18 Responses to “The benefits of a closed Mediawiki for Collaboration”

1. Jennifer Hopkins on August 16th, 2009 11:18 pm

   I have been in the process of developing units for the Diploma Children’s services in the Illawarra to link to the MOODLE platform. I have used media wiki and found it to be user friendly for my students. I was very happy to share and collaborate with other institutes. My big issues was that the units I develop have images and videos of children in them. I have arranged for the permission to publish forms of course and each parent signs these. However, they are more and more reticent in signing if they believe the content will go out to the open internet.
   My one concern is marketing. There does need to be a taster for the public, a site where the reader can get interested and then need to log in to view the more indepth sections of the course. perhaps this ‘taster’ could be set up at a later date for Child Studies and others interested.
   I also agree with the sharing. I have uploaded a few resources to the LRR and am interested to see that no other resources are public other than mine. Many of the resources are hidden in fact and hard to access. I also look for other TAFE moodle sites to see what is happening but these too are difficult to access. This is a shame as it means the students dont always get the high quality aimed for.

2. Robyn Jay on August 27th, 2009 2:28 am

   It’s rather interesting 1st of all that I add my name and contact details here to respond to an anonymous post - always nice to see who is writing : )

   I have to say I disagree with some of the comments here. Yes people are nervous about exposing themselves online but overcoming that is about having sound models that demo otherwise. Elearning leaders should be doing that; modelling openness.

   I also disagree that wikispaces is about small closed group usage; of course thats possible and sometimes necessary but certainly not always the case. You might like to check out the work of 2 of my colleagues at UNSW who started using wikispaces only a month ago:

   http://hums3001.unsw.wikispaces.net/ - 90% of the content is student driven
   THe PhD student/academic says: People are generally expected to ahve a voice on the open we these days. What’s tragic is that most start their careers without ever having learned how to deal with that.

   http://arts1091.unsw.wikispaces.net/ is a course with 550 students. IT’s combined with twitter, wordpress and Diigo all used together as a suite of open educational technologies. A real challenge but with real benefits.

   Closed wikis are often (and again I stress there are times when confidentiality is required) about individuals thinking that their IP is world-reknowned. It generally isn’t. If we are to operate in a global online community in the 21st century we need to move on and accept that the best offerings and outcomes for students are achieved through collaboration and shared content development.

   Roll on the philosophy of open education.

3. Leigh Blackall on August 27th, 2009 3:06 am

   It is very disappointing to read this. Its as though the last 5 years lobbying for openness never happened, and all the old arguments for not opening up are back again as though they are new discoveries. The extent of educational conservativeness is truly amazing.

   The elephant in the room being ignored here, and in most educational work trying to adopt social media, is the fact that Illawarra felt the need to set up their own MediaWiki rather than encourage their teachers to use the real wikis and collaborate on Wikipedia, Wikiversity, Wikibooks and other initiatives that do experience the mass collaboration. Limiting your intellectual capacity to a few hundred TAFE teachers with very little diversity in experience and perspectives (compared to the International perspectives negotiated in Wikimedia Foundation projects), asking them and the rest of the world to collaborate on a wiki project that no one has heard of - let alone trusts, was always destined to fail by the criteria you mention here. What results of course is a questioning of the usefulness of a MediaWiki and openness, when in fact it was never trialed in the first place!

   Let me guess, next you’ll set up an IllawarraTube instead of simply uploading to Youtube right? When no one uses it, will it be proof that online video doesn’t work in education?

   If this post is an indication of a common perception from the early adopters of the Illawarra experiment then I am disappointed. I had hoped that the Illawarra MediaWiki would be an interim step, nursing students and staff to considering actually engaging with real wikis. Instead, they have only confirmed the skeptics and delivered no one to a bigger picture.

   Parochialism at its finest yet again.

