Alexandra Okada, Tuesday 11 November 2014

Dr. Izabel Meister, who was a PhD student in KMi in 2012, has just published a book about her thesis, which was launched today in Brazil.

Her thesis co-supervised by Dr. Okada – “The weaving of knowledge in social networks habitat of collective intelligences” – focused on social networks as a space of creation and acquisition of knowledge. She analyzed some social networks in FaceBook and in the OER Tool-Library of the European Project: OpenScout developed by KMi team: Dr. Alexander Mikroyannidis, Dr. Suzanne Little, Dr. Ale Okada, and Dr. Peter Scott.

FOREWORD written by Ale Okada

“The third edge: knowledge in social networks” is an interdisciplinary book that points out the collective intelligence of social networks as well as the convergence and expansion of knowledge from the “Relevant Status”.

The curious title proposed by Izabel Meister is an invitation to reflect on the social network knowledge as a means of transcending the delimited boundaries via the third edge which leads to the break-up of delimited spaces. So, according to Foucault (1997:356) “a place without a place, that exists by itself”; refers to a space without space, or better put, a space of every space. In this sense, the author discusses contemporary knowledge on the web, based on the abundant access to information and sources, in which the process of construction transcends the predetermined spaces and times that were established for this purpose. Here a third way flourishes, which invites us readers to think differently about the construction of knowledge of and within the social networks (Okada, 2014).

This work studies the interdependent processes in which knowledge is updated and expanded to connections between many participants, in a complex, chaotic, and hyperdynamic way – aspects of the web and of the openness movement towards cyberculture studied by many authors (Castells, 2005; Jones, 1998). Nevertheless, “The third edge” proposes a different look at the emergence of collective intelligences which can be activated at any time and space as soon as they have been visualized by the “relevant status”, term defined by Meister as “due to its importance according to its utility, timeliness, or meaning”.

Meister’s contribution offers us a valuable new outlook on Education and Cyberculture through the innovation of the process of construction of knowledge, which is based on her dissertation at Mackenzie University in São Paulo and the Open University in Milton Keynes (UK). At the Open University, she worked at the Knowledge Media Institute on and with open search networks as part of the Colearn project – Collaborative Open Learning (colearn.open.ac.uk).

In the three chapters of this publication, we can find the initial point of this research, the methodology of investigation, and the conceptional and empirical principles of interactive, complex, and chaotic culture, from which social networks emerge. Based on the interconnection of these three seminal references, we can consider the threading of web knowledge and the theory of Relevant Status explained in the last chapters.

This book is a source of discussion for many readers:

• Creators, co-learners, and network users in many fields, including individuals responsible for spreading knowledge and information on social media.
• Researchers and web designers for educational learning that incorporate educational resources on the web and new media;
• Academic researchers in the fields of formal and informal education, including Cyberculture, Online Pedagogy, Teacher Training courses including ICT and Colearn in the digital era;
• Professionals interested in using social network for educational and/or organizational projects;

The objectives of “The third edge: knowledge in social network” for all of us – participants, co-learners, and co-authors of knowledge in 21st-century Cyberculture – are:

• Contributing to an understanding of contemporary education;
• Considering that the social web is a space for the construction of knowledge;
• Understanding that the social networks have different and proper processes of construction of knowledge, with specific issues related to Cyberculture and social webs;
• Understanding that this knowledge can only be provided by relevance in time, based on observed Relevant Status;
• Acknowledging that this process implies collective, collaborative, and open intelligence;
• Emphasizing the fluid and transcendent aspects of the boundaries between work, culture, leisure, and social fields.

When we drive our attention to the fragments of human knowledge within the sophisticated and complex virtual social networks, we shall have to consider the discussion proposed by this book and the invitation to contribute to the reflective discussion on the space of contemporary knowledge. From here arises the opportunity to meet the Third Edge.

Alexandra Okada, Thursday 30 October 2014

EDENRW8, which was held in Oxford on 27-28 October 2014, provided a good overview of the current state of online, open, and distance learning in Europe. This event was organised by Professor Antonio Moreira Teixeira, President of EDEN from the Open University of Portugal, and Professor Belinda Tynan, Pro Vice-Chancellor on Learning & Teaching at the Open University UK, with official Rapporteur, Professor Tony Bates.

