Weeks 21/22 A3c – BECTA report on Harnessing Technology in Education

Image by James F Clay via Flickr

BECTA – The UK Government agency promoting technology in education. Report on a new strategy for technology in learning.

• UK is one of the leading uses of technology in learning
• Learners are making use of technology to support flexible learning stimulated by personal use of technology
• Country needs to remain competitive, so we need to improve our learning, upgrade our skills and develop our knowledge and understanding.
• Technology is seen by Department for Children, Schools and Families and the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills as a vital tool to achieve these ambitions.
• Need to ensure providers and learners use technology well to support these ambitions.
• These departments see a need for a strong strategy to support learners of all ages.
• Technology has revolutionised the way we communicate, collaborate and do business.
• Trends reinforce the need for a continuing system wide approach to use of technology in education.
• Improve the quality of provision and outcomes
• Technology enables adult learners to choose what, how, where and when to learn. This has a powerful impact on the learning experience increasing satisfaction from 50% to 99%. Improved satisfaction, retention and achievement without expanding the physical footprint.
• TEL brings a sense of empowerment and wider choice to informal adult learning
• Technology can bring people together with shared interests (long tail)
• Technology enables learners and teachers to acquire knowledge and skills, enables effective delivery, in more flexible and customised forms.
• Reports show that learners prefer to learn in groups, by doing practical things, with others and using computers – but the most common teaching activities used still are copying from the borad and book, and listening.
• Challenges
  • Access to reliable and sustainable infrastructure
  • Pedagogical changes and professional development
  • Continuity of learning (not widespread)
  • Learner expectations of the use of technology in learning is not being med.

Weeks 21/22 A3b – the NSF Report (USA) on Cyberlearning

Image via Wikipedia

I read just a selection of sections in this report. http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2008/nsf08204/nsf08204.pdf

Cyberlearning – the use of networked computing and communications technologies to support learning.

- offers new learning and educational approaches and the possibility of redistributing learning experiences over time and space.

How did we get here?

• A new participatory web culture.
• The ease of deploying software at web scale
• OER
• From mass markets to millions of niches
• Ubiquitous computing, mobiles and broadband networking. Cloud computing and hand held devices.
• New collaborative modes, media richness, and virtual worlds

Weeks 21/22 A3a – The Horizon Report 2009

Image by TimboDon via Flickr

I’ve just read the executive summary and skimmed over the rest of the 2009 Horizon Report which aims to report annually on 6 emerging technologies or practices that are likely to enter education over 1-5 years, also outlines challenges and trends. The project centres on applications of emerging technologies to teaching, learning, research and creative expression.

3 horizons of adoption – 1 is 1 year, 2 is 2-3 years, 3 is 5 years.

1. Mobiles and Cloud Computing

• Mobiles
  • Another component of network
  • Multiple uses
  • Internet
• Cloud computing
  • Networked computers – where applications and data are held/stored on the network rather than on a single computer to enable users to use clouds of computers. Changes the way we store, use and access files and software. Increases opportunities for sharing, collaboration and tracking versions.

2. Geo-everying and the personal web

• Geo Everything
  • The ability for devices to log their geo location, and link these to information, data and other stuff.  Eg automatically tagging a photo with a location. Use in sciences – logging observation locations, gathering other information about that place, etc
  • Personal web
  • Ability to reorganise online content, aggregators. Widgets. A collection of technologies that are used to configure and manage the ways in which one views and uses the internet that supports ones social, professional, learning and other activities.

• 3. Semantic aware applications and smart objects

• Semantic aware application
  • The use of meaning by applications rather than just syntax. Apps that interpret what we are searching for rather than just taking keywords.
• Smart objects
  • Objects that can be tracked, that know where they are. People, devices, objects. Eg an artefact in a museum is tagged, scanners give viewer information about that artefact and provide other data about it. People in a conference to put people in touch with each other – eg who am I sitting by

Key Trends affecting the practice of T&L

• Increasing globalisation continues to affect the way we work, collaborate and communication. – increasingly those who use technology to expand their global connections are more likely to advance.
• The notion of collective intelligence is redefining how we think about ambiguity and imprecision. Collective intelligence leads to multiple answers. Redefining scholarship. Today’s learners want to be active participants in the learning process.
• Experience with and affinity for games as learning tools is an increasingly universal characteristic among those entering HE and the workforce. Games offer increased opportunity for interaction and active participation.
• Visualisation tools are making information more meaningful and insights more intuitive. Visual literacy becomes an important skills that needs to be taught.
• As more than 1 billion phones are produced each year, mobile phones are benefiting from unprecedented innovation, driven by global competition – multiple uses, indispensable tools.

