blogspray on Learning 2.0

Lot's of articles on learning and educational microchunking. The concept seems to be roaring through these community like blogspray. There's even a conference already in June.

• Microlearning2006

  A conference, focusing on "Micromedia & eLearning 2.0 :: Getting the Big Picture" (June 8 -9, 2006). Sponsored by Nokia. One day will be concentrating on the micromedia/microcontent side, the other day on microlearning/microknowledge. The Call for Papers is out (send a proposal/abstract until February, 28th) and can be found at the conference website.

• Nanolearning and Aggregation

  [...] There is a worldwide trend to break things down into their smallest logical components, called microchunking. We no longer buy music CD's, we download just the songs we like. Amazon.com would like you to be able to buy just one chapter, instead of an entire book. Microchunking has not seen great acceptance in the learning community, despite apparent acceptance of the concept of a learning object. In learning there are few tools and no markets for learning objects, so it isn't surprising that NanoLearning has not taken off.

  If you can microchunk learning objects, you can open up a whole new world by aggregating them. Suddenly my learning object doesn't stand alone, but it can be part of someone else's 'favorites' or the learning equivalent of a playlist. My learning object could be part of a thousand different playlists, given a unique context in each circumstance, to be part of a learning experience that I could never have created or even imagined. [...]

• Microlearning at Media Companies ...

  This one got quoted a lot recently. Randy S. Nelson from Pixar's (of Nemo fish fame) "university":

  "The problem with the Hollywood model is that it's generally the day you wrap production that you realize you've finally figured out how to work together. We've made the leap from an idea-centered business to a people-centered business. Instead of developing ideas, we develop people. Instead of investing in ideas, we invest in people. We're trying to create a culture of learning, filled with lifelong learners."

  Sounds great, of course. But John Hagel, analyst of Media 2.0, from whom a strong link points to Umair Haque, brilliant thinker on "micromedia", has some criticism in a brilliant and important post:

  "But the red flag is the narrowness of the vision. No matter how many smart people Jobs [Apple just bought Pixar via Disney] manages to recruit, there needs to be a recognition that, in the words of Bill Joy, 'there are always more smart people outside your organization than inside.' The challenge is to find ways to connect with as many smart people as possible, wherever they reside, and to develop relationships that motivate and enable all participants to get better faster by working together."

  That other way of thinking is labelled "micromedia" by Umair Haque in this seminal ppt ( must download). So here's the question: Has this consequences for a more philosophical concept of "microlearning"? Is it too short sighted to speak just of "learner-centric learning"? Do we have to create a "culture of learning" that goes beyond people, towards people-embedded-in-networked-ideas? Because no matter how smart the individual learners may get - they still may be not smart enough, that is: not as smart as "microlearning networks".