eLearning for Students with Disabilities

Thanks to Pat Hensley for inspiring me to research about eLearning for Students with Disabilities.

While online courses are convenient for many students, they must meet the List of Characteristics of Successful Online Learners

Online learning requires more active participation from the student than f2f courses, Online Courses Require Higher Levels of Thinking from Students

Online or f2f learning success for students with disabilities depends very much from the support from the teacher and institution. This is why I appreciate so much the work from Pat Hensley, as a Special Education instructor and blogger

College and University Students with Disabilities Speak Out on Their eLearning Experiences

Jennison Asuncion presented some background information on an eLearning study that was part of a larger investigation conducted by the Disability and Information Technologies (Dis-IT) Research Alliance.

Several partner organizations were involved, including Adaptech, NEADS, and the Canadian Association of Disability Service Providers in Post-Secondary Education. The research team included students (including students with disabilities), disability service providers, disability activists, professors, and eLearning specialists (managers of distance education departments, for example).

e-Learning/ICT Activities — QATRAIN2

e-Learning may appeal to students if they:

* want to learn when and where they want, at their own pace;
* have commitments which make it harder for them to attend a regular course;
* have mobility or health problems that make travel or attendance difficult;
* live a long way from a training provider;
* work irregular hours or shifts.

Skills required for e-Learning:

* Observation
* Attention
* Manipulation
* Problem solving

E-learning and Students with Disabilities: From Outer Edge to Leading Edge

E-learning is one important avenue for promoting greater access for all learners. To bring students with disabilities from the outer edge of educational considerations, teaching and information technology staff need to: apply principles of universal design, better understand the benefits of accessible technology for all learners, and ensure that electronic information environments are accessible to people with a range of disabilities. Teaching staff and students need new skills to embrace e-learning. These include presenting information in new ways, navigating and utilising the benefits the Web, and engaging in computer mediated conferencing. Leading edge advances, in both computer operating systems and assistive technology, provide students with disabilities new opportunities for fulfilment in educational programs. Educational administrators need to ensure that resources are available to progress the advantages of e-learning for all students, and that accessible electronic learning environments remain a central priority.

EffectivePracticesDOP – eLearning & Virtual Instruction

Students with disabilities are successful in virtual instruction but the success often depends, as it does in a regular classroom, on having accommodations and supports in place that meet the student’s unique needs. Here are some points noted in recent studies on the use of virtual instruction by students with disabilities.

* Students need time to learn additional technology tools and assistive technologies prior to the virtual instruction. Students will be more successful if they are already performing much of their regular classroom instruction on a computer using the Internet and any additional screen readers, magnifiers, or other assistive technologies they will need in a virtual course. Students who do not use the computer often in regular classroom instruction may need to learn new tools to be successful online and this can be a barrier.
* Students are not overwhelmed by the technology. In one study students reported that they viewed the technology simply as learning tools.
* Students need flexible time to complete online activities. In one research study it was found that struggling students were successful in completing a virtual instructional activity and stayed highly engaged in the process, but they took 16 hours to meet the overall instructional goal that took other students 2 hours to complete. It was successful but required flexibility in time.
* Students benefit from the availability of instructional resources. Having instructional PowerPoints, wikis, and other resources available just-in-time was one of the primary reported benefits of virtual instruction.

Disabilities and e-learning problems and solutions: an exploratory study | Educational Technology & Society

we examine the perspectives of the four key stakeholders about the accessibility of e-learning: postsecondary students with a variety of disabilities, campus disability service providers, professors, and e-learning professionals. We examine both problems and solutions as experienced in Canadian junior/community colleges and universities and also assess the benefits of e-learning as experienced by the students themselves. Based on the findings, we make recommendations about addressing common e-learning problems encountered in postsecondary education and about how the different roles and perspectives of the four participant groups influence their views. It is important to note this is an exploratory, descriptive study that is not theoretically based. Its main objective is to compare the views of the four groups, to suggest hypotheses for future investigations, and to propose recommendations based on available information.

