Interactive Learning: HE in FE

Attitude and identity

I have been reading (and posting to) the Learning Circuits blog http://learningcircuits.blogspot.com/2006/03/blogs-as-knowledge-management.html and have, as a result, come to consider three aspects of learning.

Firstly the need to consider the impact of identity (and thus culture) on attitude or approach to participation in learning/blogging or other educational discourse; secondly the need to consider whether the worker thinks of themselves as a learner and the prejudices that abound if a worker also labels themselves a learner and thirdly the ways in which virtual communities of practice can support learning.

Etienne Wenger www.ewenger.com and David Boud www.davidboud.com provide good academic hooks for the latter two points.

But what of cultural influence?

Within the Learning Circuits blog Peter Isackson says :
'One thing I've always been aware of is the wide-ranging inequality of people - whatever their educational level - with regard to the written word. Having few inhibitions myself, I nevertheless fully understand those who are terrified or simply intimidated by the idea of competing with others who have developed a natural sense of written expression, irrespective of their mastery of style. This makes it very difficult to democratize blogs, especially here in Europe where there are more tacit social factors that prevent people from committing their ideas to writing. '

Any thoughts?

posted by Jane @ 9:05 pm