Saskatoon

Slide 1: Education: An ecology of connections George Siemens May 14, 2008 TLt Summit Saskatoon, Saskatchewan Learning Technologies Centre www.umanitoba.ca/learning_technologies

Slide 2: 1. Let’s have a revolution!! (but they take time) 2. Complex and complicated 3. What technology does to/for us 4. Ecologies 5. The person formerly known as teacher 6. The Learner

Slide 3: CHANGE

Slide 4: Social and technological collisions

Slide 5: Technological revolution Year Industrial from 1771 Steam/Railways from 1829 Steel/Electricity from 1875 Oil/Automobile/Mass production from 1908 Information/telecommunications from 1971 Perez, C. 2004

Slide 6: Technological Conceptual

Slide 7: Why change?

Slide 8: Class

Slide 9: Divine Right

Slide 10: Unfair system: Access Barriers

Slide 11: Resonance

Slide 12: But, these things take time

Slide 14: Tension points of education Open/Closed Amateur/Expert Foster/Command Network/Hierarchy

Slide 15: Reduce barriers

Slide 16: Increased opportunities

Slide 17: Increased participation

Slide 18: Where are we now? Here Here Here Technological Conceptual

Slide 19: 1. Let’s have a revolution!! (but they take time) 2. Complex and complicated 3. What technology does to/for us 4. Ecologies 5. The person formerly known as teacher 6. The Learner

Slide 20: Complicated

Slide 21: To know the right answer

Slide 22: Complex

Slide 23: When we see complex as complicated…

Slide 24: Satisfied with false knowns

Slide 25: Creation of new frameworks, desire to simplify

Slide 26: When we iconosize concepts, we strip them of the opportunity to morph

Slide 27: Nothing is more pernicious in science than attempts to establish adherence to doctrines Radcliffe-Brown (1940)

Slide 28: 1. Let’s have a revolution!! (but they take time) 2. Complex and complicated 3. What technology does to/for us 4. Ecologies 5. The person formerly known as teacher 6. The Learner

Slide 29: Technology as blessing and curse

Slide 30: Balance is the new extreme

Slide 31: Boundaries between people

Slide 32: But what happens to us?

Slide 34: What of community?

Slide 35: Fragmentation Information Identity Understanding

Slide 36: The more we become distributed, the more we yearn to centralize

Slide 37: But individual centralization

Slide 38: 1. Let’s have a revolution!! (but they take time) 2. Complex and complicated 3. What technology does to/for us 4. Ecologies 5. The person formerly known as teacher 6. The Learner

Slide 39: Learning as network formation and navigation Connection are sufficient

Slide 40: Networks occur within ecologies

Slide 41: Ecologies: environments that fosters and supports learning Chaotic Structured informality Adaptive Alive Diverse Emergent Self-organizing, individually directed

Slide 43: Education as ecology Classroom, courses, programs, system Beyond formal Beyond myopic view of learner

Slide 44: 1. Let’s have a revolution!! (but they take time) 2. Complex and complicated 3. What technology does to/for us 4. Ecologies 5. The person formerly known as teacher 6. The Learner

Slide 45: Instructor’s role

Slide 46: Educator as scaffolder? Accreditor? Network administrator Curator/concierge Product/process…content/interaction

Slide 47: Blend, spectrum Formal to informal Gradients of technology use Contextual

Slide 48: EC & I 831 http://eci831.wikispaces.com/

Slide 49: How are ideas vetted/validated? Source of validation: By experts? Amateurs? Unwashed masses? Method: By networks? Openness? Hierarchical?

Slide 50: 1. Let’s have a revolution!! (but they take time) 2. Complex and complicated 3. What technology does to/for us 4. Ecologies 5. The person formerly known as teacher 6. The Learner

Slide 51: “people have much more knowledge than appears to be present in the information to which they have been exposed” Landauer and Dumais (1997)

Slide 52: Biggs SOLO

Slide 53: Learner’s role

Slide 54: Wayfinding Darken, R. 1996

Slide 56: On becoming…

Slide 57: Move to exploration

Slide 58: Websites and Newsletters www.elearnspace.org www.knowingknowledge.com www.connectivism.ca http://ltc.umanitoba.ca/wordpress/ gsiemens AT elearnspace DOT org