How has my Learning Philosophy changed? Answering this question for me was difficult. I have learned about may different things in this course as well as the other courses that I have taken so it’s not easy to say what has changed in my philosophy based on this class alone. I guess that’s part of my learning philosophy, nothing happens in a vacuum when it comes to learning.

Week 4 for me was a pivotal week in thinking about the variations that are important when it comes to learning. Going forward, it will be important for all people to recognize that lifelong learning is more of a necessity. I used to think my family unique, since my parents, brothers and sister have always learned for learning sake (but usually in a formal setting).  I also gained an appreciation that assessment is not always needed to show that knowledge has been attained. Much like James Paul Gee when he talked in the video, Videogames Learning and Literacy where the difficulty of the task in playing Halo you wouldn’t be tested on that it’s a known that the knowledge was gained in playing the game.
The area of my philosophy that it was most reinforced in this class however was that of social constructivist View. Some of the other courses that I’ve taken have reinforced the importance of community although initially I was not a fan of Slack using it along with blogs and reading my teammates blogs as well as other class members help to reinforce and change and hung hone my understanding of the topics ( research papers videos applications series theories Etc.)
Much like in John Sealy Brown video “meaning often emerges as much from context as content”. This sums up my philosophy in that, each context brings with it unique factors that play as significantly a role as does the material that’s being covered. Had I just taken this course and never reflected on other people’s thoughts or had other people reflect on my thoughts, I would not have gotten as much meaning out of the content. However, using this context helped develop a more meaningful understanding. In the example Henry Jenkins talked about participatory culture and civic engagement when referring to communities that have sprung up based on sharing of knowledge in areas of Interest. This aspect of the social constructivist idea is an aspect of education that I didn’t think much about in the past but will in the future.

Sorry for the video being so long, I thought I’d try something different. I would follow up with my opening with “search your feelings you know this to be true”.

VIDEO MISSING

So how has my Learning Philosophy changed, we’ll it hasn’t changed per se. Let’s just say, that what I knew as the reality of my philosophy has been augmented.  😉

Digital Diploma Mills.

Or

Chicken Little, the Sith Lords and the falling sky.

Most of the article reminded me of the slippery slope argument that you hear about with every hot and button topic and this one is no different. Many people in Academia have for years talked about how they are above the “Business of Education” as if business is beneath them. When I was in High School the teachers went on strike. Shortly before the strike every teacher in ever class explained how the Administration was trying to restrict their ability to teach bla bla bla etc etc. after hearing this from every teacher for four weeks all the students felt the teachers were justified for striking. They used their influence to promote their one sided self serving argument and that is what this article is.

In the classroom versus The Boardroom he talks about how the faculty were given “little possibility of oversight or governance; faculty were thus left out of the loop and kept in the dark about the new web requirement until the last moment.”

Not every decision need to be part of three different sub committees to give each member a platform to pontificate. Oftentimes those same people are more interested in making sure that their voices heard because what they have to say is “important” The types of decisions by committee very often have unintended consequences. A case in point, each of the Penn State campuses was allowed to decide whether they would require a residency requirement. The idea behind the residency requirement is that you must take a certain number of courses at that location in order to graduate from that College. When the Abington faculty Senate debated the topic they didn’t even really know what they were debating and so they made the decision that no residency requirement would be required. Lo and behold when students then started obtaining the history degree without ever stepping foot on the Abington Campus those same faculty who had made the decision were outraged that this could be possible. Faculty participation in decision making isn’t always the best thing.

Noble first talks about how education became commercialized. And how the focus became about research, intellectual property and intellectual capital. One of the bigger issues is that a whole generation of higher ed faculty has been raised to focus solely on “publish or perish” as well as “research” and again he blames administrators, but I’m sure there are plenty of faculty who want the release time from teaching to focus on their specialty, so it’s not just one sided. Noble then goes on to say that the administrators ignored the expanded administrative costs and focus their intentions rather upon increasing the efficiencies of already overextended teachers.  I do not think that they are overextended.  3 courses one semester and 2 courses the other with a focus on some research periodically is not being over extended in my opinion.

In the section on the birth of educational maintenance organizations, Noble talks about “undermining the autonomy and independence of faculty as well as without support for their pedagogical claims about the alleged enhancements of Education without any real evidence of productivity improvements and without any effective demand from other students or teachers.” I find that somewhat ironic given that it is understood that higher education instructors are not teachers they do not go to school to learn how to teach they are material experts in their field therefore many have very little understanding of pedagogical methodologies.

The evil doers of the article, the administrators, (you know the people that were former faculty members who have risen to the level of administration ) these ultra bad guys they are the embodiment of Sith Lords. Administrations are “deploying technology primarily to discipline a skill and displace labor”.  Noble also lays most of the expense of education at the feet of technology. The cost of education have continued to rise for a variety of reasons not just because of technology of which based on his statements in this article he would lead readers to believe. As an example, the societal expectations of the educational consumer surely plays a factor. I know I will be dating myself but I live in a dormitory and the dormitory had two shared bathrooms for all 40 people on the floor. The privileged lifestyle of the McMansion generation where everyone has their own bathroom  creates a certain expectation. God forbid you should share much of anything with anyone so you have to have your own apartment and you have your own bathroom if that’s not enough you go to the world-class fitness centers where they have all the latest equipment (How many Planet Fitness’ do you find in a medium size college town?) there are a variety of reasons why college education could be more expensive and it can’t be all laid at the feet of Technology…. its all about your spin.

Lastly when he addresses the issue of students and realizing that their computer-based courses are often thinly veiled field trials for products and market development I think back to the first class that I know many instructors taught… their first class was an experimentation, the second time they taught that class was very different than the first did that instructor pay the student to attend? The third time was probably slightly different than the second, hence the students have always been “guinea pigs in production trials masquerading as courses”.

The important thing to think about is what benefits does any technology bring?  I think that there can be benefits as well as detriments to using any technology. Isn’t that the role of Instructional Designers to help Faculty members who have little to no experience with making their teaching better because the faculty member is a material experts in their field. That is the role of instructional designers to help educate faculty on, dare I say, course design and pedagogy?

This article really just irritated me. I found it arrogant, elitist, self-serving and totally unbalanced kinda like this election cycle. And yes I made my post controversial to make it easier to comment on my one-sided view of the article, you can choose either the dark or the light either way may the force be with you.

This week’s readings and activities relating to participatory cultures were interesting, timely and fun. The executive summary reading identify the new skills and many of them where appropriate to the activities of using Scratch play, performance, simulation, networking, negotiation, distributed cognition as well as appropriation.

With the Scratch application, it was apparent that Appropriation, which in the video they talked about Remixing was a significant part of building the network of users, judgement and collective intelligence of the participatory culture of those who use the application and helped shape meaning making.

I’m not sure which came first but there’s another application extremely similar to Scratch called Alice. Alice was created at Carnegie Mellon compared to Scratch which is MIT. They both have created their own unique participatory culture in the shaping of people’s understanding basic computer programming concepts. Several years ago I used Alice in my IST 110 course to give students a better (and visually more immediate) understanding of basic program elements (If then, for loops etc.).
In the second reading they described their idea of participating culture as ” the online community in terms of a spectrum ranging from socializing to creating. At one end of the spectrum we observe the socializers-participants who are predominantly motivated by socializing, the group dynamic, and interactions with others…. At the other end of the spectrum we observe the creators-participants who are predominantly motivated by creating by the individual processes and products of programming.” Page 78. That is a very good description of both Alice and Scratch in that there are some who are very interested in the creating and/or producing new items, while others are more interested in learning from their community. This is different than the participatory culture of the new craze that’s out there… ( I have even gotten sucked into it) of course I’m talking about Pokémon GO.

Now, of course I can’t talk about collaborative participatory without talking Pokemon GO! We’ve all heard much about Pokémon GO from the different media outlets, both the good and the bad. For me the one original benefits of playing the game is that there are eggs that only hatch if you walk. I recently got a Fitbit and thought that this might be a great combination to get me to walk more, which it has. My step count prior to installing Pokémon GO was somewhere around the 5000 to 6000 range. Since installing the game my step count is closer to 11000/12000. So it’s a win!
But the added benefit is that the campus on which I work has a number of Poke stops as well as a gym (if you’re not familiar with the game the stops give you stuff to help capture Pokémon and the gym trains your Pokémon and if you team holds the gym gives you additional stuff). As I walk around campus I noticed something interesting. There are groups of students, other staff members and faculty members in some of these locations each talking to each other. Outside their normal context developing affiliations and collaborating on how best to use the different items that each member has regardless of their team color red, yellow or blue. Given that it’s a Penn State campus most are on team blue but even those that chose red or yellow are included and makes the dynamic more interesting. So, although the framework for this community building (socialization) is different than that of Scratch, it still has the same elements just not the creator aspect and maybe it will help me loose a few pounds. 😉

