Breaking the mould

I was interested today to read the transcript of some online exchanges on the BECTA discussion list. They were between Graham Brown-Martin and others who were discussing the use of VLEs in education. The ALT-C 'VLE is Dead' Symposium got a mention, as did my reference to the work of anarchist philosopher Ivan Illich. Illich argued that schools were like funnels, an industrialised, impersonal process that created more problems than solutions. His alternative was to establish learning webs where everyone could share their expertise with their communities and learn from each other as the need arose. Informal learning, for Illich, was more situated than formal learning, and as Einstein once said: 'Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned at school'.

During my presentation in Manchester I happened to mention that Illich's 1970s notion of deschooling society could now be achieved through new web based tools, but that we were in danger of turning the Web back into a funnel if we persisted with wholesale implementation of institutional VLEs that constrained rather than liberated learning.

Graham Brown-Martin makes an excellent point about new technologies and learning on the BECTA discussion group. He says: "...the technologies used by young learners outside of school are often far more powerful and relevant to the outside world than that which is within it. For example an Internet enabled Playstation 3 or Xbox 360 is some 3-4 times more powerful than a typical school laptop whilst still allowing collaborative play with thousands of other global citizens. A Nintendo Wii presents a new mode of human computer interaction far more in keeping with skills needed for future telematics than a desktop PC". Graham is absolutely correct of course, but others are not so optimistic about these informal, extra-curricular learning processes.

Always an emotive subject, the BECTA discussion on the institutional VLE descended to the level of name-calling. Referring to my presentation at ALT-C and my mention of Illich was enough to brand me as a member of the 'loony fringe' by one contributor. Actually, I'm not offended by this, but I am genuinely encouraged. It's not the first time someone has tried to shoot me down. It happened during the plenary session of ICL in Austria earlier in the year too. "No-one quotes Illich anymore!" - said an angry keynote speaker when I asked him a question. It's not always a bad thing to be labelled lunatic...

The clue is in the use of the descriptor 'anarchist'. One keen observer asked me after the event to explain my statement that Illich was 'one of my favourite anarchists'. He asked what other anarchists I admired. I responded with a list of people including: Jesus Christ, Mozart, Picasso, Van Gogh, Stockhausen, Einstein, The Beatles and Dylan Thomas. A surprising list perhaps? Few of these, if asked, would have classified themselves as anarchists in the sense that they wished to 'destroy the world'. Many of them were criticised for being mad, deluded, drug-crazed or drunken, but each of them in their own way broke the mould, enabled us to see the world in a new way, and created new concepts that made us rethink our representations of reality. To me, that is what true anarchism is. Not being satisfied with the present, it is about challenging, subverting and ultimately replacing tired old structures - 'destructive creativity' if you will.

Illich has often been misunderstood. He was not saying 'destroy school'. He was saying that the ills of the current school system (read 1970, or 2010) far outweigh the good. School is creating far more societal problems than it is solving, he believed. His notion of 'learning webs' reflects his concern that we become more community focused and able to respond to changes, whilst his critique of 'funnels' shows his concern for the bland, homogenous and often irrelevant curricula of his own time and the impersonal, behaviouristic manner in which it was delivered.

Here is what Illich actually said: “A…major illusion on which the school system rests is that most learning is the result of teaching. Teaching, it is true, may contribute to certain kinds of learning under certain circumstances. But most people acquire most of their knowledge outside school, and in school only insofar as school, in a few rich countries, has become their place of confinement during an increasing part of their lives".

On his blog, Bill Ellis provides us with a clear insight into the motivation behind Illich's thesis: "Deschooling Society was more about society than about schools. Society needed deschooling because it was a mime of the school system that it engendered and that engendered it. In our current society individuals are expected to work in dull and stultifying jobs for future rewards. This they are trained to do in schools. They go to school so that they can get a job to work for future rewards".

We are seeing some green shoots. Creative curricula and personalised learning environments are the start of the deschooling Illich espoused. The formation of loose networks of practice communities on the Social Web is another. Doing away with school systems that inhibit creative expression and individualism, and introducing forms of assessment that support learning rather than measure it are also the start of the deschooling process. Using appropriate digital media that connect people into expert webs and enable them to negotiate meaning that is relevant to their own specific contexts is infinitely better than instruction. We won't be doing away with the school or university building. What we should be doing though, is building the essence of all that is good from the school and university into each personal learning space, wherever that may be, and whatever form it might take.

Deschooling Society by Ivan Illich

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Never mind the quality, feel the width

Is Wikipedia dying a slow death? Will the one-stop shop for students soon draw its final breath?

