davidtheaussie – Page 9 – David The Aussie

We live in a world …

davidtheaussie - 03/05/2013

a world where volunteers openly write, edit, and rewrite the largest collection of knowledge artefacts that humankind has ever seen.
a world where powerful tools exist that redefine our ability to solve problems and help us to visualize what we know in ways that were once not easily possible.
a world where 72 hours of video is uploaded every minute (and that’s just toYoutube).
a world where anyone with an Internet connection can learn along with millions of others through connected learning opportunities.
a world where a 9-year-old blogger can have a greater voice and more external impact than her entire school district.
a world where institutional & personal reputation is becoming increasingly important, but more so, where qualifiers of reputation are tracked and recorded through your interactions with others.
a world where views on privacy have changed and where teens are struggling to redefine their social spaces while corporate giants are building their business models on a less private future.
a world where racist message meant for a few can quickly end up being seen, remixed, and repurposed and viewed by millions, but where those same communication dynamics can allow a young scientist to creatively share her passions.
a world where bullying incidents can quickly go viral, but where forces of human kindness can help the victims, raise awareness, and foster networks of support.
a world where the world’s most popular song (the one your kids are singing, dancing to, and remixing) is written entirely in Korean.
a world where video screencasts from an untrained educator are viewed by millions of learners, attract millions of dollars in funding, provoke thousands of educators to ‘flip their classrooms‘, and cause educators to critique and discuss the importance of pedagogy. And,
a world where governments, corporations and educational institutions try to control all of these forces but most often, realize that their attempts are futile.

A wonderful blog post over at Open Thinking looking at the changes in the way education happens and the emergence of new educational spaces around the world. Change is happening so fast that we can barely keep up … documenting it (let alone studying it or using it) is a race against whatever unseen changes come next.

Things will move ahead. New tools will be created and new technologies will be used in ways that were never envisioned. Kids in impoverished Indian villages will have an online presence as powerful as MIT or the White House. The open exchange of ideas is no longer able to be controlled … how do teachers survive and adapt in this environment?

Change. It’s not going away …

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EDUpunk

davidtheaussie - 03/05/2013

Are you edu punk? Edupunk (2008-2011) is an approach to teaching and learning practices that result from a do it yourself (DIY) attitude. The New York Times defines it as “an approach to teaching that avoids mainstream tools like PowerPoint and Blackboard, and instead aims to bring the rebellious attitude and D.I.Y. ethos of ’70s bands like The Clash to the classroom.” Many instructional applications can be described as DIY education or Edupunk.

The term was first used on May 25, 2008 by Jim Groom in his blog, and covered less than a week later in the Chronicle of Higher Education. Stephen Downes, an online education theorist and an editor for the International Journal of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning, noted that “the concept of Edupunk has totally caught wind, spreading through the blogosphere like wildfire”.

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Singularity University

davidtheaussie - 03/05/2013

Singularity University

What we know about computing and technology is doubling at an exponential rate. The computer that required a warehouse now fits in our pocket. In 25 years that computer will fit into a single blood cell. In 7-8 doublings, solar power efficiency can go from a few percent to 100%. It’s incredible to know that in 20 years from how the technological advance will be beyond our current comprehension. Computers will be molecular and organic.

The singularity university, backed by nasa and google, is an exciting project that looks at technologies and helps drive the exponential changes in our ever increasing computerised society.

Books on the wish list …

davidtheaussie - 03/04/2013

This isn’t a begging thread, this is a memory thread. I’ve got a lot of books that I’d like to read. I’ll make threads like this to keep track of books that are on my radar.

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Academic Assholes

davidtheaussie - 03/04/2013

Academic Assholes

A bit of fun to point a finger at academia itself. the growing fame of the blog thesiswhisperer.com is making itself heard via the unorthodox ramblings of an academic on the edge of the system. a worthwhile read considering the entrenched attitudes undermining academic thought.

http://www.chrisbigum.com/wp/2013/03/04/of-whisperers-skunks-and-lemmings

In a follow-up to that is a blog post from one of my lecturers, Chris talks about the thesiswhisperer.com blogger (whom he met at a speech), skunks and lemmings. Skunks are projects that are undertaken by universities as an experiment and are often doomed to fail. These ‘fail early, fail often’ projects are doomed to extinction as universities take a lemmings approach to adopting new ideas.

The thesiswhisperer.com and Chris’ blog are radical and refreshing.

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Computers in Education: A Brief History By Andrew Molnar

davidtheaussie - 03/03/2013

Computers in Education: A Brief History By Andrew Molnar

Who needs to remember anything when you can just google it? A paradigm shift has occurred which is moving learners from memorising facts to developing higher order thinking and problem solving skills. This is the cognitive approach and is useful considering our strengths and weaknesses in relation to processing information.

Learning has also, historically, changed from learning for many to learning for all; from learning controlled by schools to learning through media such as TV, radio and internet. With the invention of computers, learners were able to (for the first time) take control of their own education through self-paced learning and immediate feedback.

The most interesting part of this paper was the discussion of the constructivist approach.

The Constructivist approach viewed learning as a reconstruction of knowledge. Papert asserted that learning is more effective when the learner actually constructs a meaningful product. In building computer-driven LEGO constructions, the student learns to define a problem and the tacit practical problem-solving skills needed to solve it. Papert has tried to move education from “computer literacy,” an appreciation of computing, to “computer fluency,” the application of computers to solve real problems.

This approach is worth researching further. Minecraft definitely has a connection to LEGO and construction. Read more about the constructivist approach and see whether it has practical connections to gaming and Minecraft.

Computers have been able to create visual metaphors for abstract concepts (turbulence) or complex ideas (fractals). Increasingly, computers are required to teach concepts that are beyond human capability. Computer visualisation also restructures our way of thinking about a problem, allowing focus on higher level thinking skills because the idea (as represented by the computer’s GUI) is easier to understand and process.

Added to this is the invent of virtual reality, which allows users to develop experiential knowledge in an artificial environments. With the popularisation of distance education, people can obtain post graduate degrees in flexible formats.

While quite dated, Molnar’s history of computers is interesting. He raises a few good points about the exponential learning which is created with each new step in technology.

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TED Talk – Sugata Mitra – Build a school in the cloud

davidtheaussie - 03/03/2013

Mitra talks about the history of education and the change required to transform schools from knowledge based to skills based. He asserts that the education system is obsolete and, infact, knowledge is obsolete. He wants to help students learn independently of schools.

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The Research Kitchen

davidtheaussie - 03/03/2013

The Research Kitchen

A part of my coursework, I’ve joined a small wiki to help with my studies and research. The research kitchen is a space to collaborate and discuss research ideas with other Griffith people.

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Open Learning And Rethinking Academia

davidtheaussie - 03/03/2013

Open Learning And Rethinking Academia

In the old days, being relevant was writing academic papers. Today, if people can’t find you on the internet, if they’re not talking about you in Rwanda, you’re irrelevant.

Discussion about reinventing education and academia. Instead of just writing papers, people need to use social media, networks and tap into the knowledge out there in the street. The internet is a resource for connecting, funding and finding others with common interest and similar fields. Using communities, movements can be created that aim to resolve problems or find innovative ways to look at old issues. The focus is on learning … not education.

An interesting idea is that of practice over theory – playing with ideas and exploring, rather than theorising. Innovation is no longer expensive and limited to elite, wealthy organisations. Anyone can be innovative.

How can I take the ideas of Minecraft and education, find some ideas I can play with and practice and see what kind of outcomes I can achieve? How can I use Minecraft to be innovative?