http://www1.worldbank.org/disted/Technology/broadcast/tv-02.html
I think television and radio learning is an interesting concept but not for an entire degree, it somehow in my mind takes away the 'academic' characteristics of a degree. I feel it definitely lacks the social aspects/benefits of attending uni even more so than online learning. As with online learning there is opportunites for two way communication whereas radio or television can really only be one way can't it?
I don't think this type of learning would be as effective as it has proved to be in China in Britain. I can understand why it is so popular in a country like China where the population is so huge, real life classes would probably be absolutely massive. So perhaps watching the radio/tv programmes by yourself or in small groups would be better than in a lecture with loads and loads of people where temperatures are probably uncomfortable, and there may be so many people you couldn't hear the lecturer.
Whereas in Britain, although nowadays the majority of people have some kind of higher education or a degree because there are so many available opportunites/locations for us to learn. In somewhere like mainland China which is much less developed, the distance between Universities may be very far and therefore this type of learning would be really good.
I would be interested to know the figrues for these sorts of institutions now in the 2000's rather than the figures from the 70's and 80's.
Tuesday, 18 March 2008
Monday, 17 March 2008
Week 7 - Task 1
http://www.deakin.edu.au/future-students/online-offcampus-studies/
I think the idea of online learning is really good, especially for people who maybe live in very sparse parts of Australia and find commuting difficult. Or even for mature students who perhaps have children and would find it hard 2 leave the house during the day, this would be beneficial as they can just log on whenever they want and catch up. The online streaming idea would also be good for this as once the children were occupied the parent could catch up on some work at their own pace.
I find it strange however that courses such as Teaching (Primary and Secondary) and the Postgraduate choices of Midwifery and Nursing practice acan be completed off campus. As personally I would want a teacher/nurse with social skills and studying online pretty much denies you of any social interaction with your peers.
For me, personally, I prefer face to face learning and benefit from interaction with my peers.
I think the idea of online learning is really good, especially for people who maybe live in very sparse parts of Australia and find commuting difficult. Or even for mature students who perhaps have children and would find it hard 2 leave the house during the day, this would be beneficial as they can just log on whenever they want and catch up. The online streaming idea would also be good for this as once the children were occupied the parent could catch up on some work at their own pace.
I find it strange however that courses such as Teaching (Primary and Secondary) and the Postgraduate choices of Midwifery and Nursing practice acan be completed off campus. As personally I would want a teacher/nurse with social skills and studying online pretty much denies you of any social interaction with your peers.
For me, personally, I prefer face to face learning and benefit from interaction with my peers.
Saturday, 15 March 2008
Week 6 - Task 4
Within our forum, we all have the shared interest of doing well and improving our understanding of subject from reading eachother's blogs and interacting with eachother via comments.
I think the tutors are the ones with the power as when they comment on our blogs or post something about our blogs in the forum we are more likely to reply than if one of our friends told us to get on with our work.
I feel the 'blogging hierarchy' alters every week as sometimes people post loads of really really good stuff and therefore these students could be seen as the experts, but then in other weeks other students could write a lot of really good academic stuff & then they are seen as experts. I think really good blogs are those that you can go on, read the posts and understand straight away and want to comment on them. If you can go on and learn from someone's blog, then is it these people who are the experts?? I believe so.
Newcomers within our forum could be those who started later than the rest, as I believe in the 1st few weeks some people took a long time to come online and start and the divide between these newcomers & the students who had been online for a few weeks already (the experts??) was evident. Does anyone else agree with this classification?
I think the tutors are the ones with the power as when they comment on our blogs or post something about our blogs in the forum we are more likely to reply than if one of our friends told us to get on with our work.
I feel the 'blogging hierarchy' alters every week as sometimes people post loads of really really good stuff and therefore these students could be seen as the experts, but then in other weeks other students could write a lot of really good academic stuff & then they are seen as experts. I think really good blogs are those that you can go on, read the posts and understand straight away and want to comment on them. If you can go on and learn from someone's blog, then is it these people who are the experts?? I believe so.
Newcomers within our forum could be those who started later than the rest, as I believe in the 1st few weeks some people took a long time to come online and start and the divide between these newcomers & the students who had been online for a few weeks already (the experts??) was evident. Does anyone else agree with this classification?
Friday, 14 March 2008
Week 6 - Task 2
Organisational Units
I think something like a school or a job could be classified as an organisational unit. In something like this it is more a nescessity to do the work and complete any given tasks. A difference between this and a Community of Practice is that in C of P's it could be said the motivation is self generated and voluntary as it is for something you are interested in and not something you have to do. As in C of P's there will most likely be leaders as opposed to bosses which gives off a much more informal approach.
I also think C of P's is a much more social institution. A lot of people will partake in C of P's for a social reason as well as their interest in the subject/activity. Whereas you couldn't really say jobs are a social task. For example I found this quote by "Each community of practice develops a world view local to that particular community which reflects its shared knowledge, values, meanings, assumptions, beliefs, and practices (Brown and Duguid 1991; Dougherty 1992). I think it descibes the sharing of knowledge that makes up a C of P, whereas in an organisational unit such as a workplace people will be accepted to that institution based on their existing knowledge and not ther keen attitude to learn.
I have divided these pretty clearly, I am also aware that in some cases they divide between the two is much more difficult to determine. For example Kayleigh has a posted about determing whether her cheerleading team is a C of P or an organisational unit. So between this post and Kayleigh's post I think comments could spark a good debate. Her link is http://valentine-gobigblue.blogspot.com and the title of her post is Week 6-Task 2.
