TEL Summer School 2011

Last week (May 29-June 4) I attended JTELSS11; the 7th Joint European Summer School on Technology Enhanced Learning in Crete island, Greece. It was supported by PROLEARN Academy , EATEL, TELeurope and STELLARNET. It was such a great event for doctoral students and researchers in TEL to come together to exchange their ideas and build also a TELeurope doctoral community of practice. There were about 42 doctoral students from 22 EU countries (with different nationalities). 

The summer school program included verities of activities such as plenary sessions, workshops, group-working on different topics of interest e.g. web 2.0 in research and learning, PLE, augmented reality, adaptive learning systems and other areas of TEL research. The main part of the program was everyday group-working and interactive discussions between PhD students   to discuss and share their research issues such as methodologies, theories and other topics and techniques in PhD research. It was a unique opportunity to meet people in TEL research, fellow researchers to exchange our thoughts and develop our professional networking. 

In addition to a good scientific program, there were also some leisure activities. The location of the summer school was a great beach resort which provided participants with possibility of doing various activities such as swimming, beach volleyball, and other sports activities. The day before the summer school we had an excursion to south-western of Crete from a very glorious mountainous road. Then in the last day we also had another excursion to some villages in eastern part of Crete and a good-looking lake where we somehow got relaxed after a one-week intensive working.

On the whole, it was such a wonderful experience to benefit both from the excellent program of the summer school and to visit attractive Crete.  

Here is a video of the JTELSS11:

MOOCS! (Massive Open Online Courses)

-- PLEK12 (an open online course on personal learning environments) by Christopher Davis Sessums and Wendy Drexler  from the University of Florida ended last week. I was able to be lurking in this course and couldn’t be able to participate in all activities.  I couldn’t attend live sessions either because they were running at 2am (my time). Fortunately, all archive of Elluminate recordings are available for further access. 

-- CCK11 also just finished this week. The wrap up session of this 12-weeks course was held on Friday by the facilitators (George Siemens and Stephen Downes).  The discussion was mainly about the current situation and the future of connectivism and MOOCs.  Here is the recording of the session. Siemens created a Google Group to discuss how to plan, deliver, and research open online courses: " MetaMOOC" .

-- Another MOOC started this week about mobile learning: MobiMOOC. It will run from 2 April - 14 May 2011.

 

My pondering on connectivism!

 Since I have been engaged in research on open learning, social networked learning, open online learning environments, PLE and all those issues related to the influence of emerging technologies on our current learning ecologies, I have been also thinking and reflecting on connectivism and its merits as a learning theory and its applications in our education and learning practices in the current digital and networked. Although, it seems that connectivism is not yet widely accepted as a robust learning theory and there are some criticisms around it but, there are some links between the nature of our learning and knowledge construction in the complexities of digital and networked technologies and connectivism as a theoretical framework which still can help us understand these complexities. 

For me as a researcher in this area, there is still some sort of uncertainty to apply connectivism in my research with regards to the critical arguments around it. Nonetheless, my research on open and networked learning and personal learning environments (PLE) has some theoretical grounds in connectivism.  My reflections on connectivism as a learning theory brought me to some issues which I’d like to argue here to provide a base for further discussion and thinking:

-  With regards to the fact that some critics still argue about the potential of connectivism as a learning theory, one question is that what it offers that not existed in the other learning theories and how it explain learning processes differently from other learning theories? What are the core elements of a learning theory which qualify it as a learning theory and connectivism lacks in this respect?

-While it is not a serious learning theory (or let say a well-established learning theory), does it mean that it shouldn’t be used in our research on learning processes in technological-mediated learning environments? Most of the time I am talking about connectivism as a theoretical base for my research and the way it can explain our learning and knowledge construction in today’s networked world, there are some criticisms by some research fellows and even from supervisors that they are skeptical of that as a learning theory then, using it might endanger a research in its theoretical underpinnings.

