The sweet spot for education

Finding the sweet spot between web 2 and education

Martin Weller

Overview

• Web 2.0• HE• The sweet spot• Facebook apps• SocialLearn• Edupunk and the gift culture• Twitter networks• Conclusions

Web 2.0 characteristicsTechnologyUser generated contentInformal learning

Democracy

Bottom-up

Socially oriented

Web as platformHarness collective intelligencePerpetual beta

Higher education characteristicsControlled technology

Us generated content

Accredited learning

We know best

Top down

Individual achievement

Review before releaseFiltered intelligenceAim for perfection

Finding the sweet spot

Personal Professional

Informal Formal

Fun Work

Content SocialThis is the future of work/learning/recreation

OU Facebook apps

Tony Hirst, Liam Green-Hughes, Stuart Brown

What we learnt

• About facilitating dialogue• NOT controlling learner path• Viral spread • Support issues• Official endorsement?• Letting go of some control• Sweet spot: study-social, fun-work,

institution-individual

SocialLearn: A new OU?

What principles should it embody?

Openness

Flexibility

Disruptive

Perpetual beta

Democracy

Pedagogy

<dnwallace http://www.flickr.com/photos/dnwallace/848001061/>

A reversal

Student adapts to educational system

System adapts to the learner

Microlearner

2Learner

Cloudworks

Profile

Writes to and imports goals, resources, stream

Create goals, tasks

Pull in and publish relevant content

Pull in and publish relevant courses/designs

Publicise study and learning story

Making connections

What we are learning

• Existing business models quickly unravel

• Existing boundaries soon blur

• Different competitors

• Different audience

• Sweet spot: informal-formal, content-social

Edupunk

What I learnt

• Prepared to do more when it’s fun

• What you give away is what counts

• EdTech is at a threshold now

• It’s about how we use existing tools, not tools we create

• Sweet spot: Fun-work, learning-creating, legal-illegal?

Twitter networks

What management can learn

• Informal groupings based on interest

• Way of fostering belonging

• Physical location less relevant

• Institutional boundaries blurred

• How do organisational structures adapt?

• Sweet spot: Personal-Professional, Fun-Work, Informal-Formal

Conclusions

• Make learning a gift economy

• Embrace the social

• Experiment (and create room for this)

• Accept there will be mistakes

• Think of technology as the metaphor for understanding new social processes

Links

Course Profileshttp://apps.facebook.com/courseprofiles/index.phpMy OU Storyhttp://apps.facebook.com/myoustory/index.php

Me: Edtechie.netTwitter.com/mwellerOuseful.infoLiams blog- http://www.greenhughes.com/Stuart’s blog -

http://www.open.ac.uk/blogs/SocialCommunications/index.php

SocialLearn - http://www.open.ac.uk/blogs/socialearn/