Articulate Studio ‘13

Articulate Studio combines a number of articulate products together. The Presenter portion allows for greater control of “PowerPoint” presentation setup. The Engage part of the package allows for easy to use graphically pleasing interactions that allow for a self-paced learning. Replay allows for screen capture. I’m a big fan of Camtasia which has some of the same functionality including assessment but in Articulate studio, specifically the Quizmaker portion, this is where this product really shines.

I selected it because in the instance that I’ve used articulate time was short, a PowerPoint already existed and there was a need to see if incoming students were aware of important information. The PowerPoint was converted to a formative assessment tool to chart incoming first years students understanding of their educational path, a variety of question types were sporadically incorporated (matching, true/false, best answer, multiple choice etc.) all based on the material covered in the presentation. Then the students take the post-presentation quiz and show the results to their adviser when they come for orientation and courses scheduling. The discussion that then takes place can reinforce the known as well as correct the misunderstood information. As a learning tool, it proves helpful by allowing the creator to periodically assess students knowledge and students can re-watch segments that they missed.

For more information https://www.articulate.com/products/studio.php

ZOOM

Zoom is a virtual meeting place where users can conduct video conferences or collaborative meetings (like Adobe Connect). The basic plan is free with limited support. The standard number of participants for Zoom is 50 but in paying mode there can be as many as 200 participants. The meetings can be recorded for later distribution. The meeting can also have multiple hosts that can share their desktops to review their segment of the meeting. I have only participated in a couple of zoom conferences (The Canvas Liaisons meetings are conducted this way) but I can see the potential for conducting all manner of group discussions (small meetings, distance learning, collaborative virtual classroom work etc.).

The one thing that I like most about zoom is that it seems to work extremely well with regards to audio connectivity. In numerous meeting with another software (which is not free) the meetings had to be stopped periodically because of bad audio connections. It might just be anecdotal from my observations but the loss of sound kills a meeting quicker than quick. For more information http://zoom.us/pricing

Celly (Cel.ly)

Cel.ly is a simple but user-friendly communication tool and there are character limits like twitter. However, Celly can also share pictures, embedded video, attachments, schedule announcements and conduct surveys. It can be used for small group multi-directional communication, or moderated chats approved by the cells creator. The system allows users to work together within their own cell or invite other to collaborate. A cell is like a discussion thread and can either be public or private. I chose Cel.ly as one of my participatory technologies because it was originally developed for educational collaboration among diverse (time and space) groups.  I use it as a troubleshooting forum. faculty and staff post messages that are sent to my preferred method of receiving. I can answer their queries as text or add images and brief descriptions or link embedded video demonstrating  a technology (Canvas, LionPATH procedures etc.) Students can use it to collect and share artifacts within a safe environment.

Users can also keep a journal to record their own notes and thoughts. If that wasn’t enough it’s free  For more information, check out this setup guide that explains in more details the capabilities and restrictions. http://support.cel.ly/hc/en-us/articles/201055576-Celly-for-Schools-Setup-Guide

In the article Web 2.0Technologies as Cognitive Tools of the New Media Age, the authors illustrate how 2.0 tools are used in a social constructivist manner. The three areas they reviewed folksonomy, wiki’s and blogging the one most pertinent to the classes I’ve taken so far and this course in particular is blogging. In the article the authors cited Dickey saying “the use of blogs as a discourse tool for small group learning communities supported the emergence of community by affording students the opportunities to socialize, interact and enter into dialogue, seek support and assistance, and express feelings and emotions.This in turn helped bridge or prevent feelings of isolation.” (page 365).

