As I was listening and participating in the sidebar chat during Thursday's live session on Connectivism with Stephen Downes, I digressed ... and regressed ... to my early years of explorations and learning. Perhaps our most significant, and deepest learning, occur during our toddler, and just beyond, years. It is here that we explore, make discoveries, find others to share those discoveries with, and, in turn, are led to more discoveries! The excitement of it all should stay with us throughout our lives. Sadly, and perhaps, inevitably, it does not. I think the connections we make in those early years lay the foundations for our learning preferences and styles ... a climate (our surroundings) of multiple choices of how and with what and with whom to connect start early, and we go from there.
We do connect ...
We find that exploration and experimentation can be a bit of a messy process and we continually seek to reach that which is just out of out reach (a wee bit like trying to navigate this MOOC)
And yet, we ultimately, connect ...
I believe this process does lay a foundation and, later on, can be resurrected as another avenue for deeper, lifelong learning. We further develop our own communities of learning and communities of practice.
This morning I traveled to Google+ and hung out with John Griffin. There are many possibilities for visual and oral connections and development here. Then, I connected with Omar Abi Ghosn who is located in Lebanon, on Facebook ... then tried the hangout ... bandwidth in Lebanon not good enough to make it work too well ... so we went to Skype ... success in both microphone speaking and video, tho when closing video, the speaking voice had far less breakup. Soon, I will check in with Sam, our tech support who is located in China ... to make sure all tech issues are AOK, before sending out today's NewPosts. It has been a fun morning of exploration and discoveries (not all happy discoveries .. eg hangout w Omar). I thoroughly enjoyed connecting and hope to make similar connections with many more in CMC11 and beyond. The learning journey continues ...
Perhaps we can resurrect some of those earlier feelings of excitement of discovery, of learning about our surroundings ... and beyond ... by thinking of CMC11 as our very own Sandbox in which to play and connect with folks of many different locations, different educational backgrounds, different cultures and beliefs, new thinking/oldthinking. I am excited with the prospect of what can be, as well as what has already been ... a great learning journey with those who are here ... visibly and lurking! I am hoping to "learn, unlearn and relearn" with many ...
We do connect ...
We find that exploration and experimentation can be a bit of a messy process and we continually seek to reach that which is just out of out reach (a wee bit like trying to navigate this MOOC)
And yet, we ultimately, connect ...
I believe this process does lay a foundation and, later on, can be resurrected as another avenue for deeper, lifelong learning. We further develop our own communities of learning and communities of practice.
This morning I traveled to Google+ and hung out with John Griffin. There are many possibilities for visual and oral connections and development here. Then, I connected with Omar Abi Ghosn who is located in Lebanon, on Facebook ... then tried the hangout ... bandwidth in Lebanon not good enough to make it work too well ... so we went to Skype ... success in both microphone speaking and video, tho when closing video, the speaking voice had far less breakup. Soon, I will check in with Sam, our tech support who is located in China ... to make sure all tech issues are AOK, before sending out today's NewPosts. It has been a fun morning of exploration and discoveries (not all happy discoveries .. eg hangout w Omar). I thoroughly enjoyed connecting and hope to make similar connections with many more in CMC11 and beyond. The learning journey continues ...
Perhaps we can resurrect some of those earlier feelings of excitement of discovery, of learning about our surroundings ... and beyond ... by thinking of CMC11 as our very own Sandbox in which to play and connect with folks of many different locations, different educational backgrounds, different cultures and beliefs, new thinking/oldthinking. I am excited with the prospect of what can be, as well as what has already been ... a great learning journey with those who are here ... visibly and lurking! I am hoping to "learn, unlearn and relearn" with many ...
Hi Carol,
ReplyDeleteJust wrote something and then couldn't post and lost everything ;o( not sure why this is happening. Trying to remember now what I wrote ;o)
The observations you make linked to learning styles and preferences when we are young is interesting. I would also welcome that we are more excited about the world we live in when we get older and keep the playfulness we have when we are children (wondering how we can make this happen, our individual and collective responsibilities linked to this).
I would add that we could also look at the environment and our exposure to different approaches and how we feel that have or not worked for us which also influence our learning habits. Also Gardner's multiple intelligences which which I am sure you are familiar with ( http://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?q=gardner+multiple+intelligences&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart) are also fascinating and offer a different perspective to what we call learning styles, preferences or habits ;o)
Not sure if I captured now all I said in the first message. Oh, yes, and the photographs are beautiful too and I can see the links you are making using visual and written language.
Speak again soon.
Chrissi