Wednesday 25 May 2016

Free papers on mobile learning from #IMLF2016 conference #mlearning

This is a really wonderful set of papers that encompass the latest mobile learning realities and implementations. The proceedings were disseminated before the actual IMLF2016 conference start in Bangkok, providing a nice bit of reading.

Papers covered in the proceedings :

  • Empathic Technologies and Virtual, Contextual and Mobile Learning in VR/AR/MR Environments
  • Mobilizing the Troops: a Review of the Contested Terrain of App-Enabled Learning
  • Moving Toward a Mobile Learning Landscape: Presenting a Mlearning Integration Framework
  • Enhancing A Mobile and Personalized Learning Platform Through Facial Analytics and Interactive Quizzes
  • Using wearable technology to improve the acquisition of new literacies
  • A Snapshot of Teacher Educators’ Mobile Learning Practices
  • The growing tendency of mobile-assisted language learning development in Kazakhstan
  • The QR Code→ as a Mobile Learning Tool for Labor Room Nurses at the San Pablo Colleges Medical Center
  • Teachers’ Readiness in Using Mobile Devices for Mathematics Teaching and Learning: A Case Study in Banten Province, Indonesia
  • The Effect of Multimedia Blurb on Second Language Narrative Reading Comprehension
  • Developing Hong Kong Community College Students’ Digital Literacy through Digital Storytelling
  • The role of Universitas Terbuka-Indonesia as an Institution of Higher Education in Establishing the Existence of the Unitary Republic of Indonesia through Multicultural Education
  • LOWA operator in application on online student assessment
  • The Development of An Open Educational Resources (OER) Model based on Connectivism Theory to Enhance Knowledge Sharing between Thai OER and Malaysian OER
  • Utilization of Online Radio for Learning Media. Case study at Universitas Terbuka
  • Design and adoption factors of an m-learning application to support self-exploratory guide visit
  • The Impact and Benefits of Internet Usage in Presidential Election Campaign

I only started reading the proceedings, but for all of you looking at integrating mobile learning into a learning environment for all levels (learner, teacher, society), based on a combination of mLearning frameworks and latest insights, have a look at Helen Crompton's paper on "Moving Toward a Mobile Learning Landscape: Presenting a Mlearning Integration Framework", I can sure understand why she is one of the keynote speakers. Every page got me thinking and gave me new ideas related to my own interests. To give you an idea, I am adding the abstract of her paper here:
Mobile devices transcend the educational affordances provided by conventional tethered electronic and traditional learning. However, empirical findings show that educators are not integrating technology effectively into the curriculum. In this study, a thematic synthesis methodology was used to develop and present a framework for thinking about the integration of mobile devices in teaching and learning. The mobile learning (mlearning) integration framework is comprised of four main parts: beliefs, resources, methods, and purpose. These four areas are elucidated to reveal the many sub-components that determine how technology is integrated. An ecological framework is then presented to demonstrate how the individual parts of the initial framework operate through a complex, interconnected network of systems involving personal and environmental factors.

Monday 23 May 2016

5 week free xAPI course by experts, starting 26 May 2016 #xAPI



Online xAPI course, provided by the xAPI developers. You can pre-register for the course now, and it goes live from the 26 May 2016 (until 30 June). Full details are available on Course Hubpage on the Curatr website.

Join this MOOC to explore both the technical realities and the strategic possibilities of the xAPI. If you want to write your first xAPI statement and understand the difference between an Activity Type and a Context Extension, this is the place to be.
Equally, if neither of these things mean a darn thing, we are the community that will help you make sense out of your data strategy, and your roadmap for the medium term.
This MOOC will be open to contribution and allow you to explore the content and conversations that best fit your needs.

Starting late-May, the course will run for 5 weeks with full facilitation and a series of live events throughout June, and then remain open for the rest of the year. The conversation has already started on Twitter,  using the course ID as a hashtag #LearnxAPI – so why not head over to see what’s being said and to lend your voice to the conversation.

Here’s a quick rundown of what you can expect:

Demo access to the next version of Learning Locker

We’re running a demo version of Learning Locker v2 alongside this MOOC and you can connect up your activity to the LRS to get a feel for the next generation of Learning Locker. V2 isn’t ready for Open Source release yet, so you’re getting a head-start on the crowd by joining the MOOC.

Format & Events

Same as last year, we’ll be running two streams - one that covers xAPI strategy, and another which focuses on technical aspects.
We go live on Thursday May 26 to give you a few days to get started on the material before starting up 4 weeks of live events where we’ll be taking a more in-depth look at some of the key themes with a number of experts from across the globe:
  • Week 1 - Megan Torrance shares her been-there-done-that advice on getting started with the xAPI without breaking the bank
     
  • Week 2 - Sean Putman steers you through your xAPI-conformant Authoring Tool options, sharing best practice and advice along the way
     
  • Week 3 - James Ballard gives a view from down-under, discussing xAPI adoption in the Asia Pacific region and how vendors are working with clients to adopt more xAPI-enabled technologies
  • Week 4 - Aaron Silvers updates on the new Data Interoperability Standards Consortium (DISC) which aims to bring standardised conformance testing to ensure that vendors saying they ‘do’ xAPI, really do know their stuff.

Welcome to Learn xAPI 2016 #learnxAPI from HT2 on Vimeo.

Friday 20 May 2016

Free multilingual MOOC opportunity for 1st time MOOC organisers #EUmoocs

This is a wonderful opportunity for anyone with a clear MOOC idea, but still wondering which platform to use. The EMMA platform supports multiple languages, which includes an automated translation of transcripts of your MOOC content to the other languages (English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Estonian). 

