A Chief Learning Officer for India

I think it is about time we instituted the position of a national CLO.

Typically a CLO handles the strategic vision for education and training, implements initiatives for training and development, and is accountable for research.

For a typical organization, the CLO is tasked with an internal driven focus. This means a national CLO would be focused on training and development for all government departments including those concerned with education. While the respective departments would be functional skill and knowledge owners, the CLO would help drive initiatives which are tactical (specific skill based) as well as strategic or transformational (new knowledge and skills).

The CLO, in this day and age, would undoubtedly be an edTech champion, painting horizontal stripes of digital transformation. So, for example, she would figure ways in which simulation based training could help the Indian Postal Services to become more efficient.

But in our case, the CLO would also be tasked with an external focus, that of powering digital and other means of education for students, professionals, teachers and leaders. She would be empowered to push the transformational practices much needed in our country.

The CLO would also drive research and development initiatives that sit at the core of digital transformation. This R&D will in turn be shaped by the mission, vision and strategic roadmaps that she evolves.

The CLO would run a decentralized ship, given our structure, and would need to invest substantial time in building capable leaders to lead change at every level.

The CLO role is a crucial one for us today. We have a much varied capability spectrum in almost all fields including education. Legacy mindsets have to be challenged when it comes to education. Investments have to channelized towards a vision for digital transformation in education. And political and administrative might has to be leveraged for these purposes.

We are at the right juncture. A new education policy is about to be announced, digital initiatives are taking off and quick evolution of technology is fast making even elearning sound like a legacy approach. If we are smart enough, the CLO and her team can make rapid progress.

Your vote?

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#rhizo15 Week 3 – Content is people

There have been many ways of looking at content that have emerged from the discussions in #rhizo15 week three (and some prior cMOOCs). Some of them are:

• Content as beacon
• Content as authority
• Content as conversation
• Content as message
• Content as goals
• Content as object
• Content as commerce
• content as network
• content as people
• content as experience
• content as stock
• content as flow
• content as influence

Content in these interpretations can be essentially classified or differentiated on the following dimensions.

• as constituted (form, format, mode of authoring, instructional design, reviewed, curated, open, emergent, distributed) – books, blogs, videos, people
• as communicated (medium, packaging) – web, TV, teacher, community/network, retweeted, liked
• as intended (purpose/objective, outcomes, commerce)
• as consumed (learning, entertainment)
• as extended (repurposed, reused, recombined, contextualized, value added, interpreted)

What most people are concerned with is its quality – the net impact of content on the receiver (which could be a network). Other assessments include factors such as its development or delivery cost, coverage and ease of use. It also predicates a level of competency of the receiver(s) to be able to “effectively” consume that content.

The fact is that content is really some of all these things, not just any one. Nor are people the only way “stories” are created or transmitted (or there would be no history or even lived experience). Nor are they the only starting point. The fact is that we learn also from nature, interactions with machines and man-made processes & objects.

In sharing openly what we have learned, we personify that content or our interpretation of it. Others may then consume this personified content to (as Dave said) function in the field.

Perhaps if we think of content as people, we may also be susceptible to the mind as machine metaphors. Would we rather think of content as network as a more appropriate metaphor?

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Gamification, Serious Games and Simulations

In this introductory presentation for Amrita University’s T4E Conference this month, here are a few thoughts on differentiating between Gamification, Serious Games and Simulations.

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The Slumdog Graduate

In the Oscar-winning movie, Slumdog Millionaire, the main protagonist manages to answer very difficult (to the common person) questions to win a jackpot. People are quite unsure how he did it and he becomes the object of an intense investigation. While providing explanations for how he answered each question, it was found he could answer it because he experienced it in some way. He had never gone to school, where presumably you learn the answers to difficult questions, and therefore his feat was questioned all the more. His experiences (and luck that each of the questions aroused a connected memory deep inside him) enabled him to answer the questions.

