Tony Karrer asks on http://elearningtech.blogspot.com, “Is eLearning 2.0 Meaningful?“
I’ve been involved in eLearning somehow since about 2000, and I’m not sure that eLearning 2.0 is any different from the kind of talk around at that point – ‘let’s have less shovelware‘, or ‘guide on the side, rather than sage on the stage’. These calls for learner centred approaches to teaching seem similar to the concepts behind eLearning 2.0.
At a recent talk (blogged below) Matthew Pittinsky from Blackboard suggested that eLearning 2.0 was about (among other things) social networks. This, I would suggest, is nothing new – surely the concept of a school, college or University is about a community of learning, where social networks form, and you learn from your peers as well as from you teacher or tutor.
Matthew asked where the scholarly equivalent of Facebook or Furl was – but the truth is that academics have long shared information within their communities via papers, books and conferences. In the virtual world, email is now a mainstay of the academic community.
So – what is different about eLearning 2.0? To some extent I believe that eLearning 2.0 is simply a continuation of what went before – we have to continue to press for learner centred teaching, which engages the students in a dialogue with their tutor and their peers. If we can use ‘eLearning 2.0’ to sell this, and get the community engaged in the Web 2.0 tools that can support it, then that’s great.
Interestingly, Furl.net is used quite a bit in educational contexts. It’s particularly useful for tracking resources for a research project, sharing those resources with colleagues using a shared topic/tag, and the ability to export a citation list in an academic format. Every week I hear about another course or researcher using Furl.net in this way. So maybe Furl could be the scholarly equivalent of Furl?
Best wishes,
— Michael (from the Furl team)
This is a good point. What is perhaps interesting is that the service providers (IT/Library) in universities may not be recommending 3rd party services such as Furl – but of course, this doesn’t stop the academics and students using them extensively. Perhaps we focus too much on what we can support and rely on, and not enough on encouraging innovative use of online technology?