Supporting new pathways in discontinuous learning

gillian@elemente.co.uk

UNISO 2012 - Sighisoara

Need for learning

• European goal to have 15% of adults involved in lifelong learning by 2020

• In the UK, approximately 47% of adults aged 20-54 engage in some form of learning (UniversitiesUK 2010)

• existing researchers are approaching retirement• younger scientists are drawn to opportunities elsewhere,

particularly in the United States of America (Vught, 2008)• number of full-time postgraduate students has remained

fairly flat at about 6% of the population • only a 0.2% rise in part-time post graduate students between

2006/2007 and 2009/10 (bis.gov.uk)

Need to

• Simplify the learning process• Simplify the way we gain recognition for

learning• Be learner-centric

• Trustee and Director• www.thebild.org

•The

learner builds their own responsive learning environment

ROLE Vision

•Awareness and reflection of own learning process

Responsiveness

•Individually adapted composition of personal learning environment

User-centred

Who is ROLE?1. Fraunhofer FIT DE2. RWTH Aachen University DE3. Technical University of Graz AT4. Katholieke Universiteit Leuven BE5. University of Koblenz DE6. Uppsala University SE7. École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne CH8. University of Leicester UK9. Open University UK10. Vienna University of Economics & Business Administration AT11. Festo Lernzentrum Saar GmbH DE12. imc AG DE13. British Institute for Learning and Development UK14. Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China15. Zentrum für Soziale Innovation AT16. U&I Learning BE

Widget bundles

• Widget = small program = ‘app’• Widget bundles = groups of widgets that work

together to meet a specific need

3 Sample bundles

www.role-project.eu/WidgetCompetition

Other options

• Apple iPad – over 200,000 apps• Apple iPhone – over 500,000 apps• Blackberry – over 18,000 apps• Android – over 25,000 apps• Over 300,000 mobile apps have been developed over the last

three years• 29 billion apps downloaded in 2011• 9 billion in 2010• Revenue in 2011 – $7.3 billion• Predicted revenue 2015 – $36.7 billion(Source: mobiThinking)

Problems

• Where use the apps?• iGoogle? – not after November!• Work, university, hotel, home – major vested

interests in keeping things separate – E.g. All work ‘must’ be done in BB and employer

has firewalls…..• Do learners have the vision and skills?

Early research statistics Personalising Your Learning Environment, PLE1, n=136

• ALL individuals used more than 1 computer in a week – 85.6% using 4 or more.

• Of 7 proposed apps, the most popular was – “Single-app synchroniser for all devices (work, academic and

personal)” which scored 6 or 7 on a seven-point scale from a combined total of 103 respondents.

– “Key text finder” had an average rating of 1– “subject expert finder” an average of 3 – “social media groups adviser” a rating of 5.

• These results are consistent with expectations given other existing tools (FB, GoogleSearch, LI)

UNISO

• University IN society• Learner-centric– Widget/app bundles per course– Full interoperability for students (difficulties in

ROLE)– Sustainability– Privacy and sharing– Universities think about need to store assessed

material (and method of that)

Thank you!

gillian@elemente.co.uk