current trends in elearning

The 2009 Horizon Report is the work of The New Media Consortium and is a long running qualitative research project that identifies and describes new and emerging technology that is likely to have a big impact on "teaching, learning, research or creative expression".

This years report suggests that the next big things to come our way are:

• Mobiles
• Cloud Computing
• Geo-everything
• The personal Web
• Semantic Aware Applications
• Smart Objects

The Horizon Report also looks at some key trends and where ICT use and thought is heading.

Key trends are ranked in priority and they are led by:

• increasing globalization continues to affect the way we work, collaborate and communicate

The report suggests that those institutions that use technology to connect and communicate globally are more likely to advance than those who don't. I would tend to agree with this statement, schools have many opportunities to bring the world into their classrooms through the use of technology. Skype, video conferencing, email, youtube and other tools can be used to communicate with other schools or instructors to provide more in-depth experiences for the students. This could be seen at our school where a class spent a term corresponding with a school in England through email. The topic they were both studying was sustainability based on an inquiry learning approach, The project culminated in a series of video conferences through skype (hooked up through the data projector). It could be argued that this could have been achieved by communicating with a school in New Zealand. However, children were able to experience a different culture, different cultural beliefs, different ideology and different accents!

• The notion of collective intelligence is redefining how we think about ambiguity and imprecision.

People want to be active members of the learning process and be involved in formulating answers not just sitting back being passive listeners. I guess this leads to more options, a greater knowledge base, everyone feels that their opinions count? 

• Experience with & affinity for games as learning tools is an increasingly universal characteristic among those entering higher education & the workforce.

A survey carried out by the Pew Internet and American Life project found that multiplayer and online games are very common among young people. These games have led to increased social interaction  and civic engagement. Interface magazine has a very interesting article that tackles this kind of social interaction in a classroom. Southwell school is investigating the potential of online gaming while engaging students in deep learning by using social games on the Xbox 360

http://www.interfacemagazine.co.nz/articles.cfm?c_id=19&id=128

• Visualisation tools are making information more meaningful & insights more intuitive.

Having an IWB in my class has shown how important visual tools are to children's learning. Even the most mundane activity can be given a new lease of life by making it visually appealing.

Levy (2002, cited by Hall & Higgins) when discussing IWBs suggests that learners appreciate and respond to the "clarity of visual presentation"

Hall, I. & Higgins, S. (2005). Primary school students’ perceptions of interactive whiteboards, Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 21, 91-101

• As more than one billion phones are produced each year, mobile phones are benefiting from unprecendented innovation, driven by global competition.

I can see that the innovation and development of mobile phones (such as the iPhone) may have an impact on some institutions, especially as they are becoming cheaper, can run more applications and can do a number of things that personal computers can do, but in the primary sector I believe that any such impact is a long way off into the future. I think that children bringing such technology to school is a risky business. Unfortunately we have had a few phones stolen in the last 3 years and I think parents would be hesitant to allow children to bring any expensive technology to school...and besides phones are only allowed at school in an emergency at this stage. 

One aspect of the article that I found particularly interesting was the development of a personal web. Various tools allow for the creation of personal customized web environments. These ca include numerous learning activities and social and professional information that pertain to the persons interests. I can see that this kind of system would benefit educational facilities by enabling the sharing and pooling of information based on various topics. It would also be useful for students to organise favourite site, activities and media