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by Stephen Downes
August 18, 2009

Taking a Break

I have returned from Vancouver (yesterday I spent the entire day on airplanes) and will be taking my vacation for the rest of August. We're headed to the campground on Thursday, which means there will be a short hiatus of ten days or so while I relax on vacation. I'll probably have an issue of OLDaily tomorrow, but don't expect one Thursday and after. Regular publication will resume in September. This link, meanwhile, is from my visit to Bowen island on Sunday. On Saturday, Diego and I hiked the trail at Shadow Lake, near Whistler. And here are my photos from Vancouver. Stephen Downes, Flickr, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Flickr] [Comment]

New Media Literacies -- A Syllabus
One of the things on my 'things to do' list is to look at critical thinking and new media litera cies more closely (now that I've been able to cross "read War and Peace" off the list I'll have a lot more time!). Henry Jenkins takes the perspective, "What social skills and cultural competencies do young people need to acquire if they are going to be able to fully participate in the digital future?" My focus is a bit different; I am not so concerned with whether or not they "fully participate" and am more concerned about their being (to use a hackneyed phrase) fully empowered. The focus (of my thought) is on the individual learner, not the system of media into which he or she is entrenched. And I'm not so interested in individual competencies as I am the whole person and what they become. Henry Jenkins, Confessions of an Aca-Fan, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: New Media] [Comment]

What's Truly Amazing
I have already covered Alan Levine Amazing Stories of Openness presentation. This post is "the making of..." the Amazing Stories. Great advice and explanation. Alan Levine , CogDogBlog, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

Blog Portfolio Model

Helen Barrett adds to the list of PLE diagrams (though it isn't really labeled as such). Note the workspece-showcase axis.
Helen Barrett , E-Portfolios for Learning , August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

Interview with Vikram Savkar, Nature Education: Innovators in E-Learning Series
Susan Smith Nash (minus her trademark glasses) interviews Vikram Savkar, who from Nature Education led the development and launch of Scitable, a free science library and personal learning tool. Scitable is pretty neat: you can upload resources, build a classroom, and more. "Scitable currently concentrates ongenetics, the study of evolution, variation, and the rich complexity of living organisms. As you cultivate your understanding of modern genetics on Scitable. Susan Smith Nash, E-Learning Queen, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Copyrights, Patents] [Comment]

The Live Video Streaming Of IWMW 2009
IWMW stands for "Institutional Web Management Workshop" (I had to look at quite a few pages before I was able tyo find that out!). This post not only links to the video streams of the event, it looks at the live video srtreaming statistics. But it would be interesting to see how often the talks are viewed in the future. These event videos create a rich resource, and people will mine it for gems for a long time. Here's the event timetable with links to specific talks. Enjoy. Brian Kelly, UK Web Focus, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Video] [Comment]

The Performance Environment

Clark Quinn approaches the subject from a different direcrtion and offers his own take on the PLE, which in his hands morphs into the 'performance environment'. Note the formal-informal and active-reflective dimensions. Clark Quinn, Learnlets, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

Show me yours - I'll show you mine
I was able to chat with David Porter a bit at Open Education and to get from him a sense of his thinking that goes beyond the "almost past due" commentary he offered earlier in the conferece. That sense is echoed in this post. He writes, "I believe the simplest approach is best. Contribute examples of practice, be prepared to answer questions and critique about them. I think this could be an accessible starting point for many instructors wanting to go in the open direction." He cites David Wiley's open courses, along with those of Alec Copuros and George and myself. I really think what we are doing with these will reshape learning, and consequently, open education and OERs. And I agree with him that the 'course packages' model is a thing of the past, and that community-based sharing will eventually predominate. We will, collectively, meanwhile, continue to develop and extend the model.

See also Bringing systemic shape to open initiatives, a summary of a presentation by Fred Muldar at the Ope4n Education conference. Muldar takes a more institutionally-oriented approach than I am comfortable with, but as he said to me at the conference, they have made the institutional approach work in Holland,. and have elicited ministerial level support, so there is a model for success.
David Porter, conviviality, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Chatrooms, Online Learning, Open Educational Resources, Accessibility] [Comment]

OpenEd 2009 Recap
Another recap of Open Education 2009 in Vancouver, which was quite a good conference. This post summarizes a number of the papers, including some I've mentioned in these pages already. For another recap, see also Michael Korcuska . Cole Camplese, Cole Camplese, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

Open Access Course: Social Media & Open Education (Fall 2009)
Alec Couros will be offering an open access graduate course this Fall titled EC&I 831: Social Media & Open Education. Just as we did with last year's Connectivism course, there will be some 15-20 students registered for credit and some larger number of people taking it as an open course. Access the course here. Also, he is asking people to submit microlectures rthat will become part of the course content. Alec Couros, Open Thinking, August 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Traditional and Online Courses, Connectivism, Open Access] [Comment]

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