Spread around us are slumdog graduates going to the slumdog university that is our combined living experience. Rather than being handcrafted by some elaborate educational system designed to produce certain deterministic outcomes, these graduates are a product of their own epiphanies and will and courage and perseverance. While we spend a good part of our lives imagining change that can be structured through formal education, many of these graduates are continuously shaping and reshaping the world around us.

To call them “graduates” of a “university” is to succumb to tradition, though. And calling them “slumdogs” is itself not free of a certain bias. Let us call them “makers” and “thinkers” of a new world, unfettered by the trappings of our formal conception of education. They do not require the education we “provide” to them or the elaborate restrictions we build around who is learned and who is not. They are not guinea pigs of theory that serves capitalist and edu-casteist practice.

For we keep beating into submission every new innovation and change agent. MOOCs become xMOOCs, monologous extensions of traditional lectures, with the hilarious debate being just exactly how long should each video be (hey, statistically the eDX folks proved that it should be closer to 8 minutes and hey, look again, there is a growing cult that likes the Green Tick Mark that signifies they got something right).

But I am not laughing. There is something very wrong with a system of thinking that precludes change, that feeds carnivorously upon itself only to continuously grow new offspring. Don’t like the UGC, create a super commission. Don’t like the DIETs, reform them and add BITEs. Cry about inadequate teachers, but continue to train teachers the same way our students learn. Feast on your self and cry wolf. Centralize everything and create new systems of governance, but never realize that the world is now distributed.

What we need is to build alternate capacity to think and innovate. Like get a separate booster shot or something, right away.

Immediately, we should design and implement an ecosystem where innovators, educators, edu-leaders should be able to learn and craft distributed systems of learning that empower a whole new generation of makers and thinkers. They should permeate not just the formal regulated sectors of learning, but also address the much larger segment outside this sphere, making it possible to truly reshape the human potential of this country. More on this soon…

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Nymi, Glass and Wearable Learning

I just came across a new biometric+ device called Nymi. It is a wearable bracelet that captures your unique heart rhythms and provides a unique identification for you. Obviously, the most powerful feature is the authentication. But by adding an Internet dimension to it, the Nymi can be used not just for authentication but also alerts and notifications. By adding a gyroscope and an accelerometer to it, the Nymi can catch your motion. Nike FuelBand helps you do something similar with motion. And LeapMotion seems to be another technology that can do some cool things with motion. Additionally, by using Bluetooth Low Energy, the Nymi can detect proximity to other Nymi devices.

The Nymi, in other less physically intrusive form factors (perhaps a finger band or behind the ear) perhaps, and at much lower cost factors (at $79 today, it is more expensive than our Indian tablet, Aakash), may be an interesting piece of technology.

Also interesting are SmartWatches. The Galaxy Gear can take photos, run apps, and send & receive messages and calls. Apple is reportedly working on using curved glass (Corning Willow Bendable Glass) in its products, perhaps even making smartwatches.

Obviously Google Glass heads the pack with its potential and sophistication. Features include voice commands, apps, digital overlays, sharing & collaboration, and many other affordances. Perhaps it could be tied with behind the ear biometric devices or with motion sensing devices such as the Kinect.

Also, there are some existing technologies that all these can leverage and add-on. Take for example location services with GPS. And there are some important concerns that they solutions need to address, such as Privacy and Data Security.

What do these augur for learning?

Right off the bat, any biometric device is most useful in tracking and authentication scenarios – examinations, attendance and so on – where it is critical to check identity, location and presence.

With these technologies, for proctoring as an example, scientists could probably track differences in body internal or external indicators (heart rhythm, looking away from the exam paper or screen, pausing between writes etc), tracking an audio conversation, sensing another human or digital presence, that could pretty much alert/signal cheating, thus possibly making large scale proctoring possible.

Access to knowledge and services is another aspect that these devices can provide on the go in many new ways. For example, these devices can sense or take more as an input than simply text or voice search. But like TinEye, they can perhaps take complex, contextual (and personal) data to determine what knowledge is required or what service is desired. For example, a stroke patient unable to dial 911 or press a button, could have these devices signal for help; or a student’s level of enthusiasm in a class or while learning could be correlated; or if a student is stuck, it could trigger a mentor service.

