Analysing the Structural Properties of Learning Networks

Goodyear, Peter; Thompson, Kate; Ashe, David; Pinto, Ana Paula; Carvalho, Lucila; Parisio, Martin; Parker, Paul A.; Schwendimann, Beat A.; Wardak, Dewa

doi:10.1007/978-94-6300-103-8_2

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 21 publications

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“…Figure 1 represents a framework for thinking about the analysis and design of complex learning situations. It is known as activity‐centred analysis and design (or ACAD), because it places emergent learning activity—what people are doing when they can be said to be learning—at its centre and because it aims to clarify relations between what can be designed and the analysis of what eventuates (Goodyear & Carvalho, 2019; Goodyear et al., ,2015, 2021). Learning activity and its (actual, rather than just intended) outcomes are not designable: they emerge .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Navigating difficult waters in a digital era: Technology, uncertainty and the objects of informal lifelong learning

Goodyear

2021

Brit J Educational Tech

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This paper uses two complementary examples from an autoethnographic study of learning and sailing to explore some connections between informal lifelong learning activities, their objects (purposes) and the hybrid (digital and material) technologies on which they depend. The examples focus on an aspect of the craft of sailing and on understanding the relations between sailing, place and local history. The paper argues that close attention to activities in which people engage can help discover some less visible purposes of learning and can broaden our understandings of situated skills. The paper also argues that being able to find and configure environments suitable for learning are important capabilities for successful lifelong learners. The paper has two additional implications for thinking about research and development in educational technology. First, a technology becomes educational by virtue of its relation to emerging activity, rather than because of any intrinsic physical properties. Second, educational technologies are often assembled in complex meshworks. Understanding how they function involves analysing dynamic relations and interdependencies: listing the affordances of individual components is not enough. What is already known about this topic Across the life course, a good deal of valuable learning is informal, incidental or both. Informal lifelong learning depends upon an ability to monitor and manage one's own learning activity. Informal lifelong learning also depends upon an ability to find useful (digital and other) learning resources. What this paper adds The purposes (objects) of lifelong learning activities are not always evident. They can be ‘discovered’ through inquiry and reflection. Finding useful learning resources is sometimes complex. In some cases, it amounts to constructing and/or reconfiguring a productive learning/epistemic environment. Creating a productive learning or epistemic (knowledge‐making) environment entails assembling and holding together a meshwork of digital, material and hybrid artefacts. Learning ‘in the wild’ can also entail finding the right place for learning: the right spot in a ‘skillscape’. A technology becomes educational by virtue of its relation to activity, rather than through a priori classification or because of its intrinsic features. Implications for practice and/or policy Those who encourage and/or support informal lifelong learning may want to consider the significance of implicit purposes for, and outcomes of, learning activities and may find it helpful to have a richer conception of how learning environments are found and assembled.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Navigating difficult waters in a digital era: Technology, uncertainty and the objects of informal lifelong learning

Goodyear

2021

Brit J Educational Tech

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Networked Learning: Designing for adult literacy learners

Pinto

2014

LNS

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This paper reports on analysis of an online learning network catering for adult basic education. It introduces some key concepts from research on networked learning, as well as two complementary approaches that are useful to support and inform analysis and design of technology-enhanced environments. One approach is informed by ideas about the design of learning environments in which pedagogies are combined with complex technological arrangements. The other approach shows how ideas from urban and architectural design, particularly the work by Christopher Alexander on design patterns and pattern languages, can be used to support design for learning. Part of the argument for combining these two perspectives is that, in trying to manage the complex possibilities of new network technologies, pedagogical and humanistic ideals are easily damaged, forgotten or lost. The analytic work involves some methodological innovation, partly because of the data sources involved. It uses interviews as well as screenshots of web pages, other online artefacts and data logs; these sources allow the researcher to look ‘beyond the screen’ to reconstruct the deeper architecture of what has been created for, and by, the participants in the network. The preliminary outcomes show how connections can be drawn between some of the key qualities of what has been designed alongside the various configurations of things, places, tasks, activities, and people influencing learning. Eventually, what is learned from a case study is discussed with the aim of informing design of similar learning networks.

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Analysing the Structural Properties of Learning Networks

Cited by 2 publications

References 21 publications

Navigating difficult waters in a digital era: Technology, uncertainty and the objects of informal lifelong learning

Navigating difficult waters in a digital era: Technology, uncertainty and the objects of informal lifelong learning

Networked Learning: Designing for adult literacy learners

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