Collins, A., Halverson, R., & Brown, J. S. (. (2009). Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology. New York, NY: Teachers College Pr. 

Incompatibilities between Schooling and Technology
Uniform learning vs. Customization
Teacher as expert vs. Diverse sources
Standardized assessment vs. Specialization
Knowledge in head vs. Reliance on resources
Coverage vs. Knowledge explosion
Learning by absorption vs. Learning by doing
Just-in-case learning vs. Just-in-time learning

Result of the incompatibilities
School will become less important as a venue for education
The seeds of a new system are emerging
Industrial Revolution = Universal Schooling
Knowledge Revolution = Lifelong Learning

Seeds of a New System
Home Schooling = growing by about 29% a year
Workplace learning = companies are setting up simulations for training and learning
Distance education = growing more and more popular, virtual HS, university level
Adult education = enrichment, most towns and cities
Learning Centers = Sylvan, Kaplan, Department of Education
Educational television and videos = PBS
Computer-based learning environment = SIMS, gaming*
Web Communities = total customization + knowledge exchange communities
Technical certifications = take the exam when you are ready, if you fail, you take it again.
Internet cafes = libraries of the future in a certain sense, much more interactive

*John Seeley Brown: You Play World of Warcraft? You’re Hired!

“Something about web communities that fosters production rather than absorption.”

All the seeds started independent of technology; technology has come in an enabled it to grow.

]]> http://hickstro.org/cccl/2009/12/16/collins-and-halverson-rethinking-education/feed/ 0 http://hickstro.org/cccl/2009/12/16/situated-cognition-seminal-piece-for-my-rdp/ http://hickstro.org/cccl/2009/12/16/situated-cognition-seminal-piece-for-my-rdp/#comments Wed, 16 Dec 2009 15:45:14 +0000 Sara Beachamp-Hicks http://hickstro.org/cccl/?p=319

Brown, J. S., Collins, A., & Duguid, P. (1989). Situated Cognition and the Culture of Learning. Educational Researcher, 18(1), 32-42. doi: 10.3102/0013189X018001032

Knowledge is situated, being in part a product of the activity, context, and culture in which it is developed and used. Conventional schooling often ignores the school culture and its’ influence on what is learned in school. Activity, concept and culture are interdependent. To understand any of them in isolation is not possible.  How we learn, before formal schooling, has a great deal to do with our culture.  How can we expect that the culture of schools would not in some way impact, shape, effect learning?  The analogy of learning and tools and the exploration of how the concepts are both situated and developed is helpful.  Tools in isolation lack meaning and purpose.  The ways in which a chisel are used are defined by the community of users.  Similarly the ways in which we learn are defined by the culture, the environment, and by the people (and their own individual cultures they bring to the group).

We discussed this article in prosem and I remember thinking that is make perfect sense.  That the idea that learning can be isolated from your environment, your background, experience is foolish in part because we all have different experiences and live in different environments.  They way learning is presented, the context in which we incorporate new ideas, values, concepts into our thinking is most definitely shaped by situation.  The authors introduce the ideas of communities of practice, yet Lave and Wenger in 1991 provide us with a more detailed understanding. Understanding this theory of learning is a critical component of understanding both communities of practice and the practice of online social networks.  The ways in which CoPs are organized, developed, and facilitated, as well as the interactions of the members of the community all are important things for us to consider as we research ways to provide opportunity for teachers to participate in these forums as models for professional development.