Effective strategies for applying multiliteracies in collaborative learning environments http://tinyurl.com/m4ow6

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Effective strategies for applying multiliteracies
in collaborative learning environmentshttp//tin
yurl.com/m4ow6

• Vance Stevens
• Petroleum Institute
• METSMaC Conference
• March 16, 2006 Abu Dhabi, UAE

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The UAE context

• Hooked to the Net by Manal Alafrangi, Gulf News,
  March 2, 2006 -

http//archive.gulfnews.com/articles/06/03/02/1002
2377.html
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The survey

• In the UAE, 1,384,800 people use the Net
• It was a YouGov survey
• 779 UAE residents answered questions on their
  online experiences.
• 33 Arab expatriates 260 (rounded, estimated)
• 33 Asian expatriates 260
• 16 Western expatriates 125
• 18 remaining ??? UAE Nationals?? 140

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Findings VOIP and blog proclivities

• As many as six out of 10 respondents said they
  are familiar with the term VoIP.
• When it was explained, an overwhelming nine out
  of 10 said they found it appealing
• With the inevitable increase in awareness and
  improvement in technology, some say restrictions
  on VoIP usage will be difficult to maintain.
• more than half the respondents were supportive
  of blogs once it was explained to them (with only
  one in 10 respondents being unsupportive).

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Findings Chat proclivities

• Net primarily used as a medium for communication
  (chat, e-mail, VoIP and blogging)
• Almost half the respondents engage in online
  messaging
• some (especially respondents aged below 21)
  considering it a good way to make new friends
• only 19 per cent of Western expatriates agree
  with this opinion (24 of the 125)
• (I think its good for making friends of
  professional contacts
• http//www.homestead.com/prosites-vstevens/files/e
  fi/chat2005/chat2005.htmelderparty_marquee

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What is (are?) multiliteracies? From
http//www.pkp.ubc.ca/multiliteracies/index.php

• The term multiliteracies was coined by the New
  London Group (1996) to highlight two related
  aspects of the increasing complexity of texts
  (reference)
• the proliferation of multimodal ways of making
  meaning where the written word is increasingly
  part and parcel of visual, audio, and spatial
  patterns
• the increasing salience of cultural and
  linguistic diversity characterized by local
  diversity and global connectedness.

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Aspects of Multiliteracies Stuart Selber.
(2004). Multiliteracies for a digital age.
Southern Illinois University Press
Multiliterate individuals can, for example

• develop file-naming schemes that can be searched
  meaningfully
• write effective email messages
• participate appropriately in asynchronous
  discussion
• analyze currency, authority, and reliability of
  website content
• generate visual images that represent data
  relationships accurately and convincingly
• situate technology in social, political, and
  economic contexts

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Connectiveness ? Connectivism

• George Siemens ConnectivismA Learning Theory
  for the Digital Age http//www.itdl.org/Journal/J
  an_05/article01.htmThe pipe is more important
  than its content
• "At first people used to say it's not the e
  that's important, it's the learning. I don't
  think that's true. I think it's the e that's
  important. It's networking, it's management, and
  it's learning how to deal with computers." - Jay
  Cross, in Abu Dhabi for an eMerging eLearning
  Conference, quoted in the Gulf News, Sept. 13,
  2004, p.6
• George Siemens Connectivism Learning as
  Network-Creation http//www.learningcircuits.org/2
  005/nov2005/seimens.htm This last has
  implications for curricula

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Implications for curricula? From
http//www.learningcircuits.org/2005/nov2005/seime
ns.htm

• Instruction is currently largely housed in
  courses and other artificial constructs of
  information organization and presentation.
  Leaving this theory behind and moving towards a
  networked model requires that we place less
  emphasis on our tasks of presenting information,
  and more emphasis on building the learners
  ability to navigate the informationor
  connectivism.
• Blogs, wikis, and other open, collaborative
  platforms are reshaping learning as a two-way
  process. Instead of presenting content/information
  /knowledge in a linear sequential manner,
  learners can be provided with a rich array of
  tools and information sources to use in creating
  their own learning pathways. The instructor or
  institution can still ensure that critical
  learning elements are achieved by focusing
  instead on the creation of the knowledge ecology.
  The links and connections are formed by the
  learners themselves.

