WE believe in education - So where is all the free content?
Wayne Mackintosh
A brief moment to reflect. Education is an act of sharing knowledge freely.
So where are all the free education materials that we can adapt, modify and reuse without restriction? Why has humanity taken so long in achieving a free knowledge base for us to share for the common good of education and society? Why are the majority of our global population under served when it comes to education?
To paraphrase Bob Dylan:
" How many years [can the closed copyright] mountain exist
Before it's washed to the sea?
Yes, 'n' how many years can some [educators] exist
Before they're allowed to be free?
Yes, 'n' how many times can [we] turn our [heads],
Pretending [we] just don't see?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
The answer is blowin' in the wind."
The value proposition of sharing digital teaching materials is a "no-brainer". Getting back to Dylan's refrain "The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind" has been described as "impenetrably ambiguous: either the answer is so obvious it is right in your face, or the answer is as intangible as the wind" (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowin%27_in_the_Wind)
I started WikiEducator as a project to collaborate with the free culture movement to develop digital teaching materials in support of every national curriculum by 2015. (If we're a little late, 2017 will be just fine :-) ).
- Yesterday, WE were a top 59K site (Alexa).
- During October, WE generated more than 10.5 million hits on our site with a full-time staff of two people.
- WE train and build wiki skills for thousands of teachers in more than 110 countries -- thanks to a dedicated team of facilitators who share knowledge freely.
- WE have developed more content pages than Wikiversity (with only 6% of the number of the registered users compared to WV)
- WE can now work internationally, freed from the geographical constraints of the Commonwealth.
However, we shouldn't gloat for too long. 2015 is a little more than 5 years away, but I sense an energy that WE have a fighting chance in achieving our goal of free digital resources in support of all national curricula.
- WE need to become more effective supporting new WikiEducators in becoming active contributors to our common goal
- WE need our technology to become transparent (i.e. significantly easier to use)
- WE need to continue our commitment to provide free training to any warm-blooded (as in mammal) educator in the world who wants to learn wiki skills
- WE need to connect educators across international boundaries and
- WE need to have fun while contributing to the social good of education.
- What else do WE need to do?
Is the answer so obvious or as intangible as the wind?
Let's continue making OER futures happen for the world -- the wiki way.
Cheers
Wayne
--
Wayne Mackintosh, Ph.D.
Director,
International Centre for Open Education,
Otago Polytechnic, New Zealand.
Board of Directors, OER Foundation.
Founder and Community Council Member, Wikieducator, www.wikieducator.org
Mobile +64 21 2436 380
Skype: WGMNZ1
Twitter: OERFoundation, Mackiwg
Patricia
active open source online platform there is globally and it has been a
privilege to have been part of this growing community and project from
the get go. It has been an exciting journey to this point and I am
looking forward to much more to come.
Cheers,
Patricia
On Nov 13, 3:38 pm, Wayne Mackintosh <mackintosh.wa...@gmail.com>
wrote:
>
> A brief moment to reflect. Education is an act of sharing knowledge freely.
>
> So where are all the free education materials that we can adapt, modify and
> reuse without restriction? Why has humanity taken so long in achieving a
> free knowledge base for us to share for the common good of education and
> society? Why are the majority of our global population under served when it
> comes to education?
>
> To paraphrase Bob Dylan:
>
> " How many years [can the closed copyright] mountain exist
> Before it's washed to the sea?
> Yes, 'n' how many years can some [educators] exist
> Before they're allowed to be free?
> Yes, 'n' how many times can [we] turn our [heads],
> Pretending [we] just don't see?
> The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
> The answer is blowin' in the wind."
>
> The value proposition of sharing digital teaching materials is a
> "no-brainer". Getting back to Dylan's refrain "The answer, my friend, is
> blowin' in the wind" has been described as "impenetrably ambiguous: either
> the answer is so obvious it is right in your face, or the answer is as
> intangible as the wind" (see:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowin%27_in_the_Wind)
>
> I started WikiEducator as a project to collaborate with the free culture
> movement to develop digital teaching materials in support of every national
> curriculum by 2015. (If we're a little late, 2017 will be just fine :-) ).
