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eLearning
'Socializing' the CMS
7/1/2008
Looking for ways to bring some of the power of social networking into Ye Olde Course Management System? Start here.
WEB 2.0 TOOLS like Socialtext are being used to redesign and evolve CMS systems by harnessing the bits and pieces created by learners in support of their own learning.
WHY HAVE SOCIAL NETWORKING sites proliferated so quickly? While no one knows for certain, theories suggest that the popularity of these sites may be linked to features such as flexibility, easy access, spontaneity, and connectedness. Now, innovative faculty and business leaders are looking for ways to bring some of that openness and spontaneity into our rather staid and mature course management systems.
The challenges of creating new CMS systems or tweaking current ones lead quickly into queries about a) CMS designs, b) the features of social networking apps, and c) the role of attention in learning. With those elements in mind, take a look at how a CMS rooted in a learner-centered learning paradigm might bring some of that social Web 2.0 energy into our learning systems.
Design by Pedagogical 'Era'
The designs of many present course management systems are rooted in the faculty-centric knowledge transmission paradigm that includes the need for grades, faculty "lectures," consistent assessment criteria, and tools for tracking student participation. The designs of these systems naturally reflect the technologies and pedagogies of their particular "design time" or pedagogical era. In fact, many CMS systems note with appropriate pride that their systems originated with faculty designing for faculty.
Introducing new pedagogies. Despite the limitations (as seen from our present vantage point), our current course management systems have served us well in bringing desperately needed conveniences and efficiencies into higher education teaching and learning services. Moreover, these systems have been evolving as well, adding technology enhancements such as podcasting, voice tools, blogs, wikis, and synchronous online classroom applications. The enhancements, however, only give a polite nod to the new pedagogies that promote collaboration, constructivist strategies, content creation by students, and learning communities. This is not surprising because, as Stanford Law (CA) Professor Lawrence Lessig has noted, once a paradigm has been coded and systematized into software, it is almost like law. Designing a new CMS with a learner-centered paradigm as the primary design perspective may mean scrapping the old CMS systems. A CMS with the learner "onstage" involves moving all the faculty-directed communication to a back-bone core, while moving the learner's thinking and communication forward. This redesign could support applications that incorporate what we know about social and cognitive networking, advances in memory and learning, hyper-attention, and current and future technologies.
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