Ikarus: Teaching and Studying in Virtual Learning Environments Home -> Weekly -> Forums -> Café -> Open Source Education - an idea. ------------------------------------------- Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Monday, 3 March 2003, 11:14 PM Discuss this topic (50 replies so far) ------------------------------------------- Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Monday, 3 March 2003, 11:14 PM Hi Imagine a free open learning portal, where people can meet and learn together. Maybe its a kind of P2P - network. None technically speaking it is a joyfull and diverse marketplace. There is a currency of course. This currency is based on democracy and knowledge. One pays another with knowledge-credits. You can get credits when you share your knowledge. Here is an example. Lets say, I would like to learn swedish. There is a nice person who will teach me personally, swedish. I will give him some credits, which I have earnt from an e-learning course I provide in mathematics. And maybe my swedish teacher will buy a course in cooking. The principle is easy. It is a sort of Open Source idea, which I regard very valuable. What do you think about Open Source Education or Open Source in Education ? Thank you for your comments. Anders Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Jeff Cooper - Monday, 3 March 2003, 11:34 PM Dear Anders I've written an online article regarding the idea of "Open Source Learning." Your ideas of an online bartering system echo my own sentiments. Unfortunately, it will be a long time until traditional institutions, or even online ones, allow for free and open education and communication. There will always be ways to learn online, and one of my goals is to facilitate that as much as possible for my peers and students around the world. Receiving academic credit will be much more difficult to achieve, and perhaps is years down the road. Here is the link to my article for anyone who is interested: http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2002/08/cooper.php Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anne Fuller - Monday, 3 March 2003, 11:38 PM Anders, Its sort of like the idea that's been around for some time in certin communities where people trade skills e.g. a plumber will fix a tap (faucet, spigot) for someone else and get credits which he/she can use for babysitting from a third person in the group. To my mind its not really "Open Source" . Foldoc defines Open Source as "A method and philosophy for software licensing and distribution designed to encourage use and improvement of software written by volunteers by ensuring that anyone can copy the source code and modify it freely." I know you could argue that that is not the meaning you intend, but that is more or less the generally accepted definition. Certainly Open Education, and the trade of knowledge in the fashion you suggest sounds good. However (and isn't there always an however), how do you propose to allocate credits? Is it up to the recipient of the knowledge to determine its value. That would inevitably lead to inequities, where one person would get less credut for the same amount (or perhaps more) input than someone else. Or would there be some sort of scale set up, or someone (or some group) administering the system? I do think its a good idea, and maybe together with others in this seminar we could iron out these (and other issues) and get something like this up and running. What do others think? Anne Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anne Fuller - Monday, 3 March 2003, 11:52 PM Jeff, I justed posted a reply to Anders before reading yours. Yes, the prospect of credit from our institutions for this sort of work is unlikely. However I don't think that should stop anyone interested in learning something for themself from trading some of their expertise for access to that new knowledge. I assumed Anders was talking about voluntary involvement based on an individual's own interests and desire for learning, gaining this new knowledge without the price tag that often accompanies a course that results in a "formal qualification". Anne Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Jeff Cooper - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 01:45 AM In a nutshell [although it would have to be a pretty big nut (which I've been called myself), and a tough one to crack as well], I believe the assessment can be made through a form of online porftfolio work. The ideal would be lifelong learning where students (i.e. everybody) continue to develop their personal body of work. Assessment may come from a variety of sources, indeed there would be ways that lay people, in addition to educators, could assess the work of others, both within and outside of their own groups. Here is a scenario: Student "A" is a member of a cadre of 100 revolving around the theme "Distance Education Methods." With the help of his/her cadre, student maps out a set of work to be performed, and reviewed by members of the cadre. As the work progresses, members of the cadre give feedback, support, recommendations, etc. A rubric is generated by the student and the cadre, and the work proceeds up the rubric ladder until a level of credit may be granted. This is obviously a very rough schema in need of significant refinement. The nexus of the idea however is to create collaborative groups wherein participants work on projects indivdually and/or collectively and self and peer assess. Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Patricia Corby - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 06:33 AM I have found this site link of yours immense Jeff, it has so many links to follow up. I am just logging in here to say that I am reading your ideas with interest and will probably comment further when time to absorb has been accomplished. As I said it has so many links! Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Susanne Benker - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 08:53 AM Hi Anders, I think open source learning is generally a very good idea. Companies practise this way of dividing their know-how for example in communities of practice. But I take the view that people have to change their attitude towards education and learning. Today many people are afraid of becoming redundant if they give away their knowledge. They don't see the advantages. Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 09:25 AM Thank you for your nice comments. Lets get one step deeper in the idea. In my example there are 3 people involved in a social learning network. Me, a person from Sweden and a Cook. Okay here is an idea of the credit sharing habbit. When I first started to learn swedish, the course costs me 5 credits. After a while I find out that my Swedish learning friend is offering me so much more, then just swedish, which of course I speak fluently now. So I donate 10 Credits to him. I am his sponsor. With these credits he is able to get more lessons in cooking. And maybe he sponsors his credits to a person offering nice recipies. Giving credits is not based on "hard market rules" but on personal persuasion. I think a human will feel the difference and the quality of knowledge. What do you think ? Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Annette Mühlmann - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 09:46 AM Hi Anders, I think it's a great idea, and to give as much credits as you think the "work" you got is worth, is a good thing. So, if there are conflicts about the number of credits, the two persons can stop working together. But there is another question with which I am not sure: Many things you can't do via Internet. If I liked to learn Swedish, for example, it would be great to have a native speaker to teach me, but I think for this, it's nessacary to have personal contact - otherwise you don't really learn to speak. Although, of course, for other things like offering cooking recipes or learning cooking, the internet is very fine. So my opinion about sharing competences, knowledge and whatever via internet is, that we have to look carefully, for which transfers we can use the internet and for which transfers we can not. Best regards, Annette Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Martin Maier - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 09:52 AM Hi Andres (and all others, of course!), your idea sounds very tempting and there certainly is a great move towards "open source" going on at the moment which I think is great (I'm using a Mac, which now employs a large part of its operating system from "open source" projects, whereas MS still considers "open source" one of the most serious dangers to the market...). I'd just like to raise a few thoughts that might also be worth considering: 1. "Open source" and "knowledge credits" may work in some sort of informal education and is basically a (slightly formalized) "knowledge exchange", one was experiencing in the "early days of the usenet". 2. When it comes to high-quality content, this may not be done on such an "exchange basis" since some people rely on being paid for what they're doing. Knowledge usually doesn't pay for our daily food supply. 3. Even running and producing a specific learning environment does need to be paid for by someone (even "open source" software is not be mixed up with "freeware"!). 4. Whatever content will be employed, there are copyright issues to be considered, too. Not be misunderstood, I like the idea a lot, but felt it useful to point to some potential objections form various sides. Martin Reply Instructional Design and Competencies by Katharina Schnurer - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 09:56 AM Hi, everybody! Anders, I like your idea very much but I see a further problem: I don´t believe that "everybody" is able do design a sensemaking didactical design for his/her topic. Does anyone have an idea how to manage this problem? nina Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Martin Maier - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 10:03 AM Hi Annette, I'm not too sure if learning a language is ruled out as such using the internet! In fact, I strongly believe it is possible - at least to a certain extent. The potential of this medium lies especially in the fact that "personal contact" can be achieved easily and, more importantly, in an authentic situation. One may get away from the normal classroom situation where a couple of non-native speakers (plus a non-native teacher) talk in a foreign language which often is far from "real" conversation. I've seen people improving their fluency in online courses, mainly through high interactivity, message exchanges etc. Yes, that was a more about "brushing up", not so much about "leaning from scratch". But I also believe that voice conferences will play a more prominent role in the future (in fact, my company is offering a language course which is a mixture of asynchronous and synchronous communication). On the other hand, I fully agree with you that one should critically look at what the medium is partcularly good at, and not trying to adapt "traditional teaching" to online learning environments, where it all too often fails. Online learning has its strengths - and it should be used for exactly these. Martin Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Martin Maier - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 10:05 AM Hi Andres (and all others, of course!), your idea sounds very tempting and there certainly is a great move towards "open source" going on at the moment which I think is great (I'm using a Mac, which now employs a large part of its operating system from "open source" projects, whereas MS still considers "open source" one of the most serious dangers to the market...). I'd just like to raise a few thoughts that might also be worth considering: 1. "Open source" and "knowledge credits" may work in some sort of informal education and is basically a (slightly formalized) "knowledge exchange", one was experiencing in the "early days of the usenet". 