Pyramide d'abricot à La bague de Kenza (Paris)

Bite-sized update: higher education in fragile contexts, discovery without analytics, and the epistemology of learning culture

Thinking aloud, Travel

As much as I wish this blog could document my reflections as I read, research, speak, and listen… it cannot. Knowledge is a process, not a product, in this VUCA world we live in. I know that I am doing too much, too fast, to be ale to process everything. Accepting this is part and parcel of navigating the knowledge landscape. So here is an incomplete round-up with some schematic thoughts about where I’m headed. Higher education in fragile contexts as a wicked problem: Most ed tech conferences I’ve attended are mostly male, and tend to focus on the education of those least-in-need. Inzone’s workshop on education in fragile contexts was at the other end of that spectrum, with a diverse team of scholars and practitioners coming together to tackle wicked learning problems such as how to ensure access to education for Syrian refugees in Turkey (access), what to do when refugee camp conditions are such …

Pietro Perugino's usage of perspective in the Delivery of the Keys fresco at the Sistine Chapel (1481–82) helped bring the Renaissance to Rome.

Vanishing point

Published articles, Writing

Two parallel lines look like they eventually converge at the horizon. Technology’s chase for digital convergence, say between television and the Internet, raises interesting questions of its own, starting with what happens at the ‘vanishing point’ – and how to get there. How about publishing and learning? Semantico has a blog post based on John Helmer’s lively chat with Toby Green, OECD’s head of publishing, and myself. Yes, publishing has already been transformed by the amazing economy of effort of technology. Now it is struggling to find meaning in the throes of the changing nature of knowledge (as it’s locked in, so to speak, by its container view of knowledge). In the past, an ‘educational’ publisher was a specific breed and brand. In the hyper-connected present, where knowledge is a process (not a product), publishers who have already transformed themselves at least once (that is, they are still around) now have to consider how to …

Convergence between publishing and learning-small

Convergence and cross-fertilisation between publishing and learning: an interview with Toby Green and Reda Sadki

Interviews, Learning, Publishing

By John Helmer We’re in a world where people don’t really understand what they want until you put it in front of them,’ says Toby Green Head of Publishing at OECD. He’s talking about the challenge of creating new digital products in a technology landscape that is changing very quickly (with no end to the ‘technology treadmill’ in sight) and where market research is of limited value; where what happened in the past in educational publishing is a poor guide to what will happen in the future. This reflection comes from looking at OECD’s markets, which span both higher education and the workplace, and a remit that embraces not only information dissemination but, to a degree, instruction. We’re talking convergence. Toby Green will chair the plenary session on ‘Cross-fertilisation’ at the ALPSP International Conference. The convergence of the education and workplace learning markets is likely to be a theme for …

Audio source missing

The End of Paper: Interview with Richard Padley of Semantico

Writing

At the 2010 Tools of Change for Publishing conference in Frankfurt, we met Richard Padley of Semantico. He spoke at the conference about mobile platforms from the perspective of publishers faced with multiple delivery models including apps and the web. We started off our interview with Richard Padley by asking: What does the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement mean to you? So, is it the end of paper? Even if I tell you that 30% of IFRC’s membership don’t have e-mail? Many people seem to think that PDF is a usable digital format for publications. So, what’s wrong with PDF? Even though EPUB is the basis for eBooks, in 2010 few people are familiar with this format. What’s right with EPUB? The Kindle is a single-purpose device. It does one thing, and is meant to it well enough to convince people who love printed books to cross the digital divide. …