Easier accessibility to device functions, such as in sending a message or clicking a photo, will make the uptake of these solutions higher and higher. Add to this the ability to collaborate through existing social networks and the Internet will further enhance the usability of these devices for all activity, including learning.

I think the proximity function (pairing, detection) can be extremely useful in physical settings, and new patterns can emerge if one looks at who we students hang out with and how they all learn and share.

Exciting possibilities emerge for merging learning experience around concepts. Let me explain. Today the workhorse is the human mind that is trying to connect, for any single concept, various learning experiences. So if  I want to learn about thermodynamics, I will read the concept on my reader or from a textbook, discuss it in class with my teacher, clarify with my fellow students and experience in multiple real life situations. Each of these are disconnected from the other, except being chained by myself or through the facilitator. What is we could remove this isolation and really bring connectedness? Like what happens when I see a truck on the road – how can I get connected to what its relevance for me is if I am studying engineering, or if I am studying law, or if I am studying civic administration? This would enhance learning to a really high degree by making the entire world a LAB or a playground.

And then, feedback. These devices can signal digitally or physically, when something is right or when something is wrong. This could be enhancing the body’s signals or by inducing an externally generated signal. What if I am think/enacting the wrong solution to a math problem? Can the device vibrate in a manner that tells me I am doing it wrong? Or (for an easier scenario), can it tell if I am holding a teacup right?

I think these technologies have the potential to go far in education! Perhaps some day we will see some of these ideas come to light.

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Chaos from Order: Me @TED

Sometime ago, I gave a TED Talk. The extended transcript, by way of blog posts formed a six-part blog series, and the video was upload recently. The theme of the talk was essentially that we have become used to thinking of the educational system as a system to produce the learned rather than a system that fosters learners, and that scale is our biggest challenge today.

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As always, would love to hear your comments!

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Scale and Educational Systems

Educational systems do not scale well. We see that all around us. At smaller scales, these systems are far more effective than at larger scales. At larger scales, several constraints emerge rapidly – shortage of qualified teachers, lack of infrastructure, equitable access, degradation of learning experiences – that are primarily impacted by vision, capability and level of investments (government or private).

Since the educational system is, like Healthcare or even the government itself, primarily driven by the expert capability of human resources, there is even more pressure if we use the same systems to train/educate future human resources. Even with the promise of tools such as eLearning, intelligent tutors or e-tutoring that help reduce load on critical teaching resources, which is really a mode to reduce the adversity of scale, this primary capability is paramount.

I find this in my research over USA-India educational systems. The startling insight is that while there may be operational differences (learning autonomy is higher in the USA, teaching system is more transparent/accountable), fundamentally both countries are facing the same challenges (employability, access, equity, infrastructure, pressure on government funding, thrust on vocational training) despite there being a multiple of 4 in enrolments at school and projected multiple of 2 in HE enrolment (by 2020), if one was to compare the student population statistics (India has 4X school and will have 2X HE students as compared to the USA). We have 6 times the number of colleges. And so on.

In fact, the census (I am using this as a proxy for enrolment data which I have to find), shows that Finland, Denmark & New Zealand have a 05-24 years age group population of less than 1.5 mn people; and Australia has 5.5 mn in the same age group. But UK and USA have 15 mn and 85 mn respectively; while India has 451 mn! Finland, Denmark, New Zealand and Australia are the highest performing nations.

The UN Education Index gives these smaller countries the highest ranking in the world! Finland, Denmark, New Zealand, Cuba and Australia shared the top rank, USA is at rank 20, UK at rank 30 and India at rank 145. Not too surprisingly, the GDP per capita index by the IMF (2010) pegs the USA at rank 7, UK at 21, Australia at 10, Denmark at 17, Finland at 22, New Zealand at 32, India at 129. This showcases that despite having lower per capita GDP, all 4 top ranked countries have a better ranking. This is despite the general high correlation between the two indicators of nearly 0.81 (I took 169 countries and compared them), as would normally be expected.

This sort of questions positions like in this post, How does Finland’s Education become the Best in the World?, which tries to take what is good in the Finnish context and tries to apply it in the USA context, something I advise against for the most part.

From the Huffington Post comes another reiteration of do what works well elsewhere, Lessons from Finland’s Educational System. There is an interesting insight into the way the Finns think from what Dr. Pasi Sahlberg says:

Finns don’t believe you can reliably measure the essence of learning. You know, one big difference in thinking about education and the whole discourse is that in the United States it’s based on a belief in competition. In my country, we are in education because we believe in cooperation and sharing. Cooperation is a core starting point for growth. 

Zaidlearn points to some interesting comparisons between the Finnish and Singaporean Educational Systems in The Finnish Education System rocks!. What is interesting here that Finland GDP per capita lags behind Singapore’s, but Singapore is 52 on the Education Index rankings.

I am basically trying to make the argument that traditional educational systems are unlike traditional industrial systems and cannot scale. In which case, international lessons could be learnt for micro-strategy or operational considerations, but perhaps not for macro, policy level changes.

More importantly, this is one piece that contributes to the thinking on alternate systems of education or to change discussions.

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3 Idiots: Educational Pedagogy or Fantasy

In case you didn’t know, 3 Idiots is now a record-breaking Hindi movie, that explores and exposes the educational system. As of the time of this post, it has been released worldwide and is the highest grosser in Indian cinema history (about US$68mn in 19 days and also made 43 million pounds worldwide to date).

The movie is based in a “traditional” academic setting in an engineering college, reputed for its excellence and for its no-holds-barred-excellence-is-the-most-important thing principal. The story revolves around 3 students who get to live together in the college hostel and become lasting friends. The story tries to bring to the front the problems created by a severe focus on grades and book knowledge and essentially laments the restriction of freedom of thought and reflection that has become a hallmark of the educational system. The term “idiot” is used to refer to not someone stupid but to an irrepressible free thinker who follows his heart.

It has caught the imagination of an entire nation of learners. And that fact bears important testimony to the popular perception that the academic system discourages free thinking, diversity of opinion, creativity and innovation because of it’s over emphasis on grades, bookish knowledge, competitive spirit and teacher-centricity.

The main “idiot”, played by Aamir Khan, is, in my opinion, the only idiot in the film. Born to the assistant of a rich man, he proxies all the way through engineering college for the rich man’s son. As a result, he gets to go where his interests take him, to whichever subject and teacher that excite his imagination. He is naturally inclined to be curious, his questioning ways earning him the ire of his teachers and the ridicule of his peers. But he is brilliant and ultimately emerges as a scientist with a large number of important patents to his name.

Aamir believes in free thinking, of questioning the dominant paradigm. Ultimately he converts the principal of the engineering college, who is fanatically entrenched in the “traditional” mindset, to seeing things in a different light. The movie ends with shots of Aamir in a “school” in Ladakh doing what he believes – teaching kids to let their imagination, innovation and creativity take over.

But there is a bit of demagoguery here, with no clear indication that the ideas are as revolutionary as they seem. For example, a point of discussion should be what is exactly being proposed. The movie is not clear on what or how this pedagogy and system really to be made possible. If it is argued that ultimately it is a movie and not a research project, I would argue that it is not a trifling matter given the reach and success of the movie and its ability to shape popular perception.

The applicability of these ideas and their sudden, almost inexplicable shift from a higher education setting to a school, is a little puzzling too. There is no evidence of Aamir’s school principal having the same endgame delirium as was the case with Boman Irani, who played the engineering college principal. The dynamics are very different between the two scenarios. 

Also, there is little evidence that creativity, innovation and imagination does not at all exist in the traditional system -sometimes teacher-heroes led and sometimes with an organizational focus. It then begs the question – are we talking of a change from inside the box or are we talking about something revolutionary that is at odds with tradition. I don’t see that debate happening around me. Most of the debate seems to be around how the movie has borrowed more from Chetan Bhagat’s Five Point Someone than anything else.

