Cloudworks: social networking for learning design

Why do some social networking services work and others fail? Can we apply the best of Web 2.0 principles to an educational context? More specifically can we use this as a means of shifting teaching practice to a culture of sharing learning ideas and designs? Can we harness the potential of technologies to create more engaging learning experiences for students? These are the key questions this paper addresses. We describe how we are using the concept of 'object-orientated social networking' to underpin the creation of a social networking tool, Cloudworks, for sharing learning ideas and designs

Participatory online environmental education at the Open University UK

The role of education in helping our societies put sustainability into practice is crucial. The motivation, awareness and empowerment, necessary for citizens to understand the concept and take part in its operationalisation, ought to emerge from environmental education, since we might encounter some difficulty when trying to teach, or impose these notions in a theoretical way. In developing environmental courses, we therefore ought to progressively replace pedagogical approaches based on (relatively 'authoritarian') transfers of information with more interactive and collaborative learning processes: citizens' participation can start with the creation of communities of learners. This paper describes the construction of two web courses: a first level teaching module on environmental systems and a third level interdisciplinary environmental course, both developed at the Open University, specialised in distance and open learning. The themes of the course include participatory processes in decision-making, the perception and representation of environmental systems, alternative leadership, biodiversity, climate change and integrated water management, environmental action and governance. The concepts focused on include sustainability, complexity, uncertainty, globalisation and 'systemic problem solving'. In both courses, the overall pedagogical process is based on the notion of environmental governance. This means that the web has been chosen as a learning platform, because - it provides various types of up to date information as well as archives, - it allows various types of users to communicate between different countries, and also - it encourages collaborative and interactive learning. This paper describes the experience of the author in creating web environmental courses at the Open University. Components of the courses such as interactive activities are discussed, as well as the pedagogical focus progressively shifted towards more participatory processes of learning

ICT (WEB.DESIGN)AND JAVANESE LANGUAGE LEARNING IN INDONESIA: REVITALIZATION INDIGENOUS LANGUGES

In this paper, I would like to focus on Javanese language as indigenous language in Indonesia that needs to preserve and develop especially Javanese letters and naturalness conversation. This paper also describes important areas in which technology plays a role in language and culture revitalization and explores efforts made by Indigenous communities to preserve, maintain and revitalize their Indigenous language with the help of computer technology. Why Javanese language?, The Javanese language is becoming endangered, even though it is one of the compulsory subjects taught at Javanese schools. Students become unmotivated when they learn the language at school because of boring and irrelevant teaching and learning materials. Furthermore, their closest mentors such as teachers, parents and relatives cannot provide motivating conditions to learn the Javanese language. In order to preserve the Javanese language through education at schools, ICT-Web Design is an approach proposed for Javanese language learning. The students can learn the usage of Javanese language at a proper Javanese letters, level of politeness through a natural dialogue with ICT. An approach that is not new, but which has been under-utilized and has yet to be proven useful in Indigenous communities is the integration of technology to supplement efforts in Indigenous language education, revitalization and maintenance programs. Many Indigenous communities have embraced technologies, such as audio, video, multimedia, Internet and etc as a means to revitalize their language. However, the language revitalization employs the following categories: Indigenous language preservation; documentation and material development; and building communicative community can be applied to other Indigenous languages as well

demi: linking design with sustainability

This paper describes an educational framework offering one possible approach to linking sustainability and design. This framework, developed as part of the demi project, provides links to information new to designers thereby challenging the design status quo. For example, it incorporates the integration of different communities within designing - often from outside traditional boundaries - and an appreciation of environmental and social impacts as designs are conceived, produced, used and then discarded. The paper discusses the demi framework, its content and its educational potential. Further, it explores the possible transferability of the framework to other disciplines, promoting practical and widespread action in education for sustainability

Final report of work-with-IT: the JISC study into evolution of working practices

Technology is increasingly being used to underpin business processes across teaching and learning, research, knowledge exchange and business support activities in both HE and FE. The introduction of technology has a significant impact on the working practices of staff, often requiring them to work in a radically different way. Change in any situation can be unsettling and problematic and, where not effectively managed, can lead to poor service or functionality and disenfranchised staff. These issues can have a direct impact on institutional effectiveness, reputation and the resulting student experience. The Work-with-IT project, based at the University of Strathclyde, sought to examine changes to working practices across HE and FE, the impact on staff roles and relationships and the new skills sets that are required to meet these changes

Creating virtual communities of practice for learning technology in higher education: Issues, challenges and experiences

The need for a Web portal to support the rapidly growing field of learning technology has been well established through a number of national surveys and scoping studies over recent years. The overarching vision has been the provision of a virtual environment to assist in informing and developing professional practice in the use of learning technologies. This paper outlines the issues and challenges in creating such a portal through the experiences of developing the RESULTs Network. In the paper, design and participation issues are considered within the wider context of online and networked approaches to supporting practice and professional development. User participation methodologies and technical developments for RESULTs are described in relation to a review of existing representations of practice and a comprehensive survey amongst the learning technology users’ community. An outline of key achievements and experiences is presented, followed by some conclusions regarding the cultural and political issues in creating a viable and sustainable facility and suggestions for possible future direction in national provision

From open content to open thinking

So far Open Educational Resources (OER) research has focused on the objective to 'open' education by making accessible free educational resources to the world. In the latest years the movement has matured, and a growing amount of OER have been made available by universities, researchers and scholars through several portals. Nonetheless, the level of adoption of OERs into common teaching practices remains quite low. In this paper we suggest that one of the main barriers to OER's adoption is the lack of 'opening up' to people's thinking around OERs and we propose Cohere, a tool which aims at making this thinking visible and exportable in ways that support the emergence of 'collective intelligence' around OERs research. Accessing Collective Intelligence (CI) around OERs is presented as a medium to know and understand what people think, how people design and use OERs thus increasing the easy of re-use of OER in learning and research practices

Digital Scholarship Audit Report

This report will describe the audit of digital scholarship practices that was carried out over the period between 2nd November 2009 and 31st July 2010 as part of the wider Digital Scholarship project. The original proposal for the project included the intention to “conduct [an] exploration of current academic researchers’ practices in digital scholarship” and this document is the result of that exploration