Ale Okada presented “Developing 21st Century Skills through Colearning with OER and Social Networks.” Her research focuses on COLEARN, an open research network constituted by communities of educators, students, and researchers who have been participating in various OER international projects, including OpenLearn (2006-2009), OpenScout (2010-2012), and weSPOT(2013-2015). This study presented a group of skills that emerged in the COLEARN network during the production of the research book “OER and Social Networks.” The coauthoring process was based on colearning approach with OER and social networks. Her work presented in EDEN was also published in the book “Key competences for colearning in the digital age” by WhiteBooks Publishers in Portugal, which was launched during the event.

Almost 150 participants from more than 30 countries presented over 40 selected research papers. There were lots of opportunities for deep dialogues and feedback on our research through very interactive sessions: team symposia, ‘research-speed-dating’ papers, demonstrations, poster sessions, a connect lounge, and informal sessions.

Tony Bates presented great comments during the workshop and in his blog, which were summarised below.
Research on Open Education:

• Most practitioners – instructors, teachers, and computer scientists – are unaware of the major research findings and best practices about online teaching and learning, particularly to the management of online discussions and online course design.
• Some mistakes being made through MOOCs: unmonitored student discussion, the re-invention of the wheel through online courses for the masses, discovering what has already been known for many years: students like immediate feedback.
• More and more instructors are moving into blended and hybrid learning, but are unaware of knowledge about online learners and their behaviour.
• Successful innovation is more cumulative than “a leap into the dark”.

The complexity of teaching and learning:

• Learning is a process, not a product.
• There are different epistemological positions about what constitutes knowledge and how to teach it.
• Above all, identifying desirable learning outcomes is a value-driven decision.
• If we want to develop the skills needed in a digital age, the traditional lecture-based model, whether offered face-to-face or online, is inadequate.
• Academic knowledge is different from everyday knowledge; academic knowledge means transforming understanding of the world through evidence, theory, and rational argument/dialogue.
• Learning is heavily influenced by the context in which it takes place: one critical variable is the qualities of course design; another is the role of expert teachers/instructors.
• These variables are likely to be more important than any choice of technology or delivery mode.

Some challenges for Researchers on Online teaching and learning:

• Poorly funded by the research councils.
• There are many different variables that affect learning.
• Most studies are small scale, qualitative, and practitioner-driven.
• Most research in online learning is published in journals that are not read by either practitioners or computer scientists.
• Integration of research findings is difficult, although Anderson & Zawacki-Richter (2014) have done a good work.
• Online learning is still a relatively new field, less than 20 years old.
• Most instructors at a post-secondary level have no formal training in any form of teaching and learning.

Multiple audiences to be reached:

• Practitioners: teachers and instructors
• Senior managers and administrators in educational institutions
• Computer scientists and entrepreneurs interested in educational services or products
• Government and other funding agencies.

Next Steps:

1. How best to identify the key research findings on online learning around which most experienced practitioners and researchers can agree.
2. The best means to get these messages out to the various stakeholders.

“I believe that this is an important role for organisations such as EDEN, EDUCAUSE, ICDE, but it is also a responsibility for every one of us who works in the field and believes passionately about the value of online learning.” (Bates, 2014)

Related Links:

Eden Conference 2014

Alexandra Okada, Thursday 25 September 2014

The ENGAGE project meeting and the First Seminar on Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) and Science Education were held in Paris at the “L’espace des Sciences Pierre-Gilles de Gennes” – ESPCI ParisTech from September 22nd to 24th. This European event was organised by Alexandra Okada (OU – KMi) and Matteo Merzagora (TRACES). It brought together over fifty experts in RRI, including Inquiry-based Learning, as well as more than twenty leaders representing more than twenty-five European projects.

The aim of this seminar was to create an opportunity for knowledge exchange among FP7 and H2020 projects and experts that contribute(d) to connecting Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) and Inquiry-Based Science Education (IBSE).

“RRI is an inclusive approach to research and innovation (R&I), to ensure that societal actors work together during the whole research and innovation process. It aims to better align both the process and outcomes of R&I with the values, needs, and expectations of European society.”