These are the questions posed by the BBC's Rory Cellan-Jones in his blog post 'Wikipedia on the wane?' His post was fomented by a recent report from a Spanish academic who claims that editors are leaving the online wiki based encyclopedia faster than new ones are joining. The study estimates that Wikipedia has lost 49,000 editors in just a few months. That's rather careless of them - just where did all those editors go? What are they doing now? And where were they the last time we saw them? They certainly aren't editing Wikipedia's pages anymore says the report. And it seems that the crisis has been caused by heavy handed tactics and beaurocracy which is offputting to those who wish to create new pages or make changes to existing entries. Love or hate Wikipedia, you have to admit it is a real phenomenon, with just about every subject under the sun covered, and high rankings for all pages in search engines. If you want depth of information, go to Encyclopaedia Brittanica. If you want breadth and width of topic coverage, it's Wikipedia you need. They are both fairly accurate, but when an error was detected in the past, Wikipedians moved in quickly to rectify it. But will that continue, or will the website fall into neglect and disrepair?

The report, which also features in the Wall Street Journal, shows that enthusiasm (which let's face it, was the reason for Wikipedia's early success) seems to be falling away. Cellan-Jones suggests that without the 'worker bees' nurturing the pages of Wikipedia, and dedicated armies of enthusiastic and knowledgeable editors maintaining the fine balance between opinion and fact, the online encyclopedia may fall into disrepute. It would be ironic indeed if this was the case, now that Wikipedia seems to be gaining respect with its recently introduced new quality measures.

But there is light at the end of the tunnel - visitors to Wikipedia are on the increase, and it looks as though the rumours of its demise are premature. The solution has to be that more users need to become contributors - which was after all, the original ethos of the wiki, wasn't it?

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...and my nominations are...

Here are my nominations for the 2009 Edublogger Awards:

For best individual blog I would like to nominate Martin Weller, who on his blog The Ed Techie, has been consistent in his posting and always manages to provide some food for thought. He is @mweller on Twitter.

For me, the most influential blog post of the year contained the video (Movie) of the ALT-C debate on the death of the VLE. Recorded and posted by James Clay onto his blog e-Learning Stuff, the video has been downloaded countless times, and copied/embedded into dozens of other websites and blogs around worldwide. You can find him as @jamesclay on Twitter.

In the best New Blog category I nominate Donna Hay over at The Web 2.0 Optimist for her honest, insightful and thoughtful ideas and comments on Web 2.0 tools and their many applications in school settings. You can follow her on Twitter as @dwsm.

Best Group Blog this year should go to Pontydysgu who under Graham Attwell's leadership have continually provided valuable in-depth commentary and advice on a host of e-learning issues and debates. On Twitter he is @grahamattwell.

My vote for best Resource Sharing blog must go to David Hopkins, whose blog Don't Waste Your Time, has been a constant source of interest, and has me returning time and again. On Twitter he is @hopkinsdavid.

For best individual tweeter, I turn to Alec Couros, whom I have probably RT'd more than anyone else this year. His Tweets are often entertaining, always informative. On Twitter, Alec is @courosa.

For the Lifetime Achievement award, I want to nominate Josie Fraser, who over the years, through her blogposts, twittering and other social media channels, has inspired, challenged and encouraged us all. She is a true innovator, and has in my opinion, over the past few years made a significant contribution to learning technology. For anyone of the few left who are not following her, she is @josiefraser on Twitter.

That's me done. Who are you nominating this year?

Edubloggers 2009

It's that time of the year and the Edublogger Awards are upon us again. Josie Fraser has done a remarkable job over the past few years organising this event. She deserves all of our thanks for the impact and reach it has had over the last few years in encouraging a veritable phalanx of creative and energetic posts on every educational topic imaginable.

I felt very honoured last year to be nominated in two categories - best individual blog and most influential blog post (neither of which I stood a cat's chance in Hell of winning of course...)

This year's awards are being organised by another old friend of mine, Carol Daunt, and feature some new categories, including most influential series of Tweets around a discussion. Voting is open to all and the full list of categories is:

Best individual blog
Best individual tweeter
Best group blog
Best new blog
Best class blog
Best student blog
Best resource sharing blog
Most influential blog post
Most influential tweet / series of tweets / tweet based discussion
Best teacher blog
Best librarian / library blog
Best educational tech support blog
Best elearning / corporate education blog
Best educational use of audio
Best educational use of video / visual
Best educational wiki
Best educational use of a social networking service
Best educational use of a virtual world
Lifetime achievement

To nominate in any or all categories, simply post on your blog stating who, and linking to both their blog and to the Edublogger Awards site. My nominations will be in my next post, but I already have a fair idea who I would like to see win the Lifetime Achievement award this year. ;-)

True grit

Educational values in a digital age

View more presentations from Steve Wheeler.

I gave a lecture to the entire 4th year of our Primary B.Ed teacher education programme earlier today, entitled: Educational Values in a Digital Age. Above are the slides that accompanied the lecture. I criticised the worst aspects of formalised schooling where children are taught en masse, and I called for a more learner centred ethos in education. Sure, there is differentiation in schools, but we really don't go far enough, due to lack of time, rigid curriculum and far too few teachers leading to large and often unmanageable classes. But there is an even deeper problem: Teachers are trying to prepare children for work in a world that is constantly changing. I made the point that digital technologies and social media can help to overcome some of the problems teachers face as they get students ready to enter a world of work we can't even begin to imagine yet.

