Weekly Post #3 – Connectivism

🧠 What?

One of the readings this week was about the concept of connectivism. The suggested reading by Tony Bates on Teaching in the digital age explored the topic of connectivism in depth. According to George Siemens (2004) and Stephen Downes (2005), connectivism is a process of learning that happens via multiple connected networks of people, information, and digital systems instead of happening just in our minds. This concept is also known as a learning theory for the digital age because of its nature of learning process that happens throughout the concepts not just confined to the textbooks like traditional ways of learning. 

According to this view, the process of learning depends on how effectively we connect the new information to our past experiences and navigate them instead of just memorizing the information. Bates (2015), states that connecting new information learnt to past experiences as well as the ability to recognize patterns, and stay connected to new ideas forms the centre of modern education. One example that can be related to connectivism is that our wordpress blogs and our weekly blogs or reflections show the effectiveness of this concept. Every post that we share can be seen as individual nodes in a larger network of shared knowledge. 

 Below is the short video which highlights the key concepts and ideas about connectivism: 

💡 So What?

The importance of connectivism can be determined from the fact that it encourages the learners to focus on digital literacy, critical thinking, and any relevant or collaborative skills required instead of just focusing on memorization and isolated learning. When we look at today’s learning environment it is full of information, and through the lens of connectivism being knowledgeable means we are connected to diverse and reliable sources of information. This concept goes deeply in my academic and personal development. For example as a student, I am regularly using multiple platforms such as canva, word, doc, slides, reddit etc and with their help gathering the information and learning new knowledge. 

🚀 Now What?

After learning about connectivism in depth, I learnt the importance of building and maintaining my own learning networks such as following educators and pioneers on linkedin and other social media sites to get up to date information in academics. I plan to use this concept in increasing my connection to create more learning networks which will be helpful in future to learn and discuss various academic topics. Many tools such as Notion, Padlet, or class blogs can be integrated so that students can share their ideas, discuss with each other, and get peer review and feedback to make their learning more effective and memorable. 

Many of these platforms like google doc and class blogs support the idea of connectivism that learning happens via connection between different nodes such as humans, technology, and ideas. 

References:

Bates, T. (2015). Teaching in a Digital Age. BCcampus. https://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/chapter/3-6-connectivism/
Siemens, G. (2004). Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age.https://www.learning-theories.com/connectivism-siemens.html
Downes, S. (2005). An Introduction to Connective Knowledge.https://www.downes.ca/post/33034