-While there are many research and development being done on connectivism and at least it is something that could explain the nature of learning phenomena in a digital and networked world with regards to openness and connectivity, it indicates that it has good grounds as a growing phenomenon if not as a theory. So, a learning theory probably doesn’t become a theory unless being researched and practiced in different contexts and being developed over time by examining its potential. Since, connectivism is relatively a new born term and needs to grow over time, we all as educators and researchers can help nurture it by our contributions.

IRRODL Special Issue on Connectivism Published

I have been looking forward to seeing this special issue of IRRODL about connectivism since last year in September when I started participating in PLENK2010. So, it was published last week.

 The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning (IRRODL) is a refereed free e-journal that aims to advance research, theory and best practices of open and distance education.

Below is it the content of this issue however, I am not sure if I can post them here but since it's a free and open access journal there shouldn't be any problem I guess!

IRRODL Vol 12, No 3 (2011): Special Issue - Connectivism: Design and Delivery of Social Networked Learning

Editorial: George Siemens, Grainne Conole
Articles:

Interconnecting networks of practice for professional learning
Julie Mackey, Terry Evans

The challenges to connectivist learning on open online networks: Learning experiences during a massive open online course
Rita Kop

Emergent learning and learning ecologies in Web 2.0
Roy Williams, Regina Karousou, Jenny Mackness

EduCamp Colombia: Social networked learning for teacher training
Diego Ernesto Leal Fonseca

Three generations of distance education pedagogy
Terry Anderson, Jon Dron

Connectivism: Its place in theory-informed research and innovation in technology-enabled learning
Frances Bell

Frameworks for understanding the nature of interactions, networking, and community in a social networking site for academic practice
Grainne Conole, Rebecca Galley, Juliette Culver

Dialogue and connectivism: A new approach to understanding and promoting dialogue-rich networked learning
Andrew Ravenscroft

Proposing an integrated research framework for connectivism: Utilising theoretical synergies
Bopelo Boitshwarelo

My plan for conferences this year!

 This year I am planning to participate in one (or two) of the following conferences.

- ED-MEDIA 2011;World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Telecommunications, June 27-July 1, 2011 in Lisbon, Portugal. Deadline for submission is April 12th. We will have a paper with my colleagues about blended learning and using wikis in higher education. Two keynotes of the conference : Alec Couros  and Erik Duval  will be speaking about interesting topics of today's learning; openness and networked learning. This conference I will attend for sure and looking froward to seeing Alec and Erik and other keynote speakers' contributions. There will be a doctoral consortium in this conference which I am interested to attend.

But between the two conferences below, I may attend just one . I'd like to participate in both but it depends on the situation then!  I am now preparing my proposals for both of them which is focused on self-directed learning, personalization of learning and personal learning environments.

- 6th European Conference on Technology- Enhanced Learning  ( EC-TEL 2011), 21-23 September 2011 in Palermo Italy. Proposal deadline is April 4th. The conference theme for this year is " Towards Ubiquitous Learning" with two keynotes talking about issues related to emerging technologies and ubiquitous learning.. There will be some workshops and also a doctoral consortium in the conference.


        - PLE Conference , conference on Personal Learning Environments (PLE), 11-13 July 2011, Southampton, UK. Deadline for submission is now extended until April10th. This conference is a good venue for my research and good themes related to PLE where I can also meet some researchers in this area.

Open Movement; Openness and Transparency in Education

   Week 9 of CCK11 was about openness and transparency. There are huge discussions and debates nowadays about open movement: open source, open content, open access, open educational resources (OER) and so on and especially what they can bring to our educational and learning practices. How all content and information could be freely accessible to all? Who pays for them? What are the roles of educational institutions in moving towards openness and are there any benefits for them to make contents and materials closed or make them open?

