Looking Through My Own Filters…
Asako
(1 comments, 22 posts)
This user hasn't shared any profile information
Home page: http://asaginu.com/blog
Jabber/GTalk: yoshidawinnipeg@gmail.com
Posts by Asako
2nd Week Course Work – Part 2
11 year ago
by Asako
in Uncategorized
I attended the First Conference organized by Learning Specialists Association of Canada this past weekend, hosted by the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba. The Keynote speaker was Dr. Joy Mighty and she is the co-editor of Taking Stock: Research on Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. Her talk was focused on the higher education landscape that habitually rely heavily on surface learning despite so many empirical studies showing the shortcomings of it. We have to address the educational culture in which both instructors and students are used to and expect and reproduce surface learning. If you want to have the gist of the issue covered in the book a review by Tony Bates is useful.
Although it would be too simplistic to rely solely on the technologies to change everything, but we can leverage the new communication technologies to reshape and redesign learning in higher education. I have to remind myself how Michael Sandal, a philosophy professor at Harvard, who transformed a moral philosophy course in a large, lecture theater classroom setting. The important lesson is that it’s not solely about the technology but what you actually do with the technology.
2nd Week Course Work – Part 1
01 year ago
by Asako
in Uncategorized
The course is already in its 3rd week, but I am still going over 2nd week materials. The main textbook used in the course is Mobile Learning: Transforming the Delivery of Education and Training (Ally, 2009). I am still going over Chapter 1 and 2 right now, but so far so good. Introduction chapter of the book gives a complex set of understandings of “Mobile Learning” and not only it’s an emerging and evolving phenomena and various takes exist in its understanding. Just a month ago, while I was waiting for the delivery of my own iPhone2, the main image construed in association with the phrase, “mobile learning,” is represented by iPhone and other smart phones, whatever one can do with these tools. In the short time that I played with iPad2, the image of possible “mobile learning” has already transformed. iPad better represents the key characteristics of mobile learning, “personal, spontaneous, opportunistic, informal, pervasive, situated, private, context-aware, bite-sized, and portable” (p.13). When it comes to learning activities, the best feature of iPhone was that I can use it to connect my laptop (MacBook Pro) to the Internet anywhere I go. iPhone to me is more of a productivity tool that I can bring anywhere with scheduling, quick searches, texting, phone access, managing to do list, and maybe Twittering, etc. However, It’s hardly comfortable for any of my learning activities. While I’m quite excited about my iPad, I will be also careful to observe how it will shape my own learning activities.
I’m interested in the potential of mobile learning in widely acknowledging the diversity of learning. The diversity notion hopefully will influence education in general, and educational modus operandi becomes less prescriptive, more exploratory, and relationships building and sharing.
Mobile Learning Course
0I have started an online course, Mobile Learning, after taking one-year hiatus, on May 2. First part of the course will involve some readings. I think they would probably help me situate what this thing called “Mobile Learning.” How is it different from other types of learning? In terms of emerging technologies, I have a sense that online and mobile technologies are ubiquitous in our lives in such a way that things have advanced quite a bit comparing to two years ago when I was taking Connectivism course. I don’t think we had any mention of tablets, then.
We can probably create some interesting learning environments by using mobile devices and apps. We will probably be able to design more personalized learning activities. I’m looking forward to the latter part of the course when we will develop a project.
There is a sense that e-learning, mobile learning, online learning, whatever it may be called, things are increasingly being mushed up these days as to what we are doing with emerging technologies. Our sense of communication technologies is getting very similar to that of electricity. We simply turn it on and off whenever, wherever we need it. Definitely the focus has shifted more to what we do with it and what relationships we are developing, rather than how it works. And most importantly, learners themselves. Ultimately, the most important thing would be what learners are getting out of it.
I am looking forward to learning some cool applications of mobile devices that would work well for learning!