>
> - During October, WE generated more than 10.5 million hits on our site
> knowledge freely.
>
> WE should take a moment and reflect on what WE have achieved -- this is an
> amazing story and you are making it happen!
>
> However, we shouldn't gloat for too long. 2015 is a little more than 5 years
> away, but I sense an energy that WE have a fighting chance in achieving our
> goal of free digital resources in support of all national curricula.
>
> to use)
> - WE need to continue our commitment to provide free training to any
> skills
> - WE need to have fun while contributing to the social good of education.
> - What else do WE need to do?
> Is the answer so obvious or as intangible as the wind?
>
> Let's continue making OER futures happen for the world -- the wiki way.
>
> Cheers
> Wayne
>
> --
eliza papajanis
Minhaaj ur Rehman
to copyrighted material, he used it for all 'licensed' material be it
creative commons or FSF licenses. Freedom is freedom, it doesn't come
with CC-BY-SA. I would be interested to see how long that mountain
stands.
> - During October, WE generated more than 10.5 million hits on our site
> knowledge freely.
>
> WE should take a moment and reflect on what WE have achieved -- this is an
> amazing story and you are making it happen!
>
> However, we shouldn't gloat for too long. 2015 is a little more than 5 years
> away, but I sense an energy that WE have a fighting chance in achieving our
> goal of free digital resources in support of all national curricula.
>
> to use)
> - WE need to continue our commitment to provide free training to any
> skills
> - WE need to have fun while contributing to the social good of education.
> - What else do WE need to do?
kirby urner
access to the Internet and (b) you have enough education to know how
to read and study the materials, find your peer groups, organize a
learning experience resulting in credentials and opportunities.
Both (a) and (b) cannot be taken for granted.
Even with the copyright problem removed completely, we still have few
safe environments for concerted study. Many schools and libraries
curtail access, as much out of necessity and a need to share scarce
bandwidth as out of a lust for censorship, although in the case of
schools, many do practice various kinds of filtering, some more
insidious than others.
In many cultures, young people have the best access through Wifi
Cafes, either over the shoulder (under tutelage), renting time on a
shop machine, or lucky enough to have their own laptop. Some cafes
also rent time on larger screens where more meetings and collaboration
might occur.
The second most frequent access site is from work, where performance
may be monitored, but where furthering one's education, including
through social networking sites, is increasingly seen as job-relevant
in some lines of work. Studying accounting in a slow moving hair
salon, waiting for customers, can't be all bad, especially if the
bandwidth is being paid for regardless, true of many service provider
contracts.
In sum, whereas I see a need for more copylefted and license-free
materials, I think the more pointed shortages revolve not around
content, but around access and a shortage of study time except in
formal school settings, to which many are unable to afford access.
The rise of co-working studios, sometimes in working partnerships with
the Wifi Cafes, is probably suggestive of how the younger generation
is self-organizing to overcome these insidious barriers to its future
productivity.
Once on-line, contributing to Wikis is a great way to start
establishing a track record as a free content provider, building a
portfolio. People need to see what it is that you contribute. This
is what social networking is all about and the evidence suggests
intelligent use of these skills aids in finding collaborators and
staffing companies. Musicians tend to use Myspace. Management
consultants use LinkedIn, Plaxo and so on. More teachers are starting
to use Wikieducator. These are promising signs.
Kirby
Wayne Mackintosh
That's a good point. Self-organising, peer production communities are very different from the traditional model, hence the fear of organisations to try it out.
Administrators and decision-makers who don't have experience of the effectiveness and agility of self-organising systems find it hard to take decisions committing time and resources to this kind of approach. In some respects, its like learning to swim -- you have got to get your feet wet.
One way that has worked well for us is the pilot project approach. We encourage and support organisations to test the waters with a small but focused project. Once members of the project team see and experience the benefits of the self-organising approach -- they're sold. It takes time -- but authentic experience is a powerful approach in supporting organisations with incremental transformation.
Cheers
Wayne
Wayne Mackintosh
You make a good point about the potential abundance of access to digital content. However, in reality I think we are a long way off from a world where we have access to digital content PLUS the permissions to adapt, modify and redistribute without restriction. Herein lies the differentiating feature of OER -- namely a permission culture to remix content.
