Fortnightly Mailing

JISC Online Conference: Innovating e-Learning 2007. Guest Contribution from Geoff Minshull.

Last March, the JISC ran a highly successful online conference, Innovating e-Learning.  This was organised by Direct Learn, on behalf of the JISC. It was a five day conference, and had over 400 participants, with over 2000 posts during the event. Presentations included two videos, 14 PowerPoint presentations (some with audio and/or video), 23 Word/PDF papers, four web sites developed for the conference, etc. Presenters included Diana Laurillard, John Stone, and Stephen Heppell. After the conference, Diana commented that it was a "fascinating experience - well worth it from my point of view, as I got lots of good challenges, and much more depth of discussion than would normally be managed at a keynote. Lots to learn, but clearly the beginnings of a great new way of doing conferences".

Following on from that conference, the JISC is running Innovating e-Learning 2007, again organised with Direct Learn. This will take place from the 11th - 14th June, again online, with the two themes of  Institutional Transformation, and Supporting Lifelong Learning.  Like last year, people are  invited to respond to an open call for papers and presentations, and more information on that (and the conference generally) can be found on the web site, at http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/elearning_pedagogy/elp_conference07.aspx

Online conferences are an excellent way of sharing and disseminating information. Whilst not always free, they are invariably much cheaper than the physical equivalents, and,  more importantly, the quality of the discussions is often better. The asynchronous environment allows for much more careful thought to be put into contributions, and makes it easier for many people to contribute, unlike live sessions where active participation tends to be more limited. Also, the quality of discussion can often be higher than you might find in a physical conference.

The discussions and the presentations will be available to delegates for at least one month after the conference ends on the 14th, to give people time to catch up with everything that happened during the conference - there is always a lot going on, and it can be difficult to keep up with everything over the four days of this event, so the persistence of information that you get in an online conference is really important for delegates.

Have a look at the conference web site, and please do respond to the open call.

Geoff Minshull,

geoffm@directlearn.co.uk

e-Learning Standards: what global governance model is needed? Guest Contribution from Mike Collett.

There are several business and intellectual property models for the development of standards and specifications for e-learning.

It may be free, or there may be a cost, sometimes a large one, to:

• participate in the decision making;
• obtain documents and to re-use them.

Active organisations include ADL, AICC, ARIADNE, CEN/ISSS WS-LT, DCMI, IEEE LTSC, IMS, ISO/IEC JTC1 SC36 and SIFA. There are also lots of local and national standards organisations such as BSIIST43 in the UK.

Though they tend to share their love of acronyms, each has a different model, a different jurisdiction and a different level of international involvement or uptake. They are competing, sometimes aggressively, in an overcrowded and confusing  standards and specifications "market".

How can these models co-exist and the organisations work together?

London Conference

A free conference is taking place in London, UK on March 19th to consider some of these issues. In particular it will consider the governance or stewardship of SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model), as it is transitioned from its creators to its new international steward.

Be part of the debate – submit a paper for the proceedings (by 16th February), offer to help or just register to come along.

Mike Collett - mike [AT] schemeta.com - is a director of Schemeta and is Chair of BSI's IST/043 Committee.

E-LAMP: Travellers and technology. Guest Contribution by Ken Marks.

Picture by Vanessa Toulmin

Have you ever thought about the mismatch between mobile communities and the pattern of locally-based schools which we all take for granted? The largest traditional communities are Gypsies, Irish Travellers, Scottish Travellers and 'Showmen' (the traditional name used by the Fairground community).   Their problems started back in 1880 with the advent of compulsory school attendance (two years earlier in Scotland).    

Current legislation now allows for flexibility in terms of school attendance for children whose families are nomadic, but ICT is beginning to be used to build bridges and to challenge the notion that their schooling equates to physical attendance at school.

Since 2004 there have been a series of E-Learning and Mobility Projects (E-LAMP) which have sought to link pupils back to their 'base-schools', which are generally situated where the family overwinters. The projects have supplied them with laptops and datacards. The first project was research-orientated and sponsored by the Nuffield Foundation, but the DfES has also put resources into three subsequent projects so that over 200 children are now involved in a series of pilot activities. There are also parallel developments beginning in Scotland.

This approach has worked well with primary age children but, as you might expect, has been more problematic with secondary schools. There are problems for the secondary phase both because children have to link to a series of specialist subject teachers and because the children and families are much more cautious about committing to secondary education.

This is partly because of bad experiences of bullying, prejudice and racism and partly because Traveller children are regarded in their communities as young adults by the age of 13/14.   They then link into a form of family apprentice model for their vocational education.   [Even where parents encourage children to attend school exclusions at this stage are also all too common.]  This has lead to another E-LAMP project aimed at 'Key Stage 4' youngsters who are permanently disengaged from school.   This project uses an on-line distance-learning platform and the children are given tutorial support by specialist Traveller Education staff.   

Great to see technology actually supporting a traditional lifestyle!

Ken Marks works for the University of Sheffield's School of Education. For more information see this fuller report on progress, last updated November 2006 [65 kB DOC], or contact k.marks [AT] sheffield.ac.uk.

New Zealand's Open Source ePortfolio Project. Guest Contribution by Meredith Henson.

Meredith Henson is eCDF ePortfolio Project Manager based at Massey University in Wellington, New Zealand.

The ePortfolio Project is charged with developing an open source ePortfolio application and to provide implementation strategies for the New Zealand tertiary sector.  We are however developing the system with consideration to an international focus and appeal.

This project is a collaborative venture funded by New Zealand’s Tertiary Education Commission’s e-learning Collaborative Development Fund (eCDF), involving Massey University (lead provider), Auckland University of Technology, The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand, and Victoria University of Wellington.

Jonathan Zittrain: what would you install on one laptop per child? Guest Contribution from Steve Ryan.

Steve Ryan is Director of LSE's Centre for Learning Technology.

Resisting the urge to respond "Blackboard" to his question I sat back and enjoyed a brief history of personal computing and some very serious debating of future directions presented by Jonathan Zittrain, who is Professor of Internet Governance and Regulation at Oxford University, and Co-Founder & Faculty Co-Director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University. Zittrain gave  a highly entertaining and informative lecture and discussion at the London School of Economics on 13 October 2006. The lecture ranged far more widely than the question posed in the title would suggest and indeed neither Zittrain nor the audience actually considered specific software.

Jonathan commenced by offering a brief history of the PC, skipping all the technical stuff but concentrating on the tremendous power it gave to the individual to write and develop programs that would actually work. From this perspective, whether the PC is running Linux or Windows is of secondary importance. In both cases you can write and execute programs and particularly when combined with the Internet, all sorts of possibilities however apparently unlikely or even downright crazy emerge. Some of these would flourish and change significantly the way we work and interact. Wikipedia and Skype are just two examples.

But this apparently ideal state was threatened, challenged by those who recognise that the "channels of communication are also the channels of control" and that the individual PC through viruses and all sorts of malware can be taken over and manipulated.

While he did not doubt the seriousness of the problem, Zittrain suggested that in some respects the responses to this issue are as bad if not worse than the problem itself. In attempting to make our computing safer we have lost control. Others now automatically update and patch our systems and limit what we can and cannot do. Perhaps we are moving towards the end of the ".exe" era where anyone could develop and execute a program to the era where only approved and rights managed software will run on our machines.

In a parallel development we are seeing the emergence of specialised closed boxes, ipods, games consoles and even the "Internet box". They may be excellent at performing their specialised functions but they are closed, designed so that the individual user cannot write programs or modify them. The future then is of the increasingly sophisticated but specialised systems that lockout or limit individual creativity and control and that only do the things the system designers intend them to do.

The one laptop per child or "$100 laptop" programme is seen by Zittrain as having the potential to challenge this trend of specialism and lockout. Zittrain can best be described as critical friend of the initiative. He is certainly not starry eyed nor in the slightest bit naive about its potential and its dangers but he does see huge possibilities if many millions gain access to a laptop that combines the "traditional" flexibility and freedom to program of the PC with the sophistication and power of the latest developments in mesh networking. The former may allow continuing exciting software developments of the kind that our closed boxes will limit, The latter will offer the potential for new and extended forms of communication and collaboration that are perhaps outside the reach of current control agencies, offering new possibilities for individual and community development. So from this perspective, the one laptop per child initiative will not only impact positively on the developing world but may also reinvigorate computing and innovation in the developed.

Very refreshingly, Jonathan left half an hour for questioning and comment. The audience, comprising I would guess, heavily of students involved in Development Studies rather than Information Systems or Media pointed to some of the potential dangers, cultural assumptions, issues of control and ownership, environmental impact and sustainability embodied in such a project. Jonathan whilst accepting many of the points raised, generally took the view that the initiative was worth attempting even if it was only "half a loaf" rather than everything we might wish.

