Margaret.OCONNELL's blog

Thought I'd spruik our Pre-Congress workshop which is running on the Sunday before the Congress. It's titled Action Inquiry in a Virtual World Environment and the 'Art' of Learning Online and involves working in a 3D virtual world environment. Here's the abstract:

The art of learning online in 3D... building scenarios for use in
Virtual Worlds: action inquiry and education design. Participants will
be presented with an educational, or learning, dilemma, which they will
be expected to solve as a group, using action inquiry processes.

Last time I blogged, I mentioned again the efforts of Beth Kanter. Since then I've been snowed under with a major project at work, and have really just "resurfaced"!

One activity I was recently involved in was a conference, the Moodle Moot AU. Moodle Moots are run around the globe and provide an opportunity to show and tell experiences of using the open source online learning platform, Moodle. The one I attended was held in Melbourne just a couple of weeks ago, at the Convention Centre in Southbank (a very nice conference venue I must say!).

I'd like to introduce you to Beth's Blog. Beth blogs about how non-profit organisations can make the most of social media. I won't go through Beth's blog in too much detail but here's some highlights that might see you reading more on Beth's blog.

1. You might want to start with her bio on her Wikispace. Often our connections with others begin simply with knowing a bit more about them.

2. Then you might want to see what she writes about; for example, this post explores a recent survey about non-profits and their adoption of social media.

I came across this in my web search last week and have been reading the ideas and blog posts to see what it is all about.

The 'camp' is an open conference that is happening 5th to 7th March 2010. The Aussie Social Innovation Exchange (ASIX) is a member of the global Social Innovation eXchange network. But what IS it?

Is anyone keen to review the new book to be launched in Bribane, for the ALAR journal?

The book is by Assoc Prof Eileen Piggott-Irvine and Assoc Prof Brendan Bartlett (Eds.) and titled "Evaluating Action Research".

Crossposted from Ed(ge)ucation design...

My first views of this historic and somewhat seesawing day.

Had a wonderful discussion with Jeanette, Susan and Stephen today in preparation for the 2008 Australian conference! This will make up our conference planning team, together with the Events team here at CIT. We're working on a theme which concerns the 'Whole Person'. This from our submission:

"The whole person: sustainable futures in living, learning and working." The underpinning framework of the theme is the exploration of the encroachment of economic rationalist approaches to our work and life and its dominance in areas such as health and education particularly. This is often pursued at the expense of community development and wellbeing of individuals and families, no to mention workplaces and our educational institutions.

**crossposted from Ross' blog... I made these comments over at Ross' blog and thought I'd repost here so I can continue to reflect on our conference planning at CIT, over the next few months... Di also makes some valid points from her own conference experiences...

Your thoughts on previous
conferences, Di, remind me of my experiences in Adelaide last year. I
felt 'freer' at this conference as I had not planned to present
anything (in fact I had not planned to go until the last minute!), so
felt I could 'drift' between sessions, conversations and workshops, as
they appealed to me. However, in so doing, I was not quite as
'committed' - or perhaps invested is a better word... and thus apart
from one or two sessions that peaked my interest, I probably didn't get
out of it as much as if I was engaged in a diferent role (or
something). Still there is much power in observation I think, and it
did give me an insight into the operations of a conference.

Wow! What an amazing start to the year! Phew, there's been a lot going on - ALARA-wise and life generally :o)

I'm excited by the ALARA visioning process that has been underway for a couple of months now. I'm looking forward to the meeting coming up in March to discuss the visioning process in more detail.

The April edition of the ALAR journal is underway, with reviews to be undertaken of articles, most of which have come from our 2007 national conference (I recall that conference with great fondness too).