Relationships & Interactions in Online Spaces
02 years ago
by Asako
in My Partial Reflection
After I completed the Connectivism & Connective Knowledge course, I finally had a chance to read some of the Moodle posts that I missed during the course. A fellow course participant, Gus Goncalves, referred to Visitors & Residents presentation video by David White at Oxford University. White’s presentation provides another excellent example of social & cultural perspectives on web 2.0 phenomena. The important point made by his presentation is that if we want to understand how people are approaching digital space, it’s not entirely about technology, nor about skills or ages, either. It’s how people are approaching a given social space. He gives an example of missing the point by offering a Twitter training session. Twitter is social and cultural platform and you can only learn it by actually using it.
Some notes for the presentation are here.
The idea of the continuum of visitors and residents makes a lot of sense. What sort of interactions or relationships are being formed in a given network is very much case by case even when the members happen to be all “residents.” For example, White refers to the importance of the context for defining whether you are a visitor or resident in a given digital space. You can be a visitor in one type of network and a native in the other.
The common or mainstream behavior in the digital space is branding one’s online presence by continuously updating status, feeding pictures, video and updating blog posts, etc. –”feeding the machine.” This can be very banal, as White points out. Connecting to the social network by itself does not necessarily create productive, learning experiences.
- Communal does not mean that people are collaborating and cooperative.
- Participants require a whole lot of other skills such as critical evaluation of research.
We are ultimately talking about social & cultural phenomena. We are often referred by Web 2.0 experts to a collection of Web 2.0 tools like the image below:
This can be a very misleading representation if we are pursuing more productive interactions as learning. The image may be re-enforcing this idea that technical side of the skills and the volume of the tools are far and for most important.
Concept Map for CCK09
02 years ago
by Asako
in My Partial Reflection
Here is a concept map drawn from my experiences of CCK09:
Concept Map – CCK09 – 100%.egg on Aviary.
For a better view, please click the image and browse using “View at Full Size” in the right-hand side panel.
Connectivism: Connecting & Sharing Meanings
12 years ago
by Asako
in Uncategorized
My final project is a powerpoint presentation entitled “Connectivism: Connecting & Sharing Meanings – Navigating Through Cultural & Social Layers.” My original idea was to sync with audio file and make it more like a real presentation. In the process of creating a podcast, I stumbled into many problems. So the final product is unfortunately without audio. Please refer to notes for each slide.
Abstracts: In the course, we had many readings and attended many presentations to understand Connectivism. The course focused on understanding Connectivism from a theoretical perspective. Two additional sources on Connectivism from social and cultural perspectives are shared: 1) Digital Youth Project, and 2) James Burke’s thinking about human history and change.
I included notes for each slide. Please follow my notes available at SlideShare site when you view the slides.
Assignment #2 – Future of Higher Education
02 years ago
by Asako
in My Partial Reflection
After exploring the concept of Connectivism and the role of emerging technologies in this course, media literacy, for me, would be the important keywords for the 21st century education. As Lipton states (2008), “[a]ny form of communication that carries and conveys meaning can be considered a medium of communication.”
Although the emerging technology always dominates the discourse of the day (Mosco, 2004), the skills to critically understand how each medium works and shapes the ways we communicate would be the most significant aspect of our education programs. Kelley & Jenkins (2005) put the function of reading in a historical perspective. They state that what “reading” signifies “has changed over time and in different cultures.” (p.7) The objective of their New Media Literacies Project is to “heighten awareness of the many styles and the meanings of literacy over time.” Similarly, Media Education Project led by Prof. Mark Lipton at the University of Guelph, advocates media literacy education and published a number of atticulating guides for teachers.
I see the possibility for exploring various collaborations in higher education to shape learning and exploratory spaces. These will be possible using both traditional, classroom, or physical face-to-face interactions as well as so called web 2.0, social media technologies. We will find a mixture of traditional course structure and more flexible cross-disciplinary networking space where students use it as a sounding board for their work. The basis of Connectivism is participatory culture (Jenkins, 2006), and by actively exploring the dynamics of learning in participatory spaces (classroom, online, or hybrid), higher education can be the provider of a dynamic space in which modeling of complexity and non-linear learning for students can take place.
