Harold Jarche

Innovation Research in a Nutshell

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Dave Pollard gives us one more great synthesis for our business tool kits. In his latest post, he has summarized the key points of Michael Porter, Peter Drucker, and Clayton Christensen regarding their approaches to innovation research

I like all three models — Porter’s, Drucker’s, and Christensen’s — and if I were to be assigned to do some innovation research today, I would use a combination of all three approaches, looking at the markets, and potential markets, and the forces that drive them, from all three perspectives. That way you can actually get a ‘3-D’ forecast of the future of your, or your client’s, business or industry, or the entire economy.

This area of practice is of significant interest to me, and I recommend not only Dave’s analysis, with its diagrams, but each referenced book.

Open Source in Education: A European Perspective

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Just perused this 91 page PDF (now available as HTML) produced by Teemu Arina and Timo Tervo of the FLOSSE Posse. This is an excellent overview of many trends affecting online learning. It covers everything from the long tail, power law, connectivism, small world networks, blogs and wikis. It’s a bit short on detail, but if you’re familiar with these concepts, then it’s a fast read. If you’re not familiar with these concepts, then read the references.

The second part of the presentation covers the results of a workshop on open source in education and discusses a number of future scenarios that were ranked by the participants, for instance:

100% [of workshop participants] agreed:


Rip, Mix and Learn is the new metaphor for constructing learning objects

Amateur audio and video enters learning
Connectiveness a core competency
ePortfolios focusing on capturing informal learning appear

These will give you an idea of what has traction on the other side of the pond in the OS world. Most of the paper is CC licensed and there are a lot of interesting diagrams. Definitely a keeper for your digital archives.

Learning Networks – The New Framework

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Stephen Downes presented a work in progress in Palermo this week, Learning Networks – Theory & Practice. In order to better understand it myself, I have put my notes up here, but please listen to Stephen’s audio file and look at his slide presentation. This presentation begs for a lot more discussion. What follows is my summary and any errors or omissions are my own:

First of all, traditional online learning has been institution-based, consisting of online courses, learning management systems, and closed networks of licensed content. Content is seen in terms of course packs and learning design linearly sequencing.

On the other hand, learning networks are not institution-based but resource-based within an open network. On the Web, content is not packaged but aggregated. E-learning is more of an
engagement and a conversation than an event.

From these premises, Stephen has developed several learning network design principles (works in progress he says) that specify how networks differ from traditional learning. These can be used as a means of evaluating new technology, to determine whether it is network-centric (see the slides for details).

  1. Decentralization
  2. Distribution
  3. Disintermediation
  4. Disaggregation
  5. Dis-integration
  6. Democratization
  7. Dynamism

These principles are based on Connectivism (see George Siemens’ post) and Stephen also links these principles to what Robert Paterson has written in Going Home: Our Reformation:

E-Learning has been based on centralized systems

But these centralized systems, such as the LMS, are like a dysfunctional crutch –
There’s so much going on out there – you have to leave the cocoon and experience the web.
Stop trying to do online what you do in the classoom – it’s a different world online.

My own opinion is that the Web offered a lot of options for learner control, but this was co-opted by technology vendors and institutions. For instance, there are still “web-based learning program” that disable your browser’s navigation functions.

The fact is that the genie is out of the bottle, and we are in the metaphorical process of casting off the horseless carriage and adopting the automobile. Stephen’s framework, Rob’s vision and George’s pedagogy provide some of the foundation and now there are new tools, such as DrupalED, coming out of the artisans’ workshops to help us implement this framework. Allons-y!

DrupalED Now Available

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Boris and Will are two of the founding members of a new site called DrupalED with an aggregated edtech feed.

DrupalED is a distribution that combines core Drupal.org with a selection of modules optimized for use in educational settings. These range from K-12 to university, as well as per-class, per-department, and per-institution scenarios.

It is free, open source, libre, and available for you.

I think that this one is going to grow :)

Update: Please read Will’s comment to this post.

Architecture for a better future

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Dave Pollard produces more thought-provoking articles than almost anyone else on the Web. I have used his Natural Enterprise model to inform my own work in developing better business models for small businesses, and now Dave has started to put many of his ideas together in his latest post, Creating a Post-Civilization Culture. His framework consists of four components – Principles, Learning, Enablers & Infrastructure. The premise is that,

With the right principles that can guide our decisions, the learnings to build the new culture properly, and the enabling building blocks, we can create the infrastructure that embodies the new culture.


