A highlight of the conference for Paul, Dhal and me was attending a session entitled "Learners of the Future". Unlike most other conference sessions on online learning that I have attended, this one featured actual learners!

In particular, it featured a very active discussion with about six teenagers and one seven year old from different backgrounds talking about their use of technlogy inside and outside the classroom.

Some of the teens who offered their perspectives on their use of technology inside and outside the classroom.

As panel organizer and moderator Bill Seretta pointed out to us, this session was meant as a wake-up call to the e-learning industry. Pundits can talk about the future of learning all they want, but young people like this ARE the future of learning. If we don't spend some time understanding how they are using technology, we'll be ill-prepared for how they learn and how to teach them effectively. The panelists were very articulate, and very candid. (And the youngest panelist, a seven year old from Australia, happened to be the daughter of LearningTimes member Frankie Forsyth!) They talked about IM (instant messenger) use, their involvement in online games, their predictions for the future, and some of the "rules" of their world of social computing today, inside and outside of school.

Dhal Anglada and I caught up with the teens from the panel -- and Bill Seretta -- after their formal panel to continue the dialogue they started, and recorded a special piece to share some of the teen's insights and ideas with all of you.

Click below for a 15-20 minute Real video clip of our informal conversation -- a conversation which stimulated an hour or so of continued discussion (over dinner) among all of us LearningTimes members here in attendance.

I attended a set of sessions today on creating web sites and course content that are accessible to those with disabilities. I was curious to hear how various educators and web designers and governments are approaching the need and desire to ensure that all learners can access content and interact fully in online experiences.

One of the speakers I heard was Diana Andone, M.Sc., of Politehnica University of Timisoara in Romania. Diana is involved in a multinational project funded by the European Union to design and offer accessible web-based courses about creating web sites that are accessible.

Diana Andone of Romania with Jonathan Finkelstein after a session on an EU funded project on accessibilty.

Expectations can be very high for such self-referential courses, if you will, where you are hoping to model what you are teaching by how you are teaching it!

I caught up with Diana after her session. During this excerpt from our conversation (7-8 minutes), Diana talks about the project itself, the course delivery method they designed for offering their accessibility course, learner reactions, resulting certifications for those who complete the course, and the unique nature of projects like this in Romania, and why that is currently the case. Let's listen in:

Here's a formal description of the project from www.remotetraining.org:

"The REMOTE Leonardo da Vinci project is an innovative ICT educational product aimed at supporting learners with disabilities to develop skills necessary for entering and remaining in employment. Using an integrated fat/thin delivery mechanism which utilises a media-rich CD with low bandwidth on-line content from a central on-line learning hub, the product is compatible with current standard internet provision found in homes and businesses across Europe. The product will result in a new web design technologies qualification which will be available to learners in retail outlets in the UK, Spain, Romania and Germany, and which will be accredited through a UK National Awarding Body that forms part of the partnership."

Several of the sessions I attended related to m-learning, or mobile learning -- educational experiences enhanced by or taking place primarily on wireless devices, such as PDAs (personal digital assistants), laptops, tablet PCs, mobile phones, text messaging, etc.

m-learning is really just another piece of the learning (or e-learning) puzzle. There is certainly untapped potential for the use of wireless devices inside the classroom, but the most dramatic impact of wireless, portable computing may very well be in facilitating and enhancing site-specific field work. The ability to give learners the freedom to leave their desks, and go out into a physical world filled with primary sources and original locations, while still being connected to virtual storehouses of data and to peers and experts, can be a great new recipe for learning.

Petra Wentzel of Amsterdam talking with Jonathan Finkelstein about mobile learning.

M-learning can also be a great distraction, if not used with wisdom, restraint and/or moderation -- How many times have you returned from a vacation with 3 hours of video footage or 200 photographs, but only faint recollections of where you were when the images were captured, because you had you a camera covering your face the whole time? In the early days of using mobile devices in the field for education, we need to avoid that trap, and instead use mobile tools and connections to amplify the magic and learning effect of exploring authentic places -- in the virtual presence of authentic data and people located elsewhere. The promise is great.

One person who is beginning to uncover that promise is Dr. Petra Wentzel, from the Centre for Educational Training, Assessment and Research (CETAR) at Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. Petra talked about the use of mobile devices in field-work intensive courses, such as archaeology courses. Petra sat down with me and Dhal Anglada for a conversation about her exciting and meaningful work in this area. Here's a video excerpt (about 10 minutes) from our conversation.

(You will need the free RealPlayer, and you may need to disable your pop-up blocker to view the video clip above.)

Randal Baier
Eastern Michigan University