Conflicting verdict at the end for me, though. It leaves me wanting for more because it was hugely entertaining. And a trifle irritable because perhaps the matter should not be trifled with.

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LMS and SNS

Interesting contribution and ensuing discussion from George Siemens post on the Future of Learning: LMS or SNS. Had this brief discussion not long ago on Wilko’s blog.

What has Facebook taught us? That “social connections and information sharing” is the model that will be “successful in the long run”? I am sure George is not saying that it will be the ONLY successful model there is going to be. Also,  George lets out a fear of not using a Google service, for fear of it being revoked by Google if not successful – are we to worry too?

Was also really interesting to follow Ulises Mejias’ post on the tyranny of nodes. Ulises argues that “network undermines productive forms of sociality by over-privileging the node.” That is, by focusing on the nodes, we are obscuring the spaces that lie between nodes. Context is important, the ability to make connections and explore these dark spaces is what is important.

I am forever confused, though, why discussions on tools should precede discussion on the model. The tools will follow if the model or framework is defined, should not be the other way around. Janet does point out the amazing work around social media that some vendors are putting in to their LMS systems in her reviews and the challenges they face running both in parallel in an organization.

But to get into a discussion of whether ELGG is the best way or Moodle is really it is bringing the tools before the concept. The concept is NOT fleshed out yet. We do not have a working understanding of an implementation of networked learning beyond the collaboration tools we have today, much less an appreciation of how organizations can really implement it. For example, we do not know how to reconcile or present in alternative ways the nouns and verbs of a traditional LMS (and processes).

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The Open Screen Project

I am a little ambivalent about this one – the Open Screen project. Adobe is leading this initiative along with other majors such as Nokia. Their dream is to unify and defragment our experiences with internet, devices and media by providing a “consistent runtime environment for open web browsing and standalone applications”.

The runtime enviroment is one thought-out combination of device (PC, mobile phone, kiosk etc.), operating system, browser and media (read Flash) capabilities that they hope will get users “richer, more interactive, and universal user experiences across devices”. Basically cross-platform both in terms of viewing experiences and interaction possibilities (interoperability) that the new Internet engenders.

Why am I ambivalent? A $10 mn fund for developers over 2 years should perhaps be reason enough to realize the commitment of these players to the strategy. Moreover, a brief look at the supporting partners must rank as the who is who of telecom, computing and software. Not only that I saw that Adobe has committed to making AIR and Flash player open.

The response on the Silverlight side is also very interesting. Perhaps that is the reason for the ambivalence I have. I am sure there is space enough for two (or more) technologies to operate in the same space. However, this debate and struggle may result in greater defragmentation and lesser interoperability than before.

More to come…

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UK diaries

In the UK for a few days. Cool and windy on the streets of London right about now and it can get more than a little cold at times!

eLearningAge features this early May story from Caspian Learning, Caspian Learning offers Thinking Worlds to business, that offers easy 3D based simulation authoring that blends into the LMS. Read more at the thinking worlds site.

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On communities, processes and technology

A recent set of conversations with customers and colleagues around communities of practice, networked learning, tools and platforms has provoked a lot of thought.

One perspective, that was heavily process oriented & steeped in real life experiences, argued that unless processes and workflows (and related metrics) were established, implementing these tools in the enterprise would be exhausting and with little return for the amount of effort it would take to manage and the money it would cost.

Then I came across (thanks Swati and Shikha!) this Defence Acquisition University (DAU)  Community of Practice Implementation Guide, which provides a 14-step, 3 phaseprocess for setting up practices that could contain CoPs, Shared Interest Areas (SIA) and collaborative workspaces. This document is very elaborate and covers processes, roles, permissions, workflow, engagement rules and metrics for setting up CoPs and community knowledge bases.

