A question was put to me yesterday in a session on Philosophy and Policy of Higher Education about the universality of Popperian positivism (a position I think I was unconsciously and unintentionally promoting). The discussion subsequently led me to read Paul Feyerabend. So far I have only dipped my toe in through this very accessible … Continue reading Philosophy and science
Tag: Theory
Learning design for open online courses – part 1
Further to my previous post, Learning design principles: educational pragmatists, which was an abstraction of our beliefs about teaching, this post is an attempt to set out some practical implications for designing open online courses, following from our key assertion: Change is brought about through critical, experiential, social learning activity in connected communities where people … Continue reading Learning design for open online courses – part 1
Many worlds of teaching in higher education
The intro week of #fslt13 has zipped past and things got off to a good start. Will the substance of the course hold up as well as the intro to the process? There is still a lot to do over the next five weeks but it is much better than starting with a raft of … Continue reading Many worlds of teaching in higher education
Teaching into the third space
I had a penny-dropped moment observing a series of tutorials in Oxford Brookes University's Interior Architecture group. The language being used by the tutors echoed, for me, the language of activity theory, actor network theory and - most importantly - third space theory. I am probably over-interpreting but until this moment I hadn't realised quite … Continue reading Teaching into the third space
Launch of the OLDS MOOC
Well things didn't look promising at 1600. Cloudworks database error, and YouTube livestream not streaming. The QT feed from the OU worked. But the uni-directional presentation with no back channel or discussion forum (well there is Twitter!) made it a bit well... lacking? Twitter was sort of engaged but mostly with the tech problems for … Continue reading Launch of the OLDS MOOC
x v c: falsifiability or hybrid learning in, through and about MOOCs
[This is my abstract for OER13] Two thousand and twelve was the year of the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) (Creelman 2012). The MOOC has become a complex phenomenon leaving aspiring designers and conveners with many questions and decisions to make. Speaking loosely, observers notice two broad categories of MOOC. cMOOCs are the earlier form, … Continue reading x v c: falsifiability or hybrid learning in, through and about MOOCs
MOOCs and chaos
Dave Cormier has written a thoughtful critique from a cynefin perspective of massive open online courses (moocs) as an approach to learning the "basics". I reduce his argument almost to absurdity, but it is extremely relevant to a massive open online course that I, Jenny Mackness and Marion Waite are developing. Our mooc is called … Continue reading MOOCs and chaos
The purpose of education is to increase empathy and equality – 500 words on #purpos/ed
I never did sign up for this, but, hey, the purpos/ed project is making a splash in our world and it is worth pitching in, even if my contributions are not timely, original or synthetic of what has gone before (see David Jennings, who took the synthesising route: http://alchemi.co.uk/archives/mis/purposed_whats_the_purpos.html). Cristina Costa neatly exposes a key … Continue reading The purpose of education is to increase empathy and equality – 500 words on #purpos/ed
Humanising the Real Wide Web – the mesh, widely distributed data and “Sensor-driven collective intelligence”
I wouldn't want to presume to have thought of something before Tim O'Reilly (cf. http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/mar/15/sxsw-2011-internet-online# ; http://radar.oreilly.com/2009/03/radar-roundup-sensors.html ; http://www.web2summit.com/web2009/public/schedule/detail/10194), but in 2007 I wrote about Web3. I called it mesh networks and widely distributed databases (http://my-world.typepad.com/rworld/2007/09/global-justice-.html http://my-world.typepad.com/rworld/2007/10/more-on-the-mes.html) and cited Dust Network's (http://www.dustnetworks.com/) sensors as part of the puzzle. Semantic language technologies are part of it, … Continue reading Humanising the Real Wide Web – the mesh, widely distributed data and “Sensor-driven collective intelligence”
Digital Humanities and the #alt-ac track – but why need it be centered around the “academy”
the #alt-ac label speaks to to a broad set of hybrid, humanities-oriented professions centered in and around the academy, in which there are rich opportunities to put deep — often doctoral-level — training in scholarly disciplines to use. Recent #alt-ac conversation online additionally tends to focus on the digital humanities, a community of practice marrying … Continue reading Digital Humanities and the #alt-ac track – but why need it be centered around the “academy”
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