Subject: Re: IFETS-DISCUSS Digest - 10 Feb 2000 to 11 Feb 2000
From: Albert Ip (albert@dls.au.com)
Date: Tue 15 Feb 2000 - 22:37:30 MET
From: "Albert Ip" <albert@dls.au.com> Subject: Re: IFETS-DISCUSS Digest - 10 Feb 2000 to 11 Feb 2000 Date: Wed, 16 Feb 2000 08:37:30 +1100
List address to send message to everyone: ifets-discuss@LISTSERV.READADP.COM
Details of current discussion: http://ifets.ieee.org/discussions/discuss.html
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On Mon, 14 Feb 2000 10:53:42 -0800 Clark Quinn wrote:
>>b. The pedagogy I start with is that learner collaboration will solve a
lot
>>of the problems of managing learning, and this is what the internet can
>>really foster, even more than face to face encounters.
>>
>>In contrast, Dr. Quinn's approach would seem to me to assume an isolated,
>>individual, learner.
>
>I have been biased that way, in the past, for a very pragmatic reason..
It's great when you can ensure that you have a critical mass of students all
starting and progressing in lock-step. HOWEVER, if you don't automatically
subscribe to the standard educational model, you have to take a different
view. In truly flexible learning, you may not be able to guarantee having
any set number of learners at a particular place in the curriculum.
Certainly in the 'ramp up' phase until marketing or word-of-mouth kicks in,
you may have only few early adopters. So you need a design that supports
individual, isolated learners.
This raised two interesting points:
- the issue of the relative values of supporting isolated, individual
learner via mass customisation verse lock-step quasi-sychronous
collaboration.
- the role of learning objects
Learning object-based courseware potentially allows mass customisation. If
such mass customized course is delivered without collaboration, it allows
self-paced, anywhere, any time learning - a feature highly valued for busy
adult learners in pursuit of continuous development while meeting both work
and family commitments.
Collaboration, by definition, requires a group of people (learners and
teachers) to work on a problem together (at the same time, not necessary at
the same place). It is quasi-sychronous because participants need not be
working at exactly the same time as long as discussion/work is done within
reasonable time period - much like this discussion. If somebody missed a
discussion thread, s/he can definitely come in and post a comment, but the
rest of the discussion moves on and may not get a reply.
Does Learning object and collaboration mix? Your comment on
http://www.roleplaysim.org/demos/ welcome. This site demos a number of role
play simulations all built on the same software. From the simulation
creator's point of view, there is no learning objects within the
environment. It is ONE simulation to be created. However, from the point
of view of the developer of the software, the generator is made up of
"SimMail", "SimConference", Task, and other components. From a course
integrator point of view, a simulation is ONE learning object, to be used
together with other learning objects to deliver a learning experience.
Another interesting question is which comes first? chicken or egg. See the
pedagogical aspects of the role play simulation generator at
http://www.roleplaysim.org/papers/ .
Albert
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