Extending e-possibilities
Any contemporary look at e-learning must consider those applications that have the potential to transform teaching and learning beyond the class-centric confines of the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE).
Author: Mark Nichols, E-learning Specialist Laidlaw College, Auckland, New Zealand
Date: September, 2009
Funded by the Ako Aotearoa Northern Hub through the regional hub project fund.
Introduction
As I mentioned in E-Primer 1.3.2, any contemporary look at e-learning must consider those applications that have the potential to transform teaching and learning beyond the class-centric confines of the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). Although e-portfolios and blogs are increasingly included with VLE systems, they tend to be associated with a user’s own profile rather than any particular class area – which is why such tools have the potential to move e-learning beyond artificial class boundaries, and into the more public domain of the internet. Wikis, which can also be publicly available, emphasise a shared outcome rather than the particular input of any individual, and they therefore have clear potential for collaborative activity beyond semesterised timeframes. Virtual worlds such as Second Life invite learners into new educational experiences. Social networking sites such as Ning communities, MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, and Flickr encourage people to distribute ideas, perspectives, and artifacts, and to form new online connections. New applications such as Twitter challenge traditional models of what it means to be ‘connected’ and in touch with others. Web 2.0 is upon us. Collaboration, sharing, openness, authenticity, and inclusiveness are the core values: produsage, long tail, wisdom of the crowd, mashup and folksonomy are among the terms created to help describe the novel contributions and challenges Web 2.0 brings to
consumerism, business, collaboration and publishing, media development, and epistemology.
Extending e-possibilities is #5 in the e-Primer series