Using E-Learning as a Strategic Tool for Students with Disabilities

This paper will provide an overview of the current need e-Learning to be used as another mode of instruction, but also as a strategic tool for breaking down current educational barriers faced by students with disabilities in educational institutions. In addition, to the technological changes in online learning, students are now faced with greater opportunities to pursue employment, both domestically and internationally. In fact, they are able to apply and obtain virtual jobs, which were not available or afforded to their peers in previous decades. In the following section, there will be an overview of the current statistics of people with disabilities in the United States, along with an overview of distance education, which will also be referred to as e-Learning in this paper

Designing Online Instruction for Postsecondary Students with Learning Disabilities

This case study investigates the methodologies used to deliver online course content to postsecondary students with varying learning disabilities. The research provides a holistic picture of the students in their actual learning environment. Two college students diagnosed as learning disabled were studied with three non-disabled classmates in an online college learning environment. The purpose was to attempt to explain how the design of the course affects the students’ attitudes and performance. The design of the course featured instructional methods that research has shown to be beneficial to students with learning disabilities. Some of these included digitally delivered instructional audio, various textual interactions between the students, and other assistive methodologies. The college level world history course for this study was taught via the World Wide Web through the Blackboard course management system. Interviews,
observations, and academic documents were used to provide a complex, holistic picture of the learning experience of the students in this study.

Education Week’s Digital Directions: Educators Weigh Benefits, Drawbacks of Virtual Spec. Ed.

But, while certain aspects of online learning may work well for students with disabilities, experts say more thought and research are needed to make sure those students receive the support they need to be successful.

Successful Teaching: Strategies for Online Learning

Material needs to be offered in a visual and an auditory format. If the information is just in one format or the other, the learning style of the student may be ignored. In my course, I am offering information using slideshare with audio, and voicethread with audio.

Practical Connectivism for Teachers, TIOD10

Practical Connectivism for Teachers, TIOD10

It’s not about tools. It’s about change. via Mariana Fossatti

It’s the change underlying these tools that I’m trying to emphasize. Forget blogs…think open dialogue. Forget wikis…think collaboration. Forget podcasts…think democracy of voice. Forget RSS/aggregation…think personal networks. Forget any of the tools…and think instead of the fundamental restructuring of how knowledge is created, disseminated, shared, and validated.

Practical Ways to Facilitate Connectivism in a School Classroom?

George Siemens explains and shows some examples of the practical ways to adopt connectivism in classrooms in the K-12 education system

Sarah Stewart: CCK08: How connectivism changes my teaching practice

Great content IS important, but only if there is also a functioning and active community working together to learn, create and share. Otherwise, all that takes place is content dissemination. And that’s not education…”

So how do I encourage, facilitate or support the formation of a community of learners amongst my students? If knowledge is in the network, how do I work with the network in my role of a ‘teacher’?

George Siemens Principles of Connectivism

Principles of Connectivism
- Learning and knowledge rest in diversity of opinions.
- Learning is a process of connecting specialized nodes or information sources.
- Learning may reside in non-human appliances.
- Capacity to know more is more critical than what is currently known.
- Nurturing and maintaining connections is needed to facilitate continual learning.
- Ability to see connections between fields, ideas, and concepts is a core skill.
- Currency (accurate, up-to-date knowledge) is the intent of all connectivist learning activities.
- Decision-making itself is a learning process. Choosing what to learn and the meaning of incoming information is seen through the lens of a shifting reality. While there is a right answer now, it may be wrong tomorrow due to alterations in the information climate affecting the decision

Stephen Downes Principles of Connectivism

- Autonomy
- Diversity
- Openness
- Interactivity

The Networked Student Video

TIOD10, Assessment in a Connectivism MOOC

Assessment in a World of Connections

It is recommended to assess process rather than focus only on the final product of group projects. This can be done using tracking tools that provide insight on who contributed to what and how the final product was developed. Some ideas on process evaluation are:

* At the end of each month, week, unit, the students present what they have learned. Evaluation can be done by classmates.