How appropriate is that quote for online courses such as the one we are in right now? Many times distance learning had been attempted and in most of those previous attempts at distance learning have always had mixed results. I took a couple of courses in the 1980’s and 1990’s just for my own personal learning but did not enjoy the experience and many of the paying students dropped out of those courses in the first few weeks. One of the problems with those courses was that it was all about “push” learning but I’m sure an equal amount was isolation. However, with web 2.0 technology such as blogging, students have the ability to feel part of a larger community. Students can collaborate and have discussions in a number of different ways (google docs, blogging etc.) over distance without feeling on an isolated educational island.

   VS    

Although the authors used K through 12 learning as a foundation for this paper I think it highly appropriate in reviewing the 5 web implementations they recommend and thinking about my preferred learning environment and one in particular. I think, the third of the five, provide scaffolding, is critically important when dealing with adults. Working in many areas of higher education, both the faculty and staff very often tend to need a greater level of scaffolding to see the value of adjusting to technology when it comes to instruction. The following quote also applies to trainers and training with some of these populations “it is critical that teachers scaffold their users through modeling and coaching. Teachers can spend some time introducing the technology and provide the reasons why the very technology is used. Before using the technology as a cognitive or collaboration tool, teachers will need to design enabling tasks to help students get used to different functions and the learning environment.” page 367.

I enjoyed watching the videos in this week’s module. Watching Rethinking Learning I agree with Dr. Nicole Pinkard in that students today are consumers of media not necessarily producers of media and that the difference is usually that there is a person or program that inspires the student in their development. This is no different than how current adults, when they were younger, have been inspired by a more knowledgeable other. These MKO’s who have taken on the mentoring roll in areas that the learner had an interest typically had a smaller reach. In my own case my uncle was a strong influence on me when it came to creating and learning about TV & film. On birthdays and Christmas, I would get boxes of 8mm film (you know before videotape)

or books on cinematography, editing and lighting. Although I would only see him on major holidays I would ask him all sorts of thing from who he was working with, who was directing, who’s job is that to how they pay for stuff.

This shared interest illustrates part of what the authors wrote on sociocultural learning theory. In the article on Connected Learning by Mimi Ito et al. uses Clarissa’s example to demonstrate a more modern side of the principle of connected learning. Having “meaningful practices and supportive relationships that recognize diverse pathways and forms of knowledge and expertise…. illustrate how a highly resourceful and interest driven young person can find social and informational supports for a specialized interest.” Clarissa’s ability to have that collective collaboration of her online community demonstrates the power available to many now who have similar interests whereas in my case it was a “community” of just two.

The Video Games, Learning and Literacy video with James Paul Gee on video games learning and literacy didn’t say anything that we didn’t already know… that games are fun and people want to do well in them. I was surprised though in his comparison on assessment in games like Halo vs having assessment for algebra.  “you actually trust the design and learning at halo better than you trust the design and learning about the Algebra class and I think that’s where we’re going we’re going to be able to create learning that is so immersive, so deep, so rich in information about the development people in that learning space that the idea that we let some tests made in a different state trump what happens outside of that learning will become primitive.”

Even though I’m not very good, I’d much rather have a test in Halo as compared to algebra…Math? Not a fan. But based on what Gee says in the end of the video the competition between nontraditional 21^st century schools and traditional schools may make Algebra fun one day even for me.

The video with Mimi Ito on Connected Learning, Children and Digital Media illustrated the sociocultural learning theory as well as the others and more directly targeted interest driven creative aspects of when students get to the point of more involved “messing around or geeking-out” stage. Much like Clarissa did with her writing the important part of this is… How can educators help students make that connection? Since many of these examples are in informal settings how can established formal environments collaborate with the informal? Not every aspect of a learner’s interest can be solved with technology but those social connections across wide range of ages, locations, skill sets allow for more students who have a specialty area of Interest to explore.

Clarissa was able to develop her interest and develop a skill which enhanced her marketability for future education and employment. I don’t know if they do this currently but what if schools had a 21^st century skills class where students explored areas of interest, joined communities and developed that interest? If you were interested in cars, math, medicine, astronomy etc. you would commune with other with similar interests then presented it to the class. The presentation would talk about the subject but would also site 21^st century skills areas. This might expand others interest but would reinforce what that student had learned. Each marking period could be a continuation or a new topic of interest. I would think the challenge for schools would be as Mimi Ito pointed out “kids and adults in a shared space that’s safe, that’s sanctioned”.