e-Learning 2.0 Workshop (Stephen Downes)

• Link to Stephen Downes Homepage
• All His Papers
• All His Presentation Slides + KL Workshop Slides
• Blogs - OLDaily & Half an Hour

Web 1.0 = Read
Web 2.0 = Read -Write
Web 3.0 = Read -Write - Research
Web 4.0 = Read -Write - Research - Rambo!

At last I got to meet Stephen Downes in person and attend one of his workshops. Better yet, due to a secret arrangement (Not telling!) I got to become his personal bodyguard (I mean assistant) during this 2-day workshop in Kuala Lumpur (14th - 15th January). You can see me on the picture happily holding tightly to the handheld laser gun (I mean camera!).

In this e-Learning 2.0 workshop facilitated by Stephen (who actually entitled it ' Web 2.0 in Learning'), participants explored a full range of web 2.0 tools, and discussed (including group activities) how these tools could facilitate more effective communication, collaboration and learning. The intention was to explore the underlying technologies and to develop a sense of what to expect in the future.

NEW DISCOVERIES?
The thing about attending workshops facilitated by people like Stephen is that you can be sure of discovering a lot of new learning stuff on the way. Here are new learning tools and sites that I discovered during this great workshop:

• Gliffy - A free web-based diagram editor.
• Zoho - Offers a suite of online web applications geared towards increasing your productivity and offering easy collaboration.
• LiveJournal - A free service for your journaling and blogging.
• Bebo - Allows users to share photos with music, and blogs, and draw on members' White Boards.
• Pixer - Lets you manipulate, edit, enhance and apply filters to your digital pictures using only your web browser.
• Ustream.tv - You can broadcast your own live video show for free. You only need a computer device, camera and solid Internet connection. Not bad!
• Worldbridges - A community of communities that use 'homegrown webcasting' and other new media technologies to help people connect, learn, & collaborate.
• EdTechTalk - A community of educators interested in discussing and learning about the uses of educational technology. They webcast several live shows each week.

In addition, we discussed many other web 2.0 learning tools such Ning (Social Networking), Second Life ( 3D virtual world) and Wikispaces, which I have already explored, but are worth mentioning here (Check out the slides to discover the rest!).

Not only did we discover new tools from Stephen, he also discovered a few new learning tools from us, including:

• WiZiQ - Free Hosted Virtual Classroom platform.
• CamStudio - Free Screen Recording Software.
• eSnips - Get 5GB of free space to upload and share your files, photos, videos and music.

In other words, no matter how brilliant we are, we can always learn and discover stuff from others. Therefore, I would argue that Stephen Downes is brilliant, because he knows this and practices it all the time (Any logic here!).

However, of all the things I discovered, learned and explored during the workshop, I personally found the reading resources shared the most valuable to my learning mind. I suppose it is easier to find a new tool or site (at least for me!), than discover a great article or paper among millions. Anyway, here is a list of a few of those relevant and mind enriching writings, which Stephen recommended us to explore further (Check out the slides to discover the rest! 2nd time!):

• The Cluetrain Manifesto - Markets are about conversations (an e-Book by several authors). If you are lazy, at least read the 95 theses to get some idea.
• E-Learning 2.0 - (Stephen Downes)
• What is Web 2.0 - The web as platform. Design patterns and business models for the next generation of software (Tim O'Reilly).
• Educational Blogging - (Stephen Downes)
• How to Be Heard - (Stephen Downes)
• The Long Tail - Why the future of business is selling less of more (Clay Shirky/Chris Anderson).
• MySpace is My Identity Space - (Danah Boyd)
• Wisdom of Crowds - (James Surowiecki)

And the juicy list of excellent reading resources (especially about blogging and social networks) goes on and on (Check out the slides to discover the rest! 3rd time lucky!). As I had not read many of these recommended reading resources before, it was a thrill to discover them.

LESSONS LEARNED

Since, I was his personal assistant and camera man during the 2-day workshop, I really got to zoom in on Stephen Downes and discover more about him (I am not sure if the video recordings I took are up to mark, though! First time!). I suppose I can go on here (until the break of dawn!), writing about all the things I observed and learned from him, but I will only highlight a few important lessons I learned here, which we all can take note and actually do something about.

