[warning: opinion] Interactive Learning is such a meaningless term often bandied about as though it’s a badge of quality. A simple solitary button is interactive but unless it’s attached to some form of electrode it hardly qualifies as a pedagogically sound educational technique.
To me Engaging Digital Learning would be a better term rather than Interactive Learning. This is where the “701 e-Learning tips” ebook’s section on ‘Webagogy’ is really useful. It is really worth a read - providing a range of practical tips for a variety of elearning approaches to help people constructively engage with digital learning.
It’s for and written by a diverse elearning audience - from schools to enterprises. It contains many tips useful for avoiding many gotchas. Topics include teaching, content, culture, technology wrangling, and support. It is a PDF e-book which you can freely download, use and share under a creative commons license.
Personally, engaging with collaborative learners is the most subtle, trickiest yet most rewarding aspect of digital learning when done right.
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(Warning: opinion) You’re a brave man Tom. But you know the American way; invent a meanigless term, call it your own, and use it as a brand by which to teach by. e.g Connectivism.
The thing which amazes me is how professional educators can talk about elearning as if, somehow, it has to do with the profession of teaching. Engaging, personally, with colloborative learners, especially lifelong ones, is so tricky as you say, particularly as teachers always need to reduce their elearning to some demographic or geographic ‘market’, so they can be employed to eteach.
The funniest part is that if you generalize the term “elearning”, every teacher must agree that they are in the profession of producing or using (interactive) media, which is more attuned to needing the skills of an editor, journalist and/or graphic artist; where successful publishing is measured by the number of readers attracted to a page.
Unfortunately, educationlists rarely measure the number of readers attracted to their institutionalized learning objects or understanding why they may be, which is why they are incapable of elearning. Not all are of course. http://esmane.physics.lsa.umich.edu/wl/umich/mscribe/cshpe/symposium/20070112-umwlcd0007-04/real/f001.htm
sfj: “every teacher must agree that they are in the profession of producing or using (interactive) media”
I’m not sure it totally agree. The Fishbowl technique is a terrific example of using the medium - not media. This is based purely on sound educational practice.
The motivation for using digital media is no different from what educators use any other sort of teaching aid - it’s all about achieving desired learning-outcomes. Digital media is a tool usable for education - it is not a substitute for or better than good educational practice and technique.
sfj: “Unfortunately, educationlists rarely measure the number of readers attracted to their institutionalized learning objects or understanding why they may be, which is why they are incapable of elearning.”
[opinion] The problem may actually lie with the educational technologists like myself who say ‘this is the edtech solution you need’ and do not do the measurement you suggest.
Rather it’s the edtech geeks like me who could work better, hand in hand with educators to develop engaging, collaborative digital learning materials and tools in a very practical, educationally sound way.
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