I think something like a school or a job could be classified as an organisational unit. In something like this it is more a nescessity to do the work and complete any given tasks. A difference between this and a Community of Practice is that in C of P's it could be said the motivation is self generated and voluntary as it is for something you are interested in and not something you have to do. As in C of P's there will most likely be leaders as opposed to bosses which gives off a much more informal approach.
I also think C of P's is a much more social institution. A lot of people will partake in C of P's for a social reason as well as their interest in the subject/activity. Whereas you couldn't really say jobs are a social task. For example I found this quote by "Each community of practice develops a world view local to that particular community which reflects its shared knowledge, values, meanings, assumptions, beliefs, and practices (Brown and Duguid 1991; Dougherty 1992). I think it descibes the sharing of knowledge that makes up a C of P, whereas in an organisational unit such as a workplace people will be accepted to that institution based on their existing knowledge and not ther keen attitude to learn.
I have divided these pretty clearly, I am also aware that in some cases they divide between the two is much more difficult to determine. For example Kayleigh has a posted about determing whether her cheerleading team is a C of P or an organisational unit. So between this post and Kayleigh's post I think comments could spark a good debate. Her link is http://valentine-gobigblue.blogspot.com and the title of her post is Week 6-Task 2.
Week 6 - Task 1
As an example of a Community of Practice I belong to I am going to use McMaster Stage School which I attended allday every Saturday. for 10 years. It takes place from 10am until 5pm and has over 80 allday students and approx another 100 who just attend the morning or afternoon sessions. We have drama, singing, modern/jazz dancing, and tap dancing. The Stage School is split into different groups mainly determined by age but ability is taken into account and split up to attend all the activites. Each activity has a separate leader, and it could be said in comparison to the other teachers this specific teacher is an expert in their field. For example I wouldn't say any of out leaders are more talented than the others, but Vivienne (the founder and tap teacher) could not take a class in acting as she has always just been trained in dancing. And likewise her daughter, Sharon, who takes drama and singing could not take a dancing class as well as Vivienne, Jennifer or Wendy (the dance teachers) as she has not been as fully trrained in this area.
So kids from all over the province are thrown together in this club who maybe wouldn't necessarily choose to be friends outside the School. But as we all have a common interest (performing arts) it makes it easier to get along.
Our shared goal is to constantly learn and improve so when we put on performances they will be the best. So even say in dances or dialogue in a performance where there's people you're not necessarily the best of friends with because you want to do well and the company to put on an amazing performance you forget your real life relationship with the person and form a bond anyway so that the audience will recognise an onstage rappore. And sometimes by doing this you do end up becoming more friendly with certain people and realise you have learnt from eachother. I feel this is a good example of Wenger's statement....
This social process, includes, indeed it subsumes, the learning of knowledgeable skills. (Lave and Wenger 1991)
We all have a uniform so when we are on outings or on dinner breaks in our uniforms we are all evry much aware that we have an image/reputation to present and this is something that is important to us so we do all respect that. When we are in public together we feel like a team and present ourselves as a team...this 'togetherness' is a characterisitic of a comms of practice.
Within each group there are those who are better than others but again because it's in our interest to make all of us look good so the overall performance is better we help eachother and learn from eachother. This in itself is a good way of bonding and forming relationships. Although as a small group of students are selected to perform constantly 2/3 shows per week throughout the year, there is a divide between these members who are perceived as more talented (and could be seen as the 'experts' within the class) than the majority who aren't put forward to be invovled in these shows. In this group for a while there was a feeling that we were more 'elite' than the rest and the divide was evident, for example, the other students always went behind us in practice and some felt shy because they weren't as good. But this wasn't a nice feeling and we wanted to help the others to learn from us but at the same time we didn't want to appear patronising. However, when we did help and all worked together as a team it helped to lessen the divide. This is an example of a good comms of practice as we work together to achieve common goals.
So kids from all over the province are thrown together in this club who maybe wouldn't necessarily choose to be friends outside the School. But as we all have a common interest (performing arts) it makes it easier to get along.
Our shared goal is to constantly learn and improve so when we put on performances they will be the best. So even say in dances or dialogue in a performance where there's people you're not necessarily the best of friends with because you want to do well and the company to put on an amazing performance you forget your real life relationship with the person and form a bond anyway so that the audience will recognise an onstage rappore. And sometimes by doing this you do end up becoming more friendly with certain people and realise you have learnt from eachother. I feel this is a good example of Wenger's statement....
This social process, includes, indeed it subsumes, the learning of knowledgeable skills. (Lave and Wenger 1991)
We all have a uniform so when we are on outings or on dinner breaks in our uniforms we are all evry much aware that we have an image/reputation to present and this is something that is important to us so we do all respect that. When we are in public together we feel like a team and present ourselves as a team...this 'togetherness' is a characterisitic of a comms of practice.
Within each group there are those who are better than others but again because it's in our interest to make all of us look good so the overall performance is better we help eachother and learn from eachother. This in itself is a good way of bonding and forming relationships. Although as a small group of students are selected to perform constantly 2/3 shows per week throughout the year, there is a divide between these members who are perceived as more talented (and could be seen as the 'experts' within the class) than the majority who aren't put forward to be invovled in these shows. In this group for a while there was a feeling that we were more 'elite' than the rest and the divide was evident, for example, the other students always went behind us in practice and some felt shy because they weren't as good. But this wasn't a nice feeling and we wanted to help the others to learn from us but at the same time we didn't want to appear patronising. However, when we did help and all worked together as a team it helped to lessen the divide. This is an example of a good comms of practice as we work together to achieve common goals.
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