Critical Challenges

• Growing need for formal instruction in new skills, information literacy, visual literacy and technology literacy.
• Students are different, but a lot of educational material is not. Adapt to students needs, identify new learning models for engaging younger generations, change assessment practices.
• Significant shifts are taking place in the ways scholarship and research are conducted, and there is a need for innovation and leadership at all levels of the academy. Academic review and rewards out of sync with practice of scholarship.
• We are expected to measure and prove through formal assessment that our students are learning.
• HE is facing a growing expectation to make use of and deliver services, content and media to mobile devices. Not just an expectation to provide content, but an opportunity for HE to reach its constituents in new and compelling ways – in addition to the anytime anywhere argument.

Weeks 21/22 A2e My PLE

My attempt at depicting my PLE. I’ve used the functions identified by Conole from Activity 1 to categorise my PLE tools so some tools are repeated as they are used for more than one thing.  Purple flags indicate web 2.0 tools – I think. I wasn’t sure if web-conferencing was a web 2.0 tool or not?

1. To what extent are you using Web 2.0 technologies? I’m using a lot of different tools/functions but not very deeply. There is potential to grow.
2. How far are you using Mobile 2.0, as explored in Week 19? Very little. It’s too slow, small and  user unfriendly. A better product and I might use it more.
3. In what ways has your own practice and use of technologies changed in the last five to ten years? I’ve also been IT literate but I remember just over 10 years ago trying to work out how to use the university’s  new internal email system that was introduced when I was student. But my change has been from using the internet as a portal of information to a source of communication, interaction and a way to manage my learning/work/personal life through internet hosted services.  I’ve also found friends through shared interests.

Weeks 21/22 Act 2d – PLE v VLE a debate

Listened to a podcast debate between Martin Weller (Pro PLE) and Niall Sclater (pro VLE) chaired by John Pettit (H800 chair)

Arguments set out below, but in the end they agreed that

“Gradual bluyrring of boundaries between VLE and PLE. If students can embed parts of the VLE in their PLE then that’s a good solution.” (MW)

1. What is your perspective?

I sit somewhere between the two. I didn’t realise what I was doing was utilising a PLE on my studies and yes, it is sometimes frustrating that I have to log into Firstclass to get the forum messages when all my other emails go to my gmail or work email, and to log into the university website to get this week’s readings. The perfect solution would be to embed this week’s activities into my iGoogle (maybe via RSS) and to embed FC into there too. I’ve now got everything else I need (except my work email but I do like keeping that different).

My life is not just about studying, despite what my family thinks, so I would like studying to fit into ym life.

However, I do like, sometimes that things are kept separate –eg FC messages would be a distraction at work.

2. How does what they say compare with your own experience?

Niall says about when university systems go down and assessments are effected then the university can give extensions. This happened on H808 when the eportfolio system kept playing up and the university could shut down access to other students and they offered us necessary extensions.  However, many people would have preferred to use an alternative system because the eportfolio system was slow, clunky and not personalises-able.

At work, we have to use the VLE forums etc for assessable work, like Niall said, this is a problem as Martin said, why are we making students use the less user friendly tools to communicate. It might put them off internet communication altogether.

3. Which view aligns more closely with your own view?

Martin’s to the extent of choice, Niall’s in terms of needed few methods of communication otherwise how do you monitor it (control issues) why should we monitor it…hmmm….

I like their agreement at the end.

