Learning:
The Journey of a Lifetime
A Cloud Chamber of the Mind

February 2006 Education Notebook

An Example of a "Learning Process" Journal (using the 2 colored box format)

Some notes I made a few years ago while attending the first Asia-Pacific Web conference in Beijing (1998).

6:30 am

• When discussing the Web and Education I want to focus on how to improve Education and Learning, not on the technology. The Web is only one path to improvement.

	Conceptual	Technology
Phase I	communication	Internet I
Phase II	new ways of thinking	Internet II (high speed)

• The role of culture is important. There are two competing forces: the desire for homogeneity (status quo) and the desire to revel in diversity.
  
  
• Humans are finite information processors with a limited amount of Time. As individuals we apportion time using personal criteria of what each of us values. We are not silicon machines but carbon machines with a very limited memory and bandwidth.
  
  
• Our minds utilize time in a variety of ways:
  • interpersonal/social activities (being with others)
  • intrapersonal activities (being alone)
  • religion/philosophy
  • WORK
  • education
    • furthering understanding (literature, poetry) (non-fiction)
    • getting others to think as I do.
      
      
• The Web increases the range of opportunities because of the way it increases the number of people we can interact with. But the core issue is timeless. With or without the Web, how do we choose to spend our time? Perhaps to learn a little more knowledge, perhaps to learn a few more skills. But what about caring and compassion and the respect for other minds? This is critical to civilization.
  
  
• There are human issues as well as technical issues to consider and their interaction is very complex.
  
  
• Let's look at a few Human Factors
  • AsiaPacific Web98
    • web site: value of unexpected links
    • bound proceedings: connotations of quality and permanence
    • inter-personal presentations: value of uniexpected encounters
      
      
• Part of the Web is the electronic version, another part is the inter-personal meetings and conversations it generates.
  
  
• Aristotle made a distinction between books and the mind (books by themselves have little value - it is what the mind does with the book that is important). He distrusted books as external memory aids but I think he missed the essential point that the book is an "object to think with" (Seymour Papert - Logo). The Web is a modern book.
  
  
• Reading and writing
  • We read and make notes. It is the reader who decides what is important and how it should be organized.
  • Hypertext (at least at the moment) is the author's image of what is important
    • creating a morass of links is no help. The signal/noise ratio is to low.
    • what we need is a new type of reader - one who effortlessly creates their own personal set of links among the words and diagrams
  • With the Web the emphasis has, so far, been on the writer. This is common in Education where the emphasis is on the teacher rather than the learner.
    
    
• At the Present, we are infatuated with the medium. In the Future the message will be the key (the medium will become invisible).
  
  
• Calm technologies: computers that do not cause stress but enhance our lives.
• The Future:
  • Invisible (so easy to use that you are unaware of it. e.g. click on the blue.) Authoring is not there yet.
  • Mobile (light; wireless connectivity)
  • Value (worth the price)
  • Read/Write enabled (e.g. book + notepaper)
    • web sites containing information but capable of viewer-constructed material
    • [note 2006.02.14: blogs & wikipedia ]
  • Privacy: secure files and communication
  • Solitude: unavailability (e.g. no phone)
  • a Means rather than an End
    • not Web conferences but professional/occupational conferences
  • Not Web in Education but just Education (the Web is taken for granted)
  • Smart Environments: software that "knows" what we want to read. Then what do I "know"??

8:40 PM

Here is a structure I made a long time ago:

• Learning Strategies
  • Basic Heuristics
    • Hierarchical Structuring
    • Relating to Previous Knowledge
    • Self Monitoring
    • Asking Questions About the Material
    • Think of Examples
    • Alternative Representations
    • Time Management
  • Study Systems
    • SQ3R
      • Survey
      • Question
      • Read
      • Recite
      • Review
    • MURDER
      • Mood for study
      • Understand
      • Recall
      • Digest
      • Expand
      • Review
  • Special Cases
    • Zoology
    • Mathematics
    • History