The Convergence of Technologies-The Perfect Storm for Online Education??- Part I

Greetings
As we often see in the media, many different technologies are advancing and developing at an increased rate. What we might not grasp is that these technologies are not developing in isolated linear streams but in fact are converging where advancements in one technology will converge and intersect with changes in another technology to enhance and enrich the other. The effects of this rapid convergence of technologies might be considered the "perfect storm" in a post information age. It is not my intent to describe how this convergence will affect all aspects of our lives but instead, narrow my focus to online education alone.



Online education depends upon the technologies of computer development, artificial intelligence, LMS (Learning Management Systems), Asynchronous and Synchronous transmission, Cyber-Security just to name a few. How online education deals with the seismic waves produced by this convergence depends first and foremost on the vision of where we want online education to take us. If we look at this from the point of view of the trainer of employees, there is a question that needs to be answered. With the vision that we have, are we training students for employment in occupations that will cease to exist in the future that the students will live in? Is the vision that we subscribe to in online education flexible enough to adjust to the convergence of technologies or does it need to be discarded. I would submit to you that the industrial model of education and its vision for online education will not be able to adapt because in itself it reflects a world context that is not in synch with the changing realities that students are facing. It is my position that we need to work towards a vision that sees cultural innovation as a way to adjust, integrate and adapt to the convergence of technologies.
For example, the advancement of computer design is not only being affected by advances in chip technology and computer architecture. The technologies dealing with artificial technology and nanotechnology are having an impact on computer advancement. Cyber security advancements recognize that the use of passwords needs to be replaced by something that is highly individualized and secure. The rise of cyber attacks on corporate, military and civilian institutions is on the rise which very clearly demonstrates how vulnerable we are when it comes to the loss of personal and financial data. This displays the weaknesses and also the potential danger of relying on the present system just because it kept us safe in the past. So, what are the potential solutions to this problem?

It has been my opinion for awhile that we will need to depend upon the advancements in biotechnology and specifically, biometric security. We have been able to see new technologies designed for secure access develop. Such innovation as using finger prints to access systems, use of facial recognition to access systems, Iris access...etc have been going through growing pains. The concept behind them is the right idea. We need technology that uses unique biological identifiers that can't be spoofed or replicated in order to have security while working online. For example, such biometric identifiers could be used to authenticate that the person logging on to the virtual education interface is the person that they claim to be based on their biometric identifiers. It could also be used to authenticate that the person doing a test is the person that is suppose to be doing the test. Biometrics could also be used for tracking a person during a test to make sure that if the person is not allowed to use certain areas of the Internet during the test, that their integrity is encouraged and maintained.
With respect to the devices required to accomplish, I am party to such an innovation as part of the developer conference for the company. The item I am referring to is called a NYMI. It is a bracelet that a wearer will use that uses the individual EKG of the person to communicate with smart devices. When they take the device off, they can't access their devices. Having someone else put the device on will not give them access to that person's smart devices or data because the bracelet is based on the first person's EKG. There are other biological identifiers that are unique to the individual that might also be used. Right now the NYMI is in the beta stage of development.

Next... How course development will be affected by the convergence of AI and virtual world simulation.

Strategic design in Online Education: Skill Streams in Courses--Page #2

Referring to the previous rough diagram, the following points need to be made to clarify the headings in the diagram:

