For those that know me well, I’m a proud papa to three young goats aged 8, 6 and 4. My beloved is also in the education ranks (we met in Montreal through our B.Ed program at McGill University) so our goats have little choice in the matter of an all-education smorgasbord upbringing. The goats may end up demented, but that’s another story. I’ve got a story to share for any education institution at any level out there that believes learning isn’t part formal, informal and social. This past Sunday, around 3:30pm in the afternoon, the 8 year-old cracks open a formal learning asset (a book on science experiments) and shouts, “Hey Cate, let’s do an experiment.” Cate is the precocious 4 year-old. Claire, the 8
social learning Archive
According to Philip Schiller, Apple’s Senior Vice-President of Worldwide Marketing and Eddy Cue, Apple’s Senior Vice-President of Internet Software and Services, there are: over 1.5 million iPads in use in education institutions over 1,000 one-to-one iPad deployments in K-12 schools over 700 million downloads at iTunes U over 500,000 audio or video offerings available on iTunes U over 1,000 universities and colleges around the world using iTunes U over 20,000 ‘education and learning’ applications available for iPad Today’s announcement by Apple launching iBooks 2, iBooks Author and an iTunes U App had me thinking all along … we’ve come full circle. If you think back to the late 80’s, through the 90’s and arguably at the onset of the new millennium, Apple was primarily an
The problem I see on the horizon for leaders, teachers and parents is what I’m referring to as the anti-social social dilemma. I believe I am social media, social networking and social learning’s number one fan. I also strongly believe that IT, HR and Learning leaders should be experimenting with up and coming social sites to a) keep abreast of what’s going on in the social space to b) determine if such feature or functionality could assist business processes, sales or internal engagement opportunities. For example, have you ever heard of TimeHop, Pinterest, Bump.com or Wooplr? Savvy leaders will stay ahead of the ‘social’ chasm and ensure they are plugged in to reap downstream benefits. But therein lies the problem. No matter what generation we’re
While I was enjoying a separation from the external world of social media this past summer, George Siemens of Athasbasca University, authored a very stirring if not controversial post entitled “Losing interest in social media: there is no there there“. After finally dusting off my mental cobwebs and getting around to reading articles, research and blog posts that I missed over the summer, George’s post was, by far, the one that got me thinking the most. At over 80 comments strong, (mostly professional, some venomous) it seems to have ignited a rather distinctive debate. Is social media simply used to emote, distribute, vent and network or is it also used to enhance the knowledge base and thus to further the cognitive depth of society? Is it substantive?