The course or learning/exploratory space would be designed and facilitated by a team of “teachers” or “facilitators” including content expert, media specialist or technologist, or anybody else who can contribute to the space. The team can make the learning/exploratory space quite flexible by allowing some creative ways in which the students can negotiate to shape their own learning space. The purpose of the learning/exploratory space would be to encourage “1) self-assessment, 2) sharing the outcomes of learning with peers, 3) various forms of feedback, and 4) evaluation by the teacher.” (Lipton, 2008b) Connectivism is not about acquisition of knowledge, and it emphasizes how we all become responsible for our own learning by actively observing, reflecting, and expressing our ideas in order to share and sharpen up our understandings.
The key characteristic of the 21st century education will be ultimately about students themselves, who develop their own skills to reflect and guide their own thinking and problem-solving skills. The image of teachers standing and lecturing in front of a classroom will eventually disappear, but facilitators, guides, designers, mentors, counselors, peers, and motivators will be occupying the learning/exploratory space along with the students.
Major impediments for moving to this new orientation are the habits and the convention of how courses are constructed, structured and delivered, and how manpower in higher education is organized for teaching. The departmental and disciplinary structure is often the basis of how teaching manpower is being mobilized and the same is also the basis of job security.
Having pointed out the obvious impediments for any change to occur in higher education, there is no shortage of education research in general and e-learning research and discussions. Many higher education practitioners participate in education research collaborating with other teaching faculty members other than Education. For example, Summer 2004 issue of New Directions for Teaching and Learning published various aspects of the decoding the disciplines model. This way of thinking only starts when teaching faculty acknowledge the lack of connection between the students and what the students are expected to learn. The first article lists a series of questions for teaching faculty: 1) What is a bottleneck to learning in this class?; 2) How does an expert do these things?; 3) How can these tasks be explicitly modeled?; 4) How will students practice these skills and get feedback?; 5)What will motivate the students?; 6) How well are students mastering these learning tasks?; 7) How can the resulting knowledge about learning be shared? (Middendorf & Pace, 2004). Many productive thinking and reflection/analysis and experimentation in teaching & learning can come from the bottom up. I end with some optimism and that this bottom-up movement would be the necessary ground work for the future change in higher education.
References:
Kelley, Wyn & Jenkins, Henry (2005). Reading in a Participatory culture – Defining Reading: A (Sort of) Historical Perspective. In Full Expert Voice Section. http://newmedialiteracies.org/educators/
Jenkins, Henry (2006). Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture : Media Education of the 21st Century. National Writing Project.
Lipton, Mark (2008a). Media Education: Integration. Media Literacy Project: Research-based monograph series.
(2008b). Media Education: Metacognition. Media Literacy Project: Research-based monograph series.
Middendorf, Joan & Peace, John (2004). “Decoding the disciplines: A model for helping students learn disciplinary ways of thinking.” New Direction for Teaching & Learning. 98(Summer 2004): 1-12.
Mosco, Vincent (2005). The Digital Sublime: Myth, Power, and Cyberspace. MIT Press. [Cited in Subject/Object Blog by Steven Chabot.]
Complexity, Chaos, Emergence, and Adaptive Systems
02 years ago
by Asako
in My Partial Reflection
I took an online course on Instructional Design for Adult Education earlier this year. The cornerstone of any instructional design models is the construction of learning objectives. Everything else, such as learning support, the use of technologies, and teaching and learning resources are hinged on the clearly set-out learning objectives. Without well-defined learning objectives, you don’t have the basis for doing instructional design.
Our current discussion of complexity in education and learning starts with a different premise than the one for instructional design. In the complex, non-linear perspective, organizing, constructing and structuring of learning are left to students to do on their own. Learning is not to be designed by somebody or something external to learners themselves. Phelps, for example, conducted a noteworthy action research over 4 years in order to facilitate reflection and understanding of non-linear complexity-based learning among future primary and secondary teachers in the context of an ICT education course. Instead of directing the students to expectations of directive-style learning, Phelps focused on them “establishing self-directed and self-resposible approaches to their learning, including exploratory learning and ‘play’”. He refers us to how we normally learn in a real-life, non-institutional setting:
“Learning is usually, motivated by an activity which needs to be performed or a problem which has been encountered. Individuals seek and select information from all kinds of sources to meet their own personal needs and interests and there is always further learning which they can continue to pursue as their activities and practice develop and they reflect on their new goals.”