* Create cognitive maps of the nodes they find most useful. Ask the students to provide an explanation of how the nodes contributed to their understanding of the topic.

* Have students explain what they have learned from each other.

Accreditation and assessment in an Open Course

so I think the most important part of the assessment will be whether the learner in question has collaborated, has participated has ENGAGED with the material and with other participants of the course.

So any good qualitative assessment model requires some mechanism (preferably people based) that filters participation for good faith.

P2PU – Peer 2 Peer University / accreditation

Assessment of each other becomes intrinsic in the community learning process. Like open source software communities, the participants in a learning group provide feedback to each other, reviewing and improving each others’ work. Peers in the course will assess each others work, and P2PU online certificates will be offered to signal that you’ve completed a course. At some point one could imagine that a certificate from P2PU would be meaningful in itself.

Using Peer Assessment to Develop Skills and Capabilities

This paper discusses some of the issues of peer assessment and reports on the alignment of teaching and assessment method (peer assessment) in an online learning environment to foster the development of a range of desired skills set and capabilities – critical thinking, ability to analyze and synthesize information, problem solve, assessing and giving feedback, make value judgment and reflection. In addition, it details how this method of assessment can be employed to meet the requirements of reliability, validity and fairness of formal assessment but more importantly reduce assessment load for both the learners and tutor/facilitator.

What could the peer evaluation form and the portfolio look like for this course?

Now, if we add the rapidly changing knowledge/skill landscape, employers are likely to be looking for adaptability. There obviously needs to be a knowledge baseline, and the ability to collaborate with co-workers, but after that the workers ability to extrapolate into the future will be key. The portfolio is a perfect way to “WOW” a potential employer and demonstrate competence and adaptability in an ever-changing knowledge landscape while a paper credential is more a sign of mastering a static knowledge peak.

Peer-To-Peer Recognition of Learning in Open Education

At the end of the course the group members each create their own personal portfolios in which they compile their best pieces of writing (or those that received positive feedback). They also leave testimonials for each other describing not only each other’s mastery of the subject but also reflections on the experience of working together. In addition, a number of metrics are calculated automatically and included in the portfolio, such as the number of bookmarks that were stored, the number of ratings left, and the average rating received for their own work. There are also indicators of their level of engagement with the group and the particular roles they took on during the process, such as problem solving and peer review roles.

Is Self-Evaluation Report Writing the Answer?

To guide the students in gathering and organizing their thoughts and information, the author also provided the following prompts:

* How do you think your contributions helped others to understand the topics under discussion?
* Did others refer to your postings? How did your classmates’ input help you deepen your understanding of the issues discussed in the online forum?
* What did you learn after looking back at the discussions following your own postings?
* What more do you need to do to increase your performance and impact in the online forum?

With Luz Pearson and Stephen Downes in Buenos Aires, TIOD10

After Stephen Downes great presentation at the Universidad Nacional de Rosario, Agentina we were waiting with Luz Pearson to meet him in Buenos Aires

We are both facilitating The Spanish Connectivism MOOC, TIOD10

With Luz Pearson at her Vosbuenosaires school

With Luz Pearson and Stephen Downes in the taxi cab going to Las Cumbres School to our informal meeting

With Stephen Downes and Luz Pearson during the informal meeting with K-12 teachers

Buenos Aires Meetup: Audio and Photos ~ by Stephen Downes

This is the full list of resources (formal and informal) from
Stephen Downes trip to Argentina, May, 2010

Teaching a Connectivism MOOC, TIOD10

I hope that this review will help Luz Pearson and I facilitate the Spanish Connectivism MOOC, TIOD10

- CCK09: Sonia Triana

I would suggest that you are the one to organize your learning. You can create a blog and write your summaries there. Or you can attend the live sessions or even participate in the moodle…I only participate in the moodle when I found an idea that attracts my attetion.Consider your schedule, do you work? , do you have a family? and so on. Try to enjoy as much as you can, dont’ try to follow everything, it’s impossible.

