Education Commons^™

Moocology 1.0, Glenna Decker

deckerg@gvsu.edu

MOOCology 1.0 is the opening essay for Invasion of the MOOCs: The Promises and Perils of Massive Open Online Courses, a collection written by academics from their own insights and experiences. This chapter offers a brief overview of the history and some of the issues surrounding this disruptive technology. Important questions are raised to keep the focus on that which is most important - the learner.

Breaking The Log-Jam: Teaching The Teachers About Technology, Shelley Kinash, Ron Kordyban

Ron Kordyban

Extract:Like logs in a metaphoric lumber mill, educational technologies are streaming in faster than they can be gathered and processed. There are wikis, blogs, podcasts, social networks and a host of applications to complement the already robust world of mobile learning. Where things tend to get jammed-up is at the point of training. Someone needs to show teachers how and when to use these new e-learning tools. More and more schools and universities are hiring dedicated educators to provide professional development in the pedagogical use of educational technologies.

Learning To Teach With Technologies What Pre-Service Teachers Say About Their Experiences, Kathryn Moyle

Professor Kathryn Moyle (consultant)

It is the intention of the Australian Government, that over the next five years, as a result of the Digital Education Revolution, all secondary schools in Australia will have achieved computer to student ratios of one-to-one. This investment in infrastructure brings with it many challenges. Two of these facing Australian educators are: In what ways can advantage be made of such a significant investment in schools’ infrastructure?; and What preparation do pre-service teachers require to enable them to meaningfully include technologies in their classroom activities? To provide some insights into these two questions, this paper draws on data collected from …

Structuring And Scaffolding Learners’ Verbal-And-Visual-Thinking, Yukari Makino, Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

In attempting to understand how learners might be supported in developing their multiliteracies, the authors reflected on the educational activity of creating visual products with technology from the perspectives of structuring and scaffolding. This paper presents a case study of two sets of activities that were implemented among university students in Japan. In the preliminary study, the students used a theoretical tool for creating visual products with the help of structures, but scaffolding by the teacher was spontaneous. In the main study, on the other hand, while the students used the same theoretical structure, the scaffolding by the teacher was …

A Study Of Effective Evaluation Models And Practices For Technology Supported Physical Learning Spaces, Ian Pearshouse, Brett Bligh, Elizabeth Brown, Sarah Lewthwaite, Rebecca Garber, Elizabeth Hartnell-Young, Mike Sharples

Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

The aim of the JELS project was to identify and review the tools, methods and frameworks used to evaluate technology supported or enhanced physical learning spaces. A key objective was to develop the sector knowledgebase on innovation and emerging practice in the evaluation of learning spaces, identifying innovative methods and approaches beyond traditional post-occupancy evaluations and surveys that have dominated this area to date. The intention was that the frameworks and guidelines discovered or developed from this study could inform all stages of the process of implementing a technology supported physical learning space. The study was primarily targeted at the …

Innovative Communication: Using Technology To Connect With Your Constituents, Larry D. Long

Larry D. Long

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of Eportfolios On Learning, Elizabeth Hartnell-Young, Colin Harrison, Charles Crook, Gordon Joyes, Lindsay Davies, Tony Fisher, Richard Pemberton, Angela Smallwood

Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

This report presents the potential impact of e-portfolios on learning and teaching. It is based on case studies of eight projects that are in the early stages of e-portfolio use within the primary, secondary, further education (FE), higher education (HE) and adult and community learning (ACL) sectors. The report is primarily aimed at policy-makers. Harnessing Technology: Transforming Learning and Children’s Services, the e-strategy published by the DfES in 2005, sets a target of providing a ‘personalised online learning space for every learner that can encompass a personal portfolio’; this should be available to every school by 2008 (DfES, 2005). In …

Eportfolio Australia: Imagining New Literacies, Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

The second ePortfolio Australia conference is part of a Trilogy of conferences (the others are in Hong Kong and New Zealand), reflecting the growing interest around the world in recording digital evidence of achievement and stories to create and present personal and collective identities. This conference emphasises ePortfolio activity as communication, involving students, teachers, parents, employers, and reaching out into the whole community. In the 21st century there is the opportunity to use a range of literacies supported by technology, and the papers included here demonstrate how educators are taking up these opportunities. The range of presentations reflects the diversity …

Joining Up The Episodes Of Lifelong Learning: A Regional Transition Project, Elizabeth Hartnell-Young, Angela Smallwood, Sandra Kingston, Philip Harley

Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

In this paper, we explore the rationale, process and outcomes of the Regional Interoperability Project on Progression for Lifelong Learning, a project that established a model of cross-sector collaboration in personal development planning technology in the UK. With specific reference to the widening participation agenda, and grounded in the perspective of lifelong learners, the project tested an approach in which discrete nodes of an individual’s learning journey are joined up through technology services. The paper describes the development of conceptual and practical tools to assist transitions between various communities of learning. A set of scenarios was developed, involving study to …

Eportfolios For Knowledge And Learning, Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

In the 21st century, we talk of knowledge as the new currency, and knowledge building as the work to be done in learning organizations. While knowledge building is activity directed outward towards the creation of knowledge itself, learning is a personal consequence of this process, the aspect that is directed to enhancing individual abilities and dispositions. This chapter considers how ePortfolios can support four aspects of lifelong learning in the knowledge economy: engagement with technology, representations of identity, developing critical multiliteracies, and global and local mobility. It argues that the focus should be on lifelong learners’ capacity to create and …

When The Whole Is Less Than The Sum Of The Parts: Humanising Convergence In Iinteractive Systems Design, Steve Howard, Elizabeth Hartnell-Young, Graeme Shanks, John Murphy, Jennie Carroll

Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

Convergence, viewed as the union of disparate technical solutions, is frequently proposed as a way of maximising value for end users: reducing the number of distinct technologies users have to purchase, learn and use. Yet few empirical studies of use and convergent technology have been reported. Though convergence as a catchphrase has had currency for over a decade now, a tension remains between those who argue for strong-specific solutions, i.e. carefully targeted ‘information appliances’, and those who prefer weak-general approaches, the ICT equivalent of the Swiss army knife. We describe the dynamic nature of the trade-off between usability and functional …

Towards Knowledge Building : Reflecting On Teachers' Roles And Professional Learning In Communities Of Practice, Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young

This study was undertaken in conjunction with the Successful Integration of Learning Technologies (SILT) Project in Victorian state schools, and its purpose was to identify the forms of teachers' professional practice that enhance knowledge building, in order to inform teacher development policy and pre-service education. Knowledge building is based on a constructivist approach to learning and teaching, and this, in conjunction with the spread of learning technologies, is said to have greatly changed the role of the teacher in the classroom: from the expert dispensing knowledge to the facilitator of student learning. Using an ethnographic approach based particularly on observation …

Ict Acheivers Program, Anne-Marie Chase, Greg Powell

Dr Anne-Marie Chase