Creating a personal learning environment

Don’t stay limited
Online learners may not be aware that a Learning Management System (LMS) like Blackboard’s limits the learner. Wilson et al., (2006) contend that it does not support lifelong learning, lifewide learning or personalisation. LMSs are asymmetrical in that the tools to organise and create are richer for teachers than for learners and the scope to create, participate and take control of one’s learning is limited to the confines of the institution’s own educational platform.

The LMS course-centric model offers all learners the same experience of the system and all see the same content organised in the same way with the same tools, say the authors. This is not unlike the education model that emphasises the common experience of learners within a context (like a school or university). While there have been attempts to create links to learning products and services on other platforms, the closed nature of the LMS discourages open sharing of content and is not available to the outside world or to learners after they leave a course. Such limitations restrict the drive towards lifelong and lifewide learning argue Wilson et al., (2006).

Let’s get personal
The Personal Learning Environment (PLE), on the other hand, connects learners to a wide range of services offered by organisations and individuals enabling both formal and informal learning. Instead of limiting learners to interact with a single software, PLEs enable learners to support their goals with access to devices (laptops, mobile phones, portable media devices), applications (newsreaders, instant messaging clients, browsers, calendars) and services (social networking services, weblogs, wikis).

PLE favours symmetrical relationships where any user is able to both consume and publish their own resources, manage contexts and adopt tools to suit their needs. It reaches beyond the scope of what’s offered by institutions and allows sharing of resources, not protecting them. PLE emphasises the use of creative commons licenses enabling editing, modification, and republishing of resources (The Power of Open). Creative commons licence holders can share and collaboratively build textbooks, lectures, and lesson plans, for example.

Implications for teaching and learning
In an environment where data is everywhere and needs only to be located, there is greater value placed on skills that enable fast and accurate access to information and the ability to discern authoritative content from noise. Teaching in PLEs is less about transmitting knowledge and more about engaging collaboratively in collecting, orchestrating, remixing and integrating information into knowledge building. Learners too will spend less time collecting information and more time reflecting upon the specific tools and resources that will lead to a deeper engagement with content.



References
Wilson, S., Liber, O., Johnson, M., Beauvoir, P., Sharples., P & Milligan, C. (2006). Personal learning environments: Challenging the dominant design of educational systems. Retrieved from http://dspace.ou.nl/bitstream/1820/727/1/sw_ectel.pdf

Creative Commons (undated). The power of open. Retrieved on 11 Aug 2011 from http://creativecommons.org/

Educators Guide to Innovation. (undated). Personalised Learning Environment. Retrieved on 11 Aug 2011 from http://guidetoinnovation.ning.com/profile/paultozer

Online learning from online games

Bring out your toys, it’s time to learn
It is time adult learners discovered the joy of playing video games, or rather explored screen-based games as a learning environment. Screen-based games in the context of this blog cover games played on computers and all other electronic devises with a screen and controller. Shaffer, Squire, Halverson and Gee (2004) argue that video games are not just toys or a route for computer literacy. It also allows learners to immerse in rich virtual worlds and assume the powerful identities that inhabit them. A Deus Ex player, for instance, can experience life as a government special agent who uses state-sponsored violence to fight terrorism. In Sims Online, players learn to run political systems complete with the power to overhaul the police force and judicial system.

Making it real
Such environments make games powerful contexts for learning, developing social practices and situated understanding, contend Shaffer et al. (2004), concepts in situated learning theory. Situated learning emphasises learning in an authentic environment that parallels real-world situations. Learners engage in context, culture, activities and social interactions related to the authentic learning activity.

Group learning is intense
Multiplayer online games create robust game playing communities that bring players together competitively and cooperatively, into the virtual world of the game, and the social community of game players, note Shaffer et al. (2004). Barton & Tusting (2005) define communities of practice as a theory of learning where new technologies provide ways for learning in groups who are distributed by distance. In the game Civilization, for example, whose objective is to build an empire, players share game expertise, post news feeds, participate in discussion forums, trade screenshots, exchange game files and even run their own university to develop complex game skills. Lave & Wenger (1991) believe that virtual worlds integrate knowing and doing. Games bring together "ways of knowing, ways of doing, ways of being, and ways of caring: the situated understandings, effective social practices, powerful identities, and shared values that make someone an expert" (Shaffer et al.2004, p.7).