I quoted from Yvonne Robert's book 'Grit: the skills for success and how they are grown', which I picked up after hearing her keynote at Handheld Learning in October. It is a brilliant critique of the current assessment regimes. Roberts argues convincingly that current assessment methods place far too much emphasis on academic qualifications and not enough on self discipline and personal skills. She also points out that teaching literacy, numeracy and science is not enough to prepare children for a world of work which is constantly changing and unpredictable. She calls for more emphasis to be placed on helping students in coping with change, creative thinking and collaborative working.

The 160 students in the group were animated in their discussion of these points, both during and after the lecture. I'm very encouraged by these excellent young people. They are the new revolutionaries - the young, dynamic new teachers that can go into their schools and make a real difference. Let's hope their more experienced colleagues support them and harness their knowledge and enthusiasm.

You've been framed

Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development theory has long been revered by the education community as a model for describing what happens when we learn in social contexts. Bright young things will know that the ZPD describes the space where, with the help of a knowledgeable other person, they can extend and enhance their learning beyond that which they might achieve on their own. Reading through the recent blog post by Graham Attwell on Vygotsky's theory, I find myself agreeing with a lot of what has been discussed. Graham has a problem with ZPD in that it implies the presence of a teacher or expert. I agree that this is indeed problematic when we view the amount of self-organised learning and user generated content that is proliferating on the Web. It's blatently obvious we don't always need a 'knowledgeable other' to be breathing down our necks as we negotiate meaning and learn for ourselves in informal settings. Lev Vygotsky's ideas were the product of his lifelong immersion in Communist Soviet society, and it's apparent as you read his writings just how influenced he was by the notion of collective action. Perhaps this is one reason why his work was suppressed for so long and only began to emerge as a major theory of learning long after his premature demise.

Enter Jerome S. Bruner, an American academic who repurposed the idea of the ZPD by introducing the concept of scaffolding (often erroneously attributed to Vygotsky). According to Wikipedia, scaffolding is: '...the provision of sufficient support to promote learning when concepts and skills are being first introduced.' It fades away as the learner becomes more autonomous or expert. If we apply Bruner's ideas we illuminate Vygotsky's model in the digital age. Let's think for a minute: on a building site (the analogy used by Bruner) what is scaffolding used for? It's not used to support the building, because that must ultimately stand on its own. No, scaffolding is there to support the building process - and to support the builders themselves.

Let's now consider that the building represents 'knowledge'. We are constructing this knowledge through a process of exploration, modelling, problem solving and reflecting through interaction with artefacts and social processes. Let's assume the builders represent the learner. The learner uses a number of support mechanisms to achieve the construction of their knowledge. Then the scaffolding is brought down as they move on to the next phase of their learning.

The scaffolding removes the problem of needing a 'knowledgeable other'. It also reconciles ZPD theory with Activity Theory, where social processes and influences assume more importance than social presence. Scaffolding can be any tool or service the learner requires at that time and in that context. It can be a mobile phone or a personal computer. It can be a TV programme or a newspaper, a conversation with a friend or even a chance remark that is overheard. Scaffolding frames the learning process, and supports it, and these are the processes that we see with personal learning environments.

Related posts:

Vygotsky, ZPD, Scaffolding, Connectivism and PLEs (Pat Parslow)
Scaffolding and online synchronous communications (Sarah Horrigan)

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The VLE sucks

The ALT-C 'VLE is dead' symposium attracted a huge audience. It was like the Black Hole of Calcutta in that room, as anyone who was there will tell you. Each of our panel of four presented our cases, some arguing for and some against the demise of the VLE. Funeral notices were issued during the Conference. Heated tirades and hissy fits were traded over the blogosphere for weeks beforehand. The entire event, some cynical commentators would suggest, was hyped more than any other ALT-C presentation. The symposium video has been downloaded and watched by a cast of thousands. Some people actually went as far as to say that the VLE is dead symposium was the centre-piece of ALT-C 2009. Me? I couldn't possibly comment. All I know is that it was so popular that some people wanted us to do it all over again.

So we have now given in to popular demand. On December 16th, at 1pm in a neutral venue (er....the University of Wolverhampton) the panel will go head to head (to head to head) all over again in another heated debate over the future (or lack of future) of the institutional VLE. James Clay will argue that the VLE still has some life left in it. Nick Sharratt will go even farther, suggesting that VLEs are the best thing since sliced bread. Graham Attwell will probably talk the most sense, providing a real alternative - the PLE. I suspect we will again come to no consensus, but don't let that put you off. Variety is the Spice (Girl) of life we never saw - unless it's our chair for the debate - Josie Fraser. This is an open invitation event, and places are limited so book here soon to avoid disappointment.

The only difference is that the Midlands event is entitled 'The VLE is undead' (Official tag for the event is: #VLEundead). Undead hmm? I can actually find myself concurring with this sentiment. Undead signifies a vampirical nature, and institutional VLEs do indeed tend to suck the lifeblood out of institutions, giving little back. This is an important issue folks. The future of education is at stake, and the puncture wounds are everywhere to be seen: Students who are disengaged or bored with homogenous, bland content that sits in the 'Learning Management System'. Disenchanted staff who pay lip service to a lumbering system that very few people really want to use, because either it is too time consuming to use effectively, too difficult to navigate or simply unfit for purpose. The institution suffers too of course, because huge maintenance and upgrade fees and user contract payments have to be forked out each year, from steadily dwindling funds. And of course, just like a vampire, the VLE looms there, really not knowing that it is actually dead. Unfit for purpose.... undead. So I'm changing my mantra. The institutional VLE sucks.

How did we get ourselves into this corporate quagmire? And how do we drag ourselves out? How can we find a more liberating solution to the problems of digital learning? Does lifelong learning need to be as closely managed as it actually is in universities? What is the institution actually trying to protect itself from when it erects these dreadful walled gardens? And where is the University of Wolverhampton? These are the questions we will engage with on December 16th. Bring stakes, holy water and garlic cloves along with you. This is a fight to the undeath. And I am van Helsing....

Related posts

Web 2.0 vs VLEs (Donna Hay)

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The tribal web

This is the final post in the Digital Tribe series, which is abridged from Chapter 6 of the edited volume Connected Minds, Emerging Cultures (2009).

Anthropologists ascribe a variety of definitions to the word 'tribe' and it can be a contentious term. Most are agreed though, that a tribe is a small society that has its own customs and culture and that these define it. This series has explored the notion of digital tribes and clans, and has applied these concepts to those who consistently inhabit virtual spaces. Such digital territories are ideal environments within which new forms of cultural transmission can propogate and sustain themselves. The tribes and clans I have identified, it could be argued, are emerging as a direct result of their sustained interaction with, and through, social technologies.

Attempting to categorise the behaviour of online users into distinct tribal characteristics can be problematic, because behaviour in virtual worlds (and indeed in the real world) is ultimately diverse and often chaotic or inconsistent. When observed in its entirety however, the trails of evidence emerging on the Web can readily support the notion of the virtual clan. Individuals have an inherent need to belong, so groupings will occur naturally in the real world, in families, kinship groups, clans and other social collectives. The evidence for clannish behaviour online is abundant too, as seen in the creation of specific cultural artefacts that identify distinct web user groupings. The tacit gathering around new 'digital totems' to form transient interest groups is another form of evidence (e.g. Ning, MMORPGS, Crowdvine) as is the marking out of territories through the sharing of social bookmarks, the tagging of digital objects and voting for preferences and usability (e.g. Delicious, Digg). Consistent representation of digital identity within specific tools (recall the Facebooker and Flickrite tribal differences) is yet another form of evidence for the existence of virtual clans.

It should also be acknowledged that clans tend to emerge within tribes as cutural definitions and user generation of digital artefacts become more pronounced. There may be one single digital tribe in the broadest sense of its meaning, but an analysis of the virtual world and it multitude of social networking and communication behaviours indicates that there are indeed many subsets of this large digital tribe - they are the virtual clans, and although we shift our allegiances, we may each belong to several.

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En masse, online

This post is a continuation of Wednesday's post entitled: Virtual Clans

Still other virtual clans are emerging from the cultures surrounding online leisure activities such as massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs), strategy games and transnational special interest groups that meet en masse, online. In massively multiplayer online gaming, the ‘clan’ (sometimes referred to as ‘guild’) is the name used to describe a group of individuals who play competitively against other clan groups. One very popular online role-playing game, World of Warcraft, has millions of adherents who compete seriously on a regular basis in guilds with strangers they become very familiar with but never meet face to face. MMORPG clans who engage with war games sometimes name their virtual clans after real or fictitious military divisions or armies. They may further identify themselves as members of their clan by creating uniformly themed avatars (their digital altar egos) to represent themselves within cyberspace. World of Warcraft even introduced digital tabards which could be adjusted electronically to show unique features that identify a particular guild. Members then purchase their own for their avatar to wear, thereby identifying more closely with their virtual kin group.

Furthermore, virtual clans often develop their own closed newsgroups and e-mail listings to keep their geographically distributed members informed. In MMORPGs, clans can identify themselves further by developing their own virtual territories, building businesses, and earning virtual currency (Childress & Brasswell, 2006). They can be fiercely competitive and often take immense pride in their achievements at the expense of rival clans. As virtual clans become larger and more organised they also tend to become more hierarchical, even electing their own leaders – clan chieftains, and developing their own unique ‘tags’ which can be used to visually identify themselves as clan members in text communication.

In Second Life, a 3-D multi-user virtual environment (MUVE) which at the time of writing has reached in excess of 8 million subscribers, there is a distinct differential between those SLifers who own land and commodities, and those who are simply ‘visiting’ and making use of these commodities. The traders and the consumers are a reflection of real life, so in effect, in-world experience mirrors our observations of real life. The use of avatars is a departure from real life with many SLifers participating in the practice of gender swapping. Even more strangely, some SLifers employ avatars that represent themselves as animals of all kinds, some common, some exotic. Still others choose to present themselves as fantasy figures, such as characters with Anime cartoon features, or aliens, wizards, pixies or fairies. Yet the clear distinction in Second Life is between the traders and those who purchase. The SLife tribe thus has at least two distinct clans, and it is highly likely that others will emerge as Second Life and other MUVEs become better established.