For example, we're in the early phases of establishing a national New Zealand OER collaboration for the school sector (http://wikieducator.org/OERNZ). There is an abundance of material which can be accessed -- for example, the Learning Federation (http://www.thelearningfederation.edu.au/copyright.html) or the NZ Ministry of Education funded TKI project (http://www.tki.org.nz/e/tki/about/terms.php) --- In these examples there is no cost associated with viewing or making copies for educational purposes. However, the most important freedom for educators -- namely the right to adapt, modify and redistribute the content to better meet the needs of the learners we serve are restricted :-(.
Good points with reference to the challenges and costs of internet access in a wide variety of situations. A more perplexing challenge relates to basic access to a school. For example, 76% of the children in sub-Saharan Africa of the age for the last three years of the secondary schooling system will not have the privilege of attending school or contact with a teacher. There is simply not enough money to build enough classrooms or train enough teachers to satisfy the needs of the youth who are eager to learn.
How can OER help these children? This is why we need to think creatively about technologies that can generate printed text books for children who will not have the privilege of attending school. WE need to think of creative solutions where we can combine the best of informal learning with national accreditation systems -- in other word rethinking the traditional models of educational provision. This is a tough challenge -- but with concerted effort I think we can make a difference. I sense that OER is part of the solution.
That said, you allude and provide valuable insights into solving these challenges in that we need to think about the eco-system and how OER fits into the bigger picture.
Cheers
Wayne
valerie
Many of us would like to work on exactly this sort of project.
What do we know about the content needs for this? Can we layout a
foundation so we can collaborate on content creation and assembly, in
parallel with resolving distribution issues? Is there some subject and
grade level that could be used as a pilot program?
It would be nice to find a specific high-demand content area to work
through as a proof-of-concept.
..Valerie
On Nov 14, 2:17 pm, Wayne Mackintosh <mackintosh.wa...@gmail.com>
wrote:
kirby urner
<mackinto...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Kirby,
>
> You make a good point about the potential abundance of access to digital
> content. However, in reality I think we are a long way off from a world
> where we have access to digital content PLUS the permissions to adapt,
> modify and redistribute without restriction. Herein lies the differentiating
> feature of OER -- namely a permission culture to remix content.
>
> For example, we're in the early phases of establishing a national New
> Zealand OER collaboration for the school sector
> (http://wikieducator.org/OERNZ). There is an abundance of material which can
> be accessed -- for example, the Learning Federation
> (http://www.thelearningfederation.edu.au/copyright.html) or the NZ Ministry
> of Education funded TKI project
> (http://www.tki.org.nz/e/tki/about/terms.php) --- In these examples there is
> no cost associated with viewing or making copies for educational purposes.
> However, the most important freedom for educators -- namely the right to
> adapt, modify and redistribute the content to better meet the needs of the
> learners we serve are restricted :-(.
>
We're applaud the 'CS Unplugged' curriculum, made a link to it from my
notes on one of our digital math meetings (a group of professional
educators, lobbying for State of Oregon to make 2010 a launch year for
some of our pilots):
http://worldgame.blogspot.com/2009/08/education-planning.html (CS
Unplugged linked from 2nd paragraph FYI).
> Good points with reference to the challenges and costs of internet access in
> a wide variety of situations. A more perplexing challenge relates to basic
> access to a school. For example, 76% of the children in sub-Saharan Africa
> of the age for the last three years of the secondary schooling system will
> not have the privilege of attending school or contact with a teacher. There
> is simply not enough money to build enough classrooms or train enough
> teachers to satisfy the needs of the youth who are eager to learn.
>
> How can OER help these children? This is why we need to think creatively
> about technologies that can generate printed text books for children who
> will not have the privilege of attending school. WE need to think of
> creative solutions where we can combine the best of informal learning with
> national accreditation systems -- in other word rethinking the traditional
> models of educational provision. This is a tough challenge -- but with
> concerted effort I think we can make a difference. I sense that OER is part
> of the solution.
>
OER might want to consider Freedom Toaster as another way of
distributing content, perhaps a subset of WikiEducator site
specifically designed for off-line readers.
http://www.freedomtoaster.org/
In the South Africa ecosystem, there's this notion of TuxLabs (free
access to computer labs), though not all of them are branded this way.