1. Vision of Online Education:  From our vision of what online education should be will come the context by which all decisions regarding course objectives, teaching methodology and the design of engaging educational experiences will derive. All of the design should refer back to the guiding vision for online education. As a result of following process, more innovations might lead to a refining of the original vision. If the vision is to create a culture of innovation then this should be reflected in the design of the course.
2. Course Learning Objectives:  From the vision should come the definitive course objectives. If the course is to focus more on process skills than information accumulation skills then the objectives should be designed to do just that.
3. Identify and Prioritize Skills Streams: In this category it is extremely important not only to identify the skills that will be emphasized throughout the course but also the interconnectedness of these skills must be shown. As a simple example suppose a learning objective is to enable students to take and defend effectively a position on a real world problem in a collaborative simulation. What skills are necessary for a student to possess so that in the end they can effectively demonstrate mastery of the objective? Surely you can not speak of the production of an argument if a student does not know and can demonstrate the difference between a fact and an opinion! Is this a real world skill that is relevant to a student's life? Consider how often in the real world and especially in the online environment, that a theory is repeated as if it is fact instead of something based upon an educated guess. How do students determine what websites contain valid information and which are either distorted or completely wrong? This is why teaching students how to think is more important than having them repeat information they have found without critical evaluation. In the online environment they will be confronted by people who want to teach them what to think and will use all of the multimedia of the Internet to shape what they think. Whether a student addresses skill stream #1, 2 or 3 will depend where they are in their understanding of the skills that are being addressed.
4. Skill Streams # 1, 2, 3: The skills streams represent a hierarchy of skills that are connected by priority as described in the previous step. Students stream into the skill stream that they still need to acquire.This is determined by the educator online for each student in an appropriate interrogation format. The goal is to see whether or not a student can demonstrate mastery of the skill. The design of the interrogation should produce measurable results. In the diagram, only three skills streams are indicated. This can be changed but must be done with care.
5. Collaborative Reinforcement and Mastery of Skills: At the end of the previous step, students will move into the skill stream that they have been identified as being at. This new step involves a collaboration between all three groups. Students are advised that in the next step, labelled the logic pit their understandings will be put to the test in an intense session in which the instructor will be the questioner. Students in the skill stream #3 will have the responsibility of collaborating with students in skill stream #2 to teach them what is needed to understand the skill that they have mastered. Additionally, students in skill stream #2 will have responsibility of teaching students in skill stream #1 what is need to understand the skill that they have mastered. At the end of their session, students in skill stream #3 will have the responsibility of teaching students identified as skill stream #1 the skill that they have mastered. Students are informed that at the end of this collaborative session, they will proceed into the "Logic Pit" which is a timed collaborative intense session where there understandings will be put to the test by their instructor.
6. The Logic Pit Challenge: The logic pit is where students demonstrate their skills by being challenged by the instructor. The reasoning behind this is two fold. First, I have found that when it comes to asking students to defend statements that they make in a discussion of an issue, educators raised on the child centred learning philosophy had the tendency to allow students to opt out from defending statements so that they will not be embarrassed in front of their peers. They then start to depend on this opt out strategy which means that they never have to re-examine their thinking and delve into the issue in more depth. Secondly, one of the great failings of school systems is that they do not mentor students effectively on logical reasoning and how to build and deliver a sound enough argument to the point where they can make an effective stand on an issue and are able to defend what they believe using verifiable evidence. I found that when I first introduced the concept of the "logic pit" to students, there was a great deal of trepidation on their part. However, after they became use to it, I found that they looked forward to taking a stand in the logic pit to present a strategic case and were self-motivated to prepare for it. This occurred across student skill levels. After the instructor has put them to the test in a timed intense session, they move on to the online simulation.
7. Online Simulation (all skills in play): The online simulation can take many forms. The purpose is to test students' ability to apply their learned skills in a novel situation and test their ability to collaborate as a team. The collaboration concept is not new to students because they often collaborate in online gaming scenarios. The simulation could take the form of a debate where they are divided into two teams and must defend a point of view that they do not necessarily hold. This tests their ability to predict counter-arguments to their position and defend against them. The simulation could be an online court room presided over by a real world court justice, where they may play the role of a prosecutor, defence attorney or a member of the jury, witnesses, suspects...etc. The instructor can during this simulation introduce confounding variables that will force students to be innovative. For example, it may be stated that a prime prosecution witness has died of a heart attack during the trail proceedings. The instructor is no longer the "sage on the stage" in terms of his or her role but instead is the moderator and conditions changer for the simulation. The ideal form of the simulation would be to have a virtual immersive world that the students enter, taking on the role of a particular avatar personality, and then are faced with critical decisions during the play that could have and does have an impact on the direction the simulation takes. The simulation needs to be a timed event.
8. Assessment of Simulation Performance: This stage is the debriefing stage in which input about the simulation is collected from the participants, the moderator and any real world expert participants. In this stage both strengths and weakness in regards to students' command of the skills that have been in play are assessed. From the information gathered, a second simulation is cast in which the variables that represented weaknesses on the part of the student are emphasized.
9. Online Simulation #2:  Students enter the second simulation which could be a variation of the last run simulation. The idea behind this is similar to when students engage in online gaming and their turn ends because of mistakes made. They get a second chance to try again. The difference is that in doing the second simulation, the educator has changed the variables. Innovative students in collaboration will devise and think strategically with the purpose of beating the simulation and achieving the group goal.
10. Collaborative Online Real World Project: In this final assessment of student skills, students are given a challenge in which a real world issue involving a set of problems is put before them. They are encouraged to come up with a innovative solution to the described issue. They are then to access an online community dealing with the issue and be open to comments concerning their solution from the members of the community. How well they respond with their own arguments and defences becomes part of their assessment. The moderator of the community is asked for her or his input on the discussion and is also asked whether or not the students' work could be highlighted in the community for a period of time.