Phelps’ action research is an interesting case study for us to further explore non-linear, complexity-based learning. Since the course was for future elementary and secondary teachers, the concept of non-linear, authentic, complexity-based learning was introduced in that context. The course itself was about ICT education. For many subject matters and topics other than the subject of learning and learning activities, people don’t think about whatever they are doing in terms of what sort of learning they are involved in. The students are not necessarily reflective of their learning, how to shape their learning, or the choices they make in their learning activities, in terms of certain educational theories; of course, exception to this is when they are education students. In general, wouldn’t it be true to say that our course design should focus on the integration of the dialogue and sharing of how they all guide their thinking, or what the process of their making choices in their thinking among the students in the context of a given course? With this perspective, the focus would not be any fixed learning objectives or outcomes for the course.
Reflecting on the interesting research conducted by Phelps, I might be able to draw one shortcoming of CCK09. In the course, our focus is on connectivism and networking learning. While the content should not drive the course according to connectivism, all the students are connected to the course in order to understand or explore connectivism. However, from the insight I gained from the Phelps’ article, I’m inclined to think at this point that connectivism would be explored better if we have some other learning contexts for the course, and learning connectivism should be occurring as bi-products of being engaged in the contexts.
PLE’s, PLN’s & Personal Web and Leanring
02 years ago
by Asako
in My Partial Reflection
Belatedly, I listened to the recorded session given by Steve Wheller at the PLE Conference. Wheller conceptualizes the ways in which the Internet environment with rich Web 2.0 resources facilitate self-organizing learning environments for the learners by themselves. His intention of the conceptualization is obviously to influence the established institutional learning and provide some alternative thinking towards the ways to support the learners. The ultimate objective of teachers or facilitators of students’ learning is to “create conducive environments in which the students will organize their own learning.” Wheller situates the concepts of PLE’s, PLN’s and personal web in the connectivism discussion. Like Stephen Downes and George Siemens, Wheller distinguishes between the institutionalized online learning (VLE) on the one hand, and the web of learning on the other. The former is designed for students to funnel the authoritative knowledge given by the experts, while the latter, to make their own meanings through the active interactions through their webs of connections. When taking into consideration of the wider learning webs, the boundary between the formal and informal learnings become blurry. The diagram of Web 2.0 tools Weller used in the presentation shows that these tools facilitate three functions of PLEs : 1) Managing information; 2) Generating content; and 3) Connecting with others. In general, his presentation helped me to establish how the concepts of PLE’s, PLN’s and Personal web fit into one easy representation of learning, even though how learning is taking place can be very complex and highly context dependent.
While his presentation helped me visualize a snap shot of how PLE’s, PLN’s and personal web are parts and parcel of one’s learning, when he mentioned his application of Hegel’s philosophy in understanding his idea of how self-organizing learning environment takes place, or how ideas are being exchanged, I posed for a moment to locate a loose connection I may have on the subject. It took me back to what I learned about the difference between Hegel’s philosophy and Marx’s in my Sociology theory course that I took during the late 80′s. I remember from Hegel’s idealized notion of the State, Marx’s rejection of it. Also Marx’s dialectical philosophy to address the 19th century emerging social issues based on actual material productions. I apologize for getting a bit too theoretical here. However, as Stephen Downes was repeatedly asking for more specifics of the negotiations between the PLE’s and the rest of the connections, and what sort of processes are taking place in the negotiations, Wheller’s conceptualization remains somewhat abstract.
In summary, without hinting at a disruptive revolution in higher education, Weller’s conceptualization of learning in the Web 2.0 environment helps us broaden the notion of education and explore the ways to integrate Web 2.0 tools, in order for us to provide more conducive environments for learning.