One Laptop Per Child remains a relatively exotic approach, coupled
with its G1G1 marketing campaign (I have two XOs myself, which I loan
out to curious students -- there's a Python connection).
In addition to printed textbooks, sometimes blank notebooks and
writing implements are in even scarcer supply.
> That said, you allude and provide valuable insights into solving these
> challenges in that we need to think about the eco-system and how OER fits
> into the bigger picture.
>
> Cheers
> Wayne
>
I'm glad this list is available for these sorts of discussions,
looking forward to more.
I'm pleased to discover OER is such a committed and creative organization.
Kirby
Wayne Mackintosh
Wow -- its a small world :-). I'm a South African by birth and very familiar with both the Freedom Toaster and Tuxlabs projects -- both inspirational projects. We can learn a lot from these projects and find ways to collaborate.
I've always maintained that real ICT innovation in education will come from the developing world. Africa launched a continental information society initiative back in the mid 1990s, long before other regional collectives. Designing within constraints results in real innovation :-).
I too have my reservations about the XO project -- however, the strength of the OLPC initiative lies in the projects foresight to think differently about ICTs in education -- namely starting from a pedagogic foundation rather than attempting to replicate existing PC technology.
Off to take look at the CS Unplugged' curriculum -- thanks for the link.
Cheers
Wayne
Wayne Mackintosh
Wow -- CS unplugged is very smart!!!
Any possibility of getting the course materials released under a license that meets the requirements of the free cultural works definition? A few essential freedoms missing in the current license being used :-(. ND & NC clauses restricting the potential here IMHO.
Next time I travel to ChristChurch -- I'm more than happy to have a chat with the Computer Science department to see if we can get release of the materials under a free content license.
Cheers
Wayne
Randy Fisher
Please keep us informed of the developments here - this could be a great leadership statement, and a challenge to other CS departments 'round the world to follow...
- Randy
Open Education is a sustainable and renewable resource.
________________
Randy Fisher, MA, OMD
Senior Consultant & Facilitator, Intersol Group, Canada
Senior Consultant, Organization & Business Development
International Centre for Open Education / OER Foundation, New Zealand
Elected Member, WikiEducator Community Council, www.wikieducator.org
+1 613.230.6424 x144 (EST)
Skype: wikirandy
Twitter: wikirandy
* Stakeholder Engagement, Change / Transition Management & Performance
* Organization Design & Development
* Sustainable Project Implementation & Community-Building
* E-Learning, Online Collaboration & Communities of Practice
* Coaching & Facilitation
* My Bio: http://www.communitybuildingexpert.com
Wayne Mackintosh
With thanks to dedicated WikiEducators like yourself (and hundreds of others) -- WE, as a community, is now in a position to scale up our original vision of developing digital OERs in support of all national curricula.
One advantage of open self organising systems is the ability to solve problems in parallel. For example, we don't need to wait to solve all the distribution challenges before we can start collaborating on high-demand content areas. (That said -- we've made significant progress in tackling on the wiki ==> pdf challenge, and pretty soon teachers around the world will be able to download WikiEducator collections in open document format for editing locally offline -- saving on expensive connectivity costs :-) )
In terms of getting a pilot started, we could for example:
- Make contact with Vincent Kizza who is taking leadership in establishing an national OER portal for Uganda (See: http://www.wikieducator.org/OERUG ) -- Ask Vincent about high priority content areas.
- Reuse ideas and concepts from the the OERNZ project (http://www.wikieducator.org/New_Zealand_Schools_OER_Portal ) which is starting to think about different types of OER that may be useful in the school sector (http://tinyurl.com/yld88n2)
- Take Declan up on his offer for us to remix, collaborate and add value to the amazing set of lesson materials in Biology for Elementary Schools developed by his students (http://tinyurl.com/yg6wqut )
Other ideas?
Cheers
Wayne
NELLIE DEUTSCH
Here is what we are doing on WikiEducator to facilitate the process of introducing educators to the use of technology one step at a time: http://wikieducator.org/Integrating_Technology_for_Active_Learning
Everyone is invited to join.