Some key aspects identified in the RRI approach are “Engagement,” “Gender Equality,” “Science Education,” “Ethics,” “Open Access,” and “Governance.” Formal and informal education play a crucial role in mainstreaming these approaches in scientific and social practices. By incorporating these areas into teaching practices, we contribute to shaping the vision of science for future generations.

This is why several recent FP7 and H2020 projects, including ENGAGE, have made efforts to develop the links between RRI and Science Education, with a special focus on IBSE.

The event in Paris aimed to identify existing specific expertise in other projects that could be useful for one’s own project, in order to avoid missing connections between people and projects.

Alexandra Okada, Wednesday 03 September 2014

The ALTC 2014, the annual conference held at Warwick University, was one of the key events at the forefront of learning technology this year. The inspiring theme “Riding Giants: How to innovate and educate ahead of the wave” attracted interesting keynotes, speakers, researchers, and various professionals involved in the field of learning technology.

This event was organised through the metaphor of surfing:

1. Predicting Giants: What are the forthcoming big questions, big challenges, and big changes?
2. Learning to ride: What are innovative examples of collaboration and knowledge exchange in Education?
3. Evidence on board: How do we collect evidence at scale (from experiments and full-scale deployment)?
4. Staying up, mobile, and personal: How is digital (& learning) technology changing the learning journey?
5. All agog: What are the results for emerging technology and teaching practice in significant action?

Ale Okada presented her work “Co-authorship and Colearning through OER at UKOU” on knowledge exchange and collaboration (Learning to ride) within the scope of activities conducted by CoLearn, an international community of educators, researchers, and students engaged in the use of technologies for collaborative open learning. CoLearn’s association and collaboration with the UKOU’s OER initiatives have been most significant in three specific projects – OpenLearn, OpenScout, and weSPOT. Hence, aspects of these projects have been selected for discussion, providing not only evidence of impact but also, crucially, indications of ways in which co-authorship can, and indeed does foster pedagogical innovation.

Okada discussed five issues related to the conference:

1. Predicting Giants: We have been promoting knowledge media technologies for participants to re(create) knowledge through OER since OpenLearn (2006-2008). Our research analysed a few innovative examples, such as Project Santos Dumont’s life, which won the 1st Microsoft prize for innovative Educators. Teachers and students from Brazil, Portugal, and France used Blogs and the OpenLearn FM web conferencing tool to investigate and reconstruct collaboratively the aviation pioneer’s life story using social media. New research questions then emerged, such as: How could we empower OER colearners through knowledge media technologies to interact as OER co authors instead of OER consumers?
2. Learning to ride: During the European project OpenScout (2009-2013), our goal was to develop a tool-library of OER technologies. Colearners could then recommend tools, practices, examples, and methods for readapting and recreating OER. We tested the OpenScout Tool-Library based on the social platform ELGG to promote knowledge exchange and collaboration. More than 30 research groups with more than 100 participants interacted in the Tool-Library to co-author a book – OER & Social networks. There are a variety of chapters and coauthors: scholars, lecturers, PhD researcher undergraduate students, teachers, and web users. Coauthors not only produced a variety of OER together (image, video, maps, activities, text) but also contributed toward describing the tools and practices used in their chapters in the Tool-Library.
3. Evidence on board: Our next step is to collect and analyse evidence at scale. This is not easy considering that the project finished, however the community is still engaged in discussing strategies for OER – knowledge reconstruction and dissemination through “knowledge media technologies.” We started our next project weSPOT (working environment for social personal open technologies). We are currently investigating what are the key competencies and skills that colearners can develop using OER in open social and personalised platforms for inquiry-based learning? Which instruments and methods can we use to identify and analyse evidence?
4. Staying up, mobile and personal: Although we are still developing the key functionalities of weSPOT, our pre-pilots and initial case-studies show that colearners as co-investigators can develop their skills and knowledge through personal mobile interfaces for inquiry-based learning.
5. All agog: Co–inquiry platforms, which integrate personal, mobile, and even wearable interfaces can be considered emerging technologies for educators to empower colearners as co-investigators. There are already a few significant outcomes which were spotted by weSPOT users (undergraduates, teachers, and PhD students) who not only tested weSPOT to create their inquiries with useful feedback to improve the tool but also led research publications presented at international conferences.

