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educational technology, eLearning & emerging technology

I’ve spent the last nearly 6 years in the field of educational technology, however this time has focussed primarily on the application, support and delivery sides of the equation rather than the realm of educational theory. In this sense I have room to grow; and I’m looking at my research project into the educational applications of Second Life as an opportunity to do just that.

So far I have read a whole lot of material and case studies, and during this period several common themes have begun to arise with respect to the educational models and theories being employed. The terms experiential learning and action learning have both been used quite frequently and I’m now starting to look into what these two models entail.

Now Wikipedia gets a whole lot of bad press in academic circles for a variety of reasons (a professor from Brighton has even forbidden students from using both Wikipedia and Google in her course). However I personally find that it’s an excellent resource for preliminary inquiry and often offers valuable references for further research.

That said, Wikipedia has described these two educational theories as follows:

“Experiential Learning is the process of making meaning from direct experience….Experiential learning requires no teacher and relates solely to the meaning making process of the individual from direct experience. It is an inherent process that occurs naturally.”"Action learning is an educational process whereby the participant studies their own actions and experience in order to improve performance. This is done in conjunction with others, in small groups called action learning sets. It is proposed as particularly suitable for adults, as it enables each person to reflect on and review the action they have taken and the learning points arising. This should then guide future action and improve performance.”

Based on these relatively superficial definitions, both theories are quite appropriate for use in Second Life. What I’ll be interested in locating are case studies that depict how either or both of these theories are being implemented in practice.

The Second Life in Education wiki described the New Media Consortium (NMC) Campus (SLurl) as:

“the largest educational prescence in Second Life and supports events, classes, demonstrations, art exhibitions and learning experiences.”

This is the next stop in my ongoing research into the current educational uses of Second Life. Watch this space for my findings.

In the meantime the NMC Campus wiki is available here: http://sl.nmc.org/wiki/Main_Page

Having just discovered this site I still have some reading to do, but from what I’ve seen there is a great deal of information available on introductory facts on Second Life, educational uses, best practice, as well as additional links to external sites for further reading.

eDNA has a fantastic podcast interview available featuring Lindy McKeown and Jo Kay covering use of Second Life in education. The interview discusses the pedagogical/learning models possible in SL, how they see its place relative to other technologies such as emerging social software (e.g. blogs and wikis), and more “traditional” eLearning applications such as Learning Management Systems; and some of the hurdles faced by educators in uptake and use of the application.

In some ways Second Life, and to a large degree social software/web 2.0 tech in general, epitomise the cultural shift currently occurring across higher education in which the so called “digital native” students are arriving in droves in a space occupied largely by educators with far less knowledge of emerging technology. The challenge for eLearning specialists and educational technologists then seems to be finding effective ways to bridge the gap in awareness, expectations, technical knowledge levels, and importantly comfort levels.

The later is arguably the most challenging issue.

For example, I first approached Second Life with a skeptic’s view of its use in education but I must admit my personal experiences, and those expressed in this podcast, have begun to change this perception recently.

Educators on the other hand are likely to be far more skeptical and reluctant than I - both from the standpoint of Second Life’s relevance to education and its similarity to online or MMORPG gaming and the necessary system resources necessary to participate in the world and construct its regions.

I think one of the key perceptional changes that will need to occur before these sorts of technologies are more widely adopted is a shift away from teacher-focused models (”I talk you listen“, and/or “Here is the lesson plan for the semester“) and more towards learner-lead exploratory models. This is where the delineation between the LMS and emerging technology such as social software and Second Life are the most pronounced and profound.

Any attempts to generically lump Second Life and virtual worlds with the LMS in the generic “I do eLearning basket” should be avoided. eLearning has well and truly reached the stage where the subtleties and sub-sets need to be recognised and factored into planning. The eLearning portfolio is now filled with a host of disparate systems, each of which offers its own strengths and weaknesses. It is not one-sized fits all.

In a virtual realm choice is king. Users have a myriad different options available to them and can explore just about anything they wish. The possibilities are virtually endless (no pun intended). So the sorts of formalised structures you see in an LMS will not translate well to virtual worlds. To do so would be a disservice to students and learners because it would constrain their opportunities, under-utilise the tool and devalue its potential.

To me this highlights the importance of modeling best practice by educational technologists and eLearning specialists. To effectively represent virtual worlds and properly demonstrate its potential from a learning and teaching standpoint, programs like Second Life must be shown to educators and not just explained. Trying to cover this realm on paper is like trying to explain a photograph. Even the most eloquent prose cannot fully depict the world; the experience itself is its own greatest advocate.

Even more important than demonstrating Second Life though is the fact it is essential that instructors and educators be encouraged to dive in and experiment for themselves. If we are to successfully make the shift from teacher-focussed to student-lead, instructors need to walk the same path to realise its value. Simply hearing the arguments is not good enough or effective enough.

References:

• Overview: Second Life as an educational tool: Episode 9
• The transcript of the podcast is available here: View Transcript
• Listen to the MP3 Episode9-E-learningInsights.mp3 9Mb