Nicholas Bowskill

Hi Wayne, I think you're right about anything being better than nothing and also that this is not just anything. Its a noble project if done with the right values and I wish you luck. As to European representation I don't know why they haven't responded although there are a number of initiatives around networked learning communities that may have occupied people here. 

I'm very low on the totem pole at Glasgow but I'll mention it to a few people. I could certainly see benefits for participation in a number of areas that would offer excellent experience. I'll talk to anyone I see that might be interested to raise a bit of awareness if I get chance.

cheers,

Nick

One reason for my earlier concern was the idea of learners hacking away at self-study material and supported by forums such as those you find for solving IT problems. In an effort to take a more positive view I offer this from my experience of organising a volunteer initiative about 8 years ago.

The key difference is that it invited people to propose learning projects in order to gain support from the community. It avoided leaving them to do self-study and it gave the community a productive focus. The idea was that a proposal would be put to the community to invite those interested to participate as volunteers. This way everyone was a learner and gained something from it. We had projects from Mongolia, India and all over the world and it included helping coordinators to do offline work (Mongolia). The volunteers found resources and discussed the project and its development with the proposer. Volunteer groups typically had about 5-6 people working with the proposer so that no volunteer had to carry the whole burden. The proposer got a conversation about their idea, a variety of hand-picked resources and often a solution that they could use. A win-win all round.

Eventually, things drifted and it faded out but it was potentially scalable. Along the way I wrote and presented a paper at the networked learning conference in 2004 which is here http://www.networkedlearningconference.org.uk/past/nlc2004/proceedings/individual_papers/bowskill.htm

I'm not sure if this early example of internal crowd-sourcing is of interest as a different model but I can feel that I was as positive this time as I was negative before. ;-)

Best wishes,
Nick

Christel, I was just off to bed and your message opened my sleepy eyes. You mention structural issues. Can you remind us of what they were in more detail? I'd be very interested in the way you frame your inquiry-based approach. One of the things I've come to realise in my own work is that the way you set it up has a considerable influence not only upon the thoughts of the participants but also upon their feelings - both of which are important outcomes of the inquiry process. I'd be interested to hear more about your work and great that we can resurrect this engaging issue.

On that note I'm off to bed. It's almost 11.30pm here. Goodnight all, wherever you are.

Best Wishes,

Nick

Hi Sylvia/Everyone,

I think evaluation would be a very interesting topic for a seminar. Yes. This makes me think about collaborative and democratic evaluation - everyone gets to have a view and to hear the views presented. Its also distinct from someone harvesting the group and taking those views away like stolen goods or something. Lots more I think we could all say about that and other aspects of evaluation.

I've also been thinking about the whole idea of informal learning. It really troubles me in these times of networked people etc. and also in the context of events or sessions like this which might be described broadly as half way between formal and informal. I wonder if these terms have both become problematic and we might instead talk about moments of focus. By that I mean we can be present at any old event, meeting, course etc and we may be mentally attending or not. It's not determined by how 'posh' it is. I've come to thinking that it's really more about what I've so far called 'moments of focus.' That's pretty much as far as I've got or can say in a brief message like this. It's really an expression of dissatisfaction with the notion of informal learning in a networked world. If you like it i claim copyright. ;-)

Have a great weekend.

Nick