We had a few useful questions and comments, to continue the debate:

• Knowledge exchange: How could OER projects promote more knowledge exchange between stakeholders and in particular colearners?
• Collaboration: What are the OER tools that can support collaboration among learners with different skills and levels of digital literacy? How can they use collaborative platforms to develop their skills, competences, and literacies?
• Co-authorship: What are the next steps for co-authorship at scale? How are we aiming to make an impact on more active, collaborative, and inquiry learning?

We definitely agree with one of the Conference participants’ thoughts, Jorge Freire, which has been adapted slightly: “The conference reinforced our belief that the focus should be on a “co” learner-centred approach to TEL, and that our job requires us to be “co” learners: we try things, implement them, take risks, make mistakes, and handle change. And that’s the only way to ride the wave.”

Related Links:

Alt-C Jorge Freire Blog

Alt-C Robert Farrow Blog

Alexandra Okada, Friday 15 August 2014

This year marks the 300th anniversary of the events of September 11, 1714, in the history of Catalonia, which represents the people’s struggle for freedom. The FIET 2014 is one of these initiatives for celebrating the Tercentenary. Its aim is “to showcase the best Catalan practices in the fields of Education, Culture, and Technology and discuss with world-renowned specialists with the intention to generate future environments in these areas.”

The FIET network organized by Dr. Mercè Gisbert Cervera, head of the Applied Research Group in Education and Technology at Universitat Rovira i Virgili, comprised more than 100 international experts from around the world, who were invited to discuss new models of education based on emerging digital trends in Catalonia. This international meeting, held at the Seminari Pontifici in Tarragona, was organized through eleven thematic groups:

1. Education Policy
2. New models of knowledge construction
3. Key skills
4. Learning Environments
5. Teacher Training
6. Science, Technology, and Innovation
7. Technology, Education, and Culture
8. Smart cities
9. Ethics and Technology
10. Social inclusion and cohesion
11. Social Networks and citizen participation

Larry Johnson (New Media Consortium), Cristina Yáñez Aldecoa (the University of Andorra), and Alexandra Okada (The Open University – UK) were invited as international experts to discuss Technology, Education, and Culture, group seven coordinated by Ramon Palau Martin (Universitat Rovira i Virgili).

The key objectives for each group were to:

1. Create a framework document with strategic proposals for the next ten years from the dual perspective of Catalonia and the world.
2. Identify, based on the eleven themes, the eleven most relevant experiences nationally and internationally related to the application of technologies to education and culture.
3. Design a European cluster project for education and technology with participants from important cities in Europe, including Catalonia.

Six priorities were highlighted by group seven, which will be described in detail through their framework document for the Tercentenary:

1. Research on open content, open data, and open learning.
2. Accessibility and connectivity.
3. Informal and formal education.
4. Digitalization of Culture to guarantee wide access.
5. Policies to promote inclusion and more participation by all actors in society.
6. Policies to guarantee creators’ rights in the open world.

Ten projects were selected as best practices:

1. “Gallery One” Cleveland Museum of Art.
2. Art Project of Google.
3. Apps_for_good help young people make their future with new technology.
4. Berkeley – the first university to offer learning of music online.
5. CODERDOJO.
6. Cultural Heritage Experiences – Socio-personal interactions and Storytelling.
7. Key competences for collaborative open learning in the digital age.
8. Learning through the Arts.
9. Library for all.
10. Robots & Museums at London’s Natural History Museum.

Alexandra Okada, Wednesday 09 July 2014

The European project ENGAGE, “Equipping the Next Generation for Active Engagement in Science,” engaged 1200 teachers who signed up and started to download the learning materials. This project is part of the EU Science in society agenda to promote more Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI).

ENGAGE is designed to provide sustained professional development through an online community built around the use of science-in-the-news, OER curriculum materials with learning analytics, MOOCs for just-in-time learning, and a brokering system for creating school-scientist partnerships.

The ENGAGE website, developed by the KMi team (the technical and legacy lead Ale Okada, the webmaster Damian Dadswell, and the graphical designer Harriett Cornish), was launched a few weeks ago in June 2014. An impressive number of teachers from the UK started to download the curriculum materials.