 This process is far from perfect. However, if it stimulates discussion in the online education community it is a beginning towards building a culture of innovation.

The convergence of technologies are on the horizon, are you ready as an online educator for a seismic shift that will force you to re-invent your pedagogy? Converging technologies and the impact on virtual education will be the subject of my next post...........

Strategic Design in Online Education: Skill Streams in Courses

Greetings-
In the last post I suggested to you that in dealing with cognitive skills as outlined by Bloom that there is a needed change. The environment that Bloom first developed his hierarchy for does not quite fit or take advantage of an online environment. Due to the very nature of the environment on the Internet, the end goal for students is no longer to gather information for the instructor and then demonstrate the knowledge of information through assessment. There is more information on the Internet than what a teacher could accumulate in all of his or her formal education and the ability of students to find and reproduce it requires very little thought at all. In the post information age where our students are very comfortable with the Internet, the emphasis on the scales of information collection vs. process skills has shifted more to the process skills. It is not to say that students do not have to have basic foundational knowledge in whatever discipline they choose to follow but this foundation knowledge is a means to an end.

In order to create a culture of innovation within our societies, it must start at what we see as important for the education of children. We can not treat all children as if we have taken all from a specific mold which has up to this point been the foundation of the old industrial model of education.
Instead we need to educate students how to think, how to believe that they are capable of creating new knowledge and skills, and that our societies value their contributions to building the future.

With this in mind, what I am going to describe to you are some thoughts on the design of online courses that I think are essential to making "thoughtful engagement" an attitude in the learning style of online students. the thoughts that I offer are far from polished but if they get you think "what if..." and inspire you to offer suggestions for refinement then much has been accomplished that is of value. You see, in order for students to demonstrate this attitude, they need you as an instructor to model it for them and being willing to share your discoveries and challenges. These thoughts arise out of a frustration that I had experienced in the brick and mortar school and now find it creeping into the design of online courses. When we try to transfer what worked well in the brick and mortar school into an online environment, we also end up transferring some of our faulty  design issues along with the potentially good ideas.

One of these problems is that when a particular skill set is introduced to students and a dedicated set of exercises to reinforce the idea, we fail to draw connections to the next skill to show how it relates to the previously learned skill. In other words, in the exercises following we don't emphasize to students that we are building a skill repertoire which they will then focus on a specific issue that they will deal with at a time in the future. Students start to see each of these necessary skills as separate entities that are not connected. The problem is we need to have a framework of identified skills that we want students to master in a course but we don't prioritize and arrange these skills as building on the skill that came before. Part of the problem is a guilt that teachers sometimes feel if a student is struggling. We don't want the student to fail mastering the skill and in many western societies students are not to experience failure. Therefore, we have a habit of reminding the student of the nature of the previously learned skill.

So, how can we deal with this in an online environment? The following rough diagram is a display of ideas that might address this problem through a construct that I call "skill streams". The actual explanation of objects in the diagram will be detailed in page #2

Strategic Design in Online Education: "The Cascading Ideas Effect"

Greetings-

Picking up from the last post, I draw your attention to the example that I gave in regards to robotics at the end of the last post. In order to consider creating a culture of innovation within the online education environment, what happens after something is created whether it be new knowledge, new skills...etc is important. What the students exhibited is something that we should strive to achieve with all our students across all curriculum lines. Why? The "why" is really quite simple.We end up with a generation committed to laying the industrial model of education to rest and a generation committed to the positive advancement of our societies by believing that they have something positive to contribute in building the future.

The "Cascading Ideas Effect" that I proposed can best be explained by using an analogy.

When you look at a waterfall, what do you really see? What you see are streams of water cascading from a height in a linear fashion. If you introduce a small obstacle into the flow of the waterfall, the following results may occur:

• the stream may be diverted into two different paths before coming to rest at the end
• the water impacting on the obstacle, may cause a chain reaction of collisions of water droplets which then go on and continue to impact others resulting in changes of directions that increase exponentially

If we change this to refer to what happens when students create something, as the robotic students did, the small obstacle in this case is just one student saying "but wait what if we did this with our finished product...? This would be what you might call the tipping point in which a cause and effect pattern occurs and student collaboration begins again.
If the stream is diverted into two different paths this would mean that the collaboration would be divided into two different approaches as to where the finished product takes them. In both instances, the cause or catalyst is the created product. A larger obstacle could produce multiple approaches along multidisciplinary lines.

If this "Cascading Ideas Effect" is to really work in the online classroom what needs to be done?

1. First, the teacher should introduce and model this attitude in all that he or she does. In other words, we are talking about the teacher sharing what he or she has created and the process that he or she followed to produce the created object, skills...etc. Teachers should be innovators and explorers. This is not meant to be an "add on" for teachers but should be an "instead of" because teachers work hard enough as it is. The education terminology that would apply is the term exemplars.
2. Secondly, the course designer in an online environment should design his or her courses with relevant skill streams in which introduced skills are constantly and consistently built upon with the goal in mind of helping students to build a solid repertoire of skills that engage the mind and the heart in encouraging a culture of innovation.

At this point you might be thinking that I have got to be dreaming if I think that this will work. Yes, I am not dreamy but I am a dreamer but let me come back to the waterfall and ask you this question: "What happens if the waterfall is damned at its source?" The answer is that the flow dries up or stagnates with very little movement. This is what you can expect if we continue to embrace an industrial model of education which puts its highest priority on making everything standard and every student fitting the same mold.

Next...Strategic Design in Online Education: Designing Online Courses

Strategic Design in Online Education: Beyond Bloom

Greetings-
In fostering a culture of innovation within the enterprise of online education, we continue to apply habits of the mind as they apply to higher thinking skills that we want to instill in our students. However, I will suggest to you that in the digital age, we must go beyond what was described by Benjamin Bloom so long ago.

The Habits of the Mind that come into play in this instance are:

1. Thinking Flexibly
2. Striving for Accuracy and Precision
3. Questioning and Posing Problems
4. Applying Past Knowledge to New Situations
5. Thinking and Communicating with Clarity and Precision
6. Gathering Data Through All the Senses

These habits of the mind if implemented throughout a curriculum will take you only so far. The question is will these habits as proposed by Art Costa and Bena Kallick (2000) foster innovation in our students as an enduring attitude that will result in our societies reaping benefits? This is a rhetorical question as you might guess. The answer is no. In order to develop a culture of innovation in online education, we need to go beyond what Bloom suggested. The first modification would look like the following diagram which was produced by Andrew Churches(2010)

You will notice that a new level is added labelled "Create". Ultimately, in order to progress to a culture of innovation, it is necessary that something is created which has value. This fits very well with the habits of the mind shown below:

1. Creating, Imagining and Innovating
2. Thinking Interdependently

In an online course, all the tools of the Internet, especially those that allow a student to create an environment depend upon the characteristics above and are part of the students' way of learning. However, once the students have created something that is uniquely theirs, is that the end of the line?

I use to teach students about robotics and one of things I noticed was students demonstrated all the different stages of Bloom's Taxonomy. By listening to them and asking questions it was clear that the students, individually, were at different stages on the Bloom continuum. One of the final tasks for the students was to use what they had learned to built a working model of a robot. You would think that that would be the end of it but instead something very interesting happened. At the end the student groups, without my direction, started to diagram for me ideas that they had to extend what they did to other potential applications. This started a cascade effect of ideas in which each student contributed an idea and the potential pros and cons. I found this to be remarkable because it was going against an attitude that seems to be a systemic problem in our society,that being, a cynicism concerning the future.
Therefore, I would propose that we need to go beyond Bloom, Costa and Kallick, and Churches to add another level that I will term the "Cascading Ideas Effect".

I will elaborate on this concept in the next posting....

Strategic Design in Online Education: A New Mindset

Greetings-
In my last post I suggested to you that in order for online education to evolve into a more profound education experience for students, we need to create a culture of innovation. This shift not only impacts students but also online teachers in the way that they design courses and assess progress made by their students. One of the barriers to this happening is that many societies of our age have become very cynical about the future. This has the effect of creating a society at war with itself. Any suggestions that are made that are innovative that could impact education and society as a whole are too quickly dismissed or they are studied to death. This attitude is systemic not only in society as a whole but runs throughout the school systems. In such a cynical mindset,school becomes a place where the dreams and the imagination of young people about the future go to die.

