This is the reality, it is as senseless to decry it as it was to suggest that the invention of writing would destroy oral culture a long time ago." Well, maybe so, but at som point they will have to move to engage with existing culture. As some point, they need to communicate message that have more depth than "I hpe ths s prty clr to U. F tis nt thn phps we nd a crs abt yng ppl, jst 4 old ppl." It's easy to say young people communicate differently. That's cliche. What si hard is describing how the young people of today will communicate in twenty years, given this history. p.s. someone please tell Derek Keats about RSS autodiscovery. Derek Keats, keats.com, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: Books, Video, RSS] [Comment]

The Paradigm Shift
has anything shifted? Really? Rozhan Idrus poses the question, saying that, from where he sits, learning today is conductd in much the same manner as learning when he was a child. "What has shifted .. only the computer has shifted INTO our lives .. we have not shifted any education system .. we will talking abut this 10 years down the road .. same old story .. The Malaysian Smart School is already 10, yes 10 years old .. any impact ... ??Any report of any impact . I have not seen any .. have you .. anyone ??I am not worried at all about the deluge of new tools .. " (yeah, that two-dot style will drive you crazy after a while) Rozhan Idrus, eLearning .....? I've had E-Nough, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: Schools] [Comment]

Note-Taking: A Fundamental Skill of the Independent Learner
I don't care how you take notes. Use the computer, like I did today. Use paper and ink, like I did at the collaboration workshop last week. Take photographs, as I do when I travel. The main thing is, if you want to learn, take notes. Learning is not a passive act; it is an act of engagement, where you involve yourself physically and mentally, where you struggle to understand and integrate the material. Note-taking is your contribution to what is a two-way communication with the source of the learning. Maybe you'll review them again, maybe not. Keep your notes in good order, just in case. But the main this is, that you take them. Amran Noordin, Singapore Educational Consultants, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: Online Learning] [Comment]

K12 Online Conference Coming Soon
This is the third K-12 Online Conference, and is being run in basically the same way as the previous two. Not to be critical, but it's pretty much the same speakers, too. Vicki Davis, Chris Lehman, Julie Lindsay, Cheryl Oakes. What the conference organizers need to understand is that you should pick your keynotes from outside your own community, to bring new ideas and perspectives. Patricia Donaghy, Using ICT in Further Education, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

The Top Five Collections of Free University Courses
Anybody used an entire course recently? Probably not. What we really want are collections of free learning resources. (And slowly, surely, we move in that direction). Dan Colman, openculture, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: Online Learning] [Comment]

The Hidden PowerPoint Shortcut Everyone Should Know
This tip is good only for Windows users - but that's still a lot of people. Basically, it involves the Alt-C and Alt-V systems for copying to and from the clipboard, plus ALT+E, then B, which allows you to examine the clipboard. Here are some more PowerPoint tips. Tom Kulhmann, The Rapid E-Learning Blog, September 24, 2008 [Link] [Tags: Microsoft] [Comment]

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