Warm wishes,
Nellie Deutsch
Sharing is Caring!
Doctoral Student
Educational Leadership
Curriculum and Instruction
Integrating Technology for Active Life-long Learning (IT4ALL) http://www.integrating-technology.com/pd
Get ready for CO10 at WiZiQ: http://connecting-online.ning.com/
Free online workshops using WiZiQ: http://www.wikieducator.org/Workshops
Edward Cherlin
>
> My impression is there's a huge amount of free content if (a) you have
> access to the Internet and (b) you have enough education to know how
> to read and study the materials, find your peer groups, organize a
> learning experience resulting in credentials and opportunities.
>
> Both (a) and (b) cannot be taken for granted.
One Laptop Per Child (hardware), Sugar Labs (software), and various
Free content projects, including Creative Commons and others. Part of
the aim is to network up to a billion children together in a
collaborative education enterprise, creating the conditions in which
they can create Free Software and Free content to suit their needs,
and breaking free of the current barriers to education, collaboration,
and sharing. It will take a while to make the scope of the plan clear,
and longer to make it all happen.
> Even with the copyright problem removed completely, we still have few
> safe environments for concerted study. Many schools and libraries
> curtail access, as much out of necessity and a need to share scarce
> bandwidth as out of a lust for censorship, although in the case of
> schools, many do practice various kinds of filtering, some more
> insidious than others.
lagged farthest behind in the past. Multiple fiber optic cables are
being laid along both East and West coasts of Africa, and joined to
the landlocked countries of the continent, starting with Rwanda and
soon continuing with all of the others.
I and others at FLOSS Manuals wrote How to Bypass Internet Censorship,
with methods to access blocked and filtered content, and to evade
surveillance. http://en.flossmanuals.net/bin/view/CircumventionTools/WebHome
> In many cultures, young people have the best access through Wifi
> Cafes, either over the shoulder (under tutelage), renting time on a
> shop machine, or lucky enough to have their own laptop. Some cafes
> also rent time on larger screens where more meetings and collaboration
> might occur.
>
> The second most frequent access site is from work, where performance
> may be monitored, but where furthering one's education, including
> through social networking sites, is increasingly seen as job-relevant
> in some lines of work. Studying accounting in a slow moving hair
> salon, waiting for customers, can't be all bad, especially if the
> bandwidth is being paid for regardless, true of many service provider
> contracts.
that students can buy books online, and for other purposes. This is
because credit cards issued by banks in Africa cannot be used online,
since the banks are not integrated into the global banking network. As
fiber optic connections become available, this will change, but there
remains a great need in the meantime.
> In sum, whereas I see a need for more copylefted and license-free
> materials, I think the more pointed shortages revolve not around
> content, but around access and a shortage of study time except in
> formal school settings, to which many are unable to afford access.
replacements for printed textbooks. These support each other, so that
all can be expanded together, at a profit overall for all concerned.
Edward Mokurai (默雷/धर्ममेघशब्दगर्ज/دھرممیگھشبدگر ج) Cherlin
Silent Thunder is my name, and Children are my nation.
The Cosmos is my dwelling place, the Truth my destination.
http://www.earthtreasury.org/
Jan Visser
Wayne and Kirby (others?),
I agree regarding OLPC and the (limited) practice emerging from it. It’s
a different use of the technology than what’s normally being done. Papert’s
work from a long time ago is, I assume, still an inspiration for those
alternative uses. It’s therefore different also from the underlying
philosophy of WE and most OER initiatives.
I took a look at the freedom toaster. I’m not sure if I understood the concept well. How is this different from just building your own computer or acquiring one built by others and having it at an affordable price, loading it with whatever you want to load it with? I’m thinking of places where I worked in remote regions in the DRC. Schools with nothing. Stones for kids to sit on; a piece of blackened scrap wood to write on as a chalk board; teachers and students with no access whatsoever to even the most basic sources of information; no electricity supply, except for the occasional portable generator if at all. Preloaded OERs would have to be transported with the device that contains them from wherever there is a possibility to upload them (the nearest village or small town with (irregular) Internet access and basic electricity supply to where they are actually needed. That may involve someone having to walk for half a day, carrying some small device, like an iPod, with all the stuff on it and requiring no more than a photovoltaic charger or something of that kind to run it. An iPod-sized screen may not be ideal for reading, but it may work. Somewhat larger devices (Archos, electronic book readers) might do a better job.
Content must be thought of having the available technology in mind. If reading extensive documents from a small screen is not an option and printing out documents is also impossible, audio perhaps is a possibility. Or audio files enhanced with sketchy verbal and graphic information. Surprisingly or not, cell phones—shared by many—are in those circumstances often more likely to be found than any other piece of transportable hardware. If they are of the kind that is capable of uploading and playing songs, their memory capacity could also be used for uploading learning resources in audio format. Just an idea. My main point is that circumstances vary widely and there has been little progress so far in preparing the local environment to be able to explore creatively the (limited) technological resources available. From what I have seen of it, OLPC is possibly one of the global initiatives best placed to foster such development at the local level.
Thoughts?
Jan
--
Jan Visser, Ph.D.
President & Sr. Researcher, Learning Development Institute
E-mail: jvi...@learndev.org
Check out: http://www.learndev.org and http://www.facebook.com/learndev
Blog: http://jvisser-ldi.blogspot.com/
Jan Visser
After further reading I think I understand the concept better. But it’s still the problem that even when carrying CD’s around to places like the ones I described, the assumption is that you’ll find some minimal infrastructure and equipment there that allows you to play them. But I agree, it solves at least a significant part of existing problems. Regarding the other part, read my post below. And I’m interested in additional thoughts from others.
Jan
Edward Cherlin
> Wayne and Kirby (others?),
>
> I agree regarding OLPC and the (limited) practice emerging from it. It’s a
> different use of the technology than what’s normally being done. Papert’s
> work from a long time ago is, I assume, still an inspiration for those
> alternative uses. It’s therefore different also from the underlying
> philosophy of WE and most OER initiatives.
Seymour Papert, Alan Kay, Doug Engelbart, Jerome Bruner, and many
others, not only from their roots 40 years ago, but from work that
they have continued to do ever since. (In Seymour Papert's case, up
until the brain damage from being run down by a motorcycle during an
education conference in Vietnam.)
How do you see the difference in philosophies?
> I took a look at the freedom toaster. I’m not sure if I understood the
> concept well. How is this different from just building your own computer or
> acquiring one built by others and having it at an affordable price, loading
> it with whatever you want to load it with? I’m thinking of places where I
> worked in remote regions in the DRC. Schools with nothing. Stones for kids
> to sit on; a piece of blackened scrap wood to write on as a chalk board;
> teachers and students with no access whatsoever to even the most basic
> sources of information; no electricity supply, except for the occasional
> portable generator if at all. Preloaded OERs would have to be transported
> with the device that contains them from wherever there is a possibility to
> upload them (the nearest village or small town with (irregular) Internet
> access and basic electricity supply to where they are actually needed. That
> may involve someone having to walk for half a day, carrying some small
> device, like an iPod, with all the stuff on it and requiring no more than a
> photovoltaic charger or something of that kind to run it. An iPod-sized
> screen may not be ideal for reading, but it may work. Somewhat larger
> devices (Archos, electronic book readers) might do a better job.
The OLPC XO is currently the best and least expensive book reader for
such environments, when you include its revolutionary screen
technology, ruggedness, extremely low power requirements, and other
such design elements.
> Content must be thought of having the available technology in mind. If
> reading extensive documents from a small screen is not an option and
> printing out documents is also impossible, audio perhaps is a possibility.
> Or audio files enhanced with sketchy verbal and graphic information.
Sugar Labs is working on multi-language text-to-speech conversion.
> Surprisingly or not, cell phones—shared by many—are in those circumstances
> often more likely to be found than any other piece of transportable
> hardware. If they are of the kind that is capable of uploading and playing
> songs, their memory capacity could also be used for uploading learning
> resources in audio format. Just an idea. My main point is that circumstances
> vary widely and there has been little progress so far in preparing the local
> environment to be able to explore creatively the (limited) technological
> resources available. From what I have seen of it, OLPC is possibly one of
> the global initiatives best placed to foster such development at the local
> level.
Particularly when coupled with renewable electricity, broadband
Internet, and microfinance.
> Thoughts?
>
>
>
> Jan
>
>
>
> --
>
> Jan Visser, Ph.D.
>
> President & Sr. Researcher, Learning Development Institute
>
> E-mail: jvi...@learndev.org
>
> Check out: http://www.learndev.org and http://www.facebook.com/learndev
>
> Blog: http://jvisser-ldi.blogspot.com/
[snip]
valerie
You have reminded us of the range of learners to be helped. Expanding
mobile phones capabilities bypass many of the problems that you
describe and we are seeing amazing progress there.
We can be working to immediately benefit learners in less challenging
situations. There is an enormous opportunity to work with learners who
do have some connectivity and access to online content, although
perhaps this is shared or limited by time or location. Providing
content and pedagogy with multiple access and delivery options expands
the population that can benefit. But, we need to keep the millions of
learners in the "tail" in mind as we go forward. Thanks
..Valerie
Wayne Mackintosh
The freedom toaster alerts society to the fact that they do not need to purchase a non-free software license in order to have a fully functional computer system. It informs society about freedom of choice, especially that there is no need to be tempted into using illegal copies of software for lack of money. The freedom toaster is about emancipation with the added benefit of saving considerable costs in bandwidth.
When you combine this with projects like Tuxlabs which put old computer hardware to good use, widening access to ICTs in ways which were not possible before -- that's a significant innovation. Moreover, with projects like Wikipedia, it is possible also to provide remote rural schools running open source thin client labs, access to a local version of the largest encyclopaedia developed in the history of human kind.
There are innovative projects like MobileEd which harness the potential of Mobile telophony combined with the amazing world of wikis.
This is qualitatively different from what has gone before all possible because of a commitment to the essential freedoms :-)
Cheers
Wayne
Randy Fisher
A pleasure speaking with you - it's a great idea for a project....
With your assistance, I've set up a space on WikiEducator so that you can get started!
http://www.wikieducator.org/Assessment_and_Evaluation
Cheers,
- Randy
Wayne,I have been thinking about how to empower people who teach. The biggest hurdles teachers face is 'standards and assessments.' No matter who develops the standards, publishers are in control of the assessments. I suggest that we work together to put together materials that meet the standards we, as teachers, feel are important. Then make create appropriate evaluation tools that will promote the standards that we as a group feel are most appropriate for our teaching field and promote our teachers by providing quality evaluation tools for demonstrating our teaching skill levels.As the president of a testing organization, I feel I have at least some of the skills required to assist in developing some of the assessment tools and Moodle/Soodle can provide at least the starting software required for dissemination. For areas which require human grading, we have loads of teachers to call on and thus can make these tools more worldwide and very inexpensive. Program evaluation is mainly surveys and testing results, thus putting together this component will also be the same as assessment tools. There are also lots of public domain information that can help supplement the project.Testing, assessment tools and evaluation has to have statistics and quality control, which is very different than what Wikieducator does now, but can be achieved by committees and surveys. I hope this is an idea that will take off. I am willing to spearhead the project if it is appropriate for wikieducation.Chris Babowal
President
Babowal & Associates, Inc.
2588 Pioneer Ave.
San Jose, CA 95128
Skype: babceoBusiness Tel: (408) 874-6774
Cell: (408)504-8899
From: Wayne Mackintosh <mackinto...@gmail.com>
To: wikieducator-teacher...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Fri, November 13, 2009 4:52:44 PM
Subject: [WE Teacher Collaboration] Re: WE believe in education - So where is all the free content?
Chris --
Exactly! Give educators a space where they can act --- and the impossible seems achievable.
Great quote!
Cheers
Wayne2009/11/14 Chris Babowal <bab...@sbcglobal.net>
Wayne,
I like a quote:
The great aim of education is not knowledge, but action. Herbert Spenser
I think this actually describes wiki.Chris Babowal
President
Babowal & Associates, Inc.
