TechTicker
educational technology, eLearning & emerging technology

It seems the more I delve into my research on the real-world use and effectiveness of blogs in education the more questions I have and challenges I see.

Courtesy of Kate Olson from Reflection 2.0 and @kolson29 on Twitter I’m currently neck-deep in the reading of “Edublogging: Instruction for the Digital Age Learner“, which is the doctoral dissertation of Jeff Felix.

I’m incredibly excited in this document - all 283 pages of it - because the findings outlined in the dissertation summary directly support the theories I’ve had and discussed here on several different occasions.

This is not to say I’m some super-genius or visionary, because in many ways these theories are common sense. What is significant of Felix’s dissertation is that his research data assesses the real world use of blogs in education, and his observations actually support the theories.

Herein lay the importance of expanding the pool of research literature in this area - and not just in the form of theoretical musings, but real findings based on concrete research methodology.

Karen Olson and I discussed this on Twitter the other day, as I mentioned here. And as she noted, much of the discussion on edublogging is being disseminated informally via blogs.

To be effective in influencing and informing change it is absolutely critical that studies be widely published through recognised and accredited journals - and not just technical or eLearning journals, but ideally traditional educational publications as well. This would have the effective of adding much needed legitimacy to the best practice uses and awareness of eLearning technologies.

Educational technology and eLearning is still widely perceived as an add-on to the “real” learning that takes place in the classroom. As such the integration of eLearning is often given minimal consideration, which has the affect if reducing its effectiveness. I’ve even heard it argued that ineffective use of educational technology can actually distract from the learning process rather than add to it.

Therefore it’s critical that sufficient evidence and information be made available to academics interested in using emerging technology in the classroom. Else I fear new eLearning tools will fall prey to the bolt-on syndrome that has become all too commonplace.

Importantly this information needs to filter through all levels of education, from instructors on the front line, through administrative staff, to technical support staff, and perhaps most important of all, to policy makers in the upper eschalons of institutions, schools and government.

Despite its criticality, it is simply not enough for instructors alone to understand the significance of properly embedded use of emerging technologies. Adequate support, resources, and policy frameworks must be in place as well.

Not only could this have the impact of much needed recognition and reward for the scholarship of teaching - and thus inspire further uptake - an embedding of eLearning in educational policies could provide leverage for proper assessment frameworks and quantitative measuring of the real impact of eLearning projects on student learning. This in turn could be fed back into the research streams to inform additional studies.

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.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGCJ46vyR9o&rel=1&border=0]

I must admit that my attendance of and participation in the SANTEC web seminar was dreadful the last few days of the event. From the sound of things I wasn’t alone in this respect either. According to their most recent blog post:

“What happened in this seminar when the comments on this blog slowed down and stopped? Was it the mistaken message on the SANTEC list that the seminar was over? Was it simply that the workshop and seminar genres don’t mix? Or that a workshop that works well with live face to face interaction in a lab would transfer online better with some form of synchronous interaction?”

From my own personal experiences the asynchronous, web based nature of the event was initially an extremely facilitating factor, however after a few days it became the means that begot neglect.

This was due to several factors I think, not the least of which being the absence of a more pronounced human component (the synchronous interaction that was mentioned in the post), coupled the ability of the familiar to distract from the at times isolating feeling of asynchronous textual discussion.

With face to face seminars you leave your office and go to a different location. Even if it’s on the same campus you’re away from your office and the familiar environment, so there are not the typical distractions and ever-present nagging demands that must be done during the day. Significantly too is the presence of people and real-time interaction and collaboration. In this environment it’s that much easier to focus on the task at hand, because it’s right in front of you and talking to you.

The structure of the SANTEC seminar on the other hand, while giving each participant the enormous ability to consider, reconsider, edit and respond in their own time left them within the realm of the physically familiar. So when an alternative and unrelated task presented itself in the flesh, it became that much easier to “come back to that blog post later”.

That’s not to say that web-based seminars are doomed to failure, merely that their structure will need to incorporate activities, aims and objectives that account for the human component that is so integral in face-to-face seminars.

As a few examples, I offer the following activities or elements for consideration and/or discussion:

• Integration and introduction of some form of group work with a deliverable and pre-defined objective
• The necessity to interact not just textually, but via audio and even video chat tools
• An educational or explanatory component at the beginning to establish a base knowledge level
• A means of linking and/or summarising multiple concurrent discussions inherent to the relatively scattered and organic nature of the technology
• More thoughts to come…

With this said, I firmly believe that the seminar’s structure has merit, however I believe equally firmly that future participants will need to prepare themselves for a much different seminar environment than they may be used to in the past. Distraction and procrastination are Public Enemy Number One in the online realm, and I definitely fell prey to them both.

More thoughts on SANTEC as time permits…

Reflecting on the comments across the last several posts on the SANTEC blog, this year’s “Blogs for quality learning in developing contexts” is turning into an excellent introduction to the technology for new users.

Many of the participants so far have come from regions/institutions where the concept of blogging is extremely new. As a result, much of the discussion and interest so far has been on the fundamentals. Topics covered so far have included reasons for blogging, barriers or reluctances to use, and usage fundamentals.

A great graphical representation of the scale of possibilities with blogging technology has been provided by Tony Carr, who is facilitating the seminar over the next few days (Image shared under a Creative Commons License).

It kind of reminds me of a mantra one of my instructors drummed into our heads at uni “Once you know what to think, you’ll know how to act.”

Planned activities fall into three parts:

Part 1: We will introduce ourselves and learn about the history, nature and types of blogs. We will then start our own blogs on the SANTEC website. (16th - 18th May)Part 2: Time to blog (18th - 21st May)

Part 3: Learn about some of the advanced practices of effective blogging. (21st - 23rd May) If you’ve been blogging for a while why not join us and share your experience?

Today was the first day of SANTEC’s “Blogs for quality learning in developing contexts” online seminar. SANTEC, which stands for The Society and Network for Technology in Education through Collaboration

“is an enabling network of educational technology practitioners with an interest in educational technology in developing environments. The aim of SANTEC is to be a community of practice that facilitates and supports collaborative ventures and effects synergies amongst members.”

Due presumably to the timezone issues that arise from SANTEC being international and web-based, the seminar is asynchronous in nature. Discussion takes place via a threaded forum as well as blog posts and commenting. So if you missed the first day like I did don’t worry, you can review what was discussed via the forum and blog entries.

Admittedly I’ve only just learned of SANTEC’s existence within the last month, however I’m hopeful that I’ll come out of this experience with some additional insight into what other’s are doing to further the cause of blogs and social software in learning and teaching. I’ll try to write up a synopsis of the events when the flame has been extinguished on the 23rd.

In the meantime if you’d like to swing by for the fun, please refer to the following:

Dear colleagues,We’re pleased to invite you to join us for our next SANTEC online seminar on “Blogs for quality learning in developing contexts” which I will lead from 16th - 23rd May. The seminar will be chaired by Philip Uys. Please feel encouraged to post this invitation on your website and to circulate it to colleagues who may be interested.

This event takes the form of an online workshop which introduces the use of blogs for research, teaching and for personal web presence. We will learn about the history, nature and types of blogs and start our own blogs. There will be an opportunity to learn and apply some of practices of effective blogging and to share experiences of blogging for teaching and research.

To join the seminar you can just login to the SANTEC site at http://santec.uwc.ac.za on 16th May and follow the link to our seminar blog. If you haven’t been there before registration is easy and quick.

Kind Regards

Tony

Tony Carr
Staff Development Co-ordinator
Centre for Educational Technology
University of Cape Town
phone: +27216505033
e-mail: tony.carr@uct.ac.za