Tomorrow: The Tribal Web

Reference

Childress, M. D. and Brasswell, R. (2006) Using Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games for Online Learning. Distance Education. 27 (2), 187-196.

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Podcasting and the listening culture

On Wednesday I was over at the University of Bath, keynoting the Higher Education Academy sponsored Podcasting for Pedagogic Purposes SIG workshop on podcasting. Podcasting is quite a new technology, but its roots run deep back to the broadcasting cultures first emerging in the middle of the last century when radio was the prime method of mass communication. Podcasting taps into an even older culture of listening though - one that can be traced back into the mists of time, where tribal elders and story tellers would gather their clans around a village clearing or camp fire and pass on their values, social mores and traditions through a form of cultural transmission.

On Tuesday night I was invited out by the SIG organisers Jethro Newton, Andy Ramsden, Andrew Middleton and others. I was very pleased to spend some time too with Derek Morrison with whom I had a very interesting discussion over dinner in an excellent Indian restaurant. We were able to bring our own drinks, and we brought our own stories too. One thing Derek said stuck in my mind: He asked what would happen if universities suddenly removed their e-mail services. Very little would change for the students, we agreed. They would simply continue to communicate as usual through Facebook, Myspace, SMS and other non-institutional media. It would be the academics and other staff members who would be seriously affected. There were a lot of conversations, and as I listened, I realised that most of our conversation was indeed storytelling.

And storytelling still remains an important component of 21st century conversation. This kind of cultural transmission continues but now at a quicker pace and also in an ambient manner because it can just as easily be technologically mediated. In the Western industrialised society, we find ourselves in a situation where people expect to be able to walk out of their door, and step onto a bus or train wearing their ear-buds or head phones, listening to their favourite music, talking book or web download. Look around you as you travel to work today and you will see what I mean. The technology mediated listening culture that first emerged in the middle of the last century has come of age, and listeners can now travel through their well trodden urban landscapes whilst their imagination and emotions are stimulated by a very portable, personalised audio system. What is the untapped potential for this type of technology in education? What are the underlying psychological principles? These are questions I tackled in my keynote. The slides from my talk are below, and also available on Slideshare.

Podcasting and the Listening Culture

View more presentations from Steve Wheeler.

Related posts:

Wisdom of crowds (Andrew Middleton)
Podcasting and the listening culture (David Hopkins)
Learning through listening (Jean Jacoby)

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Virtual clans

This post is a continuation of yesterday's post entitled: Digital pervasion and loss of identity.

Virtual clannish behaviour can be observed in a number of ways, but probably most overtly in the subtly distinctive ways in which people use their mobile phones. Members of the mobile tribe can be divided into at least two clans. One clan can be observed holding their mobile phones to their ears whilst another group tends to stare at their devices. This is the audio message clan and the text message clan. The former continue to conceive of the mobile phone as having the same functionality of the fixed line telephone – ‘that’s why it’s called a phone’. The latter have made the conceptual leap of seeing the mobile phone as a multi-functional communication tool, and as we have already seen, have developed their own reduced or slang version of common language.

Another example is the social networking tribe which boasts many clans, such as the MySpace clan, the Bebo clan, the YouTube clan and so on. One particularly interesting comparison can be made between the users of Flickr and FaceBook. The Flickrite kin group generally trades in images (photographs) and members rarely identify themselves using their real names. By contrast, FaceBookers identify themselves using real names and photographs, and coalesce around groups with common interests that are wider than photographs. FaceBookers also have a reputation for being frivolous, and engage in virtual food-fights, ‘poking’ each other and sending silly notes, much akin to the naughty school children who sit in the back row of the classroom. Flickrites are more likely to trade in affirmative comments, the ‘favouriting’ of attractive images and the awarding of prizes in mutual celebration of each other’s photographic skills. FaceBookers on the other hand, are more intent on gathering together as many ‘friends’ as possible – some with strong social ties, many with weaker ties, as they are ‘friends of friends’ or simply random acquaintances.

One virtual tribe will behave in a manner that can be distinguished from other tribes. Clans on the other hand tend to be large ‘kin groups’ that generally involve themselves in an identifiably common practice, but are distinct in some way within this practice. They yet remain a part of the larger social mass of the tribe. Whereas clans represent a part of society, tribes may constitute the entire society. Virtual clans are defined more by the technology they subscribe to, and ultimately, the software they use. Although we are bombarded on all sides by advertisements and corporate images prompting us to subscribe, buy into and involve ourselves in commodities of all shapes and sizes, many of us also have infinitely more choice in what we do, the alliances we make and how we spend our money. As a result of this plethora of choice there are many virtual clans – the distinctions are often subtle, but the clans are different, inspired by different motives, identified by different artefacts and activities, and ultimately, distinguished by different aims and destinations.