  On Wednesday live session on Elluminate (March 16^th),   Zaid Ali Alsagoff  talked about: Sharing to Connect, Interact and Learn . He was an active participant of MOOCs (PLENK2010, CCK11) whose insightful reflections and perceptions of openness and connectivity were shared in the session with other participants of the course. The discussion was all great and inspired me to ponder more about these issues in my research also.  Here is his presentation on Slideshare and the entire session as Elluminate Recording and as MP3 Audio.

This quote as a conclusion of this discussion makes us think of the value of openness in education:

“Embrace openness because it’s a great way to connect and interact with amazing people and experience awesome learning”!

 

   I think for being open and transparent in learning and collaboration, some tools like blogs, Twitter, Slideshare, YouTube, Google, Bookmarking tools  etc.  can help us for aggregating, organizing, remixing and sharing our content and artifacts. Perhaps Twitter and blogging have more values for openness and visibility and to promote connectivity.

   On Friday, the facilitator’s discussion continued by Siemens and Downes on the history open movement in education. Siemens referred to the first initiatives of open source movement and how they were reacted at the time. It was in 1998 that the ‘Open Content License’ was introduced: http://www.opencontent.org/opl.shtml

Here are some links related to open movement and openness in education:

George Siemens, Free and Open Source Movements

George Siemens, Open Source Content in Education

Stephen Downes, Open Education: Projects and Potentual (slides and audio)

George Siemens & Kathleen Matheos, Open Social Learning in Higher Education: An African Context (video)

Stephen Downes, The Future of Open Educational Resources (video)

Alan Levine, Amazing Stories of Openness

Stephen Downes, Models for Sustainable Open Educational Resources

Stephen Downes and David Wiley, Downes-Wiley: A Conversation on Open Educational Resources

Open Education: Moving From Concept to Reality by G. Siemens: http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/OE_presentation.htm

Budapest open access initiative: http://www.soros.org/openaccess/read.shtml

It was mentioned in the discussion that there are three phases of open learning:

-          Open Content, e.g. open educational resources (OER) , open course ware (OCW)

-          Open Courses, e.g. CCK11, PLENK2010, EC&I831, PLEK12, DS106,  …

-          Open Assessment, which is also very important among topics of openness in education.  What does that really mean? How it can be applied in the context of open education. Who can assess learning? Who are the stakeholders in the process of open assessment?

The Elluminate recording of the session will be soon available.

Interviewing the MOOC's participants

In this spring I conducted some online interviews with the participants of two open online courses as part of my thesis data. The interviewees varied in professional background and their extent of participation in open online courses. While they were all good users of social media and web 2.0 tools, the way and purposes they incorporated those tools in their professional activities and educational and learning practices were different. Most of them have been participating in more than two (M)OOCs with different level of engagement. In each course the level of activities and the requirements for participation however were also varied. In one course, which two interviewees came from, there was a need for more active participation and preparing some reflections and final digital and online projects which required more involvement in use of tools and technology to fulfil the requirement.   
I did interviews on Skype, GTalk and one by phone and I used some online tools like Pamela for recording.

The whole process of interviewing was challenging though; for arranging practical preparation and technical resources but, also inspiring to go through participants’ experiences and perceptions of such open online environments and their interactions with resources and people from different parts of the world, using many forms of technologies and tools in the process of learning and collaboration.

CCK11’s week six on PLEs & PLNs

The topic of week six of CCK11 was about personal learning environments and networks which is very relevant to my research. The facilitators’ live session on Elluminate on Friday 25.2.2011 was a great discussion on the topic with valuable contributions from the participants. The session was started with a question about the definition of PLE from the point of view of participants and what is unique in PLE? As shown below, there were different thoughts on the definition of PLE:

Source:CCK11

Some people just refer to a single application as their PLE like Twitter connections or iGoogle which seems to be more tool-oriented but, some other see PLE as a combination of different tools, services, resources and connections in the process of learning.  One person believed that PLE concept is a result of Web 2.0 evolution and if the internet did not move that way to more participatory direction, perhaps we wouldn’t talk today about PLE! Downes mentioned that PLEs are not just for collecting and aggregating resources and materials but rather pull all learner needs to PLEs then, remix, repurpose and create new artifacts and share them with the community. PLEs are where a lot of learning happens by all those processes.

