I’m in the midst of the ELI Web Symposium, a two-day event that runs through today. I’m posting my stream-of-conscious notes as I listen to the presentations, and chat with others (this was a great chance to connect and re-connect with some colleagues whose work I respect – hello especially to Cyprien Lomas (blog), Paul Hagner). Once the archives become available in the next few days, I’ll post some of my conversations throughout the conference.
“It is interesting to do comparison of values in education though in both US and China for example. US educators are talking strongly about continued needs in math and science and Chinese educators speak about teaching creativity in innovation.”
Robert Morse, University of Indianapolis

Students are clearly thinking different, and they need us to to help by formally guiding their thinking so they can apply it in their professional lives.

• US students are at the bottom internationally by 12th grade in science
• 90% of scientist living in asia
• declines in US patents in science articles in the past decade
  Source: Mortenson, 2003 OECD

• 49% not well prepared for college in research skills
  Source: Sanoff 2006, Hoover 2006

“Students who are learning and involved are more likely to stay in, and graduate from college”

John Seely Brown -

• learning by doing
• community of practice thriough legitimate peripheral participation
• distributed cognitive apprenticeship

We need to create social spaces – learning occurs through conversations, web surfing, social interactions – and encourage the informal learning students are quite comfortable with.

• assess critical thinking, quantitative skills, writing
• asian cultures spend more time in school – higher time on task than in US
• give learners the ability to create their own personal learning network
• rebuild, not retool, education

around 4:23 Matthew Szulik said that there are people whose motivation is the betterment of their work through sharing.

How do we make learning more relevant?

• guided learning by doing
• apprenticeships, mentoring – process of moving from novice to expert within a given set of practices
• learning communities
• next generation interfaces for distributed learning – one example: multi-user virtual environments
• legitimate peripheral participation (tacit learning similar to that involved in internships or residencies