In my learning, I tend to gravitate towards connectivism. We live in an information overloaded society. Knowing how to access quality sources and weed out the clutter is of paramount importance. When I was a child, I loved spending hours in the library reading. My favorite books were encyclopedias. I remember wandering through article after article and getting giddy with joy after seeing a particularly interesting diagram. I realized at a young age that even if I had completely read every encyclopedia, there would still be information out there that I needed or wanted to know. As an undergraduate, I studied French Literature. At first I found myself overwhelmed by the amount of articles written about any given work. I developed a method of finding what was most relevant by surveying the bibliographies of a number of articles and looking for common sources, I would then concentrate my efforts on the most referenced items. This was during the time when most references were not published on the internet and I had to manually browse through index cards, microfiche, and the like.
Fortunately, today this method of research and learning has been greatly facilitated by the availability of online resources. Now I simply browse Web2.0 products such as blogs, YouTube, Wikipedia and the like. I can now follow a reference at the click of a link and determine whether or not the information is relevant to me or not. The very reason that I am completing this certificate program is that I browsed several LinkedIn profiles of training professionals and found that many had attended this program.
That being said, I do not feel that connectivism works in every situation. In a previous training engagement, I was a flight attendant instructor. In this safety critical position, we had to rely on good old fashioned behaviorism. There is no way a flight attendant can be trained to open a door in an emergency by browsing YouTube. This would be the result:
In summary, I believe the learning paradigm needs to be adapted to the learner and learning object. The instructor must be attuned to the learner's needs and flexible enough to adapt an a case by case basis. Having a solid foundation in all of these paradigms will allow the instructor select the most appropriate delivery method.
Ben, if anything we have the access to so much information (accurate, inaccurate, and the entire range in between!), that it is a challenge to even know what to do with the 800,000 items that appear with any given search. This is one of the biggest challenges, I believe, when we navigate through content that is entirely new to us. That is part of the challenge (and excitement!) you seem to have now. It is an exciting time . . .
ReplyDeleteJeffrey
Dear Ben,
ReplyDeleteVery interesting blog entry! I have not been able to sort the connections I made between the ideas you wrote and the thoughts they provoked in me...
This is going to be broad, but if I am to try - You described how you access quality resources differently then and now. I wonder what effect that type of change has on us as a society. Connectivism also seem to suggest that 'what must be learned is determined by others and is continually changing' (TPOL, p.19-20). How much of the learning will be machine-driven? Will there be a time when substance, and not procedural/technical changes in the use of a given machine (if I use the eaxmple in the textbook), would originate from a machine rather than humans?
Now I am really confused! I would like to pay more attention to what's happening in the online world.
Thank you,
Akiko