ICWL conference, submission deadline extended (May 10 and 17!)

ICWL is an annual international conference on web-based learning. This year it is taking place on 6-9 October 2013, in Kenting, Taiwan http://icwl2013.tajen.edu.tw

• Abstract submission deadline: May 10, 2013 (Extended)
• Paper submission deadline: May 17, 2013 (Extended)

*CALL FOR PAPERS*

The conference program consists of high quality technical papers that are reviewed and selected by an international program committee. Papers are solicited on all technical aspects of web-based learning and related technologies, including but not limited to the following topics:

• Personalized and Adaptive Learning
• Computer Support for Intelligent Tutoring
• Intelligent Tools for Visual Learning
• Web-based Learning for Oriental Languages Learning
• Game-based Learning
• Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
• Computer Supported Collaborative Learning
• Web 2.0 and Social Learning Environments
• HTML5 Web-based Learning
• Intelligent Learner and Group Modeling
• Learning Analytics
• Human Factors and Affective Computing for Learning
• E-Learning Platforms and Tools
• Design, Model and Framework of e-Learning Systems
• Deployment, Organization and Management of Learning Objects
• E-Learning Metadata and Standards
• Semantic Web and Ontologies for E-learning
• Mobile, Situated and Blended Learning
• Cloud-based Learning
• Pedagogical Issues
• Practice and Experience Sharing

The submission web page is:http://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=icwl2013.

No wonder teachers love technology! - a nice way to tell the story

This is a really nice way to tell the results of an interesting study.

Mind you, I didn't properly check the study set-up, who was surveyed and how. I was right away compelled by the visual representation of the story and felt like sharing it ;)




Attribution to OnlineUniversities.com 

Open Review to enhance qualtiy of e-learning

I have a honor to serve in the Editorial Board of INNOQUAL, the International Journal for Innovation and Quality in Learning. Why I'm specially interested in this journal is that it is an open access and open peer-reviewed journal!

So now you can also contribute a review, how cool is that? The INNOQUAL inaugural journal will be published in April 2013 and you are encouraged to openly comment on our discussion papers, which are candidates for the issue.

Read the short guidelines here: http://innoqual.efquel.org/discussion-paper/

About the International Journal for Innovation and Quality and in Learning
It provides an international perspective on the theory and practice of innovation and quality in the field of learning at all educational levels and in all training contexts. It focuses on the relation between innovation and quality in education. INNOQUAL seeks contributions which discuss how technology can contribute to innovate and enhance the quality of learning.

eTwinning and citizenship: Panel discussion

The annual eTwinning conference took place in Lisbon last week. This event gathers together around 500 new and already established eTwinners to celebrate the success of last years' project collaboration, to network and to learn new ideas in workshops.

During the last day, I moderated a panel discussion on eTwinning and how it links with citizenship and school collaboration in general, and on the impact of eTwinning. You can find a blog post about the panel at the conference blog: http://conference2013.etwinning.net/panel-discussion-reflections-on-etwinning/.
  

I also co-moderated two PD workshop on Online groups with Irene Pateraki who runs one of the most successful eTwinning Group and with Brian Holmes who had studied eTwinning Online Events for his PhD . I will post a link to the presentations shortly.

Network visualisations of LLP project organisations

This visualisation allows you to see how a number of European organisations (about one thousand) are connected to each other through the involvement in the LLP programmes between 2006-2009.

Below you can explore the data. The first image is a static image and it shows how the institutions are clustered. We can see that there is lots of small clusters and one major one.

 

In the live image below, you should be able to zoom into the image and explore the clusters (note, you need a mouse for that!).

Once the report becomes public, I will share more about it.  In case it does not work, here is the link to ManyEyes: http://www-958.ibm.com/software/data/cognos/manyeyes/visualizations/llp-projects-and-networks-connecti-2.

The future of learning: Get on with it by Sugata Mitra

Hands down, Sugata Mitra is the most inspiring person in education today, as he was yesterday and will be in the future. I have no doubt about it. Period.

I've had a pleasure to see his talks twice, the first time in spring 2008 and the last time in winter 2010. At both times, it also happened that we had some time to talk together. Those talks have been so formative to me.