2. When it comes to high-quality content, this may not be done on such an "exchange basis" since some people rely on being paid for what they're doing. Knowledge usually doesn't pay for our daily food supply. 3. Even running and producing a specific learning environment does need to be paid for by someone (even "open source" software is not be mixed up with "freeware"!). 4. Whatever content will be employed, there are copyright issues to be considered, too. Not be misunderstood, I like the idea a lot, but felt it useful to point to some potential objections form various sides. Martin Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 10:11 AM Hi, As I read all your wonderfull comments, I start understanding your concerns. Let me start with the concern or the fear of institutional knowledge power. In my example I was offering a math course, for which I get some credits back, by my students. I am in a group of students that are into higher maths. We spend a lot of time in teaching math to mostly younger persons. We finally decided to put our credits together and get ourselves a math specialist, which fits our needs and educates us. What about hierarchy ? Think of Hirarchy in a spherical form , a ball, a globe. See the picture ? Where is the hierarchy now ? Well knowledge leaders built a temporaly network, in which they become the center of. Just like the math specialst , my group is supporting with credits. A spherical hirarchy is based on changing interests and views will put other persons into the center of learning networks. So we need to get into practise to let changes happen and in giving up knowledge leadership. Maybe this is hard, but worth. *smile Does it bring us further to the idea of Open Source Education ? What do you think ? Would you like this Jeff ? yours Anders Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Annette Mühlmann - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 10:51 AM Hello Martin, I agree with you in the statement that you can improve a forgein language in an online-course (in fact, I am sure that I will improve my English in this course ;-) ), but I'm sure that, if you do not speak a language at all, and if you want to learn the pronounciation, it is not possible without acustical help. I don't know much about the possibilities of voice conferences, maybe they are a good solution for that problem. On the other side, you have to look for the technical features you need for this. For example, we plan to put a video in our internet-seminar for the next semster, but I am sure that some of the students will come to the university computers to watch it, because many of them (and, at home, me too) use old, slow modems. I think, if we plan an online course, we should consider this - that doesn't mean not to use such features, but it means to look how students with some-years-old software and/or hardware can follow the course. Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 11:15 AM Hi, you are giving me so much brain food, thank you so much. As I read all your comments, I found out that you are interested in the "HOW to". Lets have an "Evolving Technology" that is based on needs, not on marketing. 10 credits from me, and another 10 from my swedish teacher, as a reward for an open source tool to let people videoconference ! Wouldn´t that be nice ? Help us ! Anders Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by ben hyde - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 11:39 AM I just wrote a long reply to this - but it took so long I was logged out and it therefore got deleted - can the time for this be set to a bit longer please!!! I would post it all again but... I was going to point out the community learning environments: http://www.experts-exchange.com/ - where you can ask questions and give them a value which is earned by the person who answers them http://www.flashkit.com/ - where people post tutorials and demonstrations which can be rated by others http://iawiki.net/ - a community knowledge space for a specific subject area Sorry for not explaining fully. ben Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by ben hyde - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 11:42 AM Have others experience using peer assessment? I found this to work pretty well - for various reasons.... But it can be problematic - as can group work (where the students get a group mark ;) ) ben Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anne Fuller - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 12:02 PM Ben I have made some limited use of peer assessment in a 3rd year CS class. Students get to run a seminar where they present the background some current issue in software development and initiate/moderate discussion of the issue. This is peer assessed by the audience i.e. the rest of the class, who award marks based on a set of criteria. I also assess using the same criteria. Interestingly, although there is some variation in marks for each criterion, the average mark awarded by the class turns out to be pretty much in agreement with my own assessment. I also use peer assessment to assist in determining indivdiual participation marks in a group project - but that, as you say, is decidedly more problematic! Anne Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Martin Maier - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 12:07 PM Hi Annette, I totally agree with you, Annette - speaking is essential! Voice conferences (see for, instance, http://www.centra.com/ or http://www.interwise.com/ to name only two), are becoming more popular these days. I'm also well aware of the fact that there are still mayn obstacles on the path and educational systems should not only focus on the latest technological possibilities but rather offering concepts that are accessible by "you and me" (so to say). We will still have to take into account limited modem speeds, but so we did with vinyl records some time ago ;-. Considering a timespan of, say, five years, we will most liekly be a different situation (remember the PC you had five years ago). More importantly, we should critically look at what we are doing online! I think if one is offering a course online, one should always be able to truly justify why someone else should login, pay telephone bills for connections, spend quite some time doing this and that. I've seen so-called "online learning platforms" that hardly do more than just distribute downloadable material to be printed out by the users (mostly based on books). This medium definitely has other strengths (interactivity), that should be xploited for learning. Sorry, I got a bit carried away ... Martin Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by ben hyde - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 12:13 PM Anne What I found interesting / useful - was the fact that it reminded the student of their own contributioon to the work - rather than it being an opportunity to significantly (it was a small percentage) grade others. Group work - in the subject I was teaching- was such an important skill so the difficulties were worth it - and I think most students agreed (those that did become part of the group that is) even if it was very difficult at times. cheers, ben Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Laurence Wilson - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 12:18 PM Having experienced the same frustration – losing work that took a long time to write – I now have the habit of creating and saving lengthy contributions in a word processor. Then I cut and paste into the discussion, or post as an attachment. You can't just use the mouse to paste, however - you have to use key strokes - Ctl and V. Hope this helps Laurence Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by ben hyde - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 12:29 PM Yes Laurence - thanks and that will enable me to spell check - but I do like the fluidity of simply typing off the cuff as it keep the dialogue fluid (maybe?) - I am sure better habits will develop. It is always the time when you forget that it all goes pear shaped. cheers, ben Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Wiebke Wendebaum - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 12:35 PM HI I really like this idea of Anders. I'm pretty sure it could not be done so easily, but I like it. The thought of a spherical hierarchy is very good. I don't think the paying is really a problem. O.K. it is now and in our society. But think about it. What's with Utopia? The society that was discribed by Thomas More (Morus). Point, he wrote the book 1516 and some things are a bit odd, but what rang a bell as I read Anders comment is, that everybody in Utopia only work 6 hours a day. The rest of the time is sparetime to read or to do other things. The utopians are not idle, they work for the society not for themselfs. Means, they do whatever their job is and as far as I can remember, they don't get any payment. You don't get money, means you don't have to give it if you want to buy anything... So a teacher would have to share his knowledge without getting paid, but on the other hand, perhaps one of his students cleans the streets for him... In such a society everybody is free to learn everything he ever liked to. And it's not important what job you have. No one is better because of his job. Payment could be the credits Anders suggests. So far for now, I've got to think about the theory... What do you all think about it? Greetings Wiebke Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 01:07 PM Hi, thanks for your support in this discussion. Let me give a brief summary of "an idea" 1. An Image of a place 2. An Example 3. Institution and hierarchy 4. Evolving Technology 5. Real world - physical needs. Let me continue with point 5. We need to pay our food. Housing, Energy, transportation, Health ... to name just a view. What do we need for this ? Of course Information, knowledge, physical work and ressources. My question is, how can a virtal e-learning plattform help , what is it worth ? How can it improve all these needs ? Don´t we want to improve ourselves, our community , our world ? I`m interested in your experience. Anders Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Martin Maier - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 01:25 PM Hi Wiebke, unfortunately, about 500 years later most of More's "utopian ideas" are still not (yet?) present in our societies... Martin Reply Online Language class (was: Re: Open Source Education - an idea.) by Anja Moemeke-Choon - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 02:23 PM Hi! An online language class has definitely its advantage. People can attend it from home, which is an important factor when there is no class for that language nearby. Also it helps parents to participate even if they don't find a babysitter (in our class there is quite a large number of young mothers; therefore the excuse "will be back in a moment, I am changing the nappies right now" is not that seldom). There are also disadvantages, as some of you already have mentioned. Especially pronunciation is difficult to cover in an online course. Martin, you talked about voice conference. We had this idea from the very beginning of our course but after one and a half year I have to admit we have only used it when testing it and most of the time it hasn't worked. Also many of our students have no or little knowledge of computers (don't ask me how often I have explained in the last couple of days how to move a file from one folder to another! but actually I should not complain, I'm not quite a genius concerning computers either ;-)) and not everybody has the necessary hardware. I am planning to put some samples of sentences spoken by a native speaker on our website, but I don't think this is going to be enough. Also foreign languages sometimes need special characters. In a classroom, on paper, there is no problem besides the student's ability to remember the characters, but in an online course you might be unable to use the whole alphabet of a language. http://www.quicktopic.com/17/H/tCcDxVXHgQxN is a website where you can see from the example of Igbo how difficult it can be to type a foreign language with an English (or German) keyboard. Concerning Open Source Education, well, somehow this does exist already, but in smaller sizes. There are tandem groups, in which you can find a partner to practice each other languages. There are forums like http://www.selfhtml.de, in which people discuss a specified topic. Some of them are open and everybody who visits the side can participate, while for others you have to sign in or even pay some fees (which some students might prefer instead of teaching, moderating or contributing in a different way themselves). It’s a good idea, but personally I prefer a real classroom and a teacher I can see and hear (and by this I don't mean on the screen or through the loudspeaker:-D!). Anja Reply Timer (was: Re: Open Source Education - an idea.) by Anja Moemeke-Choon - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 02:38 PM Ben, thanks for the warning. In order to avoid getting my posting deleted, I wrote it in Word and afterwards I copied it to thise site. Maybe this could be a solution for your longer texts as well -at least till the timer is changed ;-). See ya, Anja Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Lutz Breunig - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 03:04 PM Hallo Anders, i remember the system LETS ( Lokal Exchange Trading System). People offer services of any kind and will not be paid with real money but with other performances in exchange.There are "exchange values" for any services and individual accounts have to be administrated (credits/debts). The point is, this system is practical between private people, can be practical between business people, but of course is not practical if vou have to earn money with your knowledge. Anyway we can ask the question: What is the value of knowledge? See you, Lutz Reply Re: Online Language class (was: Re: Open Source Education - an idea.) by Martin Maier - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 03:54 PM Hi Anja, synchronous (voice) conferences have in the past often been used for in-company training, i.e. local intranets where bandwidth is not an issue. Amazingly, teh bandwidth the sound needs is roughly about 15% of 56k modem speed (ohoh, getting a bit technical here...). But there are (unpredictable) obstavles, such as - unreliable software and servers - local providers, backbones that may not provide a rather constant bandwidth. However, our experience with voice conferences has so far been rather positive (students love it!), although it takes away some flexibility of online learning! I find it nevertheless worthwhile putting soundfiles online, as you plan to do since it seems to be important to expose learners to the target language. Special characters have always been a concern but there have been some quite useful conventions around which provides ASCII equivalents (text only) to the IPA (phonetic alphabet). There is a marvellous faq by Mark Israel available from the newsgroup alt.usage.english. I also agree that information exchange takes place globally these days (that's what newsgroups are all about), and that's a great thing! But it all goes back to the 'value' of information (and exchange), doesn't it? How many websites with all sort of information (and maybe discussions) can you name you'd be willing to pay for? I'm not implying one should, but it may be a useful indicator. Martin Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 07:36 PM Hi, I have a some more things to brainstorm with you. What does a elearning-platform, like the one I mentioned in this discussion need ? It must : 6. Enable the people. Enabling them to read and write and communicate. Enable them to built knowledge networks. Give them the basics to express themselves. Help them to teach, so they can teach us. I know that : 7. Every system has its weaknesses. We are suffering. There are woes in us all. So suffering is a weakness, but a must for understanding. We need to suffer, to fix the suffering and to find a solution, to make suffering less. Tell me about your e-learning ideas or philosophy ! I would love to here it. :-) Anders Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by ulrika rogert ekholm - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 07:52 PM Feela bit "after" in this forum since I am a educating slave ;-) At daytime amd have to wait to look in here until after all the interesting things is said....tomorrow maybe I will bring MY students along into this....;-) Anders I love your idea! But the problem IS really that a lot of us are dependent on earning money with our knowledge, knowledge as is, and pedagogical knowledge on HOW to make the education work;-) Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 10:30 PM Hi , Ulrika I have heard about the problem with money, but I am working on it to fix it :-) Yours Anders Reply Re: Instructional Misdesign and Incompetencies by Martin Maier - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 10:56 AM Hi Nina, I do share your concern here! Among those who offer e-learning courses, only very few have a truly didactic approach and background. The reason for this seems to be that - some people develop e-learning environments/platforms from a rather technical background with little or no knowledge at all about learning as such - others are thrown in to develop content without knowing much about the medium OR e-learning - neither "techies" nor content developers who are