SocialLearn

The ALT-C conference in Manchester was the venue for Martin Bean to announce the forthcoming launch of SocialLearn. It was also an example of how social learning can work in practice. The conference functioned as a catalyst for online social learning, with delegates linking up using a multitude of different websites, tools and blogs – including ALT-C’s own Crowdvine site. The conference prompted people to create, link to and access resources, to ask questions, make recommendations, engage in debate and reflect on discussion. Of course, other conferences do all these things – but here many of the resources were not prepared beforehand, they were put together on the fly, and the debate extended both before and after the conference, reaching and involving people worldwide who were unable to attend in person.

And the downsides? This social learning did not persist in one place – it flared up around ALT-C and then died down again – participants needed to have plenty of online connections in place in order to locate and engage in subsequent interaction as other events provided new catalysts for interaction. And, when the conference was on and interest was at its height, the deluge of associated trivia became overwhelming as spammers took note that there could be money to be made from a bunch of interested and engaged people gathering and interacting in the same online environments.

And where did the social learning continue? Thanks to Colin Warren for this list of hashtags: #mquncon09 #aisitic09 #qsite09 #eTLC09 #hhl09 and #ulearn09