Niall Scalter (VLEs)	Martin Weller (PLEs)
Accessibility standards – feeling that free resources won’t meet standards	Individual tools are better than a VLE provided tool could be. Shame to use substandard VLE based tools when so many good ones out there. Also user can choose the system that is best for them accessibility-wise.
Robust systems – feeling that if system goes down, they won’t care as much as an institution to bring it back up, and if the institutions’ system goes down they can give extensions.	IT argument that doesn’t stand up, not enough evidence of this. However, having a distributed approach you are spreading your risk.
Multiple websites = multiple usernames and passwords	Agree, but Open ID and an iframe like igoogle can help that. Yes you need a common approach between students.
Yes you can get more up to date tools over the internet but we can modify tools to make them less functional to make them more user friendly for your average students with the basic functions needed for educational purposes.	Making a choice for the user
Important to have a system that is tested, robust and accessibility with the basic functionality.
Assessment issues – needs to be university based if tool contributes to assessment.
Support	Why not teach people how to communicate with technology effectively instead of how to use the VLE while they are at University?
University convenience	Student convenience

Weeks 21/22 – A2c – LMS v. PLE

Read:  Sclater, N. (2008b) ‘Web 2.0, Personal Learning Environments, and the Future of Learning Management Systems’, Educause Center for Applied Research, Research Bulletin, vol. 2008, no.13.

Gives arguments given for and against the LMS and PLEs in education.

LMS – learning management system, or virtual learning environment (VLE)

LMS’ suggested dis-empowerment – an attempt to manage and control the activities of the student by the university.

Those who believe in the benefits of elearning will need to decide whether their LMS remains an appropriate medium in which to facilitate it.

LMSs tend to restrict users to content designed for a particular course and interactions solely with those participants.

Weller believes that LMSs embody institutional practices, stifling innovation.

Personal Learning environments (PLEs) – a need to harness the power of a range of tools, services and content outside the institution that learners can use during their studies.

One argument is that the institution should no longer provide elearning facilities but instead tap into free resources – Warwick Business School is tapping into Google Applications into it’s LMS – including docs, calendar and email – which includes a gmail email address with WBS in it.

The multiple systems accessed through a web browser PLE model encourage learners to draw on the best from every environment.

BUT – students are then required to remember multiple web addresses, usernames and passwords.

The pesronal computer/laptop is starting to be seen as the personal learning environment.

Some proponents for PLEs hope that they will replace VLEs but admit that until there is a fundamental change in pedagogic proactice, given greater autonomy, diversity, openness and connectedness they are limited.

PLE is a way to reduce central control but itself is an attempt to systemise learning.

Positive arguments for the LMS – managing groups, tools and delivering content. Formal education is still demanded and supported, so still a need for an online system to manage admin, registration, payments, submissions and results etc. LMSs are good for restricting access to content and links with MIS.

LMSs also provide consistency of services for students and backup facilities. Vulnerability of learning these services to third party suppliers  – esp those with no contractual agreement. LMSs allow institutions to protect users (minors) and remove unsuitable material and institutions have moral and legal responsibilities for accessibility.  Getting rid of the LMS is a waste of the LMS expertise built up in-house too which simply won’t exist outside in terms of understanding the bigger picture.

LMSs may evolve into a MIS system working in the background with its information exportable to other systems that students wants to use.  Interoperability standards issues here. Not mentioned here, but I know the first thing raised at WBS in such a  discussion would be security of personal data on external sites and the policy to have anything that’s assessed (eg group work via forums) only on University supported systems.

LMSs also may need to develop into offline content, so people can access the latest version of the LMS offline, and just get it updated each time they log in.

Weeks 21/22 A2a – How to get faculty on side…

Read: Sclater, N. (2008a) ‘Large-scale Open Source E-Learning Systems at the Open University UK’, Educause Center for Applied Research, Research Bulletin, vol. 2008, no.12.

The article was about the decision to adopt an open source VLE (Moodle) instead of creating their own or buying a commercial product. Commercial products were seen to be too restrictive and put off academics, and very costly to adapt. Building your own would take too long and cost too much. Open Source meant that the OU could benefit from continual development and a basic framework already being there.  The money saved on buying or creating something from scratch could be deployed into development and integration processes.

