Learning, Knowledge and Wisdom for All in Late Modernity

Professor R. H. (‘Bob’) Fryer CBEChair, National Campaign for Learning (UK)Former Chief Executive of NHS University

EDEN CONFERENCE PLENARY SESSIONPorto, 7 – 9 June, 2012

Agenda What is the nature of the ‘late modern’

(contemporary) world? Divisive learning in a divided world What kinds of learning and learners have

a chance of thriving in the emergent world (and what will not)?

How can new technologies help? One example – Using Web 2.0, “WebWise”

An era of widespread economic, social, political, technological & cultural change

Global & national financial crises, the ‘credit crunch’ & ‘Euro crisis’ – where next after more than 3 decades of neo-liberalism?

Long-run changes in social, political & cultural institutions (Family, Politics, Consumption etc)

Some disillusion with ‘conventional’ politics Restructuring of work, employment & industry Shifts in personal & group identities & aspirations A growing tendency for ‘choice’ An information & knowledge revolution Continuing technological innovation Greater localism within globalisation Social fragmentation & division New forms & expressions of citizenship

Towards ‘Risk Society’ (Beck)

Risk Society

Choice

Multiple &Contested Information

& Knowledge

‘Fuzzy’Boundaries

Un-sustainability

BeyondConventions,

Rules & Structures

Unreliability Uncertainty

UbiquitousChange

Unpredictability

Even City Financiers & Journalists are begining to realise

”Our New Age of Volatility Defies Spreadsheeet Strategists”

“What really matters now … are non-quantitative issues, such as political values, soal cohesion and civic identity”

Gillian Tett, Financial Times, 5 June, 2012

The contradictions of learning Is engaging for some, but a nightmare for many

moreDistributes both achievement & failure Rewards the successful, punishes those who

don’t succeed (Mostly) leads to good jobs & social mobility for

some, a life of drudgery for others Begins a lifetime of learning & discovery for

some (a minority?), but exclusion for most Is beset by, & often reinforces, social divisions -

social class, race & ethnicity, gender, disabilities, region, religion, identity & age

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

1996 1999 2002 2004 2007 2008 2010 2011 2012

TOTAL

AB

C1

C2

DE

Current or recent participation in UK adult learning 1996-2012 by social class

Source NIACE Annual Surveys

Current or recent participation in UK adult learning 1996-2012 by age group

Source:NIACE

What can be done to change this?Educational solutions Improve, reform or diversify institutionsProvide additional resources for ‘deprived’ or ’excluded’ Improve access/widen participation/better opportunitiesModify curriculumEnlarge ways of measuring learning and/or achievementValue/introduce more forms, modes, locales & styles of learningChange/enrich pedagogy

Social/political solutionsRedistribute wealth, income, status & power Implement ‘positive’ action/reverse discriminationEnhance social mobility

Varieties of Learning, Knowledge & Wisdom

Learning occurs in a variety of ways; in many different locales, through many different modes, for many different purposes & the manner in which it is funded & otherwise supported also varies

Similarly, the sources, generation, validation & transmission of knowledge are both varied & often fiercely contested

What constitutes wisdom in any given context, & how it is acquired, is also open to debate

An Analytical Framework for Adult Education & Lifelong Learning

Increasingly PrivateFunding‘Big Society’ EmphasisMore Voluntary, Community, &Non- Institutional Locations

Welfare State,Collectivist

Neo-liberal, Market &Individualist

Informal Learning

Formal Learning

Focus on Institutions

National Programmes Qualifications & Targets

Public Funding

Inclusivity/WP

Social Purpose

Economy & Labour MarketMix of Public, Corporate & Individual Funding

Community , Regeneration

Public FundingLeisure, Pleasure & ‘ ‘seriously useless’

Incorporation & Control

Citizenship

Capacity Building

Focus on ‘Local’ & Personal

Welfare to Work

Work-based Training

An emergent model of learningDomain Traditional Emergent

Study Education Learning

Locale School/ other institution

Everywhere – work, home etc

Time Childhood/ early adulthood

Lifelong & life-wide

Style Teacher centred Learner-driven

Delivery Face-to-face Distance & ‘e’ Target Group Universal to max

school age -elite Specific & mass

Curriculum Expert/ pro-fessional

J oint production & user generated

Focus Theory/ abstract Practice Discipline Single Multi-disciplinary

Mode Learning by rote Reflective

Form I nstructional Constructivist Purpose Qualification Action/

application

Reconciling Max Weber with Pablo Picasso

In the emergent , late modern world of risk society, in order to thrive, citizens need a subtle and developing combination of:

