Wikiversity talk:Learning by doing

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[edit] Why have this page?

Thanks for creating this page, John, but I still don't think it gives much (if any) real, practical advice to people about learning by doing. What does learning by doing mean? What kind of "doing" can lead to learning? And, crucially, how? Currently, this page replicates what we already have in other pages - I proposed this page as a space to actually explore and lay open what learning by doing means - both in general, and in Wikiversity. I think we'd be much better off looking at the model of experiential learning (also on infed), as well as informal and/or incidental learning - all of which touch on the central issues of learning by doing. The more we can guide people through the actual process the better - otherwise, why have this page? (Pardon the rant.) Cormaggio ^beep 17:56, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

I think it is productive to reflect upon the types of learning activities that have already been introduced to Wikiversity, particularly since so many people seem to have trouble thinking outside of the box of conventional courses. By starting with that, I was not closing the page to discussion of other things. If you feel that we can learn nothing useful from reflecting on what has happened so far at Wikiversity then feel free to clear the page and turn it into a discussion of other things. --JWSchmidt 19:07, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

I absolutely applaud reflecting on what we've been doing so far at Wikiversity - reflection is central, crucial, pivotal to learning by doing (or, certainly, experiential learning). But my problem, thus far, is: where is the reflection (or even the description)? Where do we describe how the sample projects are designed to work - in the framework of learning by doing - and where do we reflect on and analyse that work? We don't (yet) - but I think it would be better if we did. I think isolating a few of the projects that you've selected already and describing how they can contribute to our understanding of learning by doing on this page would be better than a longer list of links from the page with little or no explanation/reflection (which is better in Portal:Learning projects). Of course, I will just get on with doing this myself - I'm not trying to complain - rather, to raise a general issue about how, in my opinion, this page would be more useful. And I don't think the historical background to Wikiversity's setting up is particularly useful here - except possibly in one or two brief contextual sentences, with links to the appropriate pages (eg. Wikiversity:History of Wikiversity and Portal:Education/Wikiversity model). I'm not going to blank it all just yet - but I'm going to try to layout this page bearing in mind the person who wants to know just what learning by doing is, and how to incorporate it within their own practice (teaching and/or learning). As I'm doing so, if you have clarifications of how you saw this page working, please add them here. Cormaggio ^beep 22:42, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Vocational prescriptivism and a history of blunders?

Background to this post: reading http://en.wikiversity.org/w/index.php?title=Wikiversity:Original_proposal&oldid=169 and trying to make sense of where "learning by doing" as a form of un-wiki-like vocational prescriptivism came from. Step one: the origin of the problem seems to have been a well-meant comment of "E-learning. A framework within which members of the community can actually take courses online." in the original proposal. Step two: this seems to have been chewed around by a committee which replied: "The board recommend rewriting the proposal to exclude credentials, exclude online-courses and clarify the concept of elearning platform. to be rewritten to exclude credentials and to clarify concept of e-learning." (note: this is illiterate as it stands and must be a misquote). The odd word choice or mistyping in the dictum of the board makes it unclear whether the board was talking about "e-learning" or "e-learning platform" (entirely different things). Step three: this then resulted in the article Learning by doing. If the above posts between Cormaggio and JWSchmidt properly reflect things, then disagreement and lack of community input were heavily involved. It looks to me like a case of people (including the board) slowly and unnecessarily leading each other into ever deeper water or an ever deeper mess. Possibly the board's problem was with the idea of "taking courses", because this implies a university-like infrastructure behind it, and possibly the board needed nothing more than a retreat from this idea. Unfortunately the board asked for "clarification", which could be taken to mean that a complete concept of e-learning, especially for Wikiversity, had to be created and expounded. However is this really what the board was requiring? Anyway, it then seems that interpreting the board question this way led to JWSchmidt and Cormaggio going out on a limb and writing something which despite the best of intentions simply couldn't and shouldn't have been done. Surely if a Wikiversity concept of learning is to be developed, then: (1) one should look at 1000's of resources really created, because this will show us what real contributors really want to do; (2) try to produce a multiplicity of elearning concepts based on empirical study of this data. Of course, an empirical approach obliges us to constantly update and extend the range of elearning concepts in the light of new experience. --McCormack 09:40, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Call for participation

Participation is Everything!

Growing up in rural Western Kentucky, I was in 4-H whose motto is "Learn by doing" - so I'm well acquainted with the paradigm. My first solid effort here that follows the Learning by doing model is Generating dynamic content with MediaWiki. As part of the MediaWiki Project, it asks the user to apply what they learn immediately to Wikiversity's resources (for example {{QOTD}} and Picture of the Month). I was "learning" the same things and "teaching" them concurrently.

My next project is going to be the Linux Learning Project. It will be built using the MediaWiki Project's template and will attempt to coagulate Linux, BSD, Linux server administration and others. But to teach Linux, I have to continue to learn Linux myself, so I'll know what I'm talking about. The pilot module will be Tiny Core Linux, which is my current most-active endeavor.

My goal is to get an actual server up and running for Wiki Campus Radio. The Across the Wikiverse module is a learning by doing unit where I'll be attempting to become a "radio personality" in a fun and interactive way. Some folks just wont get it until the actual infrastructure (including the Sandbox Server) are fully functional. My time and access to the Internet have been less than ideal, but as we go forward, the paradigm should prove to be quite effective. CQ 16:22, 28 April 2009 (UTC)