Excellent and persuasive EDUCAUSE article extolling the virtues of mashups and revealing some nice examples of how they are being utilised in education.

Created:Wed, 01 Aug 2007 23:38:39 GMT

Original: http://jondron.net/cofind/frshowresource.php?tid=5325&resid=1321
Posted: August 1, 2007, 5:38 pm

Following from my recent post on the subject it occurs to me that, not only might it be an interesting study to find out how learning infects social groups, it is quite possible that we might use knowledge so gleaned to improve learning throughout a community. For instance, if we can identify ‘promiscuous learners’ (sorry, might need a less value-laden term!) then it might make sense to concentrate our educational efforts on them. Essentially, these would be people with a large number of social ties, strong ones if possible, what Malcom Gladwell calls Connectors. It is very likely that they might have other interesting shared characteristics too.

Incidentally, I think that Gladwell’s ideas on how social epidemics occur are quite relevant to my developing thesis, but are also quite distinct. This is not just about the spread of ideas, memes or fashions. It is about the spread of knowledge and the growth of understanding, not just the transmission of information. Learning changes us and consequently changes those around us, but not necessarily in the same ways that we have changed. This series of posts illustrates this fairly well, albeit coarsely: the direct inspiration comes from a paper about the spread of obesity, but pulls in ideas and connections from many other things that interest me. In selecting the aspect of the paper that had personal relevance (almost certainly not the main thing the authors wanted to convey) I was infected by the learning but not (directly) the content of the paper.

This way of seeing things is helping me to make more sense of the distinctions between groups, networks and collectives that Terry Anderson and I have been writing about lately.

Networks 

Networks are ultimately concerned with (often weak but sometimes strong) one-to-one connections between the individual nodes of the system and it is at this level that transmission of infection may be most likely to occur. I suspect that this is also where mutation may be most likely to happen: the stronger the mutual link, the more likely it is that shared interests and common goals will lead to more harmonised learning. Weaker and more occasional ties increase the diversity and range of knowledge within the greater system.

Links may often be much stronger in one direction than another but still cause infection. For example, I very much doubt that Howard Rheingold sees me as part of his network but, through subscribing to Smart Mobs, I see him as, at least in a sense, a part of mine. This asymmetry again opens up the system to greater mutation, and seems increasingly common as our networks extend through social software. A well-connected node may communicate with many other nodes, but seldom with the intention of singling out a particular set of identified individuals. Indeed, the node may have no awareness at all of those who see him or her as part of their networks.

Groups 

In contrast, communication in groups may sometimes be between individuals but it more typically follows a one-to-specified-many pattern. The spread of infection is therefore quite different and, significantly, quite contained within the group. Just as stronger one-to-one links in networks probably lead to greater alignment, there is likely to be greater homogeneity of the infection in a group. Groups may be seen as hothouses for cultivating specific kinds of learning (although this does not necessarily mean that the final form of that learning will be clear in advance). 

It is not unusual for large groups to be composed of sub-groups, many of which overlap, leading to hybrid network-group entities. Equally, it is certain that almost all members of a given group will be networked with others, so networks again take infection out of the group and into the wild. It would be interesting to study groups with few or no network ties (perhaps some monasteries or isolated villages, for instance) to see what happens. I would hypothesise that, without the infectious agency of networking, they might run out of learning steam or, at the very least, lead to more homogenous and aligned learning than those with more connections.

Collectives 

Collectives are different again, and may have no equivalent in natural outbreaks of disease. Transmission in a collective occurs from the group to the individual, the group entity arising as a result of individual interactions, so any infection comes from the many, not the one. Where it gets interesting is in the implied recursion: the collective infects the individual, so the collective is composed of many infected individuals, which as a collective again reinfect themselves and so on ad infinitum. If we look at a massive collective system like Google, Amazon or Wikipedia, this gets really interesting: we might see them as causing a worldwide plague of learning, a positive recursive feedback loop not unlike that suggested in Gordon Pask‘s conversation theory, but where one of the actors is the system itself.

Collectives can co-exist peacefully with other forms and even arise from them. For instance, networks are often interesting when we look at the large-scale patterns within them. When we use a computer system to identify those patterns, it can (in principle) feed them back to the individuals who make up the network: i.e. the network becomes a collective, a cyborg composed of algorithms, connections and people. To an extent, anonymised voting within a group might serve a collective function. In effect, collectives increase the number of entities communicating within a system and, in so doing, increase the opportunities for infection and potential mutations along the way.

My ideas are still a bit fuzzy here, but I’m enjoying this intellectual excursion into the land of metaphor. Hope you do too. 

Original: https://community.brighton.ac.uk/pg/blog/jd29/read/80772/another-ramble-on-infectious-learning
By: Jon Dron
Posted: July 27, 2007, 10:37 am

I’ve been musing a little about how learning spreads after coming across this fascinating article about how obesity can be seen as a socially transmitted infection. There are perhaps many parallels between the spread of a disease and the spread of learning within a body and within a community.

Learning is not always a localised infection: quite often it affects large parts of our minds and often (like this little nagging idea) takes over quite aggressively before being accomodated by our defences. Sometimes it results in a high fever, others in just a pimple in our brains that vanishes leaving barely a trace of its existence.

It is not uncommon to build up an immunity to some kinds of learning. I, for example, was vaccinated against physics quite early on in my school career by a particularly learning-hostile teacher (a great pity because I absolutely love the little that I understand of the subject) and I am acutely aware of the need to unteach some of my students to break down their acquired resistance to some forms of learning when they come to university. Of course, it can work in exactly the opposite way: schools (done right) should work like reverse-hospitals, infecting their inhabitants with the fever of learning. Sadly, the  nature of the system means that there are many examples of the spread of MRSA-like ignorance and antipathy to learning.

Learning spreads within a community. When I learn something, a bit of it rubs off on those around me. Sometimes it can spread like wildfire – memes are an obvious example of this, the learning equivalent of a sneeze in a crowded room. Perhaps more often, the infection can be quite mild: small changes in behaviour or outlook can affect conversations and other actions, which in turn spread through the network effect to those around us and those around them. Sometimes, like some kinds of wart, the learning can be localised and barely spread at all, or can break out suddenly after seeming dormant for years.

Unlike most traditional diseases, learning can spread through almost any medium of communication, though it thrives best in an environment where people are in close contact with one another.

Unlike most diseases, the vast majority of forms of learning are beneficial, perhaps like mitochondria or chloroplasts in animal and plant cells, protecting us against the worst disease of all: ignorance.

Just musing here. However, it suggests some interesting avenues of research. I’m sure there have been studies of the benefits of education in communities, but I’m not aware of any that take a quantitative look at how the benefits spread through social networks. It would be quite a tricky study that would probably have to be looked at obliquely. Learning mutates more than the influenza virus as it infects each individual differently. It would be relatively straightforward but largely pointless to look at the spread of ideas. Learning is about knowledge, which primarily exists in people and is more about the accommodation of information rather than the information itself, far more defined by the changes it brings about than by the content that is transmitted. This idle musing is an example of such an effect: a study about the spread of obesity has brought about learning in me that is quite different from the intended effects of the paper. One way to study this might be to look at a large population sample and see what changes happen when people from relatively uninfected communities make active efforts to get infected. Another might be to look at the differences in families with children in school compared with those who are not, taking account of social ties between them.

I need to think more about this, or maybe someone else can (or already has). It would be nice to think that this little speculation has started a new infection somewhere!

Original: https://community.brighton.ac.uk/pg/blog/jd29/read/80769/infectious-learning
By: Jon Dron
Posted: July 27, 2007, 2:14 am

This bizarre but apparently rigorous study makes use of social network analysis to demonstrate that obesity is, to some extent, socially transmitted. Between mutual male friends the risk of obesity increases by 100% if one becomes obese, with smaller effects shown with different ties and different gender mixes (and none at all due to geographic proximity).
I’d be interested to explore whether learning is also contagious. Intuitively, it seems obvious that it must be. And, if it is, I’d like to explore ways to make it more virulent, and how we can more effectively overcome resistance to infection.
Created:Thu, 26 Jul 2007 22:58:13 GMT

Original: http://jondron.net/cofind/frshowresource.php?tid=5325&resid=1316
Posted: July 26, 2007, 4:58 pm

Full story at: http://jondron.net/cofind/frshowresource.php?tid=5325&resid=1315

Massively multiplayer word association ‘game’ – random words are displayed and players type in whatever comes to mind. The result is a giant network of associated words, showing relative strengths of association between them. Fascinating collective activity.
Created:Wed, 25 Jul 2007 10:28:46 GMT

Original: https://community.brighton.ac.uk/pg/blog/jd29/read/95766/human-brain-cloud-view
By: Jon Dron
Posted: July 25, 2007, 4:28 am

Extremely quick and easy way to set up a private discussion board, with eamil posting/receiving and RSS. Would be nice to provide a WYSIWYG editor, and it would be handy to throw in some more advanced features like tagging or threading |(if needed), but otherwise has all the basic features most people would need for on-the-fly discussion boards.
Created:Sun, 08 Jul 2007 18:32:33 GMT

Original: http://jondron.net/cofind/frshowresource.php?tid=5325&resid=1309
Posted: July 8, 2007, 12:32 pm

Well, not quite ended yet but blogging opportunities may get thin on the ground later. Bebo White gave a wise and thoughtful keynote on Web 2.0 this morning, with lots of sensible ideas and useful resources.  I was struck though by his slightly last-century desire for automation. He wants one right answer to each of his questions, but I think this is wrong.  He wants science, I want art. We need to informate, not automate, to have help making decisions, not to have those decisions made for us. I see it as a strength of Google that a query about the weather in Vancouver returns thousands of results (though in fact this example that he used was a little out of date, as Google now shows the weather forecast at the top of the list of results, so you don’t have to delve further if you don’t want to). I think this vagueness is particularly useful in education, where we don’t want information but the means of integrating new knowledge with old. One answer is seldom as useful as multiple perspectives and representations.  It is good to have recommendations and signposts to useful information, but not useful to hide the stuff that some automated arbiter decides is less useful.