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Manifestations in curriculum

• Examples
• The Multiliteracy Project in Canada
  http//www.pkp.ubc.ca/multiliteracies/
• Cheryl Oakess blog (an example of putting it all
  together) http//coakes50.suprglu.com/

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Impact on TEACHERS

• 4 questions to ask ourselves
• Do we teach what we know (already)?
• Or what we should know (and others appear to be
  discovering)?
• But how do we figure out what is important enough
  to teach? (given the plethora of information
  available)
• How do we learn new concepts ourselves, new
  techniques, well enough to teach them?

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How can TEACHERS stay current?

• Costly, time-bound
• Attending conferences / presentations
• Enrolling in face to face courses
• Enrolling in online courses
• Free, any-time
• Becoming involved in Communities of Practice
• Harnessing Pull information technologies as
  opposed to Push

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Communities of Practice

• A community of practice forms when participants
  in an online community evolve a working
  relationship that leads them to focus
  spontaneously on shared tasks and problems
• Constructivist
• zone of proximal development established
• scaffolding enhanced through developing
  interpersonal relationship of the participants
• Model constructivist techniques to use in
  teaching
• Friendships develop, affective filter diminished
• Training is by-product of queries, discussion

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Communities of Practice for IT

• Webheads in Action, hundreds of members since
  2002 http//webheads.info
• TESOL sanctioned EVO (Electronic Village Online)
  each January to March http//www.tesol.org

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Pull information technologies vs Push

• What IS a blog and why is it PULL?
• It runs on blog software installed on a server
  somewhere
• It allows postings
• It archives postings
• It allows comments to postings
• Crucially, it generates an RSS feedThis is WHY
  is is pull

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Pull vs Push RSS

• Jay Cross Push and Pull, Informal Learning
  February 8, 2006http//internettime.com/wordpress
  2/?p14
• Will RichardsonGave up daytime job to become
  full-time bloggerRSS Quick Start Guide for
  Educators http//www.weblogg-ed.com/rss_for_ed

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Info Management - Aggregators

• Allow you to PULL information as preferred
• Several available e.g. Bloglines
• Stephen's Bloglines links http//www.bloglines.co
  m/public/downes
• Suggestion
• Have students address some assignments in blogs,
• have their postings appear in your / each others
  aggregators as they are made

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Why blog?

• Anyone can publish
• Students have a voice, an audience
• For both students and teachers conducive to
  Communities of Practice
• For serious bloggers Instant communication.
  Echoes reverberate around the world, literally
• An up-to-date and critical literature
  emergesSpontaneous, creative commons

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Are blogs the new literature?

• Stephens Web http//downes.ca (in hiatus)
• Will Richardson, Weblogg-ed
• Jodie Fraser Edublogs
• Harold Jarches Conversations at the intersection
  of learning, work technology http//www.jarche.c
  om
• James Farmer
• George Siemens
• Jay Cross, Internet Time Blog
• Etc.etc. (easily found in Google searches and
  references to one another)

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What kinds of BLOGS are there?

• Standard blogs like Blogger
• Photo blogs like Buzznet
• HTML Blogs like Live Journal
• Audio blogs
• Video blogs
• Podcasts

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Podcasting characteristics

• Work through blogs
• Essentially, audio postings to blogs
• Thus, can be harvested through RSS
• Can be downloaded for listening later
• Podogogical resources
• Randy Merediths Podogogy http//www.podagogy.com/
  pedagogy.html
• Learncasting Podogogy in Language Teaching
  03-04-2006 by Graham Stanley, Allan Carrington
  and Randy Meredith http//home.learningtimes.net/
  learningtimes?go1151315

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The Voice

• Michael Coghlan Is Voice Online for You?
  http//users.chariot.net.au/michaelc/mater/easy_
  voice.htm
• Michaels Podomatic voice synthesis
  testhttp//michaelc.podomatic.com/entry/2006-01-
  19T05_36_13-08_00
• Finding your Voice Online An Inquiry into the
  Use of Online Voice Applications in Higher
  Education by Michael Coghlanhttp//www.elearn.wa.
  edu.au/kt/edition05/download/Coghlan.pdf

