Sharing Nicely

Category: open education

How to build a project

My friend Chris Geith asked me for five points on how to build a new project. Here is what I sent back to her. I have more questions than answers. Some of these are things I wish I’d done better at P2PU. Some of this applies to tech projects more than other types of projects. […]

Too big too fail – One problem with MOOCs

Failure drives learning. Or rather, debugging drives learning. Not getting it right the first time, making strategic changes, and observing their outcome lets us learn. This is all second nature to engineers, artists, and poets, but it is the complete opposite of how most of education works. The path is more important than the destination. […]

Let’s make badges not stink

There is a lot of noise about badges at the moment with opinions ranging from “we don’t need no stinkin’ badges” to “badges will lead to global peace.” I have been one of the original instigators (PDF) of the badges for learning movement (is it really a movement?), but my favorite session at the recent DML […]

How to know you’re doing something right

Worth checking out Matthew Ladner’s guest post on Jay Greene’s blog in which he argues that we need to create more space within the education system for market forces to bring down cost and increase quality. It lists some of the pro-business (e.g. more private & less public, let the market solve our problems) arguments and those […]

A question of core values (comment in Times Higher Ed)

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post on Apple’s move into the textbook world. It got quite a lot of attention and I wrote a slightly longer version for publication in the Times Higher Ed. I managed to add a little context from other initiatives in the field, including MITx. The full THE […]

Apple Edu = It’s a revolution, just not ours.

What a week. On Wednesday the Interwebs shut down. On Thursday Apple revolutionized textbooks. What will Friday bring? But after the hype has settled down (and yes, it was hard not to get a little swept away by all the great sounding announcements) we wake up with a slight hang-over this morning. Audrey Waters went […]

Flash Grant for Hackerschool

One of the many cool things about being a Shuttleworth Foundation fellow is that I get to give away a “Flash” grant each year to people who are doing cool stuff. It’s a no strings (almost) attached 5000 USD and could be a first step towards a full fellowship application. I decided to give my […]

Learning with a little help from your friends

Two weeks ago P2PU held its third workshop. This year’s focus was on “getting stuff done” and bringing together people who are working on concrete projects. And we did get a lot done. Check out the etherpad with our notes and visit our new projects board on trello for the details. But we also spent […]

Eureka. It’s a lab – not (just) a platform.

This announcement about Harvard receiving a US$ 40M gift to support teaching and learning innovation made me think more about the platform conversation we’ve been having (here and on the mailing list). Besides giving an elite university a lot of cash, how can we foster more innovation in learning and teaching in ways that will affect […]

Why P2PU should be a platform and not a product

I’ve had a lot on my mind with regards to P2PU recently. Bear with me for a bit of a meander … As Executive Director, one of my responsibilities is to figure out a way to make this thing sustainable, and I’m working on a sustainability plan for discussion with the board. Lots of people have […]