Another big concern which Siemens posed was what problems PLEs can solve?  This is really an important question? Can PLEs approach be a pedagogical model of education to the needs of current network era in contrast to the classroom-based model? The screenshot below of the discussion whiteboard shows what participants think of PLE in this regard. It can be realized that PLE approach has values for lifelong and informal learning and the ways the learner can organize and personalize learning. 

Source: CCK11

Here in the course page of week 6 , there are some good readings for pondering about PLEs and PLNs. Also here is the Elluminate recording from the session and the MP3 file. 

Starting the year with two other MOOCs: CCK11 and LAK11 !

Inspired by positive perceptions from the last fall’s MOOCs,  I decided to participate in two open online courses this spring:

"Connectivism and Connective Knowledge" (CCK11) By George Siemens and Stephen Downes and

"Learning and Knowledge Analytics" (LAK11) by George Siemens and Dave Cormier. 

#CCK11 started last week and will last for 10 more weeks until April 11^th 2011. The weekly topics seem interesting and I would like to learn from them to widen my knowledge of connectivism and connective learning and their applications into practice in the era of digital connectedness. On the other hand, because connectivism is the main underlying theoretical perspective in my research on PLE and open online learning networks, I hope this course will help me better understand what connectivism can bring into educational practices and learning in this connected world.  

#LAK11 began two weeks ago and will be continuing until the mid of February. Although, I am concentrating more on #CCK11 than this one but, I am following the LAK11’s  activities and attending the synchronous sessions as long as my time allow me. 

My motivation for taking part in these two MOOCs was based on my experiences from open online courses I participated in last fall: PLENK2010 and EC&I831. They were extremely inspiring and engaged me in more online networking and connecting with many people from all parts of the world. Another reason for me to attend these courses is to get more understanding of the open education and networked learning and going through different topics related to them during the course period. I am now quite familiar with the structure of MOOCs and I like the way they are being run, especially synchronous sessions which the course facilitators along with some other experts discuss the weekly topics on Elluminate.  

However, in spite of my willingness, I cannot be involved in all activities in a full potential way but, I am trying to be as active as possible and being engaged in different networks to get most out of them. Perhaps, here I should bring this point that my learning journey and experience with social media and digital tools; integrating them into my research activities and professional development, and the social interactions I had with many people during the last two MOOCs were absolutely incredible.  

Online survey for the participants of MOOCs

After experiencing an overwhelming participation in two Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC); PLENK2010 and EC&I831  from September 2010 to December 2010, and getting more understanding into the nature of open, social and networked learning which helped me make my research focused I conducted an online survey ( and here)to the participants of these two courses.

My intention was to get more insights into the experiences and perceptions of the course participants of such open and unusual courses in terms of using different technologies and digital tools, involving in online learning networks, making their personal learning environments and getting sense of being a connected learner.

However, this survey is not a main data source for my research and nonetheless, not so many people responded to it but, it was useful for obtaining some preliminary information about the topics related to open and networked learning and PLE. It somehow revealed that which technologies and how much they have been using during the course, how they have been engaged in the course activities etc.  

 I used GoogleDocs for making the survey but for some weird reason it didn’t accept the responses and I had to use another online survey maker: www.surveygizmo.com  which was also good. The survey is still underway and participants of MOOCs can respond to it.

In the survey I asked the participant if they are willing to take part in an an online interview for further elaboration on the themes and topics of the survey. I am hoping to have at least 6 people for interviewing. 

What Wordle could say about your writing and thinking?!

