Yesterday Chris Betcher, he of http://betch.edublogs.org/, was a keynote speaker at the CEGSA conference. The conference theme is Learning is a Conversation, and Chris made some really interesting points that you might like to think about.
- Learning in the 21st century is social.
Learning happens through our conversations.
The boundaries to where we have our conversations have come down. Our potential to connect has changed. - Conversations are often informal exchanges of knowledge
We have serendipitous conversations that are spontaneous
We didn’t know we didn’t know something until it comes up in the conversation, and then we realise there is a gap in our knowledge - We have these conversations in our Personal Learning Communities, Personal Learning Networks, Communities of Practice, Special Interest Groups.
- There’s wisdom in crowds so long as you have
- diversity
- independence
- decentralisation (dispersal)
- aggregation - There is a danger of the “echo chamber” effect where everyone agrees with everyone else.
Little learning takes place there
The best learning takes place when there is an element of disagreement, argument or conflict
Chris argues for using a range of tools
“When your only tool is a hammer, then everything looks like a nail”
This led nicely into my session about blogging, and my concept that a blog can be the initial point in a conversation. Or if you take up an idea that someone else has expanded on in their blog, part of an ongoing conversation.
But of course that is only so if people take the time to respond. What do you think?
3 Comments
Good summary, thanks!
With regard to the ‘Wisdom of Crowds’ vs ‘Echo Chamber’ notion, I would suggest the study of ’stigmergy’ will shed some light in how to maximise the former and minimise the latter.
http://tweetscan.com/rss.php?s=stigmergy
Fang - Mike Seyfang
Hi Kerrie
Thanks for the summary. I heard little bits and pieces on twitter but it’s good to hear what was said.
Also I’m interested in this point: The best learning takes place when there is an element of disagreement, argument or conflict.
What other conditions that are not echo chambers encourage learning? Is it adding little bits of info or maybe it’s highlighting the relationship between concepts.
I don’t think Aristotle or Socrates would disagree with the comment. Learning happens through our conversations.
And it’s a truism; the internet (and one of its subsets, the web) has changed the way we can connect. It’s now global. I’d even agree that blogs are a good starting point, although they’re not a convenient way of sharing an ongoing conversation. All discentralization and no aggregation.
Its getting the balance between different (communication) tools, and the framework in which they are meant to be applied that’s the hard bit. One profession will say carrickexchange. One will say GovDex. One will say sitepoint, and so on; each echo chamber classified by their professionalized folksomony - their various areas of interest.
I’m with Concetta’s suggestion about “highlighting the relationship between concepts”; me.edu.au and me.gov.au being the primary ones (in the search for a national systemized architecture for learning).
I’m also led by Nick’s idea of Taxonomies for Folksomonies. So that might be www.taxonomy.Australia.gov (or .edu).au. It gives me hope that at least (with the help of a National librarian) I could find the right National echo chamber of interest, and compare, and communicate, between their diverse communities.
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