To give an example, the first time I met him it was in a shady hotel bar in Romania. He was the keynote speaker of the event, and when my colleague introduced us, I had no idea who this small, round-faced Indian man was. I had not looked at the programme, I had not heard the buzz and anyway, I was not expecting too much.

With a couple of moments he had my full attention, he was telling me that he was a physicist  - we were in an education conference! And that he considered kids self-organising themselves around a computer when learning like electrons self-organise around atom's nucleus. I loved the idea! And the next day, I loved his talk! I still have a recording of it somewhere. Some years later, so it goes, self-organising appeared as a central theme of my doctoral thesis!

Enjoy the talk!
Ps. I found another posting that I wrote about him in 2008 at FlossePosse with the recording.

The use of atlas vs. google maps - discussion

You might have heard this type of argumentation before:

"the state of the ICT use in school is so outdated. My kids still need to use an atlas in school to find the Sahara desert, whereas at home they just use google maps". 

Yesterday, while listening to a panel discussion at the event called "Filling the gaps: e-Skills & Education for Digital Jobs - Launch of a Grand Coalition for Digital Jobs", this argument, once again, was used to blame, among other things, the skills shortage in IT industry.

I find myself getting slightly annoyed when people use this type of argumentation. For one thing, I find, they usually are people who make these blanket statements about the state of the ICT use in schools only based on what happens in their own kids' schools. But that's besides my main point which is that both using an atlas and google maps to find out where the Sahara desert is are valuable information seeking skills. Those skills are not excluding one another. Learning various information seeking strategies is valuable per se and should be a skill thought at school.

Second, to bring it back to the e-Skills discussion, if the kid never learns how to use an index such as the one found in paper-based atlas, she might not be in the best place to design or invent that next fancy search algorithm that will beat PageRank by Page and Brin. Until PageRank, most of the search engines on the web were mere indices. Knowing how they work, and knowing how academic citations work, a new algorithm was invented that changed lots of things for the web. 

Third, about two decades into e-learning (or what ever term you would like to use), it's disappointing to hear that people/general audience still understand the use of ICT in education as doing the same old stuff, e.g. using a map, but just by using a digital tool instead of an analogue one. By now, we know that with such e-learning, kids do write more, more often and more efficiently. Which is nice too.

But that's not anything that transforms education. That's nothing that is harnessing the power of the web and ICTs for something that you could not do with analogue means so easily. Think of authentic opportunities to learn about new countries, culture and languages through ICT-enabled school collaboration. The new ways that you can discover big data available on the web thanks to information visualisation and other cool tools. Think of opportunities to discover space and follow up Mars exploration...I wish those were the inspiring examples that people talked about in these rare occasions that the use of ICTs in education is discussed in such panels.  

  

Big Data - not only for the rich

The BBC features a really nice 5 minute video on the topic of Big Data.

Data is increasingly defining us - from the information we share on the web, to that collected by the numerous companies with whom we interact. Intrigued by the sheer scales involved, photojournalist Rick Smolan wanted to see how data was transforming the world.

Here, as part of the BBC News - What If? season, take a look at his global snapshots - compiled in his book The Human Face of Big Data.

This is also a topic that we are thinking for education, too! But for the moment, finding such appealing examples of what good big data can do for education is still limited. That said, it does not mean that they are not worth investigating for! Learning Analytics is one application area of Big Data in the field of education. I'm just writing a book chapter with Professor Bettina Berendt on the topic - more about that in another post.    

Call for Papers on Advanced Learning Technologies, Open Educational Content, and Standards

I have a pleasure to be part of the Programme Committee of this sub-conference taking place in November 2013.

Advanced Learning Technologies, Open Educational Content, and Standards as part of International Conference on Computers in Education 2013 focuses on recent directions for the alignment of learning technologies, open contents, standards and their rising impact for research, growth and societal change. To accelerate this growth, it is important to realize there will always be more than one approach. From a general perspective, two complementary approaches exist. One is ‘top-down’, in which technologies are identified and implemented from the educational and business needs for effectiveness and quality; the other is ‘bottom-up’, in which emerging technologies are utilized in design and implementation of novel learning methodologies...read the whole call

The paper submission is due on May 6 2013, see the link for the entire call.

