By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Peers, Desist!
There has been a bit of an uptick in interest in the concept of automated online peer assistance. David Truss, for example, writes on my Explode! comment wall that he'd like to see something like this FieldFindr made a reality. And Will Richardson covers similar ground summarizing a Henry Jenkins article: "we don't so much need a faculty as we need an intellectual network." Well once such application might be Peer Assist, shown here at the University of Ottawa. But not all is happiness and joy. Dave Snowden complains, "It seems that such natural processes are no longer good enough. Now we have to formalise the process, bring in facilitators, stick to strict time limits and get rid of critical comments, only allowing positive thought". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Asking to Be Kidnapped
Nice take on the metaphor I use to describe formal learning, written with humour. Worth noting are the 'ten frames' that characterize the way traditional learners are "captivated by conformity". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. How Do I Explode?
The people at ELGG created some weekend code on the fly and came up with Explode!, a partially distributed social networking application. I made some suggestions and it appears some more work will be put into the API (I hope they remember me when they make their millions). Watch this space. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Anecdotes
Today seems like a good day to note that Clark Aldrich is slowly creating a dictionary or encyclopedia of instructional technology terminology. He has been working on this for weeks, and is up to the letter 'C' (though he has been going back and adding 'a' and 'b' entries when he thinks of them, which explains this item). It's a worthy endeavour, and while I don't always agree with the definitions I certainly think this will evolve into a useful resource. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Intellect, Emotion, Spirit, and Will: Another Side of Connectivism
I have said from time to time, in asserting that 'to teach is to model and to demonstrate', that one should 'be the person you want your students to be'. Not original with me, and not original to connectivism, either, but surely at the heart of the theory, and the idea that learning is 'pattern recognition' explains why. Sessums finds links from all this to The Courage To Teach by Parker Palmer. "Good teachers possess a capacity for connectedness. They are able to weave a complex web of connections among themselves, their subjects, and their students so that students can learn to weave a world for themselves". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Let's Toss Jobs Under the Bus
I don't recommend such drastic action as indicated by the headline, but I do share the author's displeasure with Steven Jobs's simpleminded 'blame the union' analyis of education. If unions were the cause of a malfunctioning educational system, then education in places without teachers' unions would automatically be that much better. But there's no evidence of this; just look at the lacklustre accomplishments of the union-busting private and charter schools that have been launched in various places throughout the U.S. I agree with this assessment: "Perhaps we ought agree -- for once -- that the entire 'public education experiment' (in the US) of the last 150+ years has been an insanely SUCCESSFUL adventure. It worked". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Anyone, Anywhere, Anytime Myth
Norm Friesen offers the fourth of his 'e-learning myths' series. It follows the form of his previous installments. He writes, "'Anyone, anywhere, anytime' invokes a kind of 'default' person, place and time which is generally white and male (Nakamura, 2002), in a position of wealth and in a space and time generally defined in terms of production and consumption. In uncritically invoking categories like anyone, anywhere, anytime, the experience of a single (and relatively small) class of people is privileged and universalized." First of all, I don't think that anybody asserts that the internet presently allows 'anyone, anywhere anytime' access. Second, the detection of stereotypes on the internet does not make it impossible to be 'anyone', it merely points out that most people choose to be more or less themselves, through which some people can identify stereotypes. Finally, this assertion that "the experience of a single (and relatively small) class of people is privileged and universalized" doesn't trump everything. The digital divide doesn't trump everything. If we are restricted to saying things about the internet that must be true not only of rich white males but also of impoverished people with zero access, we may as well go home; it's a ridiculous requirement. More...