I sat in the large auditorium behind a woman who was nodding and even vocalising her agreement with things Bebo was saying. I wonder whether she does the same when reading things online. My suspicion is that she doesn’t. Interesting that, from the perspective of at least some of the audience, even a lecture to a big crowd seems to be a conversation. Some lessons for virtual learning design, perhaps.

Original: https://community.brighton.ac.uk/pg/blog/jd29/read/80623/edmedia-ends
By: Jon Dron
Posted: June 29, 2007, 11:26 am

Terry Anderson gave a characteristically fantastic keynote today on social learning 2.0. Of course, I may be a little biased as he very kindly gave me some credit for what he had to say and gave a brilliant plug for my book! However, the style and interpretation was all Terry’s, full of rich insights into the nature of groups, networks and collectives.

Terry is a great crosser of boundaries, pulling in ideas from many different fields and pushing out something new, fresh and thought-provoking. I’ve said it before but it’s worth repeating: inspiring things happen at the edges, as we cross into new territories. The previous keynotes have been great, with interesting things to say and deep insights into important areas in which their expertise is unrivalled, but I have not walked away feeling inspired. Reflective, yes. Enthused even. But not inspired. Terry was inspirational.

The talk was followed by a very lively and interesting discussion, attended by many of the great and the good. The underlying themes included all of usual suspects, including the stormy relationship between top-down and bottom-up control, issues of trust and privacy, and concerns about the stupidity of mobs. It is wonderful to me that these debates are at last getting out into the open. 

And while we’re on the subject of social software and inspiration, I have been bumping into George Siemens on and off throughout the conference, who has been making some interesting contributions to several discussions. It is reassuring to know that he is as smart in real life as he appears in his blog. 

Original: https://community.brighton.ac.uk/pg/blog/jd29/read/80606/edmedia-day-3
By: Jon Dron
Posted: June 29, 2007, 2:00 am

Allison Littlejohn gave a great keynote today. Not rabble rousing but clear, measured and wise. The stuff that really interested me was her notion of blending, which took a very total-ecology view, recognising the complex tensions between the top down and bottom up, private and public, virtual and real.  This is a notable departure from earlier naive views of blending, highly situated in the real world of the learner rather than that of the teacher.  I particularly liked her visualisation of the move from dependence to independence, looking at it in terms of a variety of dimensions of space, tools, activity and time. Clear discussion of the challenges of blending the private, the privileged and the public. One small thing that came up as an aside surprised me a lot though, given the nature of the conference – she asked how many people had heard of IMS-LD and there were maybe a dozen or so of us, in a hall full of hundreds of e-learning people. Amazing.

I’m currently sitting i an interesting presentation from the University of Hertfordshire, talking about getting a computer science placement student into an e-learning role. Excellent process of bringing the student along and involving him in the complete research process. Seems to work nicely from everyone’s perspective. I especially like the fact that it is as much about faculty learning from him as about the student learning from them. Great stuff!

Original: https://community.brighton.ac.uk/pg/blog/jd29/read/80601/edmedia-day-2
By: Jon Dron
Posted: June 27, 2007, 11:11 am

I Just got out from Ron Oliver’s keynote, which was nice: reassuring rather than inspiring. As Ron covered the bases with a very broad discussion of a load of stuff from learning designs to design-based research I was reminded of Clay Shirky’s recent post on the Bayesian advantage of youth.  I have noticed that many of the great and good have such a broad and deep knowledge of the area that their talks make use of a kind of shorthand and are (perhaps) so profound that they actually wind up stating the obvious. It is a bit like the old joke about people calling out numbers to stand in for jokes they already know. It would be quite entertaining to give a presentation in which this idea is taken to its logical extreme, just saying keywords like ‘authentic’, ‘constructive alignment’, ‘community of practice’, ‘blogging’ etc etc etc. Perhaps the audience could applaud after each word, or just nod sagely. No need to expand further.

It is interesting that ignorance leads to the same problem:  I am currently sitting in a presentation by a nice man with a moustache who has done some research that was old news 15 years ago, also stating the obvious (in this case that you have to rethink teaching strategies when doing it electronically and that students like being able to access course notes at any time!).

The interesting stuff happens when we know a little, not when we are complete beginners and not when we are world experts. The people that most consistently inspire me are those that are constantly moving into new territories. As they cross the borders from one subject area to another, sparks often fly. 

Original: https://community.brighton.ac.uk/pg/blog/jd29/read/80595/edmedia-begins
By: Jon Dron
Posted: June 26, 2007, 11:30 am