- CCK09: Roy Williams

What I am suggesting is that if you want to make the network viable for a (diverse) range of participants, you need to build the bridges for them to ‘ease into’ the network, rather than asking everyone to jump in the same deep end. A single “deep-end-fits-all” forum isnt an affordance for everyone, its a dis-fordance.

- CCK09: George Siemens

One of the more frustrating (but necessary) experiences in a course like this is letting go of the desire to personally manage and consume all of the information in the course. In CCK09, this task is handled by the network that you form with other learners. You’ll find a few individuals that you are comfortable with – perhaps their ideas resonate with you, perhaps you find their way of thinking intriguing. From these initial connections, you will progressively form a growing social and conceptual network.

- CCK09: George Siemens

Hi Eduardo,

I agree – the solution to managing complexity of conversation is not to reduce conversation flow but to adopt personal learning networks/environments to assist in managing flow and making sense of what’s happening.

This is a similar theme to last year’s course. The flow of conversation is too intense to master it all. Focus instead on forming a few connections and growing your learning network. As stated at the start – this course mirrors in function what Stephen and I say about connectivism in theory. Rely on the feedback loop of networks to discuss and address challenges, frustrations. Once you get totally overwhelmed trying to manage the information flow through traditional methods, networks eventually become more appealing.

George

- CCK09: John Mak

Some (especially the new CCK09 participants) might have expected the instructors (George and Stephen) to facilitate or moderate the forum discussion, as in a typical on-line course. However, they might have noticed that George and Stephen would more likely meet them in the Elluminate session instead.

- EdTechTalk#81 – The Mega-Connectivism Course (Part #1)

Talk #1 about the Connectivism Course with Stephen Downes, Alec Couros, George Siemens and Leigh Blackall
1200 people sign up for a very cool Connectivism Course… but what is it?

- Who Are the Good Informants in your Network?, CCK08 « Online Sapiens

Deciding who are the “good informants” in your learning network

- Connectivism & Connective Knowledge » MOOC or Mega-Connectivism Course

Research opportunities are enormous. MOOCs are uncharted, largely undocumented, territory. This course will produce a significant amount of data – both quantitative and qualitative. Short version: this’ll be a lot of fun. I’m not sure if the model we are working with is the future of education. If not, at least we’ve found one more model that it isn’t. I’ll confidently state that some view of learning as networked – whether conceived as connectivism or an alternative theory – is the future of education. It’s getting those details right that’s the problem…

- Connectivism & Connective Knowledge » Where does the learning occur??

The structure of this course – as mentioned at the beginning – is to have participants experience connectivism rather than to convince people of its value. What does that mean? Well, for starters, it means that participants have greater autonomy than would exist in a regular course. It means the conversation is more chaotic. It means that we’re always missing something. Everyone is. Some important conversation, somewhere, is being overlooked. Why is that so discomforting?

It’s discomforting because it goes agains the very principles that we have come to expect form education. We expect the academy to be a place that provide clarity, a path forward. In fact, we view it as the obligation of the academy. When we then step into a course and discover the conversation is distributed and that the expected frameworks for telling us what to think don’t exist, we get disoriented.

But isnt’ that life??

Isn’t that how real learning occurs? In business? In our personal lives? Who actually possesses a framework fo sensemaking in advance of encountering novel problems?

- CCK09 – Connectivists, Do We Need The Daily Newsletter? « Online Sapiens

The Daily CCK09 connectivism course newsletter was not available to the course participants during 4 days. I wanted to know what other participants were feeling without The Daily so I started a thread in the Moodle forum

- Socialization as information objects « Connectivism

Learner control is not without frustration for the instructor. I recall feeling a bit frustrated that the concept of connectivism that I was trying to communicate – the neural, conceptual, and social/external dimensions of networked learning (expressed in this presentation)- was not resonating with participants. As many theorists in education have stated, what’s important for learning is not what the educator has to share, but the current state of knowledge and interest of the learner. My attempt to move the conversation in one direction was not successful in this instance because participants were not interested in engaging in the concepts I presented. End result: learners took the course in directions that reflected their needs and interests. Not the instructors.

