Technology and Tomorrow’s University

George SiemensTechnology Enhanced Knowledge Research Institute

Athabasca UniversityMay 13, 2010Presented to:

Technology & knowledgeMore is differentControl shiftCoherence & LearningScholarshipUniversity’s Value Points

Technology & knowledgeMore is differentControl shiftCoherence & LearningScholarshipUniversity’s Value Points

Social MediaSocial Networked LearningInternet of things: “central nervous systems for

the planet”Analytics

“What we have here is a transition from a stable, settled world of knowledge produced by authority/authors, to a world of instability, flux, of knowledge produced by the individual”

Kress and Pachler, 2007

Everything is Explicit

Technology & knowledgeMore is differentControl shiftCoherence & LearningScholarshipUniversity’s Value Points

More is differentPW Anderson

The diminishing cost of data

Big data, Analytics, Data visualization

Abundance “will challenge decision-support processes which are based on ‘ordered’ knowledge”

DCDC Global Strategic Trends

Technology & knowledgeMore is differentControl shiftCoherence & LearningScholarshipUniversity’s Value Points

Transition: control and capacity to shape

From . to /

www.you.com

twitter.com/you

facebook.com/you

ustream.tv/user/you

foursquare.com/user/you

www.whatever.com/you

Contrast

moodle.youruniversity.com

with

allovertheweb.com/yourlearner

We have created spaces instead of connections

Technology & knowledgeMore is differentControl shiftCoherence & LearningScholarshipUniversity’s Value Points

Porous learning: not confined to classrooms or life stages

Networked learning doesn’t have a centre

But…

We need “centering” to understand

We need “centering” to makesense

We need “centering” to see patterns

We need “centering” to share

Social and technological networks for coherence making

Social and technological networks for sensemaking

Social and technological networks for wayfinding

Challenging the “efficient market hypothesis” of learning

Community as curriculumDave Cormier, 2008

Curriculum as computation

Edfutures/CCK08/09

Technology & knowledgeMore is differentControl shiftCoherence & LearningScholarshipUniversity’s Value Points

Your “findability” factorGráinne Conole

Technology & knowledgeMore is differentControl shiftCoherence & LearningScholarshipUniversity’s Value Points

Universities map realityFrank & Gabler (2006)

Online learning is “kind of destabilizing the mechanisms by which we produce the elite in our society”

Christopher Edley, Dean, Berkeley Law School, University of California http://chronicle.com/article/In-Crisis-U-of-California/65445/

New value points?

Content? No

Research? Yes

“Scholarship in higher education in this century has to be irrevocably tied to the technology and knowledge media that constitute such important drivers in the society of which we are a part.”

Gourley, 2008

Teaching? No (unless it’s personal, mentoring)

Credentialing? Yes

Innovation in credentialing is an important value point for universities to explore

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Social Networks & Learning (June 21-25, 2010)https://tekri.athabascau.ca/dr_seminar/

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