Chocolate coated raisins and termite mounds

I enjoyed a very interesting few hours over at the University of Southampton yesterday, where I was a guest speaker at the Higher Education Academy e-Learning Symposium at the subject centre for Languages and Linguistics Area Studies. The e-Learning symposium was small but intimate with around 65 delegates from about 20 universities. All of the plenary sessions were streamed out to the web, so those who couldn't attend at least experienced a flavour.

Jon Dron (formerly of Brighton University) who is at Athabasca University, gave an interesting first presentation on control and constraint in e-learning. Drawing on diverse sources such as Winston Churchill, termite mounds, Stigmergy, and chocolate coated raisins, Jon took us through a discussion on how ideas develop and learning processes work in online social environments. There was some debate over Personal Learning Environments and an interesting statement about the wisdom of the crowds vesus the stupidity of the masses. Unfortunately, we ran out of time, and so the discussion petered out.

Next up was Emma Place (University of Bristol) who talked about her concerns over plagiarism, cut-and-paste research and the general malaise that seems to be overtaking students in higher education due to digital laziness. Most of the audience concurred, and when a straw poll was taken, there was almost unanimous agreement that Internet research skills should become a part of the fabric of every undergraduate first year programme.

I gave my own presentation just before lunch (probably the best slot of the day) in which I covered some of my recent studies on wiki based learning, and unveiled my new 5 stage model of wiki activities. The model, which progresses through deeper stages of cognitive engagement and also a progression from solo to collaborative exercises can also be applied to just about any other online learning. It's easy to remember, because it's 'E' sy.... Students start by exploring, then progress into exhibition of some of their ideas, followed by explanation. Elaboration ensues in which all the group are engaged with trying to understand the ideas and this is capped by evaluation - placing value on the currency, relevancy, accuracy and other merits of the wiki content. It seemed to be well received, and at least one delegate blogged about it the same day.

After lunch there were two workshops, one on Second Life and MUVes in langaueg learning, and the other very much focused on a new tool for the creation of learning objects. Due to the long(ish) drive back home, I only got to participate in the first workshop, but the trip was worth it. And I met some interesting people, and had some interesting conversations, too.