Building on best practice from previous projects, we intend to influence 12,000 teachers across Europe and extend this to pre-service teachers and their trainers during 3 years (2014-2016). Teachers have already been writing positive comments:

“I downloaded this activity this morning and used it this afternoon!”

“Overall an enjoyable lesson, and I will definitely use it again.”

“If you maintain the standard set in Upd8, you are destined to be a resounding success. Fantastic work – many thanks.”

Related Links:

engagingscience.eu

Alexandra Okada, Monday 30 June 2014

The International Forum on Education and Technology was held in Tarragona, Spain on 27 and 28 June. Over 1000 people from around the world gathered at the Palau Firal i de Congressos to discuss the role of technology in Education for transformative learning. Several topics were covered during this event: teachers’ digital competence, educational policy for a network society, and new learning scenarios in the 21st century.

Prof. Dr. Jabari Mahiri from the University of California, Berkeley, Dr. Valentí Puig from the Universitat de Barcelona, Ronda Zelezni-Green from m-Schools GSMA, and Dr. Alexandra Okada from The Open University – UK were invited as keynotes to discuss transformative education through technology: Cyberculture or Third Culture?

Mahiri and Okada presented some examples to introduce both concepts: Third Culture (Brockman, 1995; Snow, 1959) and Cyberculture (Levy, Castells). Their examples highlighted how technology has been integrated into our daily lives, changing the way we teach and learn in the digital age. New concepts have been emerging, such as “learning culture,” which refers to colearners who develop and create new ways of learning with technologies throughout their lives (Hodkinson et al., 2005; Delni, 1998; Okada & Mahiri, 2014). A key issue for today’s education is to investigate how learners can create and disseminate knowledge as well as develop their 21st-century competences.

Okada also presented two European Projects: weSPOT (working with social, personal open technologies) and ENGAGE (Equipping the next generation for active engagement in Science). Both projects focus on promoting scientific literacy in formal and informal education. Her research team aims to investigate innovative frameworks and best practices for collaborative inquiry-based learning, particularly for participatory communities to promote scientific and digital literacies.

The Education & Technology Fair received thousands of teachers, young students, and educational authorities interested in digital trends in education. This event, open to the public, showcased the latest technologies associated with education, including robotics, augmented reality, mobile, and wearable technologies. During the event, Okada was invited to participate in the research group about wearable technologies for inquiry-based learning.

Alexandra Okada, Friday 23 May 2014

Dante Alighieri is one of the best schools in Sao Paulo, Brazil, built more than a hundred years ago by Italian immigrants. Currently, it has more than 4,200 students, 115 classrooms, and 5 buildings. Its aims are to connect Brazilian and Italian culture, as well as to promote ethical and educational values through innovative pedagogical approaches, high-quality teaching, and new technologies.

Science teachers have been using Inquiry-Based Learning (IBL) applied to Middle and Secondary school for eight years. All students from 11 to 16 years of age are guided to create their IBL projects for developing their scientific reasoning as part of their formal curriculum. Students who are very interested in science can also participate in extracurricular activities entitled the “Young Scientists Program” to develop more complex projects in partnership with researchers and science centres.

Over the last five years, more than 100 inquiry projects developed by Dante Alighieri’s students were awarded in several exhibitions and international fairs. These included Intel ISEF, Febrace, and other events in Europe and the USA. Students’ comments and outcomes show that the IBL approach has been changing students’ lives.

Sandra Maria Rudella Tonidandel, Science Coordinator, Miriam Brito Guimaraes, Science teacher, and Valdenice Minatel, Educational Technology coordinator, will be collaborating with the weSPOT Project by investigating the use of the weSPOT environment with Dante Alighieri’s students. The first pilot will include around 30 students from two classrooms. Sandra Tonidandel and Miriam Guimaraes are very interested in weSPOT for promoting more collaboration between participants. Furthermore, it will help investigate how weSPOT can facilitate students and teachers to organise, visualise, and access their inquiry projects. Valdenice Minatel is focused on the uses of weSPOT and mobile interfaces.

During the meeting at Dante Alighieri School in the second week of May, Alexandra Okada, Sandra Tonidandel, and Miriam Guimaraes discussed weSPOT features and how students and teachers can include weSPOT in their inquiry projects. Although the school has already been using Moodle, mobile interfaces, and creating Open Educational Resources during their inquiry projects, they started to visualise the potential benefits of weSPOT. “Participants will be more aware of the inquiry workflow and its phases. This will be very useful for teachers’ training as well” (mentioned Guimaraes). After running the first pilot with 60 students, the Dante Alighieri team would like to implement an inquiry project at scale with several students to obtain more data and develop collaborative research on the uses of a social open and mobile collaborative inquiry environment for developing scientific literacy.

Alexandra Okada, Tuesday 20 May 2014

The 13th International Public Communication of Science and Technology Conference (PSCT 2014), held in Salvador – Brazil, is one of the most important events in Science Communication. Ale Okada, Sonia Pinto and Silvar Ribeiro presented a case study about weSPOT for promoting scientific literacy through collaborative inquiry.

The PCST 2014 conference aims to raise more inclusive strategies, improve citizenship through public engagement and to discuss new models and practices for communication and participation. Okada, Pinto and Ribeiro introduced collaborative open research, with the aim of addressing these three issues by creating a framework for applying “co-inquiry” – collaborative open inquiry to scaffold citizens’ scientific skills through digital technologies.

The first pilot, which focuses on collaborative research on biodiversity, was organised by The Open University (OU) through the European project “weSPOT” for inquiry based learning, as well as the Universidade do Estado da Bahia (UNEB), coordinator of the “Telecentros.BR”training programme for Digital Inclusion.

weSPOT is a working environment with social, personal and open technologies for inquiry based learning (IBL) in formal, non-formal and informal contexts.
The Telecentros.BR training programme (2013-2014) is a non-credit online course supported by the Brazil Government. The participants are over 2,500 young educators in diverse areas with low access to digital technology. The role of these young educators is to promote better use of ICT and support the Telecentro.BR’s projects, created by the local communities who do have limited access to the internet with the exception of the Telecentro.BR’s buildings.

Public Communication of Science and Technology aims to include particularly low income people who have no access to education and to science materials; people who live in remote areas and have no access to science spaces and science goods; immigrants who have difficulty in understanding the language and the cultural context; disabled people, etc.

“Scientific Literacy through Co-Inquiry” would like to bring diverse participants together from local communities, schools and universities- including learners, educators and families to develop a collaborative investigation through weSPOT.

Related Links:

• PSCT 2014 Conference
• PSCT 2014 Abstract

Alexandra Okada, Wednesday 30 April 2014 | Annotate

The NSTA conference is one of the most important events in Science Education in the EUA, which offers the latest in science content, teaching strategy, and research to enhance and expand the professional growth of science educators. This event attracts over 30,000 attendees annually.

Ale Okada and Tony Sherborne from Sheffield Hallam University run a workshop together entitled Authentic Enquiry: Raise Motivation and Results with Real Science.
Our aim was to discuss with teachers how to turn traditional topics into scientific adventures that inspire students, instil scientific thinking, and improve test scores. This was based on a highly successful UK middle school curriculum Science UPd8 project sponsored by the Association for Science Education in the UK.

During this workshop science teachers were also introduced to two European Projects in Enquiry based Learning:
TEMI – Teaching Enquiry with Mysteries Incorporated
website: http://www.teachingmysteries.eu/
weSPOT – Working Environment with Social and Personal Open Tools for Enquiry based learning
website: http://portal.ou.nl/web/wespot

Five key features of WeSPOT were presented :
1. Social networking
2. Enquiry workflow
3. Mobile data collection
4. Learning Analytics
5. Knowledge Maps

NSTA 2014 was held in Boston on the first week of April. Workshops were organised across four strands:

• Science and Literacy: A Symbiotic Relationship
• Teaching Elementary Science with Confidence
• Leading from the Classroom
• Engineering and Science: Technological Partners

There were an impressive number of science educators who participated in numerous hands-on workshops and presentations including the Boston Museum of Science, which provided free admittance to conference attendees.

NSTA is a great opportunity for science teachers to be inspired whether it is by speakers for promoting innovative learning in their classroom, or though obtaining new professional learning resources, new strategies and technologies from countless workshops, special programs and sessions. This impressive science event lets you gain an in-depth look into particular areas of interest and science discipline.
Related Links:

• NSTA