Technical, specific, bureaucratic & accredited skills and competences; andCreativity, imagination, flexibility , spontaneity and intuition

Source: Wayne Barry, “The Generation Game”

Enhancing Learners’ (People’s?) ‘Digital Literacy’

Critical pedagogy Critical pedagogy aims:“to enable learners to go beyond thinking in

order to enable them as citizens to act as engaged agents in their various worlds, giving voice to their hopes and ambitions for change and improvement”. (Giroux 2007: 1-5)

It is about fostering “a language of critique and possibility”. (Giroux 2005: 211

It promises to engender what Barber (1998) regards as the true mark of an activist democracy - a “noisy and fractious citizenry”.

Making a contribution with Web 2.0

The ‘WebWise’ project – a European Union funded collaboration

Six countries, 9 partners, focus on ‘Public Health’

Making use of Web 2.0 in formal & informal educational settings

Pilot schemes: Bulgaria Germany (2) Greece Slovenia UK

Meaning of ‘Web 2.00’ (per Bonder Updohn 2009)

Collaboration and/or distributed authorship Active, open-access, “bottom-up” participation

& interactive multi-way communication Continuous production, reproduction, and

transformation of material in use and reuse across contexts

Openness of content, renunciation of copyright, distributed ownership

Lack of finality, “awareness-in-practice” of the “open-endedness” of the activity

Placed on the WWW, or to a large extent utilising Web-mediated resources and activities

Why Web 2.0? Many of the students/practitioners were already

users ‘socially’ Could be especially appropriate in the field of public

health:- for ‘reaching out’ to individuals/groups in the community;- overcomes some problems of ‘face-to-face’ - enables a degree of individualisation or ‘personalisation’- mitigates some causes of inequality in learning

Scope for engaging a wider community of participants, including professionals

Would allow user generated content/knowledge to shape programme

Might lend itself to development of independent & ‘critical’ perspective of participants

“Web 2.0 technologies and practices are being introduced into teaching and learning activities. The reasons for doing so are many: For one thing, employing in the service of learning some of the communication practices that young people are already using voluntarily in their spare time arguably will help them enter the learning practices of the university, both in respect of their motivation and of the skills required of them. Related to this, for another, in both a lifelong and life-wide perspective (Jarvis 2007), the user-centred focus of Web 2.0 activities supports the learner in transgressing and resituating content and practices between the formal and informal learning settings in which s/he participates. An important third reason is the didactic potential of Web 2.0: The centrality of participation, production, dialogue ,and collaboration in Web 2.0 practices seemingly make them ideal as elements in programmes focusing on the learner’s active engagement, individually and/or collaboratively, as a prerequisite for learning. From yet a fourth point of view, many of the possible future jobs of the students will require competence in the use of Web 2.0—for example, skills in navigation, communication, and critical evaluation—and, therefore, a new task of educational programmes is to support the acquisition of such competences along with other subject-related competences.” Bonderup Dohn, N. , 2009, “Web 2.0: Inherent tensions and evident challenges for education,” International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning

One Researcher’s answer

A Web 2.0 Conception of Knowledge (& Wisdom)

Wenger’s concept of learning stresses the continuous negotiation of meaning and identity in practice in the mutual, though not necessarily harmonious, engagement with others. This closely corresponds, at the general level, to the dynamicity, open-endedness and flexibility of the Web 2.0 practices and more concretely to the centrality in these practices of “bottom-up” knowledge production, construction, and transformation; of communication and collaboration; and of use and reuse of material across contexts. Such characteristics point to an implicit understanding of knowledge and competence as dynamic, transitory, and situated phenomena. In accordance with the internality of the basic Web 2.0 goals, knowledge, and competence are phenomena of participation—they are only fully realized, ontologically speaking, in the acting in concrete situations. In the words of Wenger, “[k]nowing is a matter of participating in the pursuit of [valued] enterprises, that is, of active engagement in the world” (Wenger 1998, p. 4).

Source: Bonderup Dohn, 2009

Source: Wayne Barry, “The Generation Game”

Average Age Group Use of a Range (19)of Social Networking Sites

Source: Pingdom/Google

Age Distribution in Use of Various Social Networking Sites

Source: Pingdom/Google

Average Age of Users of Different Social Networking Sites

Source: Pingdom/Google

Growth of Facebook Search Traffic

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight& Adplanner.

Age of “Facebook” Users (2011)

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Growth of “Linkedin” Search Traddic

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Use of “Linkedin” by Age Group

Briefly, what do the case studies suggest? A long way to go?

A “The exercise failed and showed that {Masters} students are mostly not familiar with the web 2.0. tools (they are also not familiar with the terminology). Only few are using FB for personal purposes, fewer (1/10) have twitter accounts and nobody writes blog (or uses them as a study material). ... The challenge of using web 2.0. as integral part of educational process remains open and unaccomplished.”

B“Content is usually adapted from well-known sites (e.g. Wikipedia) … Usually, no clear definition of quality criteria is given by teachers and/or institutions… There is little interest from students’ side to develop their own quality criteria. “

C “Students were very reluctant to participate at the beginning, although they were offered detailed written guidelines on how to use the web 2.0 tools. Although they mentioned the extra work load required, as the main reason, they reported that they would be “happier” if this extra load would include more “traditional” forms of academic tasks (i.e. essay).

C “Different web 2.0 tools attracted different levels of participation. Blog seems to be used more often than the twitter. A potential explanation could be the structured character and the orientation of the tool. {Using the} Blog seems to be more attractive to students as it gives opportunities for academically familiar tasks” … The role of the web 2.0 developer (expert) as a facilitator, who creates a friendly environment, as well as the educator’s positive attitude towards the use of these innovations and – most importantly – his continuous active participation seem to inspire participants..”

D “Both students and faculty need support to gain knowledge and experience, and develop strategies for teaching and learning with Web 2.0 technologies in a constructivist environment. Because traditional, teacher-centered teaching and learning approaches are consistent neither with the dynamics nor with the philosophy of Web 2.0 community building such support ought to be provided through in-service faculty training, as well as workshops for students and faculty.”

Some positive signs?

D. “When the inclusion of Web 2.0 innovations is planned {attention should be paid to} the development of constructivist teaching and assessment strategies in the “traditional” FTF courses – such as learner-centered instruction, peer-interaction, peer-evaluation and scaffolding in the process of learning, ongoing non-formal assessment, project-based learning etc.”

D “The specifics of blended and on-line learning require revisiting the normative and organizational guidelines for educational institutions. These specifics include factors such as:

a. Time necessary both on the side of the educator and the learner for the development of effective learner-centered process with the active inclusion of Web 2.0 technologies. b. Pedagogical, communication, and technical skills necessary for the development of learning materials for constructivist, Web-based 2.0 environments. c. Learning and communication skills necessary for active and effective participation in Web 2.0 and constructivist-based learning processLearners’ and educators’ participation in the learning process happens at different times and different places.”

Towards good practice…?

Student perceptions of HEIs’ Use of Technology to Support Learning

Source: Wayne Barry, “The Generation Game”

Source: Slideshare

Realising Martha Nussbaum’s ‘Capabilities’ for EveryoneFor democracy to thrive, Nussbaum suggests developing ten capabilities that determine ‘what people actually are and what they are able to be’Life – able to live a full human life of normal length;Bodily health – able to enjoy bodily health, including adequate nourishment and capacity for reproduction;Bodily integrity – able to move freely and safely from place to place;Sense, imagination and thought – able to make full use of the senses to experience, think, reason, imagine and create;Emotion – able to experience attachment to people, things and experiences and to express feelings of love, longing, grieving and justifiable anger;Practical reasoning – able to conceive of the good life and to engage in critical reflection;Affiliation – able to live with others in mutual respect, understanding the position of and worth of ‘others’, and establishing the basis of self-respect and non-discrimination;Other species – having respect for animals and plants;Play – ability to laugh and enjoy recreational and playful activity; andEnvironmental control – able to engage with the processes and choices that affect our political and material lives, including rights of political participation, property holding and employment

Some supplementary data on the growth and use, by age-group, of a

range of Web 2.0 applications

Growth of “Twitter” Search Traffic

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Use of Twitter by Age Group

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Search Traffic for “Flickr”

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Use of “Flickr” by Age Group

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Growth of “YouTube” Search Traffic

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Use of “YouTube” by Age Group

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Growth in “Weibo” Search Trafffic

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Use of “Weibo” by Age Group

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Decline of “My Space” Search Traffic

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Use of “My Space” by Age Group

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Use of “Badoo” by Age

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Use of “Badoo” by Educational Level/Qualification

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.

Source: Ignite social media/Google Insight & Adplanner.