I just created a "word cloud" by Wordle from my blog today and found this:



It highlights what I am more thinking and writing about in my blog. Here is a fancy analysis of this Wordle: "Learning" is my big concern as it shows in the picture. Just right underneath it is saying that I am researching and enjoying kind of "Open" ( education & learning ) mediated by  " Technology"  and various "Social" ( media) in a “Networked” way by joining " free education" and focusing on "Informal" (learning). 

That's true; however, there is a big "conference" there as well which, perhaps shouldn't be that big (just because of some posts about different conferences!). The other bigger ones are “social” and “online” which make sense and are my concerns too but, I am wondering how small “theories” or learning theories is! Maybe the smallest one!  It makes me a bit more think about it.

The highlighted terms show my focus and the scope of my dissertation research somehow. 

This post was just for fun but, it is also worth mentioning that even a fun tool like Wordle can tell us something about our thinking and its directions. I think it is useful sometimes we put our text into Wordle to get some ideas. 

PLENK2010; Fostering Open and Networked Learning!

 picture source: Global Education

    Formally, the PLENK2010 ( Personal Learning Environments, Networks and Knowledge) which was kind of massive open online course (MOOC) finished last week but, informally it will be continuing through the networks of the participants which have been created during the course across various latforms.                     

    PLENK2010 covered various topics and issues from learning theories (e.g. comparing connectivism with other learning theories such as constructivism and cognitivism), PLE & PLN, self-directed informal learning, the role of educator in open education, the issues concerning the learner’s autonomy in open learning and many more relevant topics. 

   There was a ground for all participants with different learning styles and preferences to find out their ways in the context of this course in which, how they can learn, how to interact with others; just to be a lurker and stalking what is happening there or being an active participant to benefit from collaboration with other people in the course, creating and sharing the contents and being engaged in various forms to enrich the learning experiences. 

    For me, the MOOCs I have attended this autumn ( PLENK2010 & eci831) were exciting and very insightful. I enjoyed them and learned a lot as a participant and I got so many insights for my research on open education and networked learning. It was a great opportunity to encourage and keep me motivated to create and develop my PLE, also joining so many open online learning networks (OLNs) which have great potential for enhancing connectivity and networking in today’s connected world. 

   The big issue which makes me pondering is that: what these kinds of open online course add to education and learning?  What are the values of open education and networked social learning which challenge the structure of formal learning? And how the conventional formal education systems could cope with the needs of self-directed informal learning? Undoubtedly, these challenges are resulted from the evolutionary advancement of new social media and collaborative technologies which provide the infrastructure for putting more value on open education and informal social learning. 

Global Education Conference ( free & online)

Last week from 15 - 19 Nov. 2010, the "2010 Global Education Conference" was held online and free! It was  totally an online conference and all sessions were presented on Elluminate platform. I participated in some sessions ( as many as my schedule allowed me) which I enjoyed some of them.

I personally like the idea of having such a worldwide online conference which brings all interested people from all over the world together in such an online environment to discuss about global education issues. The organizers explained the conference "collaborative and world-wide community effort to significantly increase opportunities for globally-connecting education activities. Our goal is to help you make connections with other educators and students, and for this reason the conference is very inclusive and also is provides broad opportunities for participating and presenting."

 It was free and just on your desktop to join and no travel or money were needed! With the fact that it is not easy to organize such a big online conference but, in my opinion, it was well-organized  with good moderators and all sessions were on time except few which presenters didn't show up!

All presentations were recorded which are available here.

Here is the  "The Global Education Collaborative",  the official social network of the Global Education Conference if anybody interested in joining the network.

AECT Conference 2010 in Anaheim, California

In late October ( 25-30) I attended AECT "Association for Educational Communications and Technology" conference in Anaheim, California, US. 

This year's conference theme was:  Cyber Change: Learning in Our Connected World. It was very related to what I am researching in my dissertation which is about open and networked learning in a networked world. The conference covered various topics and themes regarding new technology applications in education and learning. 

