Saturday, October 17, 2009

Media Literacy: Making Sense Of New Technologies And Media by George Siemens - Oct 17 09

eLearning Resources and News

learning, networks, knowledge, technology, trends

by George Siemens

Decentralized Work: The Final Frontier

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The ideologies that give birth to systems remain long after they cease being valuable.

End result: We have systems and policies that function under ideologies / views that are no longer needed, and in many instances, have an overall negative impact. Consider work.

Many people are now involved in work that does not require physical presence at an office. Yet, how we define and value work still carries the views from 50+ years ago.

Taylorism is still reflected in how we see work and employees.

Inside Higher Ed considers decentralized work:

"Whether you call it teleworking, Web working, telecommuting, distance working or e-working, the concept is the same: Work is not some place you go, it is something you do. It focuses on the information-age idea of decentralizing the office, as opposed to the industrial-age idea of bringing everyone to one single location."

Value of Visual Thinking

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I am inept with visuals.

I made a decision at the start of the year to increase my use of visuals in presentation and blog posts. I have not been tremendously successful, but I will keep trying.

Resources such as this - the value of visual thinking - are helpful in

increasing my guilt and sense of inadequacy with visuals and

increasing my desire to continue improving how I communicate.

From the post:

"In the design of business, visual thinking will be key in the design of new processes, systems, and structures.

Expect to see the mapping of

ecosystems,

flows,

org charts,

social systems and

data visualization.

All of which can help people understand and get behind change."

A Few Web 2.0 Resources

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A few (unrelated) resources on web 2.0:

Microsoft and web 2.0 resources (via Stephen Downes) I am not sure how Microsoft defines web 2.0 - not much in the list that fits my definition. However, still a number of useful resources.

The distance between Microsoft and Google is quite evident in participative / collaborative tools. Google is the web 2.0 poster child (have a quick look at their labs). I think Google needs a strong competitor. Microsoft has had trouble playing that role so far ...

IBM & Web 2.0 - a number of videos, websites, whitepapers, etc. on how IBM uses web 2.0.

Adoption of emerging technologies for collaborating and organizational productivity (interesting to note that learning is not an explicit focus) is growing.

The Chemistry of Information Addiction

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Information addiction is appearing more frequently as a term to describe how our brain craves information.

The chemistry of information addiction indicates why many people find the internet (particularly under the banner of real-time tools) so rewarding: We crave information and we want it now.

The author states that we find "not-knowing" to be stressful. I am curious how the stress of not-knowing relates to the stress of information abundance - i.e. "significant attainments lost in the mass of the inconsequential"

Using Technology To Improve The Cost-Effectiveness of The Academy

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Tony Bates explores using technology to improve the cost-effectiveness of the academy (and part 2).

After exploring the challenges faced by universities, Tony concludes, logically, that:

I believe we need much more variety in institutional structures and models of educational delivery than we have at the current time.

We need in other words more innovation and experimentation, if the challenge of greater access, greater quality and lower cost is to be met.

Only through experimentation, trial and error and a certain amount of risk-taking are we likely to find new models that "work" in that they achieve the three goals stated: more access, better quality, less cost.

The problem with this observation is that traditional universities are generally too tied to existing models to innovate rapidly. I have met with too many departments that have plans like "next year, we will have two courses online".

There is a sense that the university's response is mismatched to reality of the scope of societal change.

Toward the end of the second post, Tony offers a series of 10 implications. I generally agree with these points, but do not think it offers enough about the systemic change required by universities.

If we are going to look 20 years in the future, I am less concerned about details such as instructional tactics than I am about the big issues of policy / funding / research / systemic structure of higher education.

Personal Learning Environments/Networks: Call For Chapters

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Our PLE / N conference is well underway. If interested, the recordings are available (under week five).

A call for chapters has been issued as well for an upcoming PLE book.

Nowism

Google Wave, Twitter, FriendFeed, and Facebook have given rise to the what is known as the real time web. Trendwatching picks up on this theme and addresses it as Nowism (good list of realtime tools about 1 / 3 of the way in). This briefing is worth a skim.

Notable quote:

The bottom line: While the appeal and influence of "now" has been building for years, societal attitudes, sky-high consumer expectations and new technologies are currently converging in such a powerful way that brands truly have no choice but to go "real-time":

In their business intelligence processes,

in their customer conversations,

in their innovation labs,

in their distribution, sales, marketing and branding departments...

Emerging Technologies, Africa

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I have posted this before, but, since the course started today, I will mention it again: Introduction to Emerging Technologies, Africa is an open online 12 week course. I am teaching the course with Dave Cormier. IETA is delivered in both English and French.

More information:

Google Groups - for regular emails from course instructors

Moodle - English

Moodle - French

Syllabus - English

Syllabus - French

Main landing page for the course.

Originally written by George Siemens for elearnspace and first published on October 16th, 2009 in his newsletter eLearning Resources and News.

About George Siemens

George Siemens is the Associate Director in the Learning Technologies Centre at the University of Manitoba. George blogs at www.elearnspace.org where he shares his vision on the educational landscape and the impact that media technologies have on the educational system. George Siemens is also the author of Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age and the book "Knowing Knowledge" where he develops a learning theory called connectivism which uses a network as the central metaphor for learning and focuses on knowledge as a way to making connections.

Photo credits:
Decentralized Work: The Final Frontier - Yuri Arcurs
Value of Visual Thinking - David Armano
A Few Web 2.0 Resources - TebNad
The Chemistry of Information Addiction - Scol22
Using Technology To Improve The Cost-Effectiveness of The Academy - Stephen Coburn
Personal Learning Environments / Networks: Call For Chapters - Luminis
Nowism - Mehmet Dilsiz
Emerging Technologies, Africa - Marc Dietrich
Emerging Technologies, Africa - Adama01