Even Stephen Downes does not know everything about e-learning, and he does not see that as a weakness either (opportunity to learn more!). Instead, he gets excited when someone in the crowd knows something he doesn't (a challenge, too!), and wants to learn about it straight away. Since we have a computer and Internet connection, let's explore the possibilities together using Google, right now (Why wait!).

In other words, it is alright to say 'I don't know', when a participant or student asks a question, which we don't know the answer to. If no one participating in the session knows, we can always explore it together using Google, or whatever search tool we find relevant for the task (or get back to the question later, when we have an answer). If we take that kind of attitude and approach into our learning environments, we will not fear questions (essence of creative and critical thinking!), and students will eventually not fear to ask questions (mind of inquiry). Both the educators and student will benefit! You will learn more (about the content, students and yourself!), and students will not only learn more, but be more active in the learning process, taking responsibility and improving their ability to ask questions. Even before we discover a problem, or conceptualize a great idea (which might lead to an invention or innovation), we need to ask questions (Zooming in on the right or AHA ones!). Questions might seem like a threat first, but if you learn how to love them, and deal with them head-on, the rest is a ball :)

In terms of conducting a workshop (lecture, tutorial, etc.), I learned that you must always be able to quickly adapt the sessions (or classes) to the learning expectations and needs of the participants, and be able to revise and reform your workshop activities on-the-fly to ensure a more effective and relevant learning experience. Sometimes, participants might not even know what they really want, but you still have to explore through relevant questions early on, and by using your emotional, observational, and analytical intelligence (e.g. What do you know about____? What are your past experiences with ____? What do you want to learn? ) . Even if you fail to satisfy their learning expectations and needs, they will most likely appreciate your efforts to tailor and customize the learning event. I suppose the main challenge will be to meet all the participants learning expectations and needs. But that is a challenge we have to deal with, if we want to be an effective educator. And by using web 2.0 technologies like blogs, wikis, social networking sites, virtual worlds, etc. appropriately, and getting participants involved in creating, remixing, mashing-up and sharing knowledge, we are probably moving forward.

In short, we need to get everyone involved in exploring, discovering, learning, doing, reflecting, creating, and sharing knowledge and ideas. By doing so, we are nurturing their ability to learn (how to learn!). If you are able to spark, participants or students will take care of the rest.

FUTURE LEARNING DIRECTIONS?
Stephen identifies five (5) main future directions of learning (and e-learning) in his slides. I have added some of my thoughts to these five directions.

• Learning as Creation - We increasingly learn by creating/remixing knowledge, products and services during the learning process (not only consuming), with the assistance of increasingly more powerful and user-friendly learning tools.
• Social Learning - We learn by interacting with others locally and around the world, which is increasingly being enabled more efficiently and effectively with the assistance of technology (Global Collective Intelligence). Imagine participating in global learning communities and getting access to some of the greatest minds on this planet with just a few clicks. Here I am talking to Jay Cross, Jane Knight, Joseph Hart, Stephen Downes and Clayton Wright on Skype. The only cost is basically our time.
• Personal Learning Environment - People will increasingly be able to construct their own customized and convenient learning spaces, which integrates all their informal and formal learning tools. In other words, we might soon say goodbye to LMS, LCMS, portals, etc., sooner than we realize. They will probably exist, but we will hardly visit them, and mostly read their news feeds from our all-to-one learning dashboards. One User ID and Password! One Learning Space! Tons of Learning Tools! All are communicating with one another! We can get all our relevant updates from one learning space, and we can update all our learning tools with one update (Create once, publish many). WOW! That is cool!
• Immersive Learning - Augmented reality and 3D virtual worlds with fully immersive tools enabling every sense of our body to engage in the learning process. It also reflects that we will increasingly be able to construct cost-effective simulated learning environments that are close to the real thing. We are able to do and practice things in safe virtual learning environments that we could only dream about in the past (e.g. manage Google, build spaceships, teleport to Mars, discuss global warming with Al Gore, and engage in past civilizations). In short, we can stimulate all our senses to fully immerse ourselves in safe virtual learning environments that are similar, or close replications of the real ones. Practice without getting physically hurt (though, we might get a bit of mental stress!).
• The Living Arts (Things You Really Need to Learn) - We don't follow strictly the requirements and needs of PhD, Masters, Bachelor and Diploma programs, programs are instead tailored to our relevant learning needs, and we are empowered to construct our own learning opportunities and environments that enable and motivate us to find and fulfill our learning potential. Why learn something that we never use, or want to know?

