Active LOs
I'm not entirely sure that I fully appreciate what a learning object really is, but I must say that Alan's posting really resonated with a proposal that I'm trying to pull together for the EDUCAUSE site. It seems to me that by attaching trackback functionality to any document, like O'Reilly and ITConversations.com are doing, it allows others to supplement the original data with more tacit observations and commentary that might not be captured or aggregated in any other mechanism. It also provides a mechanism for making the original information less of a static artifact and more of a living document. In that context, perhaps individual blog postings can be an excellent mechanism for providing tacit context to explicit knowledge found in other electronic documents? I'm not sure if that all makes sense or not, or if this is a very juvenile posting from someone outside of the profession, but it is all very germane to some of the work that I'm doing today.
If you share any interest in topics like this, you might find this related paper on personalized, socially aware and active knowledge management systems interesting as well. This blog posting on an emerging e-portfolio project might be of some interest too.
If you share any interest in topics like this, you might find this related paper on personalized, socially aware and active knowledge management systems interesting as well. This blog posting on an emerging e-portfolio project might be of some interest too.
2 Comments:
Blogs are essentially self-reflective tools - in teacher preparation many class sessions incorporate (often at the beginning of each meeting) metagcognitive journalling that requires the learner to respond to a prompt. The very process of writing and translating our ideas, feelings, beliefs and knowledge to writing helps us understand new things. I think that Matt's comment about activie knowledge management systems and ePortfolios are a relevant connection for blogging in that by reading (rather than listening) to the ideas of others we 'hear' differently. And we begin to contribute to the knowlege of others while negotiating through discourse.
This is the crux of the *knowledge* issue.
One rather incredible barrier is the limitation and often overwhelming inherent nature of blogging - it is text-based. Considering the decreasing rate of reading throughout the world, I wonder if we choose what to read, will we read journals, magazines, newspapers, or books ... or we will spend time reading blogs, wikis, etc.
This is the crux of the *management* issue.
With the variety of tools that abound, it seems critical that we consider the preferences and needs of the learner/user when thinking about how best to communicate. We are an exclusive group participating in this discussion. Why can't we have an option to allow me to listen to the latest postings as I drive 75 miles to work? Or to see Sue making a point on my Treo on my trip to Boston?
I tihnk one needs to be careful in characterizing something as large and varied as weblolgs.... I do not agree with a label that blogs are necessarilty self-reflective- they can bem but it is not really a neceassary condition. Blogs that focus on specific world events are externally reflective. Blogs that are community journals for projects may have some amount of reflection.
Also, text basis just the state of the blog right now. Why? text works. But most blogs have a variety of decent templates for the visual display, there are more than a handful of them that are only visual (photoblogs, videoblogs). ITConversations is pushing new ground with audio blogs.
For that matter, to be vain and turn McCluhan on his head, it is not the media (text, audio, etc) but the message. I care about blogs that have meaningful content to me, and I will focus on them based on the value or joy of their content. I will take a well written, interesting text only blog (no graphics) over a garish media weighted one any day.
And what is also important is not just what is posted on the blog (e.g. almost the equivalent of the course content, or the lecture, ugh), but what is underneath and between-m the comments, the connections via Trackback or other linkage means to like minded (or not so like minded) content elsewhere. The interesting stuff is what is in between amd RSS and other things are the glue (for now).
Post a Comment
<< Home