How is your institution dealing with disruptive technologies?

1. How is your institution dealing with disruptive technologies? Terry Anderson, PhD Professor, Athabasca University

2. Athabasca University, Alberta, Canada 34,000 students, 700 courses 100% distance education Graduate and Undergraduate programs Master & Doctorate Distance Education Only USA Accredited University in Canada * Athabasca University *Athabasca University

3. * Athabasca University Alberta average low temperature in January -19 C. Population density Canada - 3.36 people per sq km (35 million) Thailand - 118.43 people per sq km (66 million)

5. “Canada is a great country, much too cold for common sense, inhabited by compassionate and intelligent people with bad haircuts”. • Yann Martel, Life of Pi, 2002.

6. Our Values • We can (and must) continuously improve the quality, effectiveness, appeal, cost and time efficiency of the learning experience. • Student control and freedom is integral to 21st Century life-long education and learning. • Current educational models do not scale for lifelong learning for all residents of our planet.

7. Our Values • We can (and must) continuously improve the quality, effectiveness, appeal, cost and time efficiency of the learning experience. • Student control and freedom is integral to 21st Century life-long education and learning. • Current educational models do not scale for lifelong learning for all residents of our planet.

8. Three Educ. Technology Disruptions: • Content Crash • MOOCs and OERs • Connectivist learning – Network effects, Persistence and participation beyond the course Dealing with disruption

9. Content Crash

10. Posted on October 30, 2011 by G.E. Ross

11. Content: A bargain even at 80% off?? Most of us like Free!

12. Cost of Content

14. Cost to produce educational video • 1995 - $1,000-$3,000 per minute • 2012 – approaching zero

15. User Generated Content

16. Education was Based on Old Models of Scarcity P. Banbury 2009

17. Now: Anyone, Teaching Anything, to Anyone Lore.com

18. Educational Response • Open Educational Resources • Textbooks • Learning objects • Open Scholarship

19. South African open Text project “innovative education project has enabled the government to print more than 2.4 -million free maths and science textbooks for a nominal cost.” SA Times, Mar. 2012 Siyavula | Technology-powered Learning www.siyavula.com/ "we are opening" in Nguni.

20. Are Open Texts Associated with Higher Marks? “students in courses that used FWK textbooks tended to have significantly higher grades and lower failing and withdrawal rates than those in courses that did not use FWK texts.” Feldstein, et al.(2012). Open textbooks and increased student access and outcomes. EURODL, 3. Retrieved from http://www.eurodl.org/?p=current&article=533.

21. We need more than objects, We need an OER culture http://wiki.creativecommons.org/OER_Policy_Registry http://www.poerup.info/

22. aupress.ca Canada’s first Open Access press!!

23. But What about MOOCs??

24. MOOC History by Alys From http://prezi.com/754uv3qpe_0k/mooc-history/ a MOOC History by Alyssa Martin

25. MOOC Completion Rates?? • Coursera Course Computational Investing, January 6, 2013 by Tucker Balch , • 53,265 enrolled • Completed the course: • 4.8% of those who enrolled • 18% of those who took a quiz. • 39% of those who submitted the first project.

26. Familiar Access rationale • "If we continue to keep the barrier to entry low, we’ll enable students to taste many many courses, and that may be a good thing for education.” Tucker Balch

27. MOOCs • Free Access • Who benefits from their attention? • Is partial knowledge/learning bad? • The bar has been raised, we have to add value beyond content or “subject matter content”

28. MOOCs Through the Lens ofOnline Learning Pedagogy • Behaviourist/Cognitive – Self Paced, Individual study • Social Constructivist – Groups, LMS • Connectivist – Networks and Collectives Anderson, T., & Dron, J. (2011). Three generations of distance education pedagogy. IRRODL, 12(3), 80-97

29. xMOOCPedagogyGen. 1 - Cognitive Behaviourist • Medium to high quality content • Screen captures, video lectures, page turners • Machine scoring of quizzes and assignments • Optional testing (for fees) and emergent accreditation • Badges, challenge exams for credit Scaleable, Flexible!

30. MOOC Challenges to Traditional Schools • Are our course really better than those from MIT? • How interactive are our instructors? • Do we accredit seat time, courses or learning? • Will our students choose our fees over free? • Is American learning (knowledge) the same as Thai learning? • Can we develop a business model from free MOOCs?

31. 2nd Generation - Constructivist • Online Learning Current model – continued strong growth in US and globally 32% of higher education students now take at least one course online.

32. Constructivist Learning in Groups Garrison, R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (2000). Critical thinking in text-based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(2), 87-105. • Long history of research and study • Established sets of tools • Classrooms • Learning Management Systems (LMS) • Synchronous (video & net conferencing) • Email • Need to develop face to face, mediated and blended group learning skills

33. Problems with Groups Relationships Paulsen (1993) Law of Cooperative Freedom NOT Scaleable Restrictions in time, space, pace, & relationship - NOT OPEN Often overly confined by leader expectation and institutional curriculum control Usually Isolated from the authentic world of practice “low tolerance of internal difference, sexist and ethicized regulation, high demand for obedience to its norms and exclusionary practices.” Cousin & Deepwell 2005 “Pathological politeness” and fear of debate Group think (Baron, 2005) Poor preparation for Lifelong Learning beyond the course

34. 3rd Generation: ConnectivistLearning

35. Connectivism • Building knowledge networks with resources and people.

36. Connectivist Learning

37. NOT Learning in a Bubble

38. Persistence Rosetta Stone

39. Networks add diversity to learning “People who live in the intersection of social worlds are at higher risk of having good ideas” Burt, 2005, p. 90

40. If you want to learn how to fix a pipe, solve a partial differential equation, write software, you are seconds away from know-how via YouTube, Wikipedia and search engines. Access to technology and access to knowledge, however, isn’t enough. Learning is a social, active, and ongoing process. What does a motivated group of self-learners need to know to agree on a subject or skill, find and qualify the best learning resources about that topic, select and use appropriate communication media to co-learn it? http://peeragogy.org/

41. Connectivist Learning http://terrya.edublogs.org/2012/12/18/connectivy-your-course/

42. Walled Gardens (with windows) • Connectivist learning thrives in safe learning spaces with windows allowing randomness, external participation and public presentation

43. Soft-to-hard Generations 1-3 Sets, nets and groups Into action…

44. The Landing Platform 1,686 plugins available, our installation using about 90 Fairly strong development team, plotted roadmap

45. What is the Landing? • Walled Garden with Windows • A private space for Athabasca University – students, staff, alumni • A public place • A user controlled creative space • Boutique social network • Networking, blogging, photos, microblogging, polls, calendars, groups and more • A campus for Athabasca

46. A soft space 24

47. net group set Where to look first

48. collective net set group Multiple rationales for This Connectivist Space Sustaining ties Making ties Ad hoc networks Knowledge diffusion Social capital Social presence Cooperation Sharing Serendipity Interest -orientation Sense-making Collective intelligence Intentional discovery Courses Committees Research groups Study groups Centres and departments 48

49. LMS ELGG Andersen, Henriksen,Secher & Medaglia, (2007) "Costs of e-participation: the management challenges", Transforming Government: People, Process and Policy, 1(1)29 - 43 Bottom up control and Innovation

50. Is Your Institution ready to Exploit these opportunities??