Virtual youth clans spend much of their time texting each other on their mobile phones. They may identify their clan more subtlety that through the kind of mobile phone they use, its features and capabilities. They may identify as a part of a clan through the use of specific language and other symbolism. Some virtual clanships are emerging through the choice of social networking service – Bebo users are distinctly different in many small ways to their counterpart clans who subscribe to FaceBook, who are again different to those who use MySpace.

On Friday: En masse, online

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Digital pervasion and loss of identity

This is a continuation of yesterday's post entitled: Always connected.

“We are all digital now” claims Paul Longley of University College London, in a research report (BBC News, 2006). In so doing, he identifies a global digital tribe. Taking into account the fact that much of the world’s population is more than a day’s walking distance from a fixed line telephone, and even allowing for the growing trend toward mobile phone usage in developing countries, or the paucity of computers in the third world, Longley’s claim could be considered contentious. However, where applied to western industrialised nations, it musters some credibility. There is none the less a need to acknowledge the digital divides that are perpetuated wherever technology is applied. Interestingly, Longley’s claim may hold some truth when contextualised in a world where cable and satellite television channels proliferate, digital mobile communication becomes ever more pervasive, surveillance of civil movement and activity is automated, and where digital identification of individuals, commodities and services is becoming common place. The location of a global digital tribe within this landscape is a feature of interest for this chapter.

Longley’s research team identified digital tribes by their socio-economic activities and by the manner in which they used information and communication technologies. Yet there are more subtle distinctions that can be made, particularly at the perceptual and motivational levels of analysis.

There is an argument that due to the process of globalisation, national boundaries (and therefore tribal boundaries) have been eroded to the point that we are amalgamating into a homogenous mass of humanity, and where the last vestiges of tribal identity are vanishing. In essence, the forces of globalisation have amalgamated us all into one tribe. We are living in a ‘corporate age’ runs the argument, in which all of our decisions are being dictated by ‘those who have the real power’. Therefore, wherever I travel, I can find the same fast food outlets, and the same familiar chain stores where I can purchase clothing and footwear I will be comfortable wearing. I can blend into the background because I am wearing a similar style of clothing to the hundreds of other people milling around in the high street, and I will not be conspicuous, because I am eating the same food and drinking from an identical soft drink can as the natives. Have I therefore blended in to such an extent into the local culture that I lose my identity? No, my individual identity remains intact, whilst my individualism is subsumed into the social melange within which I am located. Identity and individualism are not synonymous, even though there are obvious commonalities. The identity argument may break down when it is applied to the formation of a single ‘digital tribe’, but clearly there are many personal identities represented within the tribe. It is quite possible then, that there is in fact one ‘digital tribe’ in the broadest sense of its meaning, but there are many sub-sets of this large digital tribe – what we can term ‘virtual clans’.

Tomorrow: Virtual Clans

Always connected

This is a continuation of yesterday's post entitled: The digital tribe and the network nation.

It was Howard Rheingold (2002) who coined the term ‘smart mobs’ (a play on the word 'mobile' or mobile phone) to describe individuals who work collectively and intelligently toward a mutual goal without necessarily having met. Unlike their more feral counterparts, smart mobs tend to act intelligently and with a purpose. They are distributed beings (Curtis, 2004), carrying devices that have immense computing power and telecommunication capability, enabling them to collaborate in ways which were previously inconceivable. The immediacy of their communicative ability and the ubiquity and persistence of their engagement (they are always connected) within the smart mob enable them to perform collective feats of imagination, co-operation, trading and the exploitation of aggregative mind power, beyond anything humankind has ever achieved up to this point in its history. This may appear to read as a eulogy, but in reality smart mobs are the vanguard of an influential social movement that will gather pace over the next few years and will ultimately radically change the face of education.

Smart mobs can act for the public good, for example where drivers use their mobile phones to inform a local radio station of a road traffic accident. They can also act concertedly for more nefarious purposes, such as tram or bus passengers who text their ticketless friends to warn them of the location of ticket inspectors. Some smart mob activities may be pointless to all but those who participate in the action. In recent years, a new social phenomenon has been observed, particularly in urban areas. Known as ‘flash mobs’, they are large groups of people who suddenly gather in a public place, perform some meaningless activity for a period of time, and then just as quickly disappear. The T-Mobile dance was an example of this phenomenon and there are many more examples. Flash mobs are almost always co-ordinated by one or more individuals through mass SMS texting, e-mails or other electronic message transmission methods. Technology directed flash mobs have occasionally gathered for political purposes at times of civil unrest in Romania and China, but generally their purpose is ill defined. Flash mobs have been explained as a classic example of the innate need for people to belong to a group, be privy to inside knowledge, and be able to participate in what is ‘happening’.

