By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Weeknote 36/2014
Doug Belshaw, 2014/09/11
Doug Belshaw has interviewed a number people (including me) over the last week or so on the topic of the Mozilla Web Literacy Framework. He writes, "I’m starting the ball rolling towards a v2.0 update of the Web Literacy Map (which looks prettier here in the Webmaker resources section). More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Learning and Connectivism in MOOCs
Stephen Downes, [Sept] 11, 2014, Desconectado IV Encuentro Internacional de Investigadores en EducaciÓn Virtual
In this presentation I examine the phenomenon of MOOCs as I see them, explaining how they result from and support an understanding of the world based in pattern recognition. The presentation is structured along the lines of the six major elements of the underlying literacies of network interaction. [Link]. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Challenges (and Future) of Networked Learning
Stephen Downes, [Sept] 05, 2014, , Online, to Medellin, Colombia, via Vidyo
A conversation about challenges (and future?) of networked learning. A broad understanding of the meaning and potential of networked learning can help educational institutions to rethink their role beyond the provision of LMS and centralized information systems. What skills are needed? What happens if we don't develop them? What kind of technology supports the development of said skills? What’s the relation between this and issues of information property and citizenship in a digital context (POSSE models, Indie web movement)? [Link] [Slides] [Audio]. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Tropes vs Anita Sarkeesian: on passing off anti-feminist nonsense as critique
Ian Steadman, New Statesman, 2014/09/05
Misogyny is of course not limited to video games, but it is of particular concern there, and its prevalence explains why critic Anita Sarkeesian raised $158K from more than 6,000 backers to make a series of videos on "Tropes vs. Women in Video Games". As Ian Steadman writes in this commentary, it's nothing we wouldn't expect from informed critique in any other discipline. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Windows Store is a Cesspool of Scams — Why Doesn’t Microsoft Care?
Chris Hoffman, How-to-Geek, 2014/09/12
I learned firsthand about the cesspool of scams around the same time this article came out, in mid-August, when I was struggling with the Windows video player app. Windows 8 didn't come with a native DVD player (something I find incredible) so I went searching for one, and found scam after scam (including the many many fake-VLC apps described in this article. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. OER MOOC: Use of Open Educational Resources in Classroom
Ramesh Sharma, Slideshare, 2014/09/12
I saw a presentation advertising this MOOC. Searching for the MOOC (because the URL of the MOOC is nowhere in the presentation) I found this item on LinkedIn (stupid login probably required - why do people write articles on LinkedIn?) by Ishan Abeywardena suggesting that the purposes of MOOCs and OERs are opposed. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Coursera
Jonathan Mayer, Web Policy, 2014/09/12
Coursera is learning yet another lesson learned long ago by real LMS providers: you can't fake your way to privacy and security; you have to have real measures in place. Stanford's Jonathan Mayer identifies three major flaws:
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Using technology in music teaching – my workflows
Simon Dring, drummer / teacher, 2014/08/13
As I read posts and articles on education technology and digital pedagogy I find myself often wishing that writers would be more reflective. In an article about, for example, the workflow involved in teaching music online, the important bits aren't the broad overviews that anyone could figure out - creating handouts on Sibelius, storing notes on box.com, typing quick notes using of Drafts. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Federal Reserve Board backs up e-Literate in criticism of Brookings report on student debt
Phil Hill, e-Literate, 2014/08/13
The 'Brookings Report' has been cited by some as a reason to doubt that student loan repayments pose a significant economic risk. The authors write, "Despite the tremendous interest in the perceived problems in the student loan market, there is relatively little empirical evidence to support the discussion." My own view is that we will see dramatic and immediate evidence of the risk should interest rates rise significantly. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Active players in a network tell the story: Parsimony in modeling huge networks
Amit Rechavi, Sheizaf Rafaeli, First Monday, 2014/08/13
One problem with studying networks is the huge amount of data generated. But what if you just studied the active members of a network, thus reducing significanty the data that hs to be crunched? Would it be reliable? In some cases, yes. More...
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