My personal experience with the power of Podcasts

I have read much about Podcasts and the use of it, but I have to say that after acquiring my first iPod, and in this case an iPod Touch, I can speak to the values of this tool in a more authentic way. It is another channel with the world and one you take with you... Moreover, it stimulates another sense, so it brings a relaxation from reading (online or print) and supports learning. Those, who work online full-time, will appreciate that... I found incredible input on what's out there for free (beyond iTunes) through this Pick the Brain article (BTW, Pickthebrain is a great site).

Again PLEs..

I was just reading Graham Attwell's paper on PLEs and his discussion of the future of PLEs in e-learning. My immediate internal reaction was: "Yes, yes!" I would also direct my attention to using PLEs beyond the boundaries (?) of informal learning, i.e. the potential of having such an environment within institutions... For working adults, isn't the goal to marry informal with formal learning as part of a rich and ongoing learning strategy? The ultimate goal is to connect new knowledge with existing one, building synergy between theory and practice. These social software based tools/services, that are the base of PLEs, have potential of becoming the necessary bridge between these two worlds of learning.

A different perspective towards an online environment...

My earlier post on Web 2.0 LMS's is some way discussed by Tony Karrer in his blog on July 2006: http://elearningtech.blogspot.com/2006/07/do-you-want-lms-does-learner-want-lms.html.

Would the PLEs be exactly as what I referred to as an LMS that capitalizes on existing, and even lets the user select each tools to use? The environment mentioned by Karrer is a bit different from the one I'm focusing on. My focus here is on online teaching at the higher education level. So, the little tidbits of content, which is the interest in the corporate environment is now substituted by bigger chunks that will be used within courses, which then compose entire programs.

Would PLEs using Web 2.0 technologies be a possibility for institutions? This would allow a better bridge between tools used in the workplace and those used in the academic setting. There is no reason why this gap shouldn't be reduced.

--Stella.

Web 2.0 LMS's

Given the growth of services available on the net on a rapid pace, and the growth in the number of users of these services, it seems reasonable that some of them just (like browsers did) will eventually become commodities (in some sense). A lot of these services are based on existing and growing specialized databases, which again re-enforces the importance of the users, also as creators of value-added. Moreover, the concept of mash-ups is becoming common in the generation of new services or combination of services.

Would it make sense to think of LMS’s as shells that would capitalize on existing services, and provide internally just those services inherently proprietary, such as grade recording, syllabus information, etc.? Let’s say there was a way to establish policies in this more decentralized environment, would such a model make sense? If not, why? And if it makes sense (even if partially), how far are we from such environments? Or are we already there?