They used the Business Readiness Framework to assess the suitability of 4 Open Source VLEs. The framework uses 7 differently weighted criteria

1. Functionality
2. Usability
3. Documentation
4. Community
5. Security
6. Support
7. Adoption

Moodle won at the time of the comparison but Sclater says that Sakai is now a worthy competitor.

Moodle claims to maximise socio-constructivist learning – “it focuses on users building their knowledge and understanding in conjunction with other learners” as opposed to other VLEs that are “merely shells” and “pedagogically neutral”.

Sclater offers an idealistic view on how we can encourage faculty adoption of the VLE, but really it’s ways to get adoption of elearning.

These are:

• Communication – raising awareness of how to “move from print based educational paradigm to one that also effectively exploits the dynamic, interactive, and communicative aspects of the Internet”. Communication of – institutional direction and policy, successes in elearning, new learning technologies deployed at the OU and how they can be accessed and external funding opportunities for elearning projects.
• Evidence gathering – including in the communication strategy but need evidence of elearning practice in the university and elsewhere but not to overwhelm so it has to be filtered to inform and reinforce the elearning strategy. Which elements of online learning are beneficial to learners in different disciplines.
• Training – training courses for faculty. Face to face is better, higher participation than online courses but due to quantity of faculty needs to be online.
• Incentives – now here is the radical bit
  • even with support broadly for elearning strategy there is not enough incentive to produce courses which involve online learning
  • “Faculty are more likely to engage in developing their skills when they see the point of doing so”
  • Enhancing the learning experience for students is the driver BUT there is no tangible incentive compared to research.
  • Incentives should include additional payments, changes to promotion procedures linking to elearning innovation as well as research output, recognition
• Funding – in campus universities funding tends to go to the campus based student services where lecturing remains the priority for many. New policies could stop funding for courses that do not have considerable elements of elearning!  But this could create box ticking and people will simply claim that having online copies of course notes is enough to make it elearning.

—-

The University of Warwick does not have a VLE but it does have websites that are MIS linked. The Warwick Business School built it’s own VLE. In a way this is good because we have control and claims are made that it is better than what is on the market. We are, however at a point now that you could not switch to Moodle as we do already have the basic framework and are now going the same as Moodle and just developing it continuously to incorporate new technologies. However, I do not know how our developers interact with the VLE building community, and from Sclater’s article, this seems to be a distinct advantage of Open Source VLEs, as you have more experts working together to find solutions. Of course, as he says, the Open Source community has it’s downfalls too – the delays in development, not being able to wait, not being able to tie in commercial release dates to students with non commercial development road maps that are very fluid, and so on.

Reflections on implications of new technologies at work

When I came back from maternity leave I asked if I could work at home at least one day a week – not with my daughter of course, but to save on travel time and childcare time – I could save 36 miles petrol money and 2 hours childcare.

I was refused this offer, despite there being plenty of technological tools to help me do this. We have a remote desktop system that lets you log into your desktop from anywhere and access all the network drives, applications etc etc.

I would say 95% of communication at work takes place by email even when I’m there, so this could still be handled, and we also have an online classroom tool that can be used for meetings if a real time exchange was needed – in fact, we have the phone too.

So unfortunately technologies haven’t advantaged me in terms of flexible working. However, when I have needed to be at home I have been able to work where possible – so my employer is gaining from these technologies being in place but I am not!

Aside from that, the use of email has significantly changed the way we work. Pretty much all communicaiton is by email internally and all communication externally until we get to the critcal point of chasing someone for work that you’ve already emailed a few times.  Email also allows you to record conversations which verbal conversations don’t allow, which is important when agreeing action points or discussions. Unfortunately this is very necessary.

I wouldn’t say that any web 2.0 tools have been used in the way I work yet.

Week 21/22 – A1 – The implications of new technologies for education

Reading first half of:

Conole, G. (forthcoming) ‘Stepping over the edge: the implications of new technologies for education’ in Lee, M.J.W. and McLoughlin, C. (eds) Web 2.0-based E-learning: Applying Social Informatics for Tertiary Teaching, Hershey, PA, IGI Global.

This article briefly outlines the shift from web 1 to web 2 tools and how they are used.  She argues that the impact of Web 2.0 can be positive and negative so institutions need policies and strategies to handle it.  Web 2 changes the type of technological support provided by institutions but also the way learning is designed, delivered and supported. (paraphrase p 3)

Web 2.0 tools are multifaceted in their classifications (unlike web 1 tools) so hard to classify as one or other purposes, also web 2.0 information can be easily transmitted between tools enabling users to make their own personal environments in the location and format they prefer.  The key shift is towards social and collaborative characteristics of these tools, and from desktop to web hosted services.

Web 2.0 are being used for new forms of dialogue, collaboration, co-construction of knowledge and reflection and can address the needs of different disciplines, learning approaches and educational challenges such as diversity, accessibility and cultural issues.

Table 3: Characteristics of web 2.0 technologies and associated impact on practice

Change	+ive impacts	negative impacts
Free resources	Specialised niche use social tools, allow contributions	Inappropriate academic literacy skills
Ubiquitous access	Technology as a core tool for learning Scale = wisdom of the crowd	Narrower, but deeper digital divide
Multiple Communication and distribution channels	Increased opportunity for peer and tutor dialogue. Information repurposed to meet different needs	Fragmentation of voice. No centralised repository of knowledge No single communication channel, confusing for user.
Free tools and services	Personalisation	Lack of institutional control What is the point of the LMS? What should the institution be providing
Media Rich representations	New forms of sense-making New forms of representation	Lack of new forms of digital literacy  by teachers and learners
User generated content and social profiling	Variety and acknowledging individual contributions. Knowledge sharing and community build	Quality assurance issues. Inappropriate descriptions and use of personal information for other purposes

Taken from Conole (forthcoming)  p. 8

Implications for learners

Lots of evidence quoted that students are changing the ways they interact with technologies and use them to support their learning.  Students see technologies as core to learning, PC and laptop ownership is high. Range of mobile devices. They use a variety of tools and resources to support their learning, appropriating these tools to their personal preferred style of communication and ways of learning.

2 sides of the argument. 1. that technology changes they way students to learn, they like bite sized chunks of information, multi-modal and multi-faceted representation and learn through experimental interaction, rather than step by step instruction.  2. that students lack the necessary ability to harness their technological skills for learning purposes, eg they know how to find information on the web but not how to critically evaluate them.

Implications for teachers

The change in teachers is less radical, probably for cultural reasons and less value seen in using web 2.0 tools. Lack of support within institutions, lack of time and incentive to develop teaching methods because of research pressures.  The teacher’s role is under threat from the information rich web 2.0 and user generated content, peer dialogue and co-construction of knowledge – the notion of the teacher as expert and student as receiver is out of place.

The main difference is the cultural context within which teachers works.   The use of social tools has a peer dimension, and use of these tools depends on peers using them, and if their peers aren’t using them so they don’t see the potential benefits in using them. There is only interest and value if others are contributing and if what they say interests you.

Academics are overwhelmed by the choices available and the fear of  a fundamental change in their role as teacher, and associated loss of authority.

Implications for support staff

Pro elearning staff find themselves arguing with outdated arguments about technologies with have nothing to do with today’s digital environment. Providing the right kind of professional development for staff is a key issue.  A key characteristic of these technologies is “learning by doing” so potential users need to use them to understand the affordances of these new environments and how they can change their teaching.

Implications for institutions

Most educational institutions are working with out of date systems and environments, at odds with Web 2.0 technologies. Tension between institutional systems and open free tools. Institution systems are generally only available for the duration of the studies and they normally have very low limits. If we are working towards life long learning and long term repositories of information students may be reluctant to invest time into an institutional system.  Thirdly, if students are already using some systems, they may not want to switch to institutional ones, and finally, institutional systems are usually inferior.

However, institutional services are needed when they are robust, supported, linked to MIS, library etc.

These new ways of working together, both socially and in organisations, can change the physical needs of a university too, such as tiered lecture theatres which are out of sync with the new ways of working.