4. sridgway on August 27th, 2009 5:13 am

   Eyes wide shut: Closed Collaboration
   How far we have come only to find ourselves at the beginning, “Closed Collaboration”, what an oxymoron and from within from an institute which pioneered open conversations and content creation with video on blip.tv images on flickr and blogging in open networks. Like you (although we are not sure who you are as you have hidden behind the veil of DET authentication) I work with teachers and sections each day whose first reaction is shock and horror that others in their own section might be able to view their content let alone the entire world. “I have done all this work why should I let my colleagues who do nothing use it”!! What is the basis of this fear of sharing and collaboration which is so prevalent in our organisation and so prevalent with our teacher’s when contemplating online delivery. Part of it stems from the historical sovereignty of the teacher in the class room where teachers taught in isolation from their piers judged only by their students who had little choice but to accept what was delivered up to them. There was little impetus to change with teachers working within a large conservative educational bureaucracy preceded over by poll driven politicians and teachers unions who little interest in challenging the status quo (despite their industrial litigiousness) . The problem for DET NSW is that the world has changed, or what Thomas Kuhn termed a paradigm shift has occurred, and the organisation has been left stranded like a flightless bird on the landscape of educational history. Yes we can survive in hapless ignorance because of our self imposed isolation behind the digital firewalls we maintain but eventually we will be abandoned by the very people we depend on, our students! The 20% will retire soon, it’s the future we must look to, the students who take connectivity, collaboration and open conversation for granted!!! Sorry but your decision to remove your mediawiki and it’s resources from the open web is a signal to every prospective student, employer and employee at home on the web each time they click on a dead link. Wrong Wrong Wrong, sad to have come so far only to return to the cave, but like all revolutions they can find themselves defending that which they fought so hard to overcome.

5. alexanderhayes on August 27th, 2009 6:53 am

   I see some measured ( if not calculated ) forms of locked success occurring here.

   As Robyn points out……we, at EDUPOV dont hide behind “admin” . Admittedly I’m the main writer of ciphers and signs

   Some readers might accuse the FLN of simply outing an edifice of a web space and it’s purported connected tendrils as little more than a smoke screen behind which the congratulatory back-patting, quality ? awards and self-serving-career-driven-bitch-faced-in-fighting exists within….till the money runs out…….as it does.

   What I’m seeing though is a gradual culture change where the “open” web has become more squared - http://www.web2summit.com/web2009/public/schedule/detail/10194

   I share in the disappointments that Leigh expresses and I too am shocked at the navel-gazing, introverted chem-trail paranoia that emits however I’m of the opinion that large organizations are incredibly hard to turn….in fact socio-telepathically attached to resisting change…..that websites like this actually have small, measured, tentative steps into increments of value.

   Having read the FLN blog now from end to end I can honestly say ” well done “.

   For what is yet to be determined. Where it’s headed is most definitely where all other TAFE NSW supposed collaboration ends up.

   Facing inwards….familiar……fuzzy……detached.

   Hope is a great thing.

   Faceless is yet another.

6. Dean groom on August 27th, 2009 7:52 pm

   Anything inside the DET bubble means students have to work through that membrane. The is little evidnce to show that the bubble an closed systems drive any improvement to learning. There are so many factors at play that supporting the politically driven, proprietary preferences to lock learning in closed spaces have no constructive alignment. If the toolset, instructional design, pedagogy and assessment is well defined and delivered, the noize of the crowd is sulteted through motivation and focus. Learners need to deal with the noize and course designers need to facilitate it in open transformative practice. The bubble is problematic at best. Next they’ll be saying that developing a closed virtual world in wonderwal is better for learning than an open wild in second life.

   Sorry to be negative, but closed communities are not where the signals of change in education are happening, and can’t see how bubbles drive change. Macquarie is very much sharing the views and approach Robyn has spoken about, but always open to seeing evidence of alternate studies.

7. Steven Parker on August 27th, 2009 11:57 pm

   Great comments, thank you. I posted this under my own name, just click on authors ’sparkered’ , the Wordpress template doesn’t make the author apparent.
   There is no fear of sharing and collaboration within the context of TAFE. Instead off using the word closed I should have named this post “The benefits of a PERMEABLE Mediawiki for Collaboration”. The Resource Mediawiki is permeable in that it’s been set up with a DET username and password so EVERYONE in TAFE NSW can access and contribute (it’s just not available for global consumption), thats a darn sight more open than most TAFE NSW wikispaces. The big downside for this is the creative commons share and share alike licence can’t be used, the upside is all the copyright stuff in the TAFE repository can be linked to. Viz yes there has been a measured calculation to use the DET username and password login done in consultation with many teachers and Institutes esp CLI and TELs.

