NetGeners.Net

... a free and open learning adventure

… on Ne(x)t Generation Learning

v.080810

I think we're --in a lot of ways --in a period of the most profound reinvention of ...education and how people need to learn since the invention of literacy. Tim O'Reilly

… face that half of what you learned at year 1 might be out of date by year 3 of your study?… manage 10 to 14 different jobs – just before you turn 38, more would follow later on?

How will you …

… qualify for one of the top 10 in demand jobs in 2010, which not even existed in 2004?

… be prepared for jobs that not even exist yet, demand the use oftechnologies that haven't been invented in order to solve problems that you don't know are problems yet ?

Do you think that this would be sufficient to be prepared for the future?

Not sure? Not yet? Maybe not?

Do you have the skills that are expected in today’s lifelong learning knowledge and information societies?

Do you really know how to take advantage of the web for your personal learning needs to have a competitive advantage at today's job market?

Than join our adventure @NetGeners.Net

NetGeners.Net is a free and open learning space for you to develop the skills you need in today's lifelong learning and knowledge societies.

You will have access to a large range of learning materials, with great flexibility regarding roles, spaces and time.

At NetGeners.Net you are a learner, project manager, teacher, moderator, which ever roles you like to take on – and likely this will be more than one.

Interact with real people, work on concrete tasks and scratch an itch! Actually, learning can be fun!

You might think of NetGeners.Net as a course, just that it is Free, Openand flexible without fixed start and end date.

You will not only act as a passive learner, but become an active contributor and co-creator.

Like to see how NetGeners.Net could feel like?

Right, so let’s show what we experienced @ NetGeners.Net and listen to the voices!

In March 2008 some students from Greece and Spain,coupled with folks from the Gambia, Portugal, and the Netherlands started working at NetGeners.Net – and this is what we have experienced so far...

“At the beginning it started really small, but as time went on the NetGeners.Net website and courses grew in size.”

“More and more material was added and discussions intensified.”“At the beginning we didn’t know each other,

but with time, our confidence and trust grew and we were able to talk more freely. And frequently scheduled chats also helped us to know each other”

“We participated in a learning project named "Different Ways To Disseminate Information" or "DWTDI". During our research we have learned how to collaborate from distance using web technologies, as two of us were in Sweden, one in England and one in Greece.”“Furthermore, we have learned how to merge our separate work using open source technologies like wikis in order to introduce a common result.”“We strongly believe that this project helped all of us to improve our ability in English and our knowledge about the tasks that are included in the project.”

“I've learned a lot of things. To be honest I didn't even know what exactly copyleft was when the project started; but I learned about it along the way and figured out some details about copyright.”

“We liked the NetGeners experience because it was different from formal education and because we had the freedom to choose our tasks and project methods.”

“The "find out yourself" aspect NetGeners provides stimulates to search and actually learn about something, while in higher education students are mostly supposed to read books and just learn them by heart, rendering the knowledge useless since most things are forgotten along the way.”

“The NetGeners.Net experience was very different: learning is done - not received; more flexible, more possibilities to choose the theme and the way how to develop it; dynamics of the roles with no clear separation of teacher/learner.”“We believe that the NetGeners project had some unique features. First of all, the group participants could totally take the responsibility of their project, content and organisation and could make decisions about the future tasks or chats on their own.”“We were not obliged to use the NetGeners official places (e.g. the NetGeners' web pages and Wiki) to upload our stuff and we could make decisions all together!”

“It's not about what I learned, but about how I learned it. The same knowledge might be obtained through open source communities or traditional learning environments (actually the whole learning process is identical with open source in my opinion), but in traditional learning environments it is not as interesting.”

•“In formal classes you're bombed with information which you have to cope with, at NetGeners.Net it was easier to do so and I think we have learnt better than in formal education.”

Did I hear someone saying learning can’t be fun?

“It is just great! I really liked the fact that we had to search all over the internet for information and the rather flexible schedule.”

Well, I can tell you that we all learnt quite some things and definately also had some fun...

“Combine that with a very interesting project subject and there comes a great way to learn!”

Like to give it a try ?Like to give it a try ?

Engage in personally meaningful activities by working in one or more learning projects within your area of interest to create solutions to problems Establish (or join) project teams and team roles, including work assignments and roadmaps Search for and engage with available online content and communities Re-experience how others learn at the web Create materials yourself and share your project results with others and reflect on them Integrate your contributions into the NetGener.Net space so others could learn from it and build on them Use a broad range of collaborative technologies Present your project results, learn from the presentation of others and engage at discussions You are invited to take on an ACTIVE role that will include try and error attempts, experimenting and taking a risk of not completing a taks 100% as you might have liked.

Up for a Up for a NetGeners.NetNetGeners.Net learning adventure?learning adventure?

NetGeners.Net is for all of you out there, because together we learn!

Join in @Join in @NetGeners.NetNetGeners.Net

This is to say that we welcome you as a:Student in formal educationFree learner outside of formal educationEducator (Teachers) that like to participate with their students

There is no minimum age limit, nor any minimum prior educational requirements.

Find out more & participate!

Visit us at: www.netgeners.net

Contact:

A.Meiszner@open.ac.uk

NetGeners.Net is a pilot project fromthe

Institute of Educational TechnologyThe Open University – UK

Like to watch the movie at youtube: ?