A couple years ago, a colleague and I posited an instructional-design approach to improving learning and performance when utilizing Web 2.0 technologies. This approach was built upon the socio-constructivist philosophies of learning and emphasizes three dimensions in designing learning for the Web 2.0 environment—social/collaborative elements, user-generated design, and knowledge management. The motivation for this approach stemmed from the recent emergence of approaches to learning that are based on self-determination and networked contexts such as heutagogy (Phelps, Hase, & Ellis, 2005) and connectivism (Siemens, 2005), which help us understand learning as making connections with ideas, facts, people, and communities.
Learning has grown beyond mere consumption of knowledge and become a knowledge-creation process. We sought to develop a model (so to speak) that builds upon the inherent capacity of networked communication to support improvement in learning and performance and a means to approach learning in which students engage in a process of learner-driven design. Learning in this new paradigm is derived from innovation rather than instruction. Our investigations while assembling this model reinforced the notion that learner-designed contexts have the capacity to connect the formal learning agenda of educational institutions with the personal learning goals of students.
Our contention is that the learner must be placed at the intersection of social construction of knowledge (Glasersfeld, 1995) and distributed cognition (Salomon, 1993). Thus design, particularly for networked contexts, should slide to the learner-directed side of the pedagogy-heutagogy continuum. Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2003) identified social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presence as the conditions for developing an online learning community. Their finding, in conjunction with our assertions, dictates that design should now provide for co-configuration, co-creation, or co-design of learning.
That’s what we think, anyway. What about you?
If you’re interested, you can find the complete model in Wired for Learning: An Educator’s Guide to Web 2.0, Terry T. Kidd, Irene Chen (Eds.), Information Age Publishing. Charlotte, NC.
Garrison, D. R., Anderson, T. & Archer, W. (2003). A theory of critical inquiry in online distance education. In M. G. Moore, & W. G. Anderson (Eds.), Handbook of distance education (pp. 113–127). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Glaserfeld, E. V. (1995). A constructivist approach to teaching. In L. Steffe & J. Gale (Eds.), Constructivism in education (pp. 3–16). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Phelps, R., Hase, S., & Ellis, A. (2005) Competency, capability, complexity and computers: exploring a new model for conceptualizing end-user computer education. British Journal of Educational Technology, 36(1), 67–84.
Salomon, G. (1993) No distribution without individual’s cognition: A dynamic interactional view. In G. Salomon (Ed.), Distributed cognitions: Psychological and educational considerations (pp. 111–138). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Siemens, G (2005). Connectivism: Learning as network-creation. ELearnspace. Retrieved November 15, 2007, from http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/networks.htm.