- The Technological Dimension of a Massive Open Online Course: The Case of the CCK08 Course Tools

This paper reports the results of a survey conducted among the CCK08 attendants. The aim was to analyze learners’ views about the multi-tool environments adopted in the course and to give some suggestions for setting up multi-tool course environments.

- CCK09: What is the participation of a teacher in a learner’s PLE?

by Christy Tucker – Wednesday, 14 October 2009, 06:07 AM
With self-motivated adult students, it can be successful to just let people self-select tools and do their own thing. With younger students, you may have to limit choices to something more realistic (not remove their ability to make a choice, but to provide 2-3 ways to work rather than 8-10). You might also have to do more nurturing students of how to select appropriate tools. Depending on your audience, even adult students may need help learning how to pick tools. If you’re nurturing them to make their own decisions, then that still seems to fit within connectivism to me. What do you think?

by Jane Brotchie – Monday, 19 October 2009, 03:21 AM
How to nurture and support learners is the heart of the matter for me. From my own experience so far on this course I think it is exciting and inspiring but I’m sure there are many people who have already dropped out or reduced their level of activity. Perhaps that’s part of the process for this course. It is pitched at Masters’ level and the members are a confident group. Some may also be leaving because they have got what they came for.

But if I am designing a course for my adult learners, I want them to build in confidence and to stay motivated. For this, it seems to me that there is a role for tutor and peer support being an articulated part of the course design. I don’t think this needs to shift the power away from the learner.

- Teaching in Social and Technological Networks « Connectivism

For educators, control is being replaced with influence. Instead of controlling a classroom, a teacher now influences or shapes a network.

The following are roles teacher play in networked learning environments:

1. Amplifying
2. Curating
3. Wayfinding and socially-driven sensemaking
4. Aggregating
5. Filtering
6. Modelling
7. Persistent presence

- Is this a course or something else? « Jenny Connected

I think Stephen and George could choose another way to describe this experience rather than use the word ‘course’. The word ‘course’ has many traditional connotations that do not seem to fit what they are trying to do here. They could then make it explicit what they are trying to do in terms of introducing a new learning experience. For example, they could have a list of things that you should NOT expect from this learning experience (e.g. tutor support) and a list of things that you SHOULD expect – e.g. to make your own choices about how you will connect to people to find the information you need, to determine your own curriculum, to determine your own assessment criteria, to determine your own assessment methods, to determine your own success criteria, to set your own priorities, to order you own learning environment etc. – whatever it is that they see as the key learning elements.

- Changing teachers? « Jenny Connected

It seems to me that a teaching approach that takes account of connectivism, is one that fosters learner autonomy, so that learners are encouraged to make their own choices and decisions, making use of the extensive resources that are now available to them on the web. If education is to result in people having increased choice and control over their lives, then it must model this from the bottom up.

In other words, the teacher’s role is one of supporting learners in their ability to make appropriate connections to the subject content and to other learners (where learner means anyone who is learning, at all levels of experience and expertise). The teacher’s own personal philosphy of education will affect how these connections are supported, where, with whom and with what. So a teacher may focus on supporting the students in connecting with the subject, e.g. physics. This might involve lectures in traditional lecture halls, but with connectivism in mind, the lecturere might also point students to the possibilities of connecting with physics networks. Or a teacher may focus on supporting students in connecting with each other in a group, with the purpose of exchanging experiences or collaborative working on a project.

- The CCK08 MOOC – Connectivism course, 1/4 way @ Dave’s Educational Blog

Community building. I’m a bit of a community freak. I’m in the online stuff for the community as much as the learning… I like to hear about people’s lives as much as their professional accomplishments, I learn from their mores as much as their knowledge. I would have liked a bit more sanctioned community building directed from the top, to help scaffold the organicness of the groups that are out there… but that’s just me.

- CCK08 revisited « Jenny Connected

To be true to these four characteristics of connectivism, the course ‘tutors’/facilitators (whatever you wish to call them) need to take a ‘hands off’ approach, and that is where I think CCKO8 experienced the most problems. These problems were related to the fact that

- many people still have very traditional views of what we mean by course and the role of a tutor within a course
- the tutors were sometimes inconsistent in their approach – so we could view the lack of intervention in ’sparring’ that went on in the forums as a ‘hands-off’ approach, but then the choice of exemplary posts to be included in the ‘Daily’ is a very ‘hands-on’ approach.

- Reflections on Personal Connections « Lisa’s CCK08 WordPress Blog

Professionally and intellectually all this is great. But I think after this class is over, the blogs I’ll come back to, the people I want to know better, may not be the ones whose work stretches my intellect or changes my approach to work, although those were the connections I initially hoped to make. They may be the ones, like Ruth Demitroff, with much wiser things to say. They may be the ones posting beautiful pictures of their walk in the woods with their dog. And the things I’ll treasure will be things like Ed’s whiskey haikus, Ken’s bizarre satires, and Mike’s visiting with me in Second Life and playing guitar on video.

- Environmental Engineering and Course Critique « Lisa’s CCK08 Blog

I hoped the live sessions would be highly interactive, and I’m sure our instructors did too. But the focus is always on some sort of presentation, the lecture mode, but with backchannel chat and questions. Our instructors and their guests present, with slides they control. We listen, and are invited to comment with open microphones, but we students do not set the subjects for discussion and it’s hard to take the lead.

- Argumentation online « Jenny Connected

So as a moderator in this situation of a large course and fierce debate in some of the threads, what would be my responsibility to participants who feel intimidated and therefore won’t post. I suppose the alternatives for these participants would include:

* find smaller/calmer discussion threads/groups to join
* connect through means other than moodle discussion forums – blogs etc.
* join the live sessions – Elluminate/Ustream
* exploit opportunities for making connections between concepts/ideas, through reading, listening, observing and ’lurking’
* find like-minded participants and set up your own small groups
* recognise that participation in forum discussion is voluntary not obligatory

- CCK08, Connectivists Should Develop Their Own Connections Using Social Tools « Online Sapiens

As connectivists, we already have many tools to continue connecting and learning: our blogs, Twitter, Delicious, Twitter Search, Google Blog Search.

- Developing a connectivist education philosophy « Jenny Connected

- learners can learn autonomously in the time and space of their choosing,
- they can negotiate their own curriculum and define their own learning paths
- they can find, select, analyse and synthesise the information they need from a variety of different sources,
- they have the skills to make meaning of this information, both working alone and with others, and thus extend their knowledge

I haven’t yet worked out where the teacher and assessment fit into this. I’m hoping that I will understand this better by the end of the course.

- Networked Learning Conference 2010,
The Ideals and Reality of Participating in a MOOC

The research found that autonomy, diversity, openness and connectedness/interactivity are indeed characteristics of a MOOC, but that they present paradoxes which are difficult to resolve in an online course. The more autonomous, diverse and open the course, and the more connected the learners, the more the potential for their learning to be limited by the lack of structure, support and moderation normally associated with an online course, and the more they seek to engage in traditional groups as opposed to an open network. These responses constrain the possibility of having the positive experiences of autonomy, diversity, openness and connectedness/interactivity normally expected of an online network.

- Networked Learning Conference 2010,
Blogs and Forums as Communication and Learning Tools in a MOOC

To a large extent, blogging and forum use correlated with specific individual learning styles and media affordances: the use of blogs was associated with the ability to create personal space for personal learning, quiet reflection and developing personal relationships with bloggers and others. The use of forums was associated with fast paced challenging interaction, relationships based on sharing of ideas, more open discussion and more links to the discussed themes and bigger picture.