The platform uses a wide array of learning analytics and survey tools, peer assignment options and a student toolbox.

20 MOOCs will be selected out of all the proposals that are sent in. To participate (= sending in your MOOC proposal), you only need to provide the usual contact information, a short MOOC description, your community of interested learners (for promotional purposes), and the languages you will use.
Deadline for submitting your proposal: 30 May 2016, although the deadline is close by, the information needed is doable in a short time span. Just do it, this is a great opportunity to have access to a great MOOC provider with multiple language options for free.

More information and the form to fill in if you want to participate can be found here. And quickly sharing some of their information:

What is EMMA?EMMA is a 30-month pilot action supported by the European Commission that provides an innovative system for the delivery of free, open, online courses (MOOCs) in multiple languages.
Hosting for selected MOOCs will be guaranteed for free until May 2017.
Benefits that you can have for free
  • Free hosting of your MOOC on the EMMA platform.
  • Use of the automated translation system for your videos and lesson texts (8 languages available).
  • Use of tools for peer assignment and student toolbox creation.
  • Use of learning analytics, tracking and ad hoc survey tools.
  • Use of the Blog.
  • The support of a professional communication service for student recruitment and institutional visibility.
  • Access to a community of MOOC providers willing to share their know-how and experience.
What is expected from you
  • Willingness to give feedback on the EMMA experience.
  • Willingness to edit automatic transcriptions and translations.
  • Willingness to collaborate on EMMA activities.
Participate!
Submit the Request for participation FORMEMMA evaluation committee will select 20 MOOCs from amongst those submitted within 7 days of the closing date of the selection period according to the following criteria:
  1. Reputation of the teacher/expert/institution affiliated to a discipline.
  1. Presence of an active community linked to the teacher/expert/institution.
  1. Number of languages in which the MOOC will be delivered.
Only submissions received by the deadline will be considered.
Should your proposal be selected, our team will support you in the delivery of your MOOC.

Wednesday 18 May 2016

Call for papers in Hawaii and Germany on innovative #EdTech #CfP

Two calls for papers/proposals below:

Open Educa Berlin or OEB2016
Conference dates: 30 November - 2 December 2016.
Deadline for submitting a proposal: 1 June 2016.
Submission page can be found here.
The OEB conference gathers over 2000 participants from around the world. It is inspiring, as well as a great networking conference. The theme of 2016 is 'Owning Learning'. Tomorrow’s learning is about ownership. We will own our learning. We will control what, where, when and how we learn. We will access, link, combine, interpret and interact with knowledge. We will be empowered as never before. We will make learning work for us. OEB 2016 is all about the new world of the empowered learner - a world in which learning is owned by learners.

Hawaii International Conference on Systems Sciences
Conference dates: 4 - 7 January 2017.
Deadline for submissions: 15 June 2016.
Dan Suthers, Maarten De Laat and Caroline Haythornthwaite invite papers for the Learning within Digital and Social Media mini track at the Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, (HICSS-50).

Pasting their call here:
"We solicit papers on how human learning takes place via interactive and social processes enabled or supported by digital and social media. We seek to bridge disciplines and research communities between system and learning sciences, so within this scope a broad range of research questions, learning settings, and theoretical and methodological traditions will be considered. Contributions may include new design approaches, theoretical perspectives, learning analytic techniques, policy implications and/or other research results relating to the relationship between digital and social media and learning. Studies may be situated in formal or informal learning settings, and we particularly encourage studies of learning "in the technological wild".

The shared theme across accepted papers will be on relationships between human learning activities and the technologies used. Topics of particular interest include:

* how learning takes place in networks, crowds, teams and communities that exist on and through the WWW and digital and social media;

* how the affordances of technological systems influence or are appropriated for learning via social processes, and how design of affordances can leverage these influences;

* how learning is (or can be designed to be) distributed and coordinated across multiple digital and social media;

* learning practices at the nexus of distributed work, socializing, and knowledge sharing;

* learning analytics in digital and social media: how to understand learning via the traces people leave in social media;

* new trends in learning and digital and social media, including issues and opportunities relating to information literacy, literacy and new media, ubiquitous learning, viral learning and entrepreneurial learning; and

* ethical issues relating to learning online, including issues relating to data capture, analysis and display, and learning about controversial subjects or anti­social activities.

HICSS 50 and the "Big Island"
The Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, in its 50th year, is one of the longstanding scientific conferences and is highly ranked among information systems conferences. Diverse disciplines unified by a focus on information technologies are woven together in a matrix structure of tracks and themes. By attending HICSS you are not only reaching the audience of your track and mini-track; you also have the opportunity to learn about what is happening in related fields and meet leaders in those fields. Mini-tracks within the Collaboration Systems and Technologies and the Digital and Social Media tracks are particularly relevant.

Friday 13 May 2016

Future of Education: merging quantified, qualified & connected Self #telepathy #telekinesis #quantifiedself

The people from the European Multiple MOOC Aggregator (EMMA) asked me to contribute my view on the Future of Education. So I recorded a talking head video (added below the slide deck), and accompanied it with a slide deck. In this This video proposes the Future of Education as the realization of human telekinesis and telepathy as a result of merging the quantified, qualified, and connected self. By reaching a telekinetic and telepathic state of mind, more time is left to dedicate to each of our personal learning goals. But in order to reach this connected state we must provide more curated content (like MOOCs), achieve a better understanding of how the mind works, and promote open access and open data. The video also offers two possible assignments.
  


Future of education for EMMA MOOC from Inge de Waard

And here is the full video: