By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. e-Learning Tech That is Fit For Purpose, Innovative and Sustainable
Wilbert Kraan asks the question central to e-learning standards: "for a new type of tool, do you agree an interoperability specification first, and then build applications, or build applications first, and then agree a spec later?" A bit of both, he seems to argue; that's why the E-learning Framework (ELF) is being developed iteratively. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. George Siemens: Connectivism: Learning as Network-Creation, Learning Circuits November 19, 2005
This is a first-rate paper by George Siemens that seems to me to offer a subtle revision to connectivism, one that brings it much closer into alignment with my own views (Siemens's characterization may differ). In particular, Siemens takes pains to define 'network learning' and to contrast it with contemporary theories of learning, such as behaviourism and constructivism. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Jeff Jarvis: Google Base v. Microformats, BuzzMachine November 19, 2005
Interesting commentary on the newly launched Google Base that says, in essence, "What we need instead is a means of letting you tag and structure your data so it can be found reliably by any search engine no matter where it is on the internet. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Press Release: LAMS announces new version, LMS integrations, services and Moodle Partnership, LAMS November 19, 2005
James Dalziel writes in, "in some ways, this is the most important LAMS announcement of late in that it points people to the actual code they can now use themselves." OK. But what is most interesting about this announcement, it seems to me, is not the new version of LAMS (come on, it's a .01 upgrade) or even the integration of LAMS with Backboard, Moodle and Sakai (with more planned), it is rather the emergence of an explicitly commercial model for the open source software. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Jonathan Potts: Cover Story: Transforming America's Schools, Carnegie Mellon Today November 19, 2005
Mitchell Weisburgh sent me the link to this interesting article about a new program at Carnegie Mellon "to train doctoral students from several disciplines - including psychology, computer science, philosophy and statistics - to conduct applied educational research." I am all in favour of research - it is, after all, what I do - but need to caution that training in reasearch assumes - doesn't it? - that an appropriate research paradigm in the field is already in place. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Stephen O'Hear: Seconds Out, Round Two, The Guardian November 19, 2005
The article seems OK so far as it goes, though it would have been nice to see some mention of the actual work taking place in what I have been calling e-learning 2.0. It looks at some of the generic applications on the web - web 2.0, folksonomies, the wiki - and overlooks the work in e-learning specifically (which, I might add, has been driving and not merely following these wider web applications). More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Various authors: WSISBlogs Archive, Digital Divide Network November 19, 2005
I was on the fence about whether to list this multi-lingual collection of WSIS blog entries - full of fascinating stories about how to organize an information society while holding a conference in a less than open society. On the fence, that is, until I saw this item: "A visually impaired participant was stopped at the security check because his guide dog hadn't been registered for the Summit". More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Josie Fraser, Ed Tech Posse, Dean Shareski: Blog Workshops November 19, 2005
Josie Fraser has SuprGlued herself and among the entries showing up on the new site is this collection of resources for a workshop she conducted on RSS, blogging, etc., last week. Some good stuff here, including slides, a chart of web-hosted services, and a blogging comparison chart. Also SuprGlued this weekend was the Ed Tech Posse, with whom I had a wide-ranging conversation this morning. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Christian Kohls: Interview mit Stephen Downes, eTeaching.org November 19, 2005
Interview (short podcast) with me while I was in the Netherlands. Despite the title, the interview is in English (my Dutch bing less than proficient). More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Godfrey Parkin: E-learning Grows Up, Parkin's Lot November 19, 2005
I still have a lot of catching up to do, but I think this article is an appropriate way to lead today's unusual Saturday edition of OLDaily. Godfrey Parkin writes, "the 'e-learning 2.0' name is a ghastly and inappropriate label... because it suggests a finite release of a formal upgrade, which is the opposite of what is really happening." Well, I do apologize for it - but if I hadn't coined it, some marketing type would have, and then we'd be seeing "e-learning 2.0 (tm)" advertisements all over the place. More...
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