   Look I trained 14 teachers today from this open wikispaces http://learnspace.iiwiki.edu.au/. The teachers are setting up their open wikispaces with information on their sections. We showed them lots of open tools and resources. Eventually I came to show them the TAFE Resource Mediawiki. The first question I got as usual was “Is this available on the open internet for our competitors to see” ah ha I thought with all of your comments in mind and stopped the whole class.

   I asked:
   Q - Hands ups if would you prefer the resource mediawiki to be open to people outside of TAFE NSW? (No attempt was made from me to convince them on the benefits of either open or DET permeable based on my personal point of view)

   A - Not one person was pro open, in fact they where quite adamant that it had to be behind the DET username and password. As you say Leigh this reflects “Educational Conservativeness” nothing wrong with that mate, in fact this reality has to be accepted and worked with. A big issue for many teachers I’ve found is they don’t want to share their validated assessment with the wider world (RTO’s).

   Q - I then asked would you be prepared to share and collaborate on your Mediawiki resources with other teachers from other Institutes across TAFE NSW

   A - I kid you not every teacher’s hand immediately went up. I think this off the cuff poll reflects the wider mindset of many TAFE teachers (The 20%) nothing wrong with it, in fact it as much reflects cathexis with an idea of looking after TAFE’s interests as the cathexis with your idea’s that openess somehow looks after TAFE’S interests as well as the rest of the world.

   Oh course open and permeable can and should be accomodated, respected and encouraged in training.

   If an individual teacher wants to do something in wikieducator, go for it in fact one of the trials from CLI was in wikieducator you’re all welcome to use Brick laying resources or “brickie” http://www.wikieducator.org/Building_and_construction go for it.The problem is this wikieducator resources hasn’t been uptaken by TAFE staff, again I suspect there is no emotional connection from TAFE teachers with this type of organisation. I am waiting on the report findings on TAFE using wikieducator .

   I’m scratching my head with all of your earnestness for all things to be open, is this an idealogical thing which is all consuming. If so why should it be forced on people? Not good.

8. Cecile Bower on September 2nd, 2009 7:38 pm

   An interesting discussion although I was quite bemused by what appeared to be personal attacks on colleagues who are trying to push the envelope the best way they can in a multi-faceted, multi-headed beast (and that is being kind) that is TAFE NSW.

   At CLI we carried out a modest trial developing a wiki for the building and construction area. One of the things that appealed to me was the ability to have a wikipedia-like site that had a TAFE context. TAFE NSW teachers could contribute and update underpinning knowledge and skills. It could be like a clearing house of usable content . Teachers could refer to it, update it, add to it and reutilise in whatever way they needed in the ‘classroom’:. The could use the content for a print worksheet, link to it from their Moodle or even run a collaborative student project to add to the topic/unit based entries. Its primary focus was to aid teachers and students. To be honest the use of open software in an open environment was secondary,

   We worked with WikiEducator who were generous in providing us with a site and training. In consultation with several TAFE NSW teachers we created a wiki structure that would be scalable across topics/or units in their vocational area. It has been a successful project in that we built it. But they did not come despite promotion across the state by web conferencing. We found out a lot with this trial, but the most disappointing finding is that only a few teachers were prepared to share in this open environment. Nor were there any contributors from outside TAFE NSW.

   I am so glad we have a TAFE NSW wide mediawiki at Illawarra where we can migrate our content from WikiEducator (with acknowledgement of course). I think it will have more ‘presence’ there.

   For us it is baby steps. I am sure in time the culture will move to a more open learning environment. In the meantime I believe we should continue ‘plugging away’ within the parameters that are set around us. I am a feminist. I fully appreciate all the little victories women made before me that mean I can vote today! Don’t get me started on our illustrious industrial relations history.

