Our formal education does not account any social learning. But this type of learning takes place through our lives, including the years of formal education. I encourage you to share the best examples of social learning from your personal experience.
I participate once in awhile in MOOCs (massive open online courses). My best experience of social learning perhaps was the second edition of Connectivism and Connective Learning in the 2009, leaded by Stephen Downs and George Siemens. I hope Patrick will mention those two names in his session about learning theories (even if affiliation of connectivism with the learning theories is easily questionable). That was one of the first courses conducted in this format. I was impressed by the number of people participating, the internationality, technology used [daily news received via email, interaction via forum in Moodle, weekly synchronous session, everybody was supposed to write a blog and share it with the others via the RSS feed, social bookmarking]. I have just finished my second studies at the ‘Formal University’, and the possibility of interacting with founders of the theory, so easily, so directly, so openly amazed me most. What else I remember is a freedom of choice how much I want to participate, but on the other hand a responsibility I had for my own learning experience. There was a big flow of information which was difficult to control, so I needed to find my way and place in the course. Nobody have sent me a certificate that I “successfully completed the course”, but I learned a lot and felt inspired to explore more on my own.
Key elements that make me think of that experience a successful one:
- Feeling of participation in an international community.
- Various technology used (maybe at the time too overwhelming).
- Different levels of participation allowed (I was mostly reading, as I had little time to contribute).
- Direct interaction with experts (teachers at my university seemed so much more distant even if on-site).
- Course was massive an open but had a certain rhythm and routine embedded too (daily emails, weekly synchronous sessions).
- The format encouraged reflexivity about the learning experience and my own understanding of the topic via blog (I wish I used it more...).
- Spirit of sharing and exchanging resources, thoughts, experiences and learning together.
There is certainly more.
Linus Torvalds (the creator of the open source operating system - Linux) states that there are just a few factors that drive people to do things: survival, social life, entertainment. He says that those motivations are progressive [“The hacker ethic” by P. Himanen]. It is perhaps too simplistic to narrow the motivation of human actions to those categories only. However it somehow makes me think about formal vs. social learning. Maybe formal education will progress and promote more often an entertainment, exciting, challenging and interesting experiences, instead of a survival course?
Maja
Thank you for such thoughtful reflection, Maja. Survival, social life,entertainment? Hm... Simplistic, yes, but can you think of anything else that motivates us for learning and doesn't fit to the scheme? We had some groupwork at a seminar recently, and we had a marketologist in our group who said the most powerful motivators in marketing are fear, pride and greed. Quite cynical. I could link fear to survival, and to a certain extent pride to social life, but then the principles diverge... Greed as motivation to learning? Any ideas? Maybe collecting digital badges on the learning path would exploit some of this feeling? And then showing them off has definitely something to do with pride...
Actually, I think I can simplify it even more. I read the same thing as Maja in Torvald's introduction to The Hacker Ethic, and it made me think about the work I've done on aesthetics. In the end, I think it is all about connections--making and understanding the connections between things is a powerful drive. Connections serve us in all those ways--we connect with other people (social life), with the world (survival), and with the stories and sensations around us (entertainment). Fear is what we feel when we are disconnected (or about to be :).Greed and pride? I don't buy it. Those are just excessive and possessive forms of wanting connection. Not all of us are driven by those.
Learning is all about finding and making connections between ideas and between ourselves and the world around us. Because we do that best with other people, we are driven to take part in social learning activities. It used to be only in the classroom, but now it is becoming more prominent online. Education 2.0 is about opening up to those new means of connections.
Pat
Hi Eduard,
You asked what else motivates us for learning and doesn't fit to the scheme... I think an example is how we welcome people onto a course.
First impressions during a face-to-face course set the tone for the whole course, and an effective welcome creates a sense of belonging and trust, if done in a sincere and natural way. The welcome could be as simple as a greeting on arrival, or as elaborate as a prepared ice-breaker/team-building activity.
Here's a question: what is the online equivalent of a welcoming smile as a learner enters the room for a face-to-face course?
Cheers,
Chris
Hi Chris,
Good point. Nothing beats it :) But we can be welcoming and inclusionary all the same. Pre-course material, intro videos, and virtual coffee mornings between stakeholders all help. Doesn't it also come back to Androgogy (excuse my rant, i have a thing against the word pedagogy in our environment) Where learners are ideally attending because they want to rather than they have to. That they are taking responsibility for their own learning path and are motivated,disciplined and ready to embrace deep rather than strategic learning. If those things are in place then I feel we can address the welcoming in lots of different ways. Even to the extent of online games (that are relevant) or even I loved the open uk second life welcome to the course areas..... Kiwi ingenuity will always fine a way :)
Apart from the Eumetcal Workshops (!), I think my best social learning experience was when I first started as a forecaster. Looking back I think this may be due to the following:
- We were a group of six people, all of us fresh out of school with our degrees and ready to start our career as weather forecasters: motivated and happy to have a job!
- A separate room and computers were set-up just for us, but with most of the authentic tools used operationally. No technical problems.
- The same teacher throughout the basic training period, who was a forecaster as well = recognized our needs.
- A bit of competition: after a while we started to issue forecasts, and compared them with the operational forecasts and observations. (Fun)
Indeed the social part was important because we could relate to each other and share impressions and problems.
Erik