The conference was very well-organized and I enjoyed the whole programs. It was a great experience for me to develop my professional networking.  In addition to attending some good sessions about researching on social media and web 2.0, social networks, personal learning environments,  learning networks , I  found some people who are working and researching in my area of research whose comments to my research were very helpful.  

There were different types of presentations and very useful workshops of which I really enjoyed the workshop about " using cutting-edge technology to improve qualitative research and evaluation" by Rick West ( Brigham Young University). This presentations was also great: " social leaning linkage model for open network learning environment (ONLE) and PLE" by Chih-Hsiung Tu & Michael Blocher ( Northern Arizona University). 

I also attended a workshop by David Merrill where he was talking about new approaches in instructional design and some principles of instruction "e^3 (effective, efficient, engaging) Instruction."  

   

There were also such good programs for graduate students ( faculty/student mentor program, intern program) which of course, I  would have wished to be in one the them!

AECT is a prominent association for promotion technology in education and learning. It has published some books of which two are more important: Handbook of Research for Educational Communications and Technology  and Educational Technology: A Definition with Commentary. 

It is also publishing several journals including: Educational Technology Research and Development , TechTrends - Linking Research and Practice to Improve Learning, Instructional Science and Quarterly Review of Distance Education. Here is the list of its publications. 

The 2011 AECT international conference 'Celebrate 3.0: Design.Learn.Community' will be in Jacksonville, Florida , on November 8-12.

There are some few photos of  the conference here in my Flickr.  

 

Educational Technology Journal Survey Research

University of Florida is conducting a survey about educational technology journals. The purposes of this research are to:
(1) advance the field of educational technology by determining the most academically prestigious publication venues in the field;
(2) determine most important factors relating to the choice of publishing in a journal in the field of educational technology; and
(3) connect research interests to specific journals in the field of educational technology.

This is a short survey (e.g., 15 minutes) that will evaluate several dimensions of the peer-reviewed journals in educational technology. Results will be shared with AECT and other educational technology groups.

 Interested to participate in this research go here and fill in the survey.

RSA Animate - Changing Education Paradigms , Ken Robinson

A 'Networked Student' in 21st Centruy, #PLENk2010

  In this video you can see how a 'connected student' in the 21st century learn and make his/her own learning networks. A student of 'Connectivism'  basically without a specific textbook or assigned lectur hours by teacher. Connectivist approach assumes that learning occures by making different social connections using tecgnology and tools and creating 'personal learning environment'. Using different social media and collaborative tools, a networked student is able to find relevant contents on the web, organize them in the way needed, reproduce and share them by social bookmarking tools like Delicious and Diigo and getting feedback from different people.

100 Inspiring Ways to Use Social Media In the Classroom

Social media may have started out as a fun way to connect with friends, but it has evolved to become a powerful tool for education and business. Sites such as Facebook and Twitter and tools such as Skype are connecting students to learning opportunities in new and exciting ways. Whether you teach an elementary class, a traditional college class, or at an online university, you will find inspirational ways to incorporate social media in your classroom with this list.

Theories of Learning

Web 3.0 (Semantic Web)

Revolution after revolution or revolution in revolution?! When the WWW was invented by Berners-Lee in early 90s it was so called the biggest human evolution after industrial revolution. Later on, by emerging  web 2.0 technologies and social media and different social networks like Facebook, Myspace, Twitter etc. there was a  big argumentation around it that how this evolution has changed human lives. Now it is all about the openness and connectedness of new generation of emerging social web tools which make it difficult for people to select and adopt them in appropriate ways. How one can manage very many different web applications and the information could be retrieved from them and how these huge sources of information could semantically be of help. That's the issue now that web 3.0 or semantic web is all about!

 

Above is a fascinating video by Kate Ray who has interviewd some experts in web technologies including: Tim Berners-Lee, Clay Shirky, Chris Dixon, David Weinberger, Nova Spivack, Jason Shellen, Lee Feigenbaum, John Hebeler, Alon Halevy, David Karger and Abraham Bernstein.