Rheingold also identifies a ‘thumb tribe’ which consists predominantly of those younger members of society who appear to be constantly connected to the rest of their tribe and who use ‘one thumb signalling’ via text to communicate. They belong to the larger tribe of the ‘always connected’ who are identifiable by their apparent dependency on mobile telecommunication technologies. They are clearly identified not only by the means through which they communicate, but also by the manner in which this communication is constructed, i.e their vocabulary. SMS text is constrained by a single message limit of 160 characters. To save money, txters have developed a reduced form of language made up of letters, numbers and symbols. Known as ‘squeeze text’ (Carrington, 2005) this clannish form of language changes the morphology of the language being used, with little or no loss of its semantics for those who are members of the clan. For those outside the clan however, txting can present a bewildering conundrum.

Tomorrow: Digital pervasion and loss of identity

References

Carrington, V. (2005) Txting: The end of civilisation (again?) Cambridge Journal of Education. 35 (2), 161-175.
Curtis, M. (2004) Distraction: Being human in a digital world. London: Futuretext.
Rheingold, H. (2002) Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution. Cambridge, MA: Basic Books.

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The digital tribe and the network nation

This is a continuation from yesterday's blogpost entitled: Digital Tribal Identity

I will argue here that within the present information age, where digital communication technologies have fractured the tyranny of distance beyond repair, and where computers have become pervasive and ubiquitous, identification through digital mediation has become the new cultural capital (Bordieu & Passeron, 1990). Cultural capital is the set of ‘invisible bonds that tie a community together’ (Curtis, 2004, p 72) without which societal cohesiveness begins to unravel. It is this ‘social glue’ - such mutual understandings and exchanges that occur on a daily basis – that holds together the basic building blocks of social life in which people simply ‘look out for each other’. In the real life community, people work hard to sustain such mutual exchange, and its value is instilled in them from an early age. This results in the transmission of the culture from generation to generation.

For the digital community, such tribal identification operates at least within the social and individual levels, but may be inherently more complex, transcending age, ethnicity, gender and other social divisions such as disability. Paradoxically, it is largely the individual figures within this equation who act in concert to perpetuate the social cohesion of the tribe. Even stranger in the digital age, such exchanges are conducted regularly through one or more mediating technologies.

The anthropologist Erving Goffman suggested that the performance of the self is a social act designed to regulate the impression one presents to others. Goffman’s notion of impression management in public spaces evokes the construction of the self simultaneously in the mind of the individual and in the collective mind of the audience (Goffman, 1959). We see ourselves reflected in the eyes of the other, and adjust our behaviour to conform and remain accepted by those with whom we choose to identify (Cooley, 1902).

Rheingold (2002) applies this ‘theory of being’ to the use of short message service (SMS) texting by young people – who they send texts to, and receive them from, defines an element of their social identity, as constructed by themselves in relation to the others in their SMS circle of communication. Such small friendship circles may be physical, or virtual, or a combination of both, but for the individual, this may matter little, but remains very much an essence of his or her identity as a tribal member. The content of the text message may also be secondary to the fact that the message has been sent, and the perception that the sender has been ‘thinking about you’. Such management of impression is projected through the technology to show the sender in a ‘best light’ to others.

Tomorrow: Always connected

References

Bordieu, P. and Passeron, J-C. (1990) Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. London: Sage Publications.
Cooley, C. H. (1902) Human Nature and the Social Order. New York: Scribner.
Curtis, M. (2004) Distraction: Being human in a digital world. London: Futuretext.
Goffman, E. (1959) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York: Doubleday. Rheingold, H. (2002) Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution. Cambridge, MA: Basic Books.

Digital tribal identity

Earlier this year I published an edited volume entitled 'Connected Minds, Emerging Cultures' which was a compendium of papers written by leading theorists and practitioners in the field of learning technology. Over the next few days I will present an abridged, bite size series of exerpts from one of my chapters which was entitled: 'Digital Tribes, Virtual Clans'. I hope you enjoy it and look forward to reading your comments.

Tribes use common culture to construct group identity and will employ dialects as a shared but often exclusive form of communication. The dialect of the London East End for example, is peppered with rhyming slang, whereas just a few hundred miles away, the Geordie dialect of the North East of England is heavy with accent and vocabulary that have survived from the incursions of the Norsemen several centuries before. Such linguistic devices, although deriving from different roots, both serve to exclude outsiders who attempt to enter into the circle. Thus the shared symbolism of the slang or dialect tacitly protects the tribal culture and secures its social exclusivity for its members. Communication, including speech, clothing and actions all serve to signal our cultural identities and group membership (Pahl & Rowsell, 2006). Cultural transmission is the communication of ideas. According to Dawkins (1976) key actions and thinking patterns of members of a culture are influenced by a contagious patterns of information known as ‘memes’. Memes carry no specific rules, but in effect are adopted and shared around by the tribe as a means of perpetuating that culture.

The smaller elements with the tribe, which we call clans, also employ shared symbolism. Each clan for example, has its totem, a symbol that represents it and distinguishes it from other, possibly rival clans. In primitive clans, the totem was often a representation of an animal or tree. Durkheim suggests it is easier for clan members to project their feelings of awe toward a totem than toward something that is as complex as the clan itself (Haralambos & Holborn, 1995). For digital tribes and virtual clans, the totem – the traditional rallying point for all tribal activity – is patently the world wide web. Not only are these digital spaces objects of intense interest and rallying points for the clans, they also act as transmitters of units of cultural knowledge. Several authors have argued that digital technologies and electronic networks provide perhaps the best environment for the transmission of memes (Blackmore 1999; Adar, Zhang, Adamic & Lukose, 2004). Such new literary practices of communication (Lankshear & Knobel, 2006) rely heavily on shared spaces, shared symbolism and the viral nature of the social web.