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Podcast and other voice examples

• Aiden Yehs http//www.aidenyeh.podomatic.com
• Students post speeches
• others respond with recorded comments
• Odeo and Springdoohttp//odeo.com/a/UE66smL4kL3fl
  KZHCP6f8ibGLmlwQ8PO5iK4xjff/cmnt6800

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Other content managers

• Moodle e.g. Multiliteracies for Collaborative
  Learning Environments http//www.opensource.idv.tw
  /moodle/course/view.php?id23
• Elgg e.g. http//www.eflbridges.com
• Facebook (see Wikipedia http//en.wikipedia.org/wi
  ki/Facebook_(website)
• Bedo (see Emma Duke-Williams, Show and tell
  online http//www.tech.port.ac.uk/staffweb/duke-w
  ie/blog/?p390

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Content management and CoPs

• What do Learning Mgmt Systems do?
• host some kind of content
• Provide teachers means of manipulating content
• provide means of access of that content
• Track student progress
• Foster communities when they
• allow users to maintain their own profiles
• associate faces with events
• allow tagging http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Del.ici
  o.us
• It might host users blogs

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Characteristics of content mgmt 2.0

• Free
• Open Source http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-sou
  rce_software
• Creative Commonshttp//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crea
  tive_Commons
• You can set them up on your own server Venny
  Su. (2005) An Open Source Portal for Educators.
  TESL-EJ Vol. 9. No. 1, On the Internet
  http//tesl-ej.org/ej33/int.html

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Web 2.0 ? eLearning 2.0

• Links to lists of tools
• Graeme Daniel, Web 2.0 and Education (Feb 14,
  2006) in WWWTools for Education
  http//m.fasfind.com/wwwtools/m/2756.cfm?x0rid2
  756
• Stephen Downes From EduBlogs to the Collective
  Consciousness Director's Cut http//downes.jot.co
  m/WikiHome
• Some I use
• YahooGroups e.g. http//groups.yahoo.com/group/efi
  webheads/
• Frappr e.g. slide show at http//wiaoc.org
• PBWiki e.g. http//baw-06.pbwiki.com/

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Other technologies

• Tony Vincents http//www.learninginhand.com/
• iPod-learning http//www.epic.co.uk/content/resour
  ces/white_papers/iPod.htm
• Duke University, in the US, has distributed iPods
  to 1650 new students, pre-loaded with useful
  orientation information.
• Students can download from the Duke Web site,
  similar to iTunes, where they will find
  orientation schedules, audio books, language
  lessons, lectures, even the University song!
• Curtis Bonks OOPS, Did I mean to share that
  Opensource, Opencourseware, and the learning
  objects of tomorrow https//www.elluminate.com/sit
  e/pmtg.jnlp?psidd2036466210.348289 ? (recorded
  presentation with numerous examples)
• Kerry Hargreavesshttp//web.mac.com/kerryhargre
  aves/iWeb/Site/Photos202.html

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Conclusion

• Those concerned about the decreasing half-life of
  information see little point (apart from the
  pleasure of paging through glossy photos) in
  subscribing to magazines or any other media that
  has a production run that delays news getting to
  you when you can get instantly updated constantly
  through the blogosphere. 
• The blogosphere has emerged as the library of
  quality and of record, and it's not all text, but
  decidedly multimedia (aud-blogs, video-blogs). 
• Being multiliterate means knowing where the
  library IS in the first place, and then
  organizing access to it, then utilizing and
  interacting with it. 

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PP 107 Multiliteracies for Collaborative
Learning Environments

• This presentation has been developed over the
  course of two years teaching online in the TESOL
  Certificate Program Principles and Practices of
  Online Teaching
• http//www.homestead.com/prosites-vstevens/files/e
  fi/papers/tesol/ppot/portal2005.htm
• Presenter information http//vance.webheads.info