This is not to suggest that every innovation that comes along should be adopted but we should follow one of the important principles of brainstorming and that is to not dismiss new ideas immediately but instead to strive to garner as many new, innovative ideas as possible. What is needed to begin this process is a change in mindset that takes us away from the pervasive cynicism that creates a society that constantly complains of the shortcomings of their lives but stifles every potential solution with the idea "it probably won't work". The change in mindset that I will describe involves changes that look at habits of the mind that are important to students and teachers and change in the structure of online courses.

Habits of the Mind, as described by Art Costa and Bena Kallick, describe a set of 16 attitudes that students and teachers should adopt in order to function effectively in a culture of innovation. These habits described below are not new but how they might be applied to the online environment is new.

1. Persistence: One of the great problems that has its roots in a society with a cynical mindset is the fact that students when confronted with dealing with a difficult issue are quick to give up. Unfortunately, as a society, we are all to blame for this. Too often teachers and parents are enablers of students' lack of persistence. What students need are real models and examples of persistence and the fact that persistence often leads either to success at the task or the development of a alternative approach to meeting the task. NASA adopted a phrase that describes a type of mindset that needs to be more fully accepted. That phrase was:" Failure is not an option!".  The history of our nations have many examples of persistence and how it paid off. Unfortunately, we too often present these examples as exceptions to the norm rather than emphasizing that this should be the norm in our societies. Within the context of the online environment, we have before us a rich well of resources but how often do teachers and students stop after a couple of Google searches?
2. Managing Impulsivity: Collaboration in an online environment can produce great results when properly moderated by a teacher but there is always a tendency of students to cut each other off before what they are saying is fully explained. Patience is important in this environment as much as it is important in a regular brick and mortar school. The difference is that in an online environment there is even a greater potential for distraction. For example, in a collaborative discussion there is always the chance that a student will go to his or her Facebook account to check to see what is up or become embroiled in sending messages to people who are not part of the collaboration. The role of the instructor should always be to make sure that every student is addressed by name which re-emphasizes that this is not an event in which you can be anonymous and that your contribution is vital to the success of the group.
3. Listening to Others with Understanding and Empathy: One of the great problems of our age is that we have taught students to be narcissistic about life in our societies. It is again a product of a cynical society that we have students who have become self-absorbed and have an attitude of self-entitlement. This becomes quite evident in their relationships with their instructors, peers and parents. This is something that they have learned by the adult models in our societies. As adults consider this question: When we give to charitable causes, do we do it anonymously, not expecting any recognition or tax receipts from our government? In order for students to listen to others with understanding and empathy they need to consider the welfare of others more important than their own at the particular time in question. That involves developing the discipline of self-sacrifice for a greater good.

As you can see from the first few habits of the mind, they are attitudes that educators and students alike need to adopt if we are going to foster a mindset that is conducive to a culture of innovation. The next few attitudes tie in very nicely with the very heart of innovation and how a hierarchy of thinking skills such as Bloom's Taxonomy needs to change to incorporate to fit with a culture of innovation as it applies to online education. This discussion is for the next segment....

Strategic Design in Online Education: Creating a Culture of Innovation

Greetings-
The education systems today produce students who are taught that the highest value to aspire to is to be a good consumer of goods and services. This value originates with an industrial model of education which also sees as the goal of education to produce workers to serve and labour in the global economy. But, is this the system the one that will lead to the greatest advancement of humanity on a global scale? The world in which this system thrived in is not the world today and is not the world that these students will end up spending their adult lives in. The revolution in education sees a change from this conveyor belt, standardized, one-size fits all perspective to one where the unique gifts of each student are to be focused on being producers of new knowledge, skills and wisdom. In order for this to happen there needs to be a change in the culture of education where innovation is not simply a by product of the system but instead is a focus of the system. This focus says to students that you are not all the same but that you have unique skills that are valued and if enabled or mentored by a system with a correct perspective, you will be architects of the future.






A culture of innovation will not come easily and will meet resistance because those who have a vested interest in the old system will mount substantial resistance if they see that interest threatened in any way.  Sir Ken Robinson gives a good description of what we are up against.


The revolution in education has already begun. Online education has the greatest potential  to enrich
the education of students by strategically designing what they offer to students so that a culture of innovation is encouraged, valued and most importantly, seen by the students that they can make valuable contributions to plotting the future.
In order for this to happen, online education needs to start fostering the habits of the mind which is an alien concept to many students but will be embraced by them when they see how much the world will open up to them.
Next posting will deal with the strategic design of course content that will put them on the path described.........