Our scheduled presenter didn’t appear, but I started recording anyway when those present started talking about how networks work to promote learning any time, any year, via a robust PLN. Ali Boumousa, one of the original Webheads from 2002, got us discussing the nature of informal learning environments which are always there, always-on, and always available to participants as needed. This led us to discuss the media aspects of social media, how all media and such networks have in common that they are a continual firehose of information which we need to learn to sip from. When Ali raised the issue of techniques for filtering efficiently from our multiple streams of information overflow, we mentioned Nicholas Carr’s The Shallows http://www.theshallowsbook.com/ and then got to talking about MOOCs, which I had mentioned as a curriculum model in slide 13 in the plenary address I recently delivered at the ELTAI conference in Vellore,http://www.slideshare.net/vances/learning2gether-to-achieve-the-aha-moment
http://goodbyegutenberg.pbworks.com/w/page/33070273/Week2EVO2011
Meanwhile, multitasking, I was trying to locate our scheduled presenter on Skype. I saw that Dave Cormier, whose work I’d referenced here, was online. So on a whim I Skyped him, interrupting his guitar practice Sunday morning in Prince Edward Island, Canada, but he agreed to pop in and join us in Elluminate for a stimulating conversation. The result was an enlightened, spontaneous, recorded discussion, and the event itself serves to illustrate how a PLN works.
Announcement:
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Cameo appearance by @davecormier livens conversation on MOOCs and eportfolios at #learning2gether rec’d: http://tinyurl.com/2011jun19cormier
— Vance Stevens (@VanceS) June 19, 2011
Recording: