ISTA 8 in Egypt

This is a short response to Pete Cranston's question about outputs from the Aqua-TNET project on innovations in aquaculture and fisheries teaching and learning. The project is essentially a network for tertiary education institutions in Europe, so the focus is more on the application of ICT in formal tertiary education, although we are certainly interested in other types of less formal lifelong learning. We are currently working on a review guide, which will be available via the Aqua-TNET website as soon as it is ready. As may be expected, there is increasing use of the Internet for delivering distance learning, or "blended learning" (mix of campus and distance learning). Much of this is based around replicating traditional teaching models with online lectures, tutorials (real-time, or more commonly forums such as this one) and student assignments etc. Doing that successfully is not easy, with ensuring good participation and fair assessment particular issues. So we are interested in new patterns of learning, tools or approaches that are more effective for the Internet age. We have been looking at the increased use of video (real-time and on-demand), virtual and other simulations, and the use of mobile devices (mLearning). Uptake of these, especially mLearning, has been limited in European tertiary education. I or other colleagues in the group will post separate messages about particular examples. A key interest at the moment is the issue of collaboration in developing teaching and learning materials. Most people believe this is beneficial, but practice is hampered by copyright and other intellectual property considerations, and the perhaps natural inclination of many teachers, who are often keen to use other people's materials but reluctant to share their own. Nevertheless there is a range of formal initiatives at institutional, national or international levels to promote the sharing of course materials. Examples include: ARIADNE [url]http://www.ariadne-eu.org/ [/url] JORUM [url]http://www.jorum.ac.uk/[/url] INTUTE [url]http://www.intute.ac.uk/[/url] MERLOT [url]http://www.merlot.org/merlot/index.htm[/url] ASK [url]http://ask.oucs.ox.ac.uk/[/url] If the definition of “Learning materials" is taken to include sub-elements of courses, or even components of individual lessons or exercises, then things open up much further, and there are very interesting developments and debates going on, perhaps influenced by the open-source software movement and creative commons licensing, to build more collaborative learning communities. See for instance the OECD report “Giving Knowledge for Free" ([url]http://www.oecd.org/document/41/0,3343,en_2649_37455_38659497_1_1_1_374…]) or David Wiley's arguments for open access to learning materials at [url]http://opencontent.org//docs/teachers_claim.html[/url]. Formalised examples of this can be seen in the Wikiversity project [url]http://www.wikiversity.org/[/url] or the open access to materials provided by Massachusetts Institute of Technology [url]http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html[/url] and the UK Open University [url]http://www.open.ac.uk/openlearn/home.php[/url]. Less formal examples are seen in the way that people are now using Web 2.0 technologies to mash information and media from resources such as news sites, podcasts, YouTube and Flickr and introduce their own interpretation and explanation through blogs, social networking sites, or services such as Slideshare ([url]http://www.slideshare.net[/url]) etc. Organisations such as FAO and WorldFish are valuable contributors in this process with respect to aquaculture and fisheries resources. Whilst it may be difficult to see exactly what impact these technologies will have on formal education, it is clear that the ground is shifting and one way or another, ICT is going to bring a major change in the access people have to information and opportunities to participate in learning. We would be interested to hear people's thoughts on what they expect educational institutions to be providing, and to what extent they are interested to contribute to, as well as take from, educational services delivered through ICT. John PS Some further links at [url]http://del.icio.us/tag/aquatnet[/url]