This framework, coupled with Robert Paterson‘s narrative on the next Reformation, could sow the seeds for some grassroots action. It may be just what we need at the local level to address our own community’s sustainabilty issues.

Provinent Acquires LearnStream

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Provinent, headquartered in Toronto, with its development shop in Fredericton has just purchased LearnStream, another Fredericton company. From the press release:

Provinent Corporation, Canada’s leader in e-learning consulting and custom e-learning content development, announced today that it has acquired New Brunswick based LearnStream, a pioneer in e-learning courseware development.

I wonder if we’ll be seeing any more mergers and acquisitions this year?

“A Learning Blogosphere”

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A recurring theme here and elsewhere is that decentralized Web 2.0 technologies are better than older, centralized technologies (e.g. LMS & LCMS) in enabling learning on the Web. Here is an interesting story about a University of Michigan class that implemented blogs for learning, beginning about a year ago. The first installment from the Community Engine Blog is now posted:

Milestone 4 – Why blog instead of using technology X?

This question came mainly from academics who had invested in some previous computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) system. Nonetheless, it also came from students and is a reasonable question. Should we adopt new technologies because they are new? As I hope this tale illustrates, adopting new technologies is costly.

My answer is this. By design, blogging allows individuals to raise topics of interest and create threads of conversation without having to ask anyone’s permission. That was an explicit design consideration for this course; I wanted to know what was going on with students. Bulletin boards tend to be top-down and are owned by one person. Wikis force you to go through a social filter. Others can edit your pages or even delete them.

Second, because blogging also produces XML-based feeds, it is very easy to aggregate all of the individual contributions in one place while still maintaining individual attribution. Third, the XML-based feeds in blogs allow me to join people and resources to my group vs. having to get them to join me. Note, I did ask permission of everyone whose feed I aggregated into our site, but they did not have to go through a sign-on process and explicitly produce content for the site. By localizing content creation, blogs make it possible to ask permission and get a coherent stream of content.

The lessons learnt in this case provide some guidance to anyone implementing blogs for education today. Some of the obstacles were due to the fact that this class was just slightly ahead of the technology adoption curve, but their experiences can now inform many others embarking on similar trips. The numerous trackbacks & comments attest to the value of these experiences being posted.

In the space of a year, blogs for learning have moved from the bleeding edge to the leading edge.

Tagback

Mrs Blash’s Home and School Communicator

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I have frequently mentioned how a blog would make home and school communication very simple. Well Debbie Blash, a school Principal, has started a blog:

Welcome to Mrs Blash’s home and school communicator. It is hoped that through this blogger that we will be able to improve home and school communication. Please feel free to contact me through this site.

It’s on Blogger, so it’s free and it seems so obvious that I wonder why more schools (like ours) have not adopted the medium. Mrs Blash is obviously new to blogging, but she has taken the plunge in order to further communication – bravo! In our town we have "Talk Mail" using the telephone system, but not much on the Internet. Maybe soon …

Well-prepared for old age

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Milton Glaser on "10 Things I Have Learned (2002)"

IF YOU HAVE A CHOICE NEVER HAVE A JOB.

One night I was sitting in my car outside Columbia University where my wife Shirley was studying Anthropology. While I was waiting I was listening to the radio and heard an interviewer ask ‘Now that you have reached 75 have you any advice for our audience about how to prepare for your old age?’ An irritated voice said ‘Why is everyone asking me about old age these days?’ I recognised the voice as John Cage. I am sure that many of you know who he was – the composer and philosopher who influenced people like Jasper Johns and Merce Cunningham as well as the music world in general. I knew him slightly and admired his contribution to our times. ‘You know, I do know how to prepare for old age’ he said. ‘Never have a job, because if you have a job someday someone will take it away from you and then you will be unprepared for your old age. For me, it has always been the same every since the age of 12. I wake up in the morning and I try to figure out how am I going to put bread on the table today? It is the same at 75, I wake up every morning and I think how am I going to put bread on the table today? I am exceeding well prepared for my old age’ he said.

Glad to know that being a freelancer is preparing me for my old age ;-)

Via BoingBoing