All in all, a thought provoking session, leaving me more optimistic about the potential of the initiative and recognising that it would really be up to “you”, what you install on the $100 laptop and not solely the decision of some Agency, Government or even Blackboard.

Steve Ryan - s.ryan@lse.ac.uk

Previous OLPC posting from August 2006, which includes a video of a prototype $100 laptop.

Let's face the music and learn. Podcasting for people with visual impairment. Guest Contribution by John Rudkin.

John Rudkin is eCommunity Manager for Blackpool Council.

In 2003, Blackpool Council embarked on an information and learning project partnering the local Society for the Blind, funded by the UK Adult Education Advisory body NIACE, and supported by Apple UK, the BBC and Ultralab. It was the start of a long and (for the community) fruitful relationship.

Everyone has heard of Podcasting over the last 12 months or so I'd guess? Everyone knows about streamed media and content sharing, but what we started predated Podcasting (so prevalent in its mention at the 2006 ALT conference), which was what we needed to ultimately make it tick.  Still, NIACE  saw the potential and supported this rather visionary project idea; Audio broadcasting to mp3 players.  During those early experiments we were inspired to look around at other mediums, and we hit on streaming, and a year later (when we found a funder in the Lancashire Digital Development Agency) blueIRIS was born. Launched on the 18th of October 2005, blueIRIS marked the start of a whole new chapter in the development of the Blackpool, Fylde and Wyre Society for the Blind and its Talking Services, and the beginning of a brand new approach to delivering information and learning content.

blueIRIS?

The new "post-patent" environment for e-learning: a perspective. Guest contribution by Jim Farmer.

The simultaneous announcement of the Blackboard patent [3 MB PDF] and the issuing of the complaint [200 kB PDF] against Desire2Learn on July 26, 2006, is one of those events that immediately changes our perception of ourselves and what we do. The emotions - disbelief, anger, frustration, resignation, and denial - show how unexpected, shocking, and important this event was to higher education. As bloggers educate us on patents, Blackboard business strategy, and the history of e-learning, three sharply different issues are emerging:  policies to encourage innovation; the commercialization of teaching and learning;  and collaboration among higher education and its suppliers.

E-learning for public library staff. Guest Contribution by Howard Hills.

E-skillsUk has just completed a major new report evaluating an e-learning programme rolled out to public library staff in the UK. The report is on on the E-skillsUK web site.  The report contains much of interest, including the major changes the library service is going through to move from a process organisation (ordering, giving out, taking in and maintaining book stock) to a pro-active service organisation (encouraging more participation in reading, supporting readers in a number of different ways).

As someone who knew little about libraries I was surprised both at the extent of the changes and the direction. Libraries are set to become learning centres: this will take time, and will depend on the creation of partnerships, but that is the trend; so what better place than to try out a new approach to e-learning? And I have "seen it all" (in the Royal Navy, Ministry of Defence, LloydsTSB, and PricewaterhouseCoopers) so that is perhaps a surprising comment.

The method of learning reminds me of the paper organisers new staff in Lloyds Bank were issued with that planned out there first week at work, who to talk to, which learning modules to study, which work based assignments to complete, which books to read; then write it up and review the learning with a supervisor. The Frontline programme uses the same approach electronically using coaches and assessors who are themselves completers of the course. The result is very low tech, and very successful. The same approach could be implemented easily by many employers.

Lessons learnt, include that:

• the supervisor/coach role using a recent completer of the course works well;
• the majority of learners considered themselves reasonable confident with IT;
• all found access to IT easy (perhaps not surprisingly with the widespread public access to IT available in libraries);
• managers felt the implementation was very straightforward and painless for them.

If you want to know more - read the report, or email Howard Hills - howard [AT] howardhills.net. www.howardhills.net

Personal Learning Environments make a step forward. Guest Contribution from Mark van Harmelen.

Mark van Harmelen is an e-learning and a social software consultant, and also an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Manchester’s School of Computer Science.

The UK is increasingly focusing on the development of Personal Learning Environments (PLEs) after a slow start that began with client systems such as Colloquia (2000) and the  Manchester PLE/VLE Framework (2004). This week saw a two-day meeting  (on 6 and 7 June) organised by CETIS and held in  Manchester. The meeting comprised an initial ‘experts’ only day, and a second public day.

