NETWORKED LEARNING

Networked learning characteristics:

It's usually informal. It's often a form of non institutional professional development.

It assumes we need to engage in self-directed, lifelong, on the job learning.

It argues that because of the wealth of information online, good digital literacy strategies are necessary to drive our continued, informal, professional development.

LET'S LOOK AT SOME DEFINITIONS

"Learners have to take responsibility to organize their own learning activities and to acquire knowledge from others to achieve their learning goals”. (Hsiao, Kester, & Sloep, 2013, p. 69)

"learning in which information and communication technology is used to promote connections: between one learner and other learners, between learners and tutors; between a learning community and its learning resources."

Goodyear, P. Banks, S. Hodgson, V. and McConnell, D. eds (2004) Advances in Research on Networked Learning. London: Kluwer Academic Publishers

WHAT IS IT?

• Probably online, focused more on peers, less on  instructors
• Probably student driven, with no required or set syllabus
• Possibly collaborative, though not necessarily, probably over social media
• Peers provide resources, input, and critical engagement
• Dependent on individual's ability to connect, proficiency with online tools

HOW IT HAPPENS...

• It can be centrally organised, part of a structured course, or not
• It can be self organised, or it may be instructor structured
• It may be informal, a spare time activity
• It may be a required part of a course or of professional development
• It may be just how a person organises their online professional life

The Connectivist network

In this model you are responsible, almost entirely, for you own learning.
You find materials, assess them, build a network of people to learn from, and test your own ideas.This can be as part of your everyday online activity, or as part of a course.

It centres around collecting and assessing resources, creating things from them, and sharing.This creation may be a blog post, a practice, a resource, graphic, object, or idea.

THE CONNECTIVIST MODEL ( VIA STEPHEN DOWNES)

This model uses digital curation.

In this presentation we define digital curation as the selection, collection, and archiving of digital artefacts, and the addition of value, through reflection, commentary and use of what we gather.

COLLECTING

COLLECTING

• Finding articles, videos, podcasts, journals, blogs, or anything else that might help
• A key skill here is knowing where to look, and who to ask (networking)
• Having a network of people who can direct you to good resources, a PLN, helps
• Sorting out the good from the bad, being critical, discerning, and rigorous.
• Collecting is active, not passive, a dialogue, between you and the resources

You might use a tool like Feedly to organise the blogs, journals, YouTube channels, writers, sites and publications you read...

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REFLECTING

REFLECTING

• Involves assessing, accepting, rejecting, cataloging what you collate
• This can be formal or informal,but it's probably critical.
• Are the ideas,sources reliable,evidence solid? Is it applicable?
• It's possibly public, eg. on a blog, so the we can engage others
• By engaging critically, our knowledge deepens.

An example here might be selecting articles from feedly that you have read, saving and cataloging them in pocket...

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and then annotating them critically in a blog, which is shared on twitter...

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REMIXING/REPURPOSING

REMIXING/REPURPOSING

• We adapt the resources and reflections to our context/needs.
• We've collected and assessed ideas, and made critical decisions.
• We take this knowledge and adapt it to our own purposes,
• We put what we think might work into practice, and test it
• The test then becomes part of our reflection.

That could be a blog post, an article, a change in the way we do something, a set of methods we decide to experiment with.

It can be something concrete, like building a weather balloon at home and sending it into the stratosphere with a smartphone attached to film the curvature of the earth.

Matthew Ho + Assad muhammad

A lego man in near space, and the curvature of the earth...

There's crossovers with the Maker Movement, with Seymour Papert, with reflective learning and eportfolios, with interest driven learning.

SHARING, FEEDING FORWARD

Sharing/ fFeeding forward

• The resources tests, reflections and artefacts are shared online
• People pull these into their own curation process and share
• We get value from their engagement, reflection, remixing and sharing
• Our PLN grows, in influence, expertise, reach and quality
• We have access to more and better resources and interaction

THE COGNITIVIST TAKE

COLLABORATION

Cognitivists argue, with some evidence, that collaboration is beneficial for learning for complex tasks, and damaging for simple tasks.

Working on your own is more efficient for things that are simple, or where you know a lot already.

Working collaboratively works efficiently for tasks where you have a lot to learn, or where what is to be learned is complex.

This is because collaboration requires mental resources, meaning you have fewer left to learn with. This cost is worth it for complex endeavours, and loss making for simple ones. You gain more than you lose by sharing complexity, if you share it we'll. you lose more than you gain by sharing simplicity.

the limits?

MENTAL RESOURCES ARE LIMITED

Cognitive Load Theory

This theory argues that we have a limited ability to take in new information. Anything that distracts us takes from these resources, and limits learning.

In addition, the more you know about a topic, the easier it is to learn, and the less structure you need.

The less you know, the more guidance and structure you need.

It's the reason why there's no picture on this page.

Few distractions.

This cognitive limit is why it's dangerous to talk on a mobile and drive. We can take some new information in, but not much.

It's why we learn to drive in car parks and not on motorways, new information is harder to take in when you are a novice at something.

And it's why we can drive on autopilot when we drive a route we know, and why we focus hard on a new and challenging route. When we know a topic or skill well, it requires almost zero resources to practice.

Hsiao argues that networked learning has specific cognitive demands.

If you are unfamiliar with the media used, or online collaborative methods, the resources you have for actual learning are reduced. You have to learn about the tools and the method before you can learn about the topic.

Online collaboration is more difficult than collaborating in person, so it tends to detract from your learning ability.

Developing confidence, expertise and ability with the tools you are going to use is also helpful, and approaching those tools in a structured, and supported way.

Digital Literacy is learned, and not innate.

Providing levels of subject area and technical support that are sensitive to what the learner already knows.

The amount the learner already knows, about the topic and the tools, is likely to be key to the amount of guidance, support and feedback they need.

FREEING UP COGNITIVE RESOURCES

Being technically familiar with the tools- social media, curation tools, blogs -should help.

Having clear techniques for collecting, connecting, reflecting and sharing will also free up resources.

Being clear, ruthless and specific about your topics, learning goals, and the projects and associated resources you target will also provide focus. In networked learning, leaving knowledge and resources at the table are key skills. There's no syllabus, or course descriptors, so, it's up to individuals to edit their own curriculum on the fly.

Knowledge online is staggeringly abundant. Focus, selection and exclusion are key.

Building a good PLN is key. The better quality your network is, the less demanding it is to assess information, find good quality resources, and weigh the validity if perspectives, arguments and ideas.

Having a good PLN gives you a ready made market of peers to share and assess your work, as well as feeding in resources to you own ongoing curation.

The networked learner tends to choose their own path through resources and peers.

Their curation tools and techniques are how they sort and sift information.

They tend to invest time in developing their PLN as a way of outsourcing sifting, and the cognitive footwork.

GOOD LUCK CURATING...