By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Increasing Social Presence in Online Learning through Small Group Discussions
Mete Akcaoglu, Eunbae Lee, The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 2016/05/18

This could have been such an interesting paper had the authors not succumbed to what is a disease in our field, small (n=33) and unrepresentative (graduate students pursuing a master's degree in education) samples. The idea was to determine the impact of small group size on social presence in learning, where social presence was measured in three dimensions. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Does Formal Credit Work for MOOC-Like Learning Environments?
Engin Kursun, The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 2016/05/18

This article has an almost-decent sample size and the sort of conclusion that magazines like the Chronicle love to publish: "Data was collected via 516 responses to an online survey and achievement tests.... The credit bearing group also scored significantly higher achievement scores than the credit careless group. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Status of E-Learning in Public Universities in Kenya
George L. Makokha, Dorothy N. Mutisya, The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 2016/05/18
OK, I get this: "e-learning is at its infant stage in universities in Kenya. Majority of universities lacked senate approved e-learning policies to guide structured implementation. A few lecturers (32%) and students (35%) used e-learning and few courses (10%) were offered online. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Introducing Spaces, a tool for small group sharing
Luke Wroblewski, Official Google Blog, 2016/05/18

Google has released an app called 'Spaces' intended to support small groups. It integrates other Google apps. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. SSRN has been captured by the enemy of open knowledge
Paul Gowder, Medium, 2016/05/18

As the Press Release announces, Elsevier has acquired the Social Sciences Research Network (SSRN) and plans to in some way roll it in with Mendelay. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Whatever happened to … Logo?
Doug Peterson, doug – off the record, 2016/05/17

Logo was an almost magical tool in its time designed to help students learn to program. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Future of Work and Learning 2: Chatbots
Jane Hart, Learning in the Modern Social Workplace, 2016/05/17
Ah, chatbots. Everyone's favourite potential robot teacher. They've been around for a while - here's me interviewing one that ran for president in 2000. Today they're a lot more sophisticated and sometimes even passing the Turing test (here, here and here). More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Interested In The Moodle Academy?
Moodle News, 2016/05/17

In what looks like "a direct response to the Canvas Network," Moodle's Gavin Hendrik has announced the Moodle Academy, "a centralized MOOC hosting platform run and managed by Moodle. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. E-Learning in K-12 Schools: The Prospects for Disruptive Innovation
Paul W. Bennett, The Atlantic Institute for Market Studies (AIMS), 2016/05/17

I wasn't expecting much from this report as the Atlantic Institute for Market Studies (AIMS) typically parrots a hard-right neo-liberal political agenda, but it is actually fairly comprehensive and reasonably accurate. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Pedagogy out of Fear of Philosophy as a Way of Pathologizing Children
Arie Kizel, Journal of Unschooling, Alternative Learning, 2016/05/17
This article has the most awkward title ever, but represents a logical progression from Friere's characterization of the 'pedagogy of the oppressed' (and more positively, 'pedagogy of hope'). The pedagogy of fear "stunts the active and vital educational growth of the young person, making him/her passive and dependent upon external disciplinary sources. More...