In addition to learning a lot of stuff from Stephen, I learned a lot from more than 40 participants both from the corporate and the education (mostly Higher Education) sectors in Malaysia (picture below). Interestingly, we are also planning to start an official e-Learning community (whereby we physically meet on regular occasions) in Malaysia, and if you are interested to find out more about that, please join or visit our new Malaysian e-Learning Community in Facebook (you need a Facebook account to join).

Finally, I would like to thank FIK International for organizing a great workshop.

Oh, I forgot (this post is getting long!)! You might be wondering why Stephen and the 'Myau' picture. Well, during the first day of the workshop we all suddenly heard the sound of cat ('Myau'), and Stephen probably thought he was going a bit nutty, or the jet lag was really getting to him (which it was, I suppose!). However, it was only a ringtone to one of the participants, and we all had a great laugh! So, the picture is in memory of this funny informal learning incident. Myau!!!

In conclusion, I am glad that I attended the workshop (and became Stephen's workshop assistant), and got to know Stephen better. These are the kind of learning experiences that spark our motivation to learn and explore more. Yeah, now I am also a certified e-Learning 2.0 specialist (by attendance). If you are interested to learn more, please give me a buzz :)

Webnode - Create Your Own Website Easily For Free!

• Link to Webnode
• Webnode Overview & Demo
• Via Malaysian E-Learning Community (Via Jane Hart)

"Webnode is completely FREE. There is no catch."
(Haven't we heard that one before? If you tell us the catch we would trust you more!)

The webnode system is a free hosted tool (until when? Soon you will probably see different pricing packages for extra services and additional storage.) that completely manages your entire web project. Anyone, without any technical know-how, can create and manage their own little website (Something like Google Page, but perhaps a bit better. I need to explore both properly to have any serious opinion). There is no need to install anything on your computer or server. Everything is made available through your web browser. Webnode includes tools for website publishing (Webnode Builder), advanced website statistics (Webnode Statistics) and webmail (Webnode E-mail). By using Drag-and-Drop from the toolbar you can add new content such as polls, forums, articles, catalogues, widgets such as PayPal and much more. Webnode contains many cool templates, and you can even make your own.

The interface is pleasant and it seems easy-to-use, and you will probably be positively surprised with all the features and tools provided. Explore the demo site and judge for yourself.

As for me, I am looking forward to meet Stephen Downes for the first time tomorrow (and hopefully not the last!). He is conducting a 2-day 'e-Learning 2.0' workshop here in Malaysia. Don't worry (and be happy!), I will be posting all the juice I learn from this projected amazing learning adventure (Coming soon!) :)

Wikia Search (Will Challenge Google Search Soon?)

• Link to Wikia Search
• YouTube Video - Jimmy Wales talks about Wikia Search
• Via Dan Colman

"Wikia is working to develop and popularize a freely licensed (open source) search engine. What you see here is our first alpha release. We are aware that the quality of the search results is low. Wikia's search engine concept is that of trusted user feedback from a community of users acting together in an open, transparent, public way. Of course, before we start, we have no user feedback data. So the results are pretty bad. But we expect them to improve rapidly in coming weeks, so please bookmark the site and return often.

Right now, the most important thing you can do is help with the "miniarticles" that appear at the top of popular search terms ...more (and watch Jimmy Wales reflect this project)"

Facebook is already challenging Google's potential online advertising revenue, and soon Wikia might even challenge them on their core function; the mother of all tools, 'Search' itself. While we thought that Yahoo and MSN were the main 'Search' competitors, Wikia Search might become the innovation that changes the playing (or learning) field (Especially, when searching for educational content). Is Google Search as good as its' brand would suggest, and ready to take on the challenge(s)?

Wikia Search's look-and-feel is pleasant and the search results are alright. But then again I am not an expert in this area, so please search for real expert reviews on Wikia Search (in Google for now!).