familiar with e-learning, know their target groups very well. I might bring up a graphic showing this "unfortunate triangle" and how it ideally should look like. ;-) This may be a bit exaggerated but it's not at all meant to blame anyone for this. It's probably part of this "pioneering phase". The only bad thing about it is that it's sometimes damaging to the whole concept of e-learning when things don''t work out as expected (for the reasons given above) - and it proves the sceptics around us to be right... Martin Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by ben hyde - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 01:16 PM Yes - this is a brilliant idea - in the UK the tax office got rather anoyed though and tried to declare it illegal - I am not sure how far they got with this... There was a local variety in my area called Pecks - as I live near Peckham. I also think something that should be considered in relation to this is the notion of gifts. The gift economy is a concept that giving to others will result in your recieving more in return. I do not know much about this but find it a very appealing concept. There are some software programmes distributed in this way: http://www.arachnoid.com/arachnophilia/ For more about the gift economy: The Gift Economy Not all economies are based on maximizing personal gain - some are founded on giving by Gifford Pinchot Margaret Atwood Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth and Art, by Lewis Hyde (Book Review) ben Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Stefan Frank - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 02:54 PM Hi, the time for the automatic logout is set to an hour (was: 24min). The automatic logout is a feature of the Apache Webserver together with the PHP session management. If there's no activity for an hour, then your session ends and you have to login again. Even if you spend the time writing a long posting :-( Reply Special Characters and Fees for Websites/Online Courses by Anja Moemeke-Choon - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 04:41 PM Hi Martin, I had a look at the side you recommended to me. That FAQ explains the International Phonetic Alphabet and provides a link to the International Phonetic Association. In our case and in that of other people trying to type a foreign language, the problem can not be solved by using the IPA. Think about it, students learning English don't write using the IPA either . Instead we need the characters used in everyday writing (ok, in the case of Igbo it isn't that easy since there is still a lot of discussion about orthography). Our course sticks to an orthography that requires ton marks on all the vowels and the consonants m and n as well as dots below i, o and u and above the n. Subdotted and tone marked vowels can be found in Microsoft Word (insert>symbols), but when using them in a posting, it turned out that not everybody was able to read them. Also the combination of the consonants and the tone marks and the combination of the subdotted vowels and the tone marks are missing. Following the example of Uwandiigbo (and as was done with the IPA as well) we replaced those characters, so for example the subdotted o became o*. But have a look at this two sentences and you will see that it is quite annoying actually: `Ndeèwo, ahà m bù* Bi*o*la. Abù* `m onye `Nsu*ka_. At the moment, as a result of some input of our teacher, we are experimenting with Tavultesoft Keyman and others. Would I pay for any website? Actually some of the students in our course pay the internet costs of our teacher. We don't pay for the teaching though, but that's only because he is so friendly to do it without getting paid and not because we do believe that it is not worth it. I wonder if there were as many participants in the Ikarus course if it was not for free . Some probably still would attend it, but probably not as many. What do you think? Kind regards, Anja Reply Re: Open Source Education - an essay on... by Jochen Dietermann - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 08:55 PM An essay on the idea of "Open-Source-Learning" ---------------------------------------------- This essay will make some suggestions to the above theme by including the contributions are made in the forum. It's intention is not to give a detailed plan how "Open-Source-Learning" is to do, instead it reflects some thoughts and ideas of mine to this theme. Consider this as a working-draft. Knowledge in a common way of understanding always used to be open source. All the ideas people had and have are free and everybody can pick them up for ones private use. The idea to restrict the access to knowledge is a child of the internet age, where all kinds of knowledge is available in nearly every place in the world to everybody. Another thing is that the technique to copy and provide this knowledge is cheap and not a privilege to companies anymore. Especially the software and multimedia industry are affected. The companies in this business try to protect their products and knowledge by Digital Rights Management Systems and Patents on all and everything. This development is fatal, more fatal is the thought that knowledge is something you can pay for - that is to say you can buy and sell it. But ideas - let's call them "atoms of knowledge" - are all in all free goods like sunlight or the air we breath. They are essential for the evolution of the human-being. Ideas are free goods, but how to make money with the atoms of knowledge? Let's consider your Mr. Edison and you don't like this flickering gas-light, you want something else to light your house. You think about it and suddenly you got the idea to use electricity. And so you gather all the knowledge about electricity and chemistry many people explored before you and you sample them up to a new product - the electric light. Ok, this was very simplified but it shows how to make money with knowledge. You build a new product which you got in your mind by collecting ideas of other people. This new product and only this product is a thing that you can protect e.g. by a patent. The ideas behind it are a thing you cannot protect because they are essential for evolution. This means if somebody takes the ideas behind your product and changes something or adds a new idea to it, it is another product - his product. In the case of learning a product may mean aswedish language course. You, my virtual friend, think you got the absolutly best swedish language course for beginners in this world and now you want to sell. So, you search for a platform where you make the deal. How should such a marketplace of knowledge look like? What about the cash system and the ensuring of quality? For payment electronic cash is to still prefer (there are still no pratical alternatives). The identification between the business partners could be realized by private identification keys like PGP. This marketplace has its location at the WWW - this means it is a global place and so a payment in kind is a very unpratical thing ("I take yours and you take my course"). Quality ensuring is also a difficult thing because it means that everybody can criticize the offerings. A marking system with comments could be a good thing but in the end the customer should have an idea about the content of the course. This requirement means that the platform I am speaking of must more than just a marketplace. It must be a facility where the marketplace is just a part of the picture. It is a knowledge system which bases on open standards such as XML and related techniques that give the possibility to structure data. This knowledge system is a big web based library where one can learn on his own and gets help by software agents that search and interpret material on knowledge domains. If more help is needed one can change to the marketplace and pick up an offering. This is in rough outlines the idea of "Open-Source-Learning" I have in my mind. One can decide to take over the knowledge "by his own" or to connect a distributor that collected and structured the knowledge best for special needs. Jochen Dietermann Reply Re: Instructional Misdesign and Incompetencies by Paul Pavlik - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 11:51 PM >The reason for this seems to be that >- some people develop e-learning environments/platforms from a rather >technical background with little or no knowledge at all about learning as such >- others are thrown in to develop content without knowing much about the >medium OR e-learning >- neither "techies" nor content developers who are familiar with >e-learning, know their target groups very well. add to that all of the above people who do not know / care about abused student-learning syndrome, cutlural differences or etc. (Look at my profile and you will see my reasons for getttin involved .) Here in the North, most CBT students are Native, female, and have 2 or more learning difficulties. The 'abuse' rate in adult / special learning circumstances approaches 100%. does anyone else have similar ?? or concerns about similar situations? > >fIt's probably part of this "pioneering phase". The only bad >thing about it is that it's sometimes damaging to the whole concept of >e-learning when things don''t work out as expected (for the reasons given >above) - and it proves the sceptics around us to be right... Exactly... .and here in the semi-isolated communities in nothern alberta we have had CBT for 10 to 20 years! hardly pioneering eh? But that is still the attitude. Thanks for pointing this out. Of course the admins figure it is the universal panacea for all the northern ed / cultural problems. Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Andrew Chambers - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 12:25 AM This article about the development of open content in Africa may be interesting to readers of this thread: http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue8_2/keats/index.html Regards Andrew Chambers Sydney, Australia Reply Re: Open Source Education - My Article by Jeff Cooper - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 02:41 AM The article on Africa is excellent, and much better than the one I have written on the subject. I would like to repeat the Andrew's link, because people should definitely read the article (if they haven't done so already): http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue8_2/keats/index.html I also offer a link to my own article on "Open Source Learning" for those interested: http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2002/08/cooper.php I post my article in the hopes that my peers here will offer feedback, and ideas for editing the article. Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Open Source Education - My Article by Andrew Chambers - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 03:27 AM Jeff, I'm sure your article is also useful! The one I posted popped up on a mailing list I'm on just yesterday and seemed highly relevant. I hadn't even had a chance to compare them or read them both in full. Such a big topic takes a while to understand especially the politics... On a related note our University is part of a consortia called U21 which among other things is attempting to develop a learning resource catalogue for the sharing of resources between and within member institutions. This has since been extended to include the ability to communicate on such matters as it was found to be an important component of the process of using and sharing resources. There are dozens of these resource sharing initiatives occuring as well as some good attempts at open source virtual learning environments. Things look very bright for the future of sharing content, courses, teaching, tools etc. In short (as work beckons), I look forward to reading through your article and pondering the wider issues involved in open source elearning. Regards Andrew Chambers UNSW, Sydney Reply Re: Open Source Education - My Article by Jeff Cooper - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 03:55 AM Dear Andrew, Thanks for your kind words; I look forward to learning more about the Consortia, which definitely makes good sense. Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Open Source Education - My Article by Andrew Chambers - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 05:03 AM Try: http://www.u21global.com/ Regards Reply Re: Open Source Education - My Article by Anne Fuller - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 08:13 AM Jeff, I have skimmed your article and so far it looks good (although I still have reservations about he use of the tem "open source" in tthis context.) I will read more deeply when I have a bit more time, and hope to get bact to you then. Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Gerald Anton Gamauf - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 08:25 AM See whether this can be useful for us during our March exercise: http://www.EducaNext.org Gerald Reply Open Source Education - into detail by Anders Turge Lehr - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 09:47 PM Hello Andrew this little link you provide http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue8_2/keats/index.html is so amazing and I am sure it is able to push our discussion far beyond what I imagined. It is , I have to say, a little too, technical. This can be a problem to keep this very important issue open to all. Lets get this done, to a level, for everybody to understand. The article has so many fundamental and philosophical ideas about learning, that it is of high interest to us all. I will give you 10 credits for a summary of the article, which a 12 year-old can easily understand *smile thankfully, yours Anders Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Nuria Benet - Sunday, 9 March 2003, 06:55 PM Hi Anders, I read the introduction about yourself , your future plans... Let me tell you that it impresse me to see how optimist you are, how hard it had to be for you not having your parents' or teachers' support. Anyway, you got it!!!!! And what is even better is you proposal: to be honest, it may sound a bit Utopian for a lot of people, but I totally agree with you that it would be absolutely feasible. It reminds me of my so beloved "Tandem Partners" I had when I started to learn languages. It would be somehow the same thing, through different means, but with the same purpose: I tought someone spanish and got german lessons, and both for free It just cost good intentions and a bit of democracy. Reply Re: Open Source Education - an idea. by Anders Turge Lehr - Sunday, 9 March 2003, 09:06 PM Hi , Nuria thank you for your nice compliment. Well, optism is really rare these days, so is understanding. I strongly believe, that Language is a key for understanding. I am going to learn Spanish next month. And maybe I can find a "Tandem Partner" here. I will put a note at the students pinboard and I am sure , there is someone replying. Wouldn´t it be nice if europeans are getting into practise learning more languages this way ? Some amazing facts : Special Eurobarometer survey 54 ‘Europeans and Languages’ 93% of parents say it is important that their children learn other European languages. 72% of Europeans believe that knowing foreign languages is/ would be useful for them. 71% consider that everyone in the European Union should be able to speak one European language in addition to their mother tongue. 53% of Europeans say that they can speak at least one European language in addition to their mother tongue. 26% say that they can speak two European foreign languages Link: http://europa.eu.int/comm/education/languages/lang/eurobarometer54_en.html We are on a good way ! Maybe it needs to be easier and cheaper. So lets work on that. *smile Hasta pronto! Anders Reply Re: Instructional Misdesign and Incompetencies by Angela Peetz - Sunday, 9 March 2003, 11:11 PM Dear Martin and Paul, you are totally right. Most of the "e-trainings" are quite horrible. I've been looking for some content for project management that we could include into a very complex course with many topics but all I found was mainly repetitive boring stuff. Some nice design and some flash, gifs or jpegs alone don't make an interesting content. There has to be an idea behind it. Probably I end up writing the storybook myself. The topics won’t be very different (basic project management has pretty defined theoretical content) but I intend to make it fun to learn with it. In my opinion that is the biggest problem with most of the e-learning offers today: putting the good old teacher-class-classroom setting online (without a class, just the teacher) and expect people to be happy with it. In a study I've read that many e-learners are not that keen on perfect design but on interaction with others and a tutor and a variety in the spectrum of activities. When I visited the Learntec this year my impression was that adults have to learn business like whereas the most interesting new developments were designed for children. Why aren't adults allowed to having fun in learning? There are neuroscientific results that you learn much better when you have fun. So let's make e-learning fun and it will be eventually successful. Ciao, Angela Reply Re: Instructional Misdesign and Incompetencies by Andrew Chambers - Monday, 10 March 2003, 05:22 AM You might be interested in Mark Prenskys book, Digital Game-Based Learning http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0071363440/qid=1047263419/sr=-1/ref=sr__1_etk-books/104-7640412-0915941?v=glance&s=books&n=283155 Be warned it can take a long time to develop such applications, but who says you can't learn from his background and experiences and apply games or game learning techniques to adult learning??? Regards Andrew Chambers Sydney