- CCK08 – What does failure look like « An Education and Technology Blog

Given the high proportion of working educators in the MOOC, pushing the more concrete topics late into the course schedule was frustrating

Perhaps the lack of material on how one applies connectivism with actual learners is a sign that connectivism is so new that nobody’s gotten around to seriously addressing that question yet. Perhaps the lack of material on how one applies connectivism with actual learners is a sign that connectivism is so new that nobody’s gotten around to seriously addressing that question yet.

- CCK08 Failing? «

What I wonder is, did 2000 original particpants leave the course or are some still involved? Does someone have a handle on this? What is the feeling about the success or failure of this course?

- What is an open decentralized course? | Open Course in Education Futures

So, what is an open decentralized course? Based on work that I’ve done with Stephen, and open decentralized course is built on a connectivist model of learning: emphasizing learner autonomy, reducing barriers to connection forming, emphasizing participation, sensemaking and wayfinding through social and technological networks, and encouraging serendipitous connections through diversity (of ideas and participants).

- Course Recommendations: Revamping a MOOC « Lisa’s CCK08 WordPress Blog

@Stephan Downes above:”I don’t see the value in shutting the instructors up.”
The Daily is an instructor created platform – a lectern. From the “front of the room” (the daily is often referred to as the most valuable starting place) the instructor is more than allowed to speak (“I don’t see the value in shutting the instructors up.”) but is AMPLIFIED. I was dismayed at the “head patting” amid comments being included in the Daily, too. As an alternative, the instructor could link to his/her blog from the daily where any comments would then be framed as from a single participant not from the leader. It’s not that I’m not interested in what Stephan says, I am. However, I’m not interested in a course structure that automatically amplifies one viewpoint over the others.

- A response to Revamping a MOOC « Suifaijohnmak’s Weblog

So, what make sense to the learner may not be what the instructor wants to do. And whether connectivism could really achieve this would depend on the learning paradigm adopted by the learner, not only the teacher. For me, I take the stance of a learner (while I am a teacher by profession). But I may not be connected to others, as others may be avoiding me as I am a “teacher”. These are just my speculation. With the same token, George and even Stephen took a stand-off role in some ways, to let go of the teacher’s hat. But, what are the reactions of the participants?

- The structure of the course « Jenny Connected

But conceiving of a course in this distributed way, does raise some questions.

* How do learners make sense of learning when the course is distributed across a network? (I think Dave asked this)
* Does this degree of flexibility enhance or constrain learning?
* What is the role of the teacher in this type of course?
* Where does responsibility for each other begin and end in such a course?

The only thing I would change would be to add a ‘Help’ forum – a place where the ‘technologically’ challenged can go and receive help from the network to make the learning process smoother. It is difficult to keep up with the content and fully engage with the ideas, when a lot of your time is being spent getting your head round the technology.

- The value of critique… pls contribute your views | Open Course in Education Futures

The subjects addressed in this course are new to a majority. And it is not sufficient to recommend a reading and listening to a lecture so that they feel they are qualified to opine on the issue correctly.

- Open learning advance organisers « Jenny Connected

The overall message was the same. It is an open course. We can and should pick and choose when, where, how, what and with whom we learn – all as in CCK08. We can come and go as we want – but Stephen suggested that we take part in 4 activities:

* Aggregate
* Remix
* Repurpose
* Feedforward

The Spanish Connectivism MOOC, TIOD10

Luz Pearson and I am are co-facilitating the TIOD10 Workshop, a 12 week Spanish Connectivism MOOC

We both met at the open CCK09 Course: Connectivism and Connective Knowledge ’09

We hosted in Ning the first 7 weeks of this workshop and installed the Skysa Bar with chat and IM to network with the participants.

Luz Pearson posted:

It was designed thinking about teachers, the everyday-classroom-teacher-with-kids, not the university-theory-researcher-professor. Is a course for the edubloggers without a blog yet (because they dont dear to write one, they dont think they have something to say or dont know to whom they might be speaking). Mostly, they don´t have a blog because they are not ICT teachers, and they don´t have the time or motive.
After working for some years trying to make teachers use ICT on class, we thought: and if we think of teachers as learners? Simple idea, isn´t it?