The scope of the conference will cover but not be limited to the following topics:

• Open platforms, open educational resources (OERs), Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs),and open learning methods
• International alliance for open source, open standards, and federated
  repositories
• Repository and Network systems 
• Technology standards for content, portfolios, learner information, and   competencies
• Life cycle management of technical learning objects
• New generations of educational technologies
• Learning Analytics / Big Data
• Web 2.0 and social computing for learning
• Personalized educational and learning systems
• Learning systems platforms and architectures
• Advanced applications
• E-learning, knowledge management and their organizational management
• E-testing and new test theories
• Automated assessments
• Recommender systems
• Learning content retrieval
• New directions for standards development in the field of ICT and learning

The Open Book Project announced by H.Clinton - STEM material in Arabic

An interesting announcement was just made between the United States and the Arab League:

Through the Open Book Project, we will work to expand access to free, high-quality, open education materials in Arabic, with a focus on science and technology. Our hope is to lower geographic, economic, and even gender-based barriers to learning. Anyone with access to the internet will be able to read, download, and print these open materials for free or adapt a copy that meets the local needs of their classrooms or education systems.

So interesting! In the beginning of 2000, I also worked on an initiative to share learning resources across Europe. At the time, the MoE of Israel was also part of the project called European Treasury Browser. Before the second intifada broke off, there were talk of sharing resources with them, including the Arabic speaking people.

The European Treasury Browser Thesaurus, which was used to facilitate the multilingual search, had been translated into Hebrew and people were looking into translating it into Arabic too. Unfortunately, no one could decide into which Arabic, as there are so many varieties of Arabic spoken in a wide range of territory across the Middle East and North Africa. Apparently, even the modern standard Arabic has many different variations... In any case, the translation was stalled and due to circumstances, I assume it was not only because of linguistics...

I truly hope that the language will be a non-issue for this great initiative! I understand that search keywords are a complex issue as they are out of context. The content of learning material is (probably) different. In any case, I'll be interested in seeing what's coming out.

Last, a great list of people behind this initiative :) I'm so glad that I've had a chance to work with many of them!

I’m proud that so many trailblazers in open education come from the United States, including Creative Commons, the Hewlett Foundation, ISKME, Meedan, MIT OpenCourseWare, the OpenCourseWare Consortium, and Rice University OpenStax College. Your work is already proving that it has the potential to transform the way students learn across the world. 

See the video of the announcement here: http://bcove.me/qh6ebr2q 
and the press release here: http://www.state.gov/secretary/20092013clinton/rm/2013/01/203382.htm

International Conference on Web-based Learning (CfP)

One of the truly international e-learning conferences that crosses the boundaries between continents is the International Conference on Web-based Learning. This year, the ICWL takes place in Taiwan on 6-9 October 2013. In 2009 it took place in Germany, where my paper won the best-paper award. This year again, I'm serving as part of the International Program Committee (IPC) which gives me a privileged access to review the papers!

Abstract submission deadline: April 8, 2013

Personal Learning Environments (PLE): Learning and Diversity in the Cities of the Future

The annual conference on Personal Learning Environments (PLEs) has a great focus this year: learning and diversity in cities of the future. I love the step out from the formal context of learning (i.e. schools, university) and the fact that we now start thinking of the whole city as a learning environment. This allows asking the following type of research questions, for which the call for papers has now been set-up (deadline 4 March 2013)

What shapes can Personal Learning Environments take to support diversity, cross-boundary learning and interdisciplinary transformation of urban spaces? How can we design and implement Personal Learning Environments as part of highly interconnected social and technological infrastructures of smart cities? What technology-enhanced scenarios can be envisaged to enhance learning and diversity in cities of the future?

In general, PLEs are an approach to Technology- Enhanced Learning based on the principles of learner autonomy and empowerment. PLEs include methods, tools, communities, and services constituting individual learning infrastructures or ecosystems which learners use to direct their own learning and pursue their educational goals.

This year, I'm honored to serve as part of the Scientific Committee. In 2011, I was one of the (un)keynote speakers.

Teachers' collaboration networks as a PLE for professional development from Riina Vuorikari

Reading habits (paper based and web) by Finnish youth

The PISA results have since 2000 highlighted how Finnish 15-year olds excel in math, science, reading, etc. This report gives an interesting look into Finnish youth's reading habits, it includes both digital and paper-based media. Interestingly, we again find out that computers and ICTs are not often used for learning purposes, at least not in a formal learning setting (i.e. school, homework).   