As Wikia Search is only in its first alpha release, we cannot expect super quality finding (as mentioned). However, it will be interesting to see in 6 months time how it performs compared to Holy Google :)

e-Learning in Malaysia (My New Blog)

• Link to My New Blog

I just want to share with those that read this blog (or bump into it!) that I have started a new blog today (January 9th, 2008) entitled 'e-Learning in Malaysia'. It is kind of empty right now (except for a few interesting links and posts), but as I learn over the coming months (and perhaps years), I believe it will evolve into a useful blog to find e-learning related things going on in Malaysia.

I hope this blog will eventually evolve into a good starting point to discover e-learning things going on in Malaysia (that is accessible to the public). My new learning adventure (in addition to ZaidLearn) will try to mash-up the juiciest e-learning stories going on in Malaysia (past, present, future), including:

• Higher Education (Universities & Colleges)
• Schools (Primary & Secondary)
• Corporate Learning
• Communities
• Projects
• Solution Providers
• Research Papers & Articles
• People
• Conferences
• Blogs
• Etc.

In short, the main goal for setting up this blog, is to discover, learn, share, discuss, network, and reflect about e-learning in Malaysia. Click here to read the full story behind this blog.

ZAIDLEARN?
It will continue, too (speed posting the learning juice!)!

'ZaidLearn' will continue to explore the world of FREE learning tools and resources, while 'e-Learning in Malaysia' will ZOOM in on e-learning adventures going on in Malaysia.

9000+ Free Resources by Teachers for Teachers (TES)

• TES
• TES Resource Bank
• Via Patricia Donaghy

TES?
The TES (Times Educational Supplement) is Britain’s leading publication covering the world of primary, secondary and further education, as well as the market leader for teaching job vacancies.

TES RESOURCE BANK?
"The TES resource bank (9000+ resources) is a place where you can share materials with other teachers and recommend your favourite teaching resources. TES makes it easy for you to upload and download files and direct other users to websites that you have found useful. Once registered, you are allowed to freely use the resource bank to download any useful material. Resources are divided into over twenty different categories. The ICT section, alone, has 270 resources!" - Patricia Donaghy

Also, if you want to find educational resources for English (1900+), or Modern Foreign Languages (1400+), I suppose this resource bank should provide you with plenty of options.

WHAT ELSE?
In addition to contributions from teachers sharing their home-grown resources, you can have fun swapping ideas, and letting off steam in the Staffroom. Yeah, there is even a Blogs section, plus reviews of books, software and other published resources.

Finally, you might want to check out the weekly TES Magazine, which is free with all editions. A full colour glossy covering teachers’ personal and professional lives, it contains primary and secondary sections with features about good practice, tips on how to teach, special needs and ICT – plus health, money and travel.

Great :)

Facebook - Study Groups (LMS, Too!)

• Facebook - Study Groups
• Via Jane Knight

When we think of Search, we think of Google!

When we think of LMS, we think of Moodle!

When we think of Food, we think of Noodle?

Having a tough time getting everyone on the same page in your study group or group project (Yeah, especially in a formal LMS!)? Study Groups, a new Facebook application lets you quickly and easily collaborate with your classmates and plan out homework for your courses.

• Create to-do lists and track who's responsible for what
• Schedule and agree to meetings
• Discuss the finer points of this week's assignment
• Share notes and files in one place
• Create a public Study Group to collect the thoughts and ideas of users around the world on a given subject

When we think of social networking, we think of Facebook! Not only is Facebook giving Google a tough time (Threat: Advertising Model and Revenue! Soon Search?), It might over time (sooner rather than later!) also evolve into a potential Learning Management System (LMS), or a Course Management System (CMS), as Moodle calls it! With so many innovative companies producing applications for Facebook, it would not surprise me if Facebook will enable users soon (functionality already there?) to create their own online courses (perhaps even Universities, but with a slight cost to it!), providing basically all the features (quiz, forum, wiki, blog, assignment, content management, announcement, course registration, etc.) that you usually find in LMS/CMS tools. Not only would it be free on the software side, it will require no cost on the hardware and hosting side, too. Yeah, we probably would not even need to register the students, because they would already be on Facebook. This is getting interesting :)

If We Digg Together We Will StumbleUpon Some Del.icio.us Mahalo Soup!