My Position on Connectivism – Assignment #1
12 years ago
by Asako
in My Partial Reflection
My Statement on Connectivism:
Connectivism [1] challenges the contemporary education system and its orientation by contrasting it with emerging ways of knowing, interacting, collaborating producing, mixing or any other significant mode of expression afforded by emerging technologies of the new century. Downes and Siemens initiated new discourse on learning that is relevant and required for the new types of learners and engagement for the new Internet and Web 2.0 environment, in particular in the context of e-learning. What I find most relevant about Connectivism is its criticism of the existing education system and its inertia to bring about changes that are required to empower the new types of learners. Downes, in particular, repeatedly emphasizes in his numerous writings and presentations that learning is not about acquisition of the content and that there is no “experts” as such to transfer their knowledge to “novices.” The critical stance on the existing education system resonates the 20th century thinkers who were critical of the dehumanizing aspects of the modern institutions shaped by the industrial development. Illich’s deschooling and anti-professionalism[2], Freire’s “banking education,” [3]or Fromme’s the modern men’s obsession with “having” mode are known well.[4] For Illich, the solution was to develop convivial alternatives that ensure “autonomous and creative intercourse among persons, and the intercourse of persons with their environment”(Illich, 1973 cited by infed.org). In his convivial arrangements, the role of technologies is to serve individuals rather than managers (Illich, 1975 cited by infed.org). Freire also believed in connecting and networking people based on its local community through its informal and popular education leading to informed community action (infed.org, 2002). Fromme (2005) critically pointed out modern men’s erroneous focus on “having” rather than “being” in To Have or to Be? Similarly, Connectivism negates the creation of disengaged learners by simply transferring the same traditional pedagogies over to the online sphere with the implementation of the e-learning products such as Content Management System or Learning Management System. Downes and Siemens instead see potentials in a new emerging networked pedagogy, which is shaped and negotiated among the participants through their interactions in the environment of Web 2.0 and social media.
The concept of “network”[5] is central to both Downes and Siemens. For Downes (2006), the nature of a given network depends on how entities of the network are connected. He lists seven characteristics arise from it. This means that each entity plays some part in the network but no one entity can control its holistic effects or how all the connections in the network are working. Under the heading, “semantic condition,” he states that reliability of connective knowledge is achieved by “the promotion of diversity, through the empowering of individual entities, and the reduction in the influence of well-connected entities, is essentially a way of creating extra sets of eyes within the network.” Unfortunately, I am completely lost when Downs starts to talk about the nature of human perceptions or our inherent ability to recognize some patterns in everything at the level of neural connections, on the one hand, and the technical protocols of the Word Wide Web, on the other, and he continues to extend his discussion to sociological concepts such as “group vs. network.” His discussion then continues to refer to Social Network Analysis! I wonder if this is indeed a modeling of how Connectivism can be practiced?! They tend to relate to it in very abstract terms such as a set of properties at one moment , more concrete network phenomenon of the World Wide Web and Web 2.0 media, at another moment.
We were introduced to technical terms used in Social Network Analysis (SNA) in the 2nd week of the course. The common criticism of SNA is that it’s “just methodology.”[6] The success of SNA is when there is rich qualitative and contextual information about what are being analyzed. White & Johansen (2004)[7], for example, successfully utilized SNA in their longitudinal study of a Turkish nomadic clan based on detailed ethnographic data and contextual knowledge of the people. The nuances and contexts of the study were gathered by the fieldwork of Johansen that was carried out from 1956 to 2004. In a similar way, some of the nuances and contexts in which interactions, social relations, ideas or artifacts that constitute a network of given social configurations have to be qualified. In other words, “network” can be used as a shorthand for any number of configurations and contexts.
There are researchers who discuss more concrete findings regarding the nature of the network in social media. danah boyd (2009)[8], for example, delineates in her analysis of Facebook vs. Myspace that the race, class, education, and other societal divisions are being played out in the digital sphere. According to one of her subjects she interviewed, “Myspace became the “ghetto” of digital landscape.” Wesch (2008) [9] also effectively contextualizes the contemporary net generation youth at the 2008 Personal Democracy Forum and situates them in the context of American cultural dynamics of the past 25 years. His presentation narrates tensions of growing up and developing identity as represented by youth and popular culture. For the current net generation, engaging with the media like YouTube–which allows them to connect to many while in fact, talking to computer screen alone in their room late at night–would be added to their mix. Wesch, however, ends his presentation with certain optimism that the contemporary youth to change the world for better despite the inheritance of narcissism, individualism, consumerism and their own vulnerability. He might be a believer of human culture in which the youth can reframe the situations for better by responding to the inherently human value of connections and community in the social networking media.