With true process orientation, this document provides a fairly detailed best practice for the DAU in its community development initiatives. What struck me, at second glance, was the fact that it leverages the same principles that we would use to create and manage an enterprise unit. 

The second set of comments was around how useful or participated in really are blogs and wikis. Talk CoPs or networked learning, and all that people think of is Web 2.0 technology and tools, the hype not really difficult to understand, given that major technology vendors are pushing for implementation of these tools in their recent launches.

The perception that the process and/or the technology are responsible for making networked learning happen is problematic. This is especially true given the power laws we have experienced in terms of community participation and effectiveness or the constant refrain that elearning is not, perhaps, living upto its potential.

Stephen explains in his post, Connectivist Dynamics in Communities, that connectivist networks produce connective knowledge. Four elements  distinguish a knowledge-generating network from a mere set of connected elements. These are autonomy, diversity, open-ness and interactivity & connectedness. There are compelling arguments that Stephen makes, as in the past, that we need to respect these elements if we want to increase the probability of generating new knowledge (and make sense of the current base of knowledge). These elements can also be the basis of metrics and tracking.

George laments the inadequacy of tools for sense-making. He also declares “…But any view of society that does not start with the individual is disconcerting.”

All these views, taken together, suggest that there is something more to networked learning than just processes and technology. It is a connectivist approach, a model that focuses on how we learn, that provides us a different lens through which to regard fundamental questions such as how do we learn to perform in a fast changing environment or how do we get incited to participate in a network to create new knowledge.

More concerted thoughts to follow in good time…

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The digital life

I came across two ideas today that are part of a stream of developments that continue to amaze and intrigue me immensely. Mostly because of their impact on how we will be, perhaps, 10 years or so from now.

The first was when my colleagues at work showed me www.visualcomplexity.com and the second, a few minutes later in my mail, was George’s geo-broadcasting post. I now see many examples of how to THINK NETWORK (as opposed to thinking business or learning or society). As George says:

Why shouldn’t my history of search be combined with my interactions on facebook and used as a basis to provide me with important information…

We are now envisioning a digitally enhanced life where technology augments all our senses in multiple ways (Kurzweil?). Will it still make sense to think in terms of stereotypes such as web based training and instructor led training any more? Or is it the begining of , like Fabrizio Cardinali from Giunti Labs puts it, e-Learning 3.0 – Personal Ambient Learning – which he defines as:

…wireless, broadband and mobile networks transparently delivering ubiquitous and nomadic rich media content and learning services enabling media and skills based personalization to support users’ personal knowledge development plans.

Fabrizio talks about Personal Ambient Knowledge, location based and context aware (mobile learning, wearable learning, virtual worlds, location based games, on-field performance support). And Personal Ambient Knowledge as the killer technology for the knowledge society just as electricity was for the industrial society. He re-inforces Stephen’s assertion of learning:

Rather, the idea is that learning is like a utility – like water or electricity – that flows in a network or a grip, that we tap into when we want

I think it is out there and evolving in leaps and bounds every moment, and exciting to watch and contribute to in ways we only can. We are quickly moving to another inflection point that reflects a new understanding of technology that can enhance our digital lives, that can serve us from the shadows.

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Network based Training (NBTs)

I have written earlier about what I am proposing as the evolution from the CBT and WBT – the NBT or Network based training, for some time now. NBTs provide a framework for organizations who want to adopt Web 2.0 and networked learning (the connectivism way) in their systems. The main components of the NBT would be both learning process and tool based.

The NBT consists of the following components:

• a learning process that emphasizes learner participation prior to the course in setting up goals and sequences
• definition of agreed upon sequence of focus areas and learning events based on a temporal sequence
• agreed upon rules/structures of participation with weakly or strongly defined compliance
• defined initial roles for participant and educator (and others) that is consonant with a networked learning strategy
• initially defined ecology of 2.0 tools (blog, wiki, discussion forum, live conference events, other collaboration techniques etc) to be enmeshed in the course
• choosing appropriate collaboration techniques e.g. Delphi, shared maps,
• if required, avenues for structured peer review (could have multiple levels) and group work; if so required an expert review
• resource repository that captures suggested content for review and discussion; could include documents or web collaboration resources
• collaboration using techniques specifically suited for the context of the course; e.g. grouped concept maps if a goal is to create a resource base
• policy for sharing; e.g. if sharing with a wider audience is agreed upon, some way of sharing blog posts, discussions with personal blogs or social network could be explored
• statistics for the facilitator role to judge quantitatively and tools for analysis based on qualitative criteria
• setting up of a default network for the participants of the course (as more people join, a historian role is defined that brings them up to speed using a special mechanism for navigating the content, maybe through learner contributed summaries or commentaries)
• post assessment of learning experiences to evolve the learning ecology
• some way of integrating and reporting on the experience in both directions – organizational and personal learning environments
• norming of the participants on how to use; overcoming barriers to use

These would define an ecology within which much learning could happen. One possible view is that each NBT could become a “slice” of learning that could be linked to the PLE. Several such slices could be linked and could potentially inter-mesh to allow cross-disciplinary or cross-network linkages to promote diversity.

Obviously, from a technology point of view, one could go in two directions. One, allow loosely coupled 2.0 service integration. Two, create generic tools to store localized data and build bridges so that this information can be ported to available 2.0 services. The first allows for easy extensibility when a new 2.0 service or app comes along. The second encourages careful selection of appropriate learning tools (not just mash up anything with anything irrespective of the impact on learning – if something is indeed effective, one would rather build it in to the system in a generic fashion, giving far more control).

From a learning process orientation, specifically a connectivist orientation, it will be necessary to position the NBT somewhere along the range between individuals and groups, connectives and collectives, in an attempt to engender the greatest possibilities for leveraging the power of networked learning, collaboration and innovation. The prime challenges and constraints will lie in shaping policy, between open-ness and protection of IP for instance.

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Terror in Mumbai

It is a heartbreaking moment for all of us. Terrorists, coming by the sea route, have wrought havoc on the city of Mumbai, our financial capital. They have killed scores of people and injured many more. Many still remain hostage to them across different locations in the city. An angered community has lashed out at what it calls inept political management while at the same time lauding the many brave soldiers and policemen who lost their lives and those that are continuing to stage an offensive even as I write this post.

In such a time of distress, as has happened in India, as has happened across the world, a plethora of emotions are being voiced – anger, frustration, grief and helplessness. It is a time when one hopes that everything will be alright, that public memory will be a tad longer this time, that governments in the South Asian region will accelerate the pace of the attack on terrorism, that politicians will not be able to inflame tensions or garner political mileage and that somewhere, somehow educators will start playing their part in encouraging an environment where our society and others start reflecting and acting on the core issues – demystifying and encouraging collaboration throughout the communities they work with every day.

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Connectivism MOC – Posts

I have been writing over at my other blog, http://learnoscck08.wordpress.com and thought I would reference some posts here as well. It’s nearing the end of the Connectivism MOOC and it’s been a ride!

• CCK08 – Paper 1 – Position on Connectivism
• CCK08 – Learning formations
• CCK08 – Elluminate – Groups and Networks
• CCK08 – Passion vs Reason
• CCK08 – Brain and Learning – Part One
• CCK08 – Connectivism Impacts
• CCK08 – Network Based and Network Led Training
• CCK08: I’ve got the power (Moodle Forum)
• CCK08: Paper 2 – Changing Roles
• CCK08: Level One MindMap

Enjoy reading and do write in with comments!

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CCK08 – Connectivism and Connective Knowledge

Well, the first week is coming to an end. It has been an eventful one, leading me to start at the very basics – my conceptions of theory, knowledge, reality, beliefs, meaning, understanding, truth – and the evolution of pholosophical, psychological and educational thought and how it informs any discussion around learning theory. Check out some of the observations at the CCK08 website and http://learnoscck08.wordpress.com (my blog for the course).

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