• Digg
• StumbleUpon
• del.icio.us
• Earlier Post on Mahalo

If We Digg Together...
Digg is a place for people to discover and share content from anywhere on the web. From the biggest online destinations to the most obscure blog, Digg surfaces the best stuff as voted on by their users.

...We Will StumbleUpon...
StumbleUpon helps you discover and share great websites. It uses ratings to form collaborative opinions on website quality. When you stumble, you will only see pages which friends and like-minded stumblers have recommended. This helps you discover great content you probably wouldn't find using a search engine.

...Some Del.icio.us...
del.icio.us is a social bookmarking (collection of favorites) website. The primary use of del.icio.us is to store your bookmarks online, which allows you to access the same bookmarks from any computer and add bookmarks from anywhere, too. On del.icio.us, you can use tags to organize and remember your bookmarks, which is a much more flexible system than folders. In addition, you can share your favorites with friends, family, coworkers, and the del.icio.us community.

...Mahalo Soup!
Mahalo (Hawaiian for 'Thank you') is a human-powered search engine that creates organized, comprehensive, and spam free search results for the most popular search terms. Their search results only include great links (or links filtered by humans!).

If Google's arsenal of learning tools (including blogs) does not get you where you want, these four human-powered social learning tools (Fantastic Four!) could do the trick. Sometimes, you need collective human filtered intelligence to find the stuff you are looking for, and other times Google Search is sufficient. Find the right blend and you might have a winning formula to finding amazing learning stuff in this amazingly fast growing information galaxy (overload!). I suppose sometimes machine-powered search engines need help to understand the contextualized meaning of apple, bush and paris :)

Peter's Online Typing Course (Extremely Useful!)

• Link to Typing Course
• Author- Peter Hudson

Turn Yourself Into a Typing Hero!

"By the time you finish this course, you will be able to confidently type all the letters, numbers and the most common symbols, with proper ten-finger touch typing technique. Although there is some use of interactive multimedia here, this course is minimalist in nature, purposely without many of the bells and whistles common to some of the other typing sites and CD-ROMs out there. Frankly, such things often end up simply adding a lot of clutter, and consequently produce a counter-educational effect. The focus here is on sound pedagogy, and facilitating progressive and efficient (but hopefully not boring!) learning. I believe there is everything here necessary for you to become an accomplished typist in the shortest amount of time possible. Plus, this course has the great advantage of being FREE, without the need of registration, or any such silly marketing-things!" - Peter Hudson

From what I have learned after observing many Professors and Senior Lecturers (PSL) in action, is that they often lack the ability to type quickly. It is often the one, two, three, four fingers magic show! This typing course is great, because it is easy-to-read-learn-practice, and you don't need to save penguins or score hoops doing it, which might not appeal to PSL. It wouldn't also surprise me if there is a strong correlation between poor typing skills and de-motivation to facilitate online learning (e-mails, forums, chatting, etc.). In short, the faster you type, the more time you have to think (Better yet, do it at the same time!). The beauty comes when you are capable of typing as fast as (or faster than) you think. Also, then you don't need to say, "What was I thinking again?".

If you find this free online typing course a bit boring, and want more 'bells and whistles', here are more free typing tutors/tutorials/courses you might want to explore (Via Patricia Donaghy and Jane Hart):

• Goodtyping
  Free online typing course. Please try it without registering. If you like what you practice, then bother to register :)
  
  
• TypingWeb
  is a free online typing tutor & keyboarding tutorial for typists of all ages. All skill levels will benefit from TypingWeb's free keyboarding lessons.
  
  
• Rapid Typing
  A typing game, where the training takes place in a “virtual picturesque underwater world” adding some fun to the learning.

• keybr.com
  Take typing speed test and practice typing online.
  
  
• PowerTyping
  An online free typing tutor for kids, students and adults alike!
  
  
• BBC Typing Tutorial
  Aimed at the younger kids, but is great fun for anyone learning typing.

So, if we are not 'Billy the Kid' in typing, I suppose we have another potential New Year's mission for 2008. Yeah, I am practicing it right now :)