   Incidentally I think Otago Polytech site on wikieducator is great and I applaud the work that Stephan Wridgeway is doing at SIT but they are working at college level and not across the state. Do either of you have contributors beyond their college or internationally? International content is great but TAFE NSW content needs to specifically address the needs of training packages, professional codes, practices and licensing requirements specific to national and often state based requirements.

9. Robyn Jay on September 3rd, 2009 6:46 pm

   Yes, it’s an emotional debate and head butting will abound hopefully with some grace and respect in tact. The world however IS moving on.

   Depite what TAFE decides around this, I will continue to share my knowledge and experience and connect/converse with those beyond my institution. What you may consider your own IP is never unique - what we do, say, construct is based on what we have seen, read and experienced to date. As lowly individuals the best we can do is to critique, adapt, improve and through it back out there for others to do the same. And yes, I do try to contribute and participate in TAFE content and events IF THEY ARE OPEN.

   The days are gone where anyone can think they know it all. The only way to learn and grow is to know how to connect globally.

   Learners won’t come to you for content. The large institutions putting all content on the open web has proved that. Richard Buckland here at UNSW has proved that - http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=6B940F08B9773B9F - his courses are overflowing. He’s running highschool taster courses. Learners seek quality interaction and quality teaching. The web is full of content. IN my experience the best teachers are open about their teaching practices; they have nothing to hide and gain respect and reputation from being open.

   I was saddened to click on Alex Miller link above and be rejected access; I respect what Alex has to contribute and would like to be able to share our own ideas with her.

   But when it comes down to it, it really matters not for me that TAFE closes off its content. I can find the same, or perhaps better, on the open web. Content specific to a local context naturally has lesser appeal to some but that’s no reason to lock it away. I reiterate however that there ARE particular circumstances that require content to be closed - I’m int he process in finding a solution for one of our child care centres seeking a means of sharing childrens learning plans with parents for eg - but IP isn’t one of them.

   It doesn’t surprise me in the least that no hands were raised to the question - “Hands ups if would you prefer the resource mediawiki to be open to people outside of TAFE NSW?” - teachers are products of a different age. The same response would be found here. It’s a great question to trigger a conversation like we’re having here.

   Finally you may be interested to view a new UNSW TV video just out that is quite relevant to this conversation - http://tv.unsw.edu.au/video/all-of-a-twitter-

10. PAUL WRAY on September 3rd, 2009 10:13 pm

    I am surprised to see the flaming of a colleague who is working through real issues on the ground, where he doesn’t get to tell users (and managers) what they want, nor change the constitution of the organisation that gave rise to the lack of a sharing culture.

    It seems to me that a reasonable reading of Stephen’s initial post would see he has a nuanced appreciation of what is possible, what his users want, and how to serve them best, while trying to push out the boundaries at the same time. (It was also pretty clear the writer had not set out to hide their identity, as if they were some kind of troll.)

    Its no good being an revolutionary in the TAFE environment if you look around and find you’ve converted noone. I think the flamers need to realise they are preaching to the converted, to someone who understands quite well the advantages of openness. But I guess working through the problems day to day is less fun than taking the high moral ground.

11. Steven Parker on September 8th, 2009 5:27 pm

    Thanks for the video Robyn enjoyed it though easy on the head butting y’all I’d be mindful of not getting caught up in the great open versus closed debate with your colleagues, it’s a classic point, counterpoint (Tilting at Windmills‘) trap with no resolution, it can shut down any productive conversation on design solutions to offer end users choice in how they want to use VLE systems and tools based on their current professional needs and cultural values. I think slides 8-12 of this presentation humorously capture the problems of taking absolute positions in the open vs.closed debate. As you know there will always be merits for both positions on a case by case basis and by being more inclusive you will less likely alienate some people (“Products of a different age”) to your viewpoints which would be a shame.

    What I am trying to nut out with colleagues are design solutions on how to:

    1- Foster sharing and collaboration (and openness) between teachers from different Institutes in TAFE NSW – what works what doesn’t work.
    2 - Enable the VLE systems to enable end users to choose between making their work open, closed, accessible with authentication to free up content sharing.