330+ participants joined TIOD10 in Ning
50+ participants were active at some time
50+ participants moved to MOODLE TIOD10

During Weeks 1 and 2, participants only used the Ning Forum to discuss, learn and network.

It was on week 3 of the TIOD10 MOOC that we extended conversations to other networks like Blogs and Social Bookmarking (Delicious, DIIGO). We hoped to create chaos on the course. Participants should then feel the need of a PLE to organize their learning

We appreciate very much the support from:
- George Siemens
- Stephen Downes
and from our CCK09 friends, John Mak, Nicola Avery, Leila Nachawati and many others

We remember that the CCK09 started with Overwhelmed participants but we are still Continuing to attempt to destabilize courses

Related Posts: My PLE for Online Courses and Conferences

Related Posts: My PLEs for Online Courses and Conferences:

- My PLE for the 2009 Edublog Awards
- My PLE for the Corporate Learntrends 2009 Online Conference
- My PLE (Personal Learning Environment) for the CCK09 Connectivism Open Online Course
- My PLE for the Corporate Learntrends Online Conversations
- My PLE for the CCK08 Connectivism Course

Learn from your Campus and Online Teacher Colleagues

Faculty Focus recommends campus and online teacher colleagues who could really help you pedagogically. These teachers will be your learning network.

My Best Virtual Friends Nominations, 2009

Last year, in December, the Shorty Awards, gave me the opportunity to nominate and give thanks to all my best Twitter friends

Gabriela Grosseck alerted me, via Delicious, that Steve Hargadon had posted about the Edublog Awards 2009 Ceremony :

we asked those attending live in Elluminate to give a “shout out” to someone who had made a difference for them this past year. One of the downsides of an awards ceremony, and especially one in which there is an imperfect public nomination and voting process, is that it doesn’t really do justice to the larger sense of community and support that exists in our ed tech / social media / Classroom 2.0 / blogger world. We wanted the awards show to have a way to recognize the broader contributions that are made every day.

During the “shout out” I gave thanks to: Claudia Ceraso (fceblog), Lisa Lane, Patricia Hensley, David Truss, Sabrina De Vita, Luz Pearson, Gabriela Grosseck, Britt Watwood and… they didn’t give me enough time to nominate other great virtual friends like, Lorena Zanola, Nicola Avery, Malinka Ivanova, John Mak, Durff , Elizabeth Sheppard, Jennifer Verschoor, Leila Nachawati and many others

This is my post to say Thank You!! to all my best virtual friends during 2009 and to wish them a Happy New Year 2010.

My PLE for the 2009 Edublog Awards

This is my start page, my Personal Learning Environment (PLE), my list of aggregated resources for the The Edublog Awards 2009. It is a real example of a PLE, Personal Learning Environment.

The Edublog Awards
- The Edublog Awards
- blog – The Edublog Awards
- The Edublog Awards shortlisted nomination
- The Edublog Awards Ceremony 2009
- Elluminate Recording

My Nominations
- My Nominations for the 2009 Edublog Awards
- Argentinas en Concurso Internacional de Edublogs
- Saint Exupery 6
- The Edublog Awards « Saint Exupery 6
- Best Class Edublog 2009 – The Edublog Awards
- Blogworthy Tweets
- Most Influential Tweet Series 2009 – The Edublog Awards
- Supporting Edubloggers – The Edublog Awards 2009 Results

Search Blog Posts
- edublog awards – Google Blog Search
- edublog awards – Icerocket Blog Search

Other Blog Posts
- Nominations, Appreciation and Inquiry | David Truss
- Nominations and Voting by Peers is a Big Boost
- Room 10 Grey Lynn School

Read more:
Related Posts: My PLE for Online Courses and Conferences « Online Sapiens