What became apparent at the workshop is that the name PLE now encompasses two major flavours of architecture:

• Client systems such as CETIS’s own PLE, PLEX.
• Web-based server and browser systems, building on Web2.0 tools including aggregators, blogs and wikis.

Importantly, and picking up on threads that have been emerging in the Blogosphere over the last two and a half years, PLEs are increasingly seen as a vehicle for self-directed and group-based learning, where individual learners construct their own agendas and learning programmes to satisfy their own learning goals. As such, the PLE revolution harbours two important threads, a change in learning style in institutions, and a spilling over of learning technology from institutions to non-institutional life.

In that many of the more hard-line proponents of PLEs feel that even blogs and RSS aggregators can constitute a personal learning environment, we are already seeing wholesale adoption of PLEs in contexts outside of traditional institutional learning setting. This much is sweet news to those proponents of the original idea of PLEs, that PLEs are  needed to provide lifelong learning environments across different institutions and CPD suppliers.

In fact, PLEs, as generally agreed on in the CETIS meeting, are seen as making possible a fundamental shift that can be characterised in a number of dimensions; moving towards greater autonomy, diversity, openness and connectedness in education.

However, all is not rosy, and there was a general degree of concern about possible institutional responses to the coming PLE revolution: That PLEs in their most useful incarnations can only be used to full advantage with a fundamental change in pedagogic practice  and that  institutions may be wary of a consequent loss of  control of their teaching and learning processes. Perhaps, then, from an institutional point of view, it was no coincidence that the first day of the workshop was scheduled on the much touted date of 666.

Useful links:

CETIS PLEX Blog,  their  download page, and a selection of screenshots of PLEX in action.

Elgg, a PLE-like environment initially conceived as a response to increased institutionalisation of e-portfolios.

The half-hour PLE, a simple PLE built in half an hour.

A  resource on PLEs, still under some development -- "A great general resource containing numerous references and descriptions of resources on personal learning environments" Steven Downes (thanks Steven).

A useful  note from Graham Attwell who refers to  Derek Morrison  discussing the potential dissonance between PLE use and the industrialisation of education.

warwickblogs, the University of Warwick's bold experiment in student blogging.

To contact the author email: mark -a-t- cs.man.ac.uk

Using Blogger to get teachers started with e-learning. Guest contribution from Keith Burnett.

Mark Berthelemy sounds a prudent note of caution about using 'free stuff' in his recent guest contribution. I understand the concerns, but I would add that these systems have enabled some colleagues to get started with small practical projects, and these projects have lead to greater use of our College's VLE.

I work in an adult learning context, and many of our students attend college once a week in the evening or weekend. Many students now have access to the Web outside college, and those that don't often make use of the College drop in facilities. Simple class blogs can be used to post summaries of key points, exercises, links to Web pages of value, and to provide a sense of continuity and encourage engagement with the material.

This academic year, I have been suggesting the Blogger system as being easy to set up, flexible to administer with good control over comments, and allowing blogging by e-mail. A one hour training session [ pdf, 1.3 MB ]  has been repeated a couple of times, and colleagues have seen the benefit of spending half an hour a week posting links and summaries. Students appreciate the effort and make use of the pages.

Fiona Williams posts a blog for Chartered Institute of Management Accounting students at the College, and has run training sessions on blogger in her role as an e-guide in the Finance and Accounting curriculum area. Fiona runs this page as a multi-author blog and students from different classes will use the page for hints, tips and links. The manager in the area, Sian Houseago, is building on the success of the blogs by piloting Moodle courses for students on Association Accounting Technicians programmes. I have found that colleagues who have taken ownership of a simple blog page and who have kept that page fresh and relevant are open to using e-learning in a more sophisticated way using some of the tools that Mark describes.

In conclusion, I can't resist linking to a couple of podcasts and my favourite free Web services:

• 5 minutes on Carbonyls by David Cox [ 2 MB, mp3 ] provided for AS Chemistry students to pop on their MP3 players;
• 4 minutes on Blogs in education [ 1.6 MB, mp3 ];
• ScanR - image whiteboards with your phone camera and have the results delivered as a PDF file. This service actually does work rather well. There is no online storage of your work - the transaction is sending and receiving an e-mail.

About the author: Keith Burnett works as a Maths teacher and ILT development co-ordinator at Sutton Coldfield College. He can be contacted at keithb 'AT' bodmas.org.