    In my previous comment on the micro poll of teachers the most interesting part of their response was not that they didn’t want to publish to the open internet but that THEY WANTED TO BE ABLE TO SHARE (WOO HOO!!!!) and collaborate on developing courseware with colleagues across Institutes in a authenticated space. It’s really good there is a cross Institute project underway (building upon the bricklaying course CLI developed in Wikieducator) in which we can test the assumption that the Resource Mediawiki can be used for cross Institute use and collaboration.

    Ironically having the closed Mediawiki also affords the opportunity to also try a proof of concept with Creative Commons Share and Share alike licence to enable grabbing and contextualisation of stuff from the open internet. I still want to see some design posts from you all on how to make it work with useful Mediawiki training, extensions and configuration suggestions. At a basic level I’m thinking interwiki lining and a mirrored categorisation and theme format will mean TAFE users won’t notice much difference transitioning between the open and closed spaces. Currently I am looking for a permaculture course to trial in the open Mediawiki space.

    Over all Robyn I get the points you make though I am interested as to how you’ll manage the fully open systems you’re pushing across the uni? The good news is the cultural shift to utilising the open content and tools is rife in TAFE, the digital literacy of many teachers is developing noticeably. Ripples from all of your pioneering work in Learnscope advocating openness and embedding Web 2.0 tools and practices within TAFE has no doubt played a significant role in getting the Institutes to where they are. That is only going to grow.

12. Steven Parker on September 11th, 2009 7:40 pm

    Good post from Downes on copyright which I think ties in quite nicely.

13. Leigh Blackall on September 14th, 2009 9:45 pm

    Given that almost everyone knows each other quite well here, shared many a beer, even travelled across a country together, I think we can reassure others that all flaming and hard language used here is given and taken lightly. Part of the language stems from the disappointment that Sparker, a leader in all this 3 years ago, has been bitten and lost his spirit for adventure. Its as though he suddenly has teenage kids, a mortgage, and a live in excess of his years all of a sudden.

    The CLI trial on Wikieducator, IMO doesn’t trial open education or collaboration. It trials raw text data about brick laying instruction using Wikieducator. There’s a difference. Having been someone who tried to engage NZ lecturers in that project, it was plain to see that collaboration was not thought through enough. Knowing that WIkieducator is a duplication to larger projects like Wikiversity, and that is takes time to forge use and reuse, perhaps the end point for this trial should never have been Wikieducator.

    A more genuine trial of open education, collaboration and reuse would be to trial all social media platforms with a range of subject areas - particularly those subjects that have some online education established in their traditions already. Business, tourism, design… measuring which ones give a greater return on investment, and assessing how they interrelate as content and platforms. The UNSW video is a great sell for such an idea. Where’s the TAFE ad of the same idea?

    It is quite likely, given the right work flow, that it is not the teachers at all who benefit initially from things like WIkieducator, nore the students, but the publishers! Who, saving bundles in writer costs, use the raw and open content to then go on to produce richer resources in salable formats, publishing openly, packaging for sale. We did it for 1 text book, sourced from Wikibooks, printed and bound for sale to students, makes around $1000 per year for the department, is a cheaper text book than the alternative, and the source of the book is open, we help edit it!

    I’m only hinting at ideas and methods we have tested and are beginning to evaluate here at Otago Polytechnic, the detail is in the 3 years blogging the trial. It is frustrating to be back here suggesting and arguing these points to Sparker who inspired some of these ideas 3 years ago. It seems the Australian network has been weakened. The conservative response is “baby steps” as though there was even a follow-on step planned after the first “step”. This post and supporting comments aren’t baby steps, these are shuffles to and fro, knowing cultural and organisational change is needed, but not willing to take a real step because you haven’t worked out that TAFE teachers are a minor stake holder.