Some outcomes (hastily) translated :

Since 2000, Finnish young people are reading the most variety of literature among 26 participating countries. The "reading index" that tracks the variety of reading, e.g. magazines, comics, literature (fiction and non-fiction) and newspapers is statistically decreasing in all countries. Apart from fiction and non-fiction book, Finnish youth reads less printed material. It is likely that the printed material has been replaced by, among other things, online reading and communication. 

In general, the use of web-based material among Finnish youth is at about average among PISA countries. In schools, however, computers are not used as actively as at home. In Finland, students seek less information on the Internet to help with homework and they rarely discuss their homework assignments online. Instead, the use of computer at home is mainly for pleasure purposes in Finland.

Parviainen (2012) Suomalaisnuorten lukemisen ja verkon käytön monipuolisuus http://www.oph.fi/julkaisut/2012/suomalaisnuorten_lukemisen_ja_verkon_kayton_monipuolisuus

International evaluation data on Science and Reading (TIMSS and PIRLS)

This international benchmarking data becomes available in 4 and 5 year cycles presenting participants’ achievement results in mathematics, science and reading.

For the past 20 years, TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study) has measured trends in mathematics and science achievement at the fourth and eighth grades. For the past 15 years PIRLS (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study) has measured trends in reading comprehension at the fourth grade. 

The results are presented as videos on YouTube, too, otherwise, the reports are available here.


A few pointers highlighted by my colleagues:

• An early start is critical: if parents before the start of primary school engage their children in literacy and numeracy activities (at home or at pre-primary schools) children had better scores in those subjects in the 4th grades. 
•  Fourth grade students with access to computers for instruction had higher average science achievement than those students with no access to computers for instruction (Page 235 TIMSS International Results in Science)

The EC's "Rethinking Education" strategy is out

The EC has its "Rethinking Education" strategy out since last week. You can find the communication and related documents in this link: http://ec.europa.eu/education/news/rethinking_en.htm.

What you also should look at it the Country Analysis. If I'm right, a little bit of my work is included in the analysis from Finland. One of my independent expert assignments this year was to write a long report on that, which was, most likely, used as a material for this piece of work. It's a nice feeling to be part of a big strategy report like this one ;)

A few highlights from the communication below. 

• Developing the competences of teaching staff is a continuing and increasingly urgent priority in all Member States. A completely new generation of teachers is ready to take over and a completely new set of skills are required from them. 
• It is essential that Member States create flexible options, such as high quality distance learning. Widening access and engagement through Open Education is a necessity. Technology will play a crucial role in this. 
• Apprenticeships are one very effective way to do this and I urge all Member States to develop more work-based learning schemes. 
• In particular, I support and welcome the initiative by EU Ministers of Education to boost cooperation to increase both the quantity and quality of work-based learning. The first steps will be taken at a meeting of EU Education Ministers in Berlin next month.
• Foreign language skills are especially important in times of crisis as they can open up new opportunities. That is why we are proposing a new benchmark on foreign language competences. 
• We shall also develop guidelines for entrepreneurship education at all levels including schools, universities and vocational education and training. This will encourage education institutions to develop more entrepreneurial approaches in areas including leadership, teacher development as well as curriculum delivery.

Merit pay for teachers - rambling thoughts on the issues

One answer to the issue of bad performing schools/students in the US has been the idea of merit pay for teachers. The Economist  reported on the topic recently using the case of New Jersey state, which, according to the article, has a real problem in its hands already since more than 15 years. Ugh..that's a long time, a whole childhood, if you wish..

Although they have been under the supervision of New Jersey’s state government since 1995, there has been little improvement since then. Only 40% of students read to the standard prescribed for their age, and in the 15 worst-performing schools the figure is less than 25%. More than 30% of pupils do not graduate. Few of those who do are ready for higher education. Of those who entered one local establishment, Essex County College, in 2009, a whopping 98% needed remedial maths and 87% had to take remedial English. As a result, fed-up parents are taking their children out of Newark’s public high schools and placing them in independent charter schools. Many public-school buildings now stand half-empty. The best teachers often leave in despair.

Merit pay for teachers Bonus time
A new contract for teachers is shaking up New Jersey’s largest city

It's impossible to understand the whole magnitude of the problem, but for now, I'm only wondering how such merit pay system works in an educational establishment? What is it based on? What does it really evaluate? Does it take into account how the students' perform, say, during the last academic year? Or how did they perform with other teachers for that matter? Or does it only concentrate on the teacher? What is the baseline for the evaluation? How well did you teach last year? How many hours you taught for a give group of kids? How well the kids that you teach perform in a standardised test over a period of time (which period;)? Is your "merit" based on your average performance with different group of kids if you for example teach math to several groups of kids?

Creating metrics for teacher performance has gotta have been a hec of a job, they probably spent lots of resources trying to figure that out. And then, I would also like to see how does it plays out in the school itself. Is the performance of all the teachers fitted on the normal curve to give the "grades"/merit pay? What if all the teachers' started teaching better, does it mean that non of them get any extra money?

I pay lots of attention to the TALIS study (OECD, 2009) where teachers' appraisal and feedback mechanisms as well as the feeling of self-efficacy are studied and discussed. The whole issue isn't only about the "quality" of teachers'  performance that is delivered to the kids, but the Professional Development and teacher cooperation opportunities in general play an important role too. Placing more emphasis on those factors might be a more helpful way forward..

Pedagogical Innovation and Connected Minds: two interesting reports

Teacher Network - Today's and tomorrow's challenges and opportunities for the teaching profession

We have just finalised a new book, the title is "Teacher networks - Today’s and tomorrow’s challenges and opportunities for the teaching profession". It's now at the printer and the launch event will take place later this month (Nov 14) at the Media & Learning Conference in Brussels.

I'm pretty exited about this, it's one of the major outcomes of my last project (www.tellnet.eun.org) that I've run for three years :)

Teacher networks - Today’s and tomorrow’s challenges and opportunities for the teaching profession from European Schoolnet

FP7 priorities for Creativity and Learning

Over the summer holidays, EU's new FP7 priorities for 2013 funding were communicated. Challenge 8. is related to learning, namely called "ICT for Creativity and Learning"

...Europe must also support national efforts to help students to learn better, teachers to teach better, and school systems to become more effective. This goal can be greatly advanced by learning systems that can adapt to effective use in a wide variety of diverse contexts.

Under 8.2 (technology enhanced  learning), they also mention Learning Analytics:

b) Learning analytics, educational data mining: tools and processes for collecting, storing, exploring and reasoning on large-scale educational data to better understand learners' knowledge, assess their progress and evaluate environments in which they learn. These tools and processes should aim at improving learning and teaching (including 21st century skills) for students and instructors.  

Learning analytics has now become such a hot topic. So, like all the others, I'm also studying the topic. Here is a link to my recent paper on learning analytics. I presented it this summer at “Open and Social Technologies for Networked Learning” in Tallinn.

Use of personas in communication (Professional Development Workshop)

"Personas" are used in marketing and product design to represents a group of customers so that the company can better focus its efforts. In companies such as Ford Motor Company, Microsoft and Reuters, personas are used to help better understanding of customers . A persona has a name, face, motivations, and goals - yet it is fictitious.

We in eTwinning also use personas to help our 27 National Support Services (NSS) better segment their "market" and focus their efforts. This time (June  27, NSS PDW) we worked on communication strategies. First all the six eTwinning personas were introduced (see the slides below). Then we set up groupwork to think of strategies; first of all,  how the NSS can identify eTwinners who belong to different personas?  and then, what are the strategies to communicate with them?

Identifying an active eTwinner like Maria or Peter (slides, page 8 and 10) can be rather straight forward for the NSS. They can use the "NSS desktop tools" that allow monitoring eTwinners' activities in their own country. Especially Marias are someone that the NSS staff already knows rather well and is most likely already in continuous communication with (they are often times also "eTwinning Ambassadors").

However, the most interesting and "potential" eTwinners for NSS are Marcus, Lucia, Shaun and Nina (slides, pages 12, 14, 16, 18) . They already are aware of eTwinning and have most likely established an account, but for a reason or another, are inactive or dormant users. In the workshop, we brainstormed better and more efficient communication strategies for these personas.

eTwinning personas

View more PowerPoint from European Schoolnet