San Jose, CA 95128
Skype: babceo
Cell: (408)504-8899
From: Wayne Mackintosh <mackinto...@gmail.com>Sent: Fri, November 13, 2009 3:38:49 PM
Subject: [WE Teacher Collaboration] WE believe in education - So where is all the free content?
kirby urner
> Wayne and Kirby (others?),
>
> I agree regarding OLPC and the (limited) practice emerging from it. It’s a
> different use of the technology than what’s normally being done. Papert’s
> work from a long time ago is, I assume, still an inspiration for those
> alternative uses. It’s therefore different also from the underlying
> philosophy of WE and most OER initiatives.
>
Greetings Jan --
OLPC is a fairly esoteric and futuristic project, is helping drive
down the cost of laptops by turning them into netbooks. The XO-2 has
an even smaller form factor.
The XO comes pre-loaded with some educational materials, otherwise has
a rather ordinary Mozilla-based web browser. This idea of one laptop
per child (1:1 ratio) is not the development model in many ecosystems,
and can't be presumed by every curriculum writer.
As someone who works around the Python subculture, I'm linked to OLPC
in the sense that the default user interface is implemented in the
Python language, as are many of the activities. The machine also
knows FORTH.
I just upgraded one of the XOs the other night, getting some expert
assistance. My other one is still running a rather ancient version of
the RedHat system.
I was in a long meeting with Alan Kay fairly recently in London,
courtesy of Mark Shuttleworth. Guido van Rossum, the inventor of
Python, was also at this meeting. We agreed that many educational
initiatives are orthogonal to OLPC meaning great if there's a 1:1
ratio, but we're prepared for other contingencies.
>
>
> I took a look at the freedom toaster. I’m not sure if I understood the
> concept well. How is this different from just building your own computer or
> acquiring one built by others and having it at an affordable price, loading
> it with whatever you want to load it with? I’m thinking of places where I
> worked in remote regions in the DRC. Schools with nothing. Stones for kids
> to sit on; a piece of blackened scrap wood to write on as a chalk board;
> teachers and students with no access whatsoever to even the most basic
> sources of information; no electricity supply, except for the occasional
> portable generator if at all. Preloaded OERs would have to be transported
> with the device that contains them from wherever there is a possibility to
> upload them (the nearest village or small town with (irregular) Internet
> access and basic electricity supply to where they are actually needed. That
> may involve someone having to walk for half a day, carrying some small
> device, like an iPod, with all the stuff on it and requiring no more than a
> photovoltaic charger or something of that kind to run it. An iPod-sized
> screen may not be ideal for reading, but it may work. Somewhat larger
> devices (Archos, electronic book readers) might do a better job.
>
The idea of a Freedom Toaster is its a filling station for static
media such as CDs and DVDs. You may not have easy Internet access but
if you go to a freedom toaster you can legally burn all manner of
digital assets to sharable media.
I don't know to what extent said Toasters are themselves self
updating. Juke boxes (music players) in some public places now phone
home for the current music, don't sport any disks locally.
>
>
> Content must be thought of having the available technology in mind. If
> reading extensive documents from a small screen is not an option and
> printing out documents is also impossible, audio perhaps is a possibility.
> Or audio files enhanced with sketchy verbal and graphic information.
> Surprisingly or not, cell phones—shared by many—are in those circumstances
> often more likely to be found than any other piece of transportable
> hardware. If they are of the kind that is capable of uploading and playing
> songs, their memory capacity could also be used for uploading learning
> resources in audio format. Just an idea. My main point is that circumstances
> vary widely and there has been little progress so far in preparing the local
> environment to be able to explore creatively the (limited) technological
> resources available. From what I have seen of it, OLPC is possibly one of
> the global initiatives best placed to foster such development at the local
> level.
>
>
>
> Thoughts?
>
Freedom Toasters could easily contain copyleft audio books etc., not
sure to what extent they already do as we don't have any of said
toasters in my neck of the woods (Pacific Northwest near 45th
parallel, Seattle's longitude), think we ought to, maybe by the next
Open Source Conference (OSCON 2010)?
We do have a lot of XOs around, plus billboards for G1G1 (the "give
one get one" campaign, where you pay for two, donate one to the
program).
http://www.flickr.com/photos/17157315@N00/3224155740/sizes/l/
(example poster from a previous run)
Kirby