    There are so many angles to approach this opportunity! I’ve mentioned publishers as a broadening of scope in the idea of collaboration. There’s industry of course (that famous word used in TAFE like all other rhetoric). But focusing on those teachers, perhaps you could account for an incentive beyond what they fear and imagine. How’s this?.. in initial evaluations we are finding that one teacher engaging in open educational practices using popular social media platforms annually generates $5011 worth of savings and gains to their supporting organisation. It costs $3000 to adequately train and equip such a person to a suitable level so as to be able to generate this sort of return. Perhaps you can find some opportunity for incentives and support in there? We haven’t even started the ethnography looking at how the complete change in thinking has effected these teacher’s sense of work satisfaction and importance (among other things)… but anecdotally we know the answer.. as do you.. the evidence is found on teh Internet - not the TAFE internet.

14. Vicki Marchant on September 14th, 2009 11:11 pm

    I’ve read some of the responses here with some disappointment. We are working in a world where teachers have not been used to sharing or collaborating with their close colleagues on resources that they use in the classroom, let alone put them up on Wikipedia. Its not a matter of the preciousness of the content or IP or any unrealistic value put on that - its a matter of confidence and culture!

    We and our colleagues work in a professional and personal area where we utilise open resources, software and social networking tools prolifically - not everyone is as techy. We cannot impose our practice and our culture on others who are not ready for it. In fact, they will be scared away by this - as Steven discovered in questioning some of our teachers.

    Teachers are our clients - we are here to provide them with the service they need. As we do that we can gradually build their confidence and awareness of the value of open education and open resources. We hope that one day, sooner rather than later, they will come to us and say ‘we want our resources on the open internet because we can see the value in others seeing and contributing to our material’.

    I also think there is a paradox in the arguments presented and the emotion that it has generated. If the ‘content is not king’ - and that is mostly what we are talking about in terms of the material in our mediawiki - then why get so riled up about it. The key thing is that we are using some open and web2.0 tools for collaboration and facilitating learning - that’s where the value lies. That’s where we are developing the capability and culture of our teachers, where we are encouraging them to make connections with experts and colleagues around the world. This is starting to happen and its exciting!! Who cares about content that, frankly, no-one else is that interested in (as shown in Cecile’s comments).

    So let’s stop this argument and get back to doing the exciting stuff!

15. Leigh Blackall on September 15th, 2009 12:07 am

    Why stop the argument Vicki? It goes to the core of what each of us have been doing rather intensely for nearly 5 years. Perhaps Stephen, you could moderate this given it is yoru post. Perhaps TAFENSW is no more comfortable with contraversy than it was 4 years ago?

    If after 5 years of pretty high profile exposure to the Internet, more than that on Learnscope, and all the popular things like Facebook, Wikipedia and Youtube, 100% of TAFE teachers (if we go by SParkers survey) aren’t ready to even contemplate a practice on the open Internet when we can point to very compelling reasons to do just that, then at what point do we ask ourselves, “what are the things we are doing that cause this remarkably slow uptake”?

    While I agree our evangelism is one factor for some, I think there are significant elephants in the room we have ignored for too long. I’ve always said that things like LMS, intranets, repositories and even things like Toolbox developments are a major cause. Not only has it lead to a rather entrenched legacy of development and process that seems impossible to move, it has perpetuated a culture that put it there in teh first place. What SParker describes is just another version of those projects - reinforcing status quo, taking the edge off the real challenge for another year or so.

    Evidently 100% of Illawara TAFE teachers are entirely dependent on being provided for and sheltered by their institutions, and I’m nowhere near satisfied that anything remotely like change agency has even begiin to be employed by those institutions. Nothing to remove the fanciful competativeness brought on by rationalism and performance measures. No rethink of their copyright policies. No real investment in network literacy (certainly not compared with the investments in all the things that work against it). Constant censorship and blockages, and very muddle headed implementations.

    You say things are starting to happen.. Please show. Show me one TAFE NSW policy that supports open education, one research project in it, one IT unit on board with it, a single catalistic event that might help spark it, any training and support in place for an over arching approach, any measure of investigation, let alone implimentation..

16. Steven Parker on September 15th, 2009 12:36 am

    Funny you should ask the unblocking of youtube would be the most celebrated IMO, today I got a message as yet to be confirmed that youtube cane be accessed by students within VLE systems (yes I know) which would be cool if correct. Will test from home.

    With regards to TAFE policy the scope and breath of options and tools that TAFE teachers now have