CCK11: MOOC on “Connectivism and Connective Knowledge”

I just got an invitation to the CCK11 event on facebook, via the group on connectivism and connective knowledge:

Connectivism and Connective Knowledge is an open online course that over 12 weeks explores the concepts of connectivism and connective knowledge and explore their application as a framework for theories of teaching and learning. Participation is open to everyone and there are no fees or subscriptions required.

[http://cck11.mooc.ca/]

This event got my attention for various reasons:

• I’m currently giving a lecture on Education in the Digital Age and I’m very much interested in the transformative effects that ICT and digital media can/could/should have on our current educational systems and in the effects that they already had/have on learning processes in the everyday lives of so many people around the globe (even, or mostly, outside of formal educational settings). So I thought it might be profitable to “take” this cck11 course and see what new inspirational ideas this experience might yield in and for me…
• Moreover, I’ve been a student of connectionism since the late 1990ies, working in the lab of Axel Cleeremans (a former student of one of the founding fathers of connectionism). Therefore connectivism as a theory of learning and teaching sounded like something familiar yet new to me. It appears to me as something that I might want to explore deeper, because it nicely connects (pun intended) with my existing expertise and with my current research and teaching activities.

I’ll keep you posted about my learning experiences on this blog… I will for instance try to explore the idea of how “successful” my learning will be… because I’m currently also giving a course on the “successfulness” of teaching methods & strategies and I’m more and more becoming aware of the lack of proper empirical research on this aspect of many “pedagogical recommendations”… I see a lot of wishful thinking in pedagogy and little empirical evidence of the claimed results and outcomes.

I’m really looking forward to this course and the people & ideas that I will likely encounter on this journey… You’re welcome to join too, it’s open and free!