I am looking for some extra perspectives or concepts to apply connectivism thinking in my practice. Edwards (2005)[10] refers to a useful concept of “boundary object” as something to facilitate and mediate the “in-between arena of boundary practices” when learning is taking place in unbounded environment in life-long learning where multiple learning domains and sites are involved. According to Edwards, the in-between arena is “hybrid, networked and mediated domains, which give raise to alternative framings and metaphors.” Star and Griesmers (1989) developed the notion of “boundary object” and they explain:
“Boundary objects are objects which are both plastic enough to adapt to local needs and constraints of the several parties employing them, yet robust enough to maintain a common identity across sites. They are weakly structured in common use, and become strongly structured in individual-site use. They may be abstract or concrete. They have different meanings in different social worlds but their structure is common enough to more than one world to make them recognizable means of translation. The creation and management of boundary objects is key in developing and maintaining coherence across intersecting social worlds.”
I am still premature to elaborate on some specific examples of boundary objects. They are something to help refram the known meaning in one situation and bridge us adopt to a new somewhat unknown space and situation. The concept can be useful in understanding the mechanisms of how Connectivism works in various situations and contexts.
References:
[1] I draw my understanding of Connectivism based on Elluminate presentations for the course and Downes, Stephen (2006). Learning Networks and Connective Knowledge. Retrieved: October 22, 2009. http://it.coe.uga.edu/itforum/paper92/paper92.html
[2] Smith, M. K. (1997, 2004, 2008) ‘Ivan Illich: deschooling, conviviality and the possibilities for informal education and lifelong learning’, the encyclopedia of informal education, http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-illic.htm. Retrieved October 22, 2009.
[3] Smith, M. K. (1997, 2002) ‘Paulo Freire and informal education’, the encyclopaedia of informal education. Last update: June 18, 2009] Retrieved October 22, 2009. http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-freir.htm
[4] Fromme, Eric. (2005). Have or to Be? New York: Continuum, 2005. 182pp.
[5] Downes, Stephen (2007). Groups vs. Networks: The Class Struggle Continues. Retrieved October 22. 2009. http://www.downes.ca/post/42521
Siemens, George (2008). Groups vs. Networks, Articulate slides presentation. Retrieved October 22.2009. http://elearnspace.org/media/CCK08_Wk5/player.html
Krebes, Valdis (2008). Social Network Analysis, A Brief Introduction. Retrieved October 22, 2009. http://www.orgnet.com/sna.html
Network Theory. (2009, October 9). In Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved October 22, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_theory
[6] Borgatti, S.P., Mehrs, A., Brass, D.J. & Labianca, G. (2009). Social Network Analysis in the Social Sciences. Nature, 323 (5916), 892-895
(I used the same article available from http://www.steveborgatti.com/papers/SNA_Review_for_Science.pdf, Retrieved October 22, 2009. The cited item is in p.17.)
[7]Network Analysis and Ethnographic Problems. In Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved October 22, 2009, from http://www.danah.org/papers/talks/PDF2009.html.
[8] boyd, danah. 2009. “The Not-So-Hidden Politics of Class Online.” Personal Democracy Forum, New York, June 30. Retrieved October 22, 2009. http://www.danah.org/papers/talks/PDF2009.html
[9] “The Machine is (Changing) Us: YouTube Culture and Politics of Authenticity” presented by Dr. Michael Wesch. Democary Forum, New York, June 29-30, 2008. Retrieved October 22, 2009. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09gR6VPVrpw&feature=player_embedded
[10] Edwards, Richard. (2005). Contexts, boundary objects and hybrid spaces: theorizing learning in lifelong learning. Education-Line: http://www.leeds.ac.uk/educol/documents/142037.htm Retrieved October 22, 2009.
[11] Star SL & Griesemer JR (1989). “Institutional Ecology, ‘Translations’ and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley’s Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-39″. Social Studies of Science 19 (4): 387–420.
Recent Comments