Also see my page on the Wimba Classroom.

As of February 2009:

• Now that many people in the world have the ability to exchange information on the networks of networks we call the Internet, information is growing exponentially.
• The pace of change has picked up; the introduction of new tools and technologies are almost an everyday occurrence these days
• If you want to be on top of your discipline, you must be looking online (at least in a significant part) as not all valuable information makes it to the journals and into the textbooks, and by the time it does, it may already be outdated
• You will grow your knowledgebase via the insights from others who are spread throughout the world; and you will be able to contribute to the dialogues within your disciplines
• You will come to learn who is doing what in your field
• You will come to learn which nations are amongst the leaders in your discipline/field of research
• You will meet people you never would have believed before -- the world is a much smaller place now
• You need to be using blogs and who are the key bloggers in your field
• You need to be aware of popular wiki's, discussion boards, online forums, webinars, and online-based groups/communities/ professional organizations within your discipline
• Your students will be online whether you are or not

Three key tools that you need to know about are:

1. Wimba Classroom
2. RSS feeds -- especially Google Reader
3. The Hoot - a blog from the Teaching & Learning Group at Calvin College

3/2/09

Personal Learning Networks: Why Peers Are Better Than Classmates -- from Jay Cross

"Change is racing along so fast that the old learn-in-advance methods are no longer sufficient. While network infrastructure is evolving exponentially, we humans have been poking along. ... We've got to reinvent ourselves and get back on the fast track."

Informal learning evangelist Jay Cross thought of this idea already back in 2003. Traditional schooling is no longer sufficient to deal with the complexity of modern society. In a world which is going to be increasingly more specialized what is really going to make the difference is your ability to explore, research and find relevant information just-in-time via the personal connections you have created over time.

That's why the connections you establish with your peers, the personal learning network that you create, are really valuable. Sharing and learning with other individuals who have your own passions and interest, is an opportunity to really learn and to get out of the traditional classrooms environment, where your desire to learn is too often suffocated by dogmatic principles and grade scales.

Get used to that: knowing things per se, and filling your walls at home with certificates, doesn't mean you're a good student or that you are better than anyone else. It just means that you can answer pre-determined questions when you are asked to. And, is this really the skill you need to be successful in your life? Here's Jay's vision...

2/18/09

Johns Hopkins Puts Expertise Online Publicly with Collexis -- from CampusTechnology.com
Johns Hopkins University has put its Collexis Holdings Expertise Portal online as a public Web site where individuals can search, sort, and view compiled views of the research conducted by the university and its faculty. Collexis Holdings develops semantic search and knowledge discovery software.

Medpedia’s Health Platform Could Be Just What The Doctor Ordered -- from TechCrunch by Leena Rao

2/17/09

Related tags:
Enterprise 2.0, Social Software, Social Networking, Social Computing, Social Media, Collaboration, Communities, Learning, Knowledge Sharing, KM, Knowledge Management, Remote Collaboration, Innovation, Networking, Social Networks, Social Networks, Networking, Conversations, Dialogue, Productivity Tools, Social Computing, Learning Communities, Personal, KM, Knowledge Management, Tools, Enterprise 2.0.

Launch Day of Communities and Networks Connection
Connections make the world go round. I can’t learn and improve without the things I learn from my network and beyond. Especially the interesting fringes. This requires some sort of “line of sight” to that network.  With that, I’m pleased to announce the launch of the Community & Networks Connection.  This isn’t a community, and  not as loose and open as a network. It is in that juicy place in between communities and networks that helps to collect and organize useful content from blogs and other web sites, from people who care about, and are passionate to understand these phenomenon we call “communities” and “networks.”  The goal of this page is to create a place where it’s easy to find current and highly relevant content. And perhaps to stimulate a new connection between you and these brilliant people. 

You can get a sense of the power of the site by visiting the site and clicking a keyword on the left. 

 

From DSC:
I post this because we all must begin to develop our worldwide networks within our disciplines.

2/16/09

First Monday, Volume 14, Number 2 - 2 February 2009

 

Campus should use digital tools to disseminate faculty research:ARL -- from Liberal Education Today by Bryan Alexander

http://www.arl.org/bm~doc/disseminating-research-feb09.pdf

American campuses should use digital tools to further disseminate faculty research, argues a joint statement from a group of academic organizations. "The University’s Role in the Dissemination of Research and Scholarship — A Call to Action" (pdf) comes from the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), the Association of American Universities (AAU), the Coalition for Networked Information (CNI), and the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges (NASULGC).

Two key points: higher education should use technology to share scholarship more widely. That includes born-digital and new, digitally-enabled forms of research...

2/11/09

7 Characteristics of Creative Professional Learning Communities -- from Education Innovation by Robert Jacobs

 

Open Source Learning/Courseware/Resources

2/17/09

BarCamp -- original link from Informal Learning Blog ...is an ad-hoc gathering born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos and interaction from participants. BarCamp -- from Wikipedia BarCamp is an international network of user generated conferences — open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants. The first BarCamps focused on early-stage web applications, and related open source technologies, social protocols, and open data formats. The format has also been used for a variety of other topics, including public transit, health care, and political organizing.

University Council Approves Open Access Plan -- from Boston University Today, Campus Life, by Art Jahnke and Jessica Ullian
BU to create free archive of faculty research

Boston University took a giant step towards greater access to academic scholarship and research on February 11, when the University Council voted to support an open access system that would make scholarly work of the faculty and staff available online to anyone, for free, as long as the authors are credited and the scholarship is not used for profit. Click here to download the full pdf.

“We are looking forward to new forms of publication in the 21st century that will transform the ways that knowledge and information are shared.”

Example for artists:

Example for those in the medical realm:

A handful of the virtual K-12 schools/organizations out there:

• Insight Schools, Inc.
• K¹² Inc
• Michigan Virtual University
• iNACOL
• NACOL
• Virtual High School
• Kaplan Virtual Education
• Must High School (esp. for home school and working adults)
• Keystone National High School and Keystone National Middle School