Weber originally suggested that culture should be construed as a ‘web of significance’ that was spun by the individuals who comprised the culture (Weber, 1947). Significantly, the increasing role the World Wide Web plays in the shaping of modern tribal culture causes Weber’s notion to resonate. Until recent technological innovation, people with common tribal identity lived in geographically specific locations, and considered areas of land to be their sole territory. Such territories are now being eroded due to the emergence of new digital tribes who occupy spaces located within cyberspace – a virtual space that transgresses all traditional, social and political boundaries.

Tomorrow: The digital tribe and the network nation

Related posts

When two edu-tribes go to war (Peter Ford)
Hoe verbind jij je met andere mensen op internet? (Wilfred Rubens)

References

Adar, E., Zhang, L., Adamic, L. and Lukose, R. (2004) Implicit Structure and Dynamics of Blogspace. Cited in Lankshear, C. and Knobel, M. (2006) New Literacies: Everyday Practices and Classroom Learning. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Blackmore, S. (1999) The Meme Machine. Cited in Lankshear, C. and Knobel, M. (2006) New Literacies: Everyday Practices and Classroom Learning. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Dawkins, R. (1976) The Selfish Gene. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Haralambos, M. and Holborn, M. (1995) Sociology: Themes and Perspectives (4th Edition). London: Harper Collins.
Pahl, K. and Rowsell, J. (2006) Literacy and Education: Understanding the new literacy studies in the classroom. London: Paul Chapman Publishing.
Weber, M. (1947) The Theory of Social and Economic Organisation. New York: The Free Press.

Smart talk

I'm an invited speaker at the Learning Technologies Conference at London's Olympia in January. It promises to be quite an interesting two days in the capital with keynotes from Lord David Puttnam (remember Chariots of Fire?) and Stephen Heppell, as well as a host of other social media experts including my Twitter buddies Jane Hart, Donald Clark, Barry Sampson and Mark Oehlert.

My own presentation is scheduled for Day two, where I will tackle the subject of 'New Smart Devices for Learning'. Here's the blurb from the conference website:

Smart phones are now proving themselves for learning, but what happens next with smart devices? Join Steve Wheeler as he explores how existing technologies such as GPS, cameras, light-weight projection and bar code scanning can be combined with new software to extraordinary effect. In the next few years, individual's interactions with the world, and how they learn in it, may be transformed. Steve will explore:

• Augmented reality: the short-cut to information
• The power of smart devices combined with semantic search
• Wearable learning devices - pipe dream or practical reality?
• Devices already altering how people learn: from Kindle to the TouchTable
• The challenge for L&D: adopt and understand now, or play catch up later

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Hanging in there

Socrates once said: 'I cannot teach anyone anything, all I can do is make them think'. And then there was Andrew Carnegie who said: 'People who can't motivate themselves must be content with mediocrity, no matter how impressive their other talents.' Some teachers struggle to motivate their students, and some students find it hard to concentrate for long enough to learn anything. So what is this slippery, elusive thing we call motivation? We certainly need it to do anything, anything at all. But where does motivation to learn come from and how can we capture it?

One of our Atlantis University team, Tillman Swinke, recently published a blog post called 'This time it's personal' where he deals with the subject of motivation in relation to informal learning. He remarks that learning always starts at the personal level (correct) and argues that therefore, informal forms of learning should assume more importance. Tillman then goes on to describe some of the most motivational ways to learn (e.g. my girlfriend only speaks Chinese, therefore I am motivated to learn to speak Chinese). He argues that informal learning has both intrinsic (self motivated) and extrinsic (externally imposed demands) motivation. I tend to agree but will maintain that informal learning is more reliant upon an individual's intrinsic motivation than it is by any external pressures. In other words, we learn because we are interested. When we move into the more formal aspects of learning, there the extrinsic motivation begins to be applied through a need to achieve good grades, complete successful projects and avoid falling behind your peers. The trick is to maintain an intrinsic motivation that is just as strong as if one were still learning informally.

This is one reason, I think, why personal learning environments (which tend to heavily represent informal learning approaches and are intrinsically motivated) are assuming an ever increasing importance in education. For it is within the PLE that students can truly pursue their own interests, motivate themselves to learn and generally capitalise on their personal talents and skills. It is the PLE that enables learners to transcend the often stifling nature of the institutional VLE to make their own creative choices about tool selection and formation of digital presence and identity. Now that's interesting....

Related posts

Intrinsic & extrinsic motivation and informal learning (DPhil Stuff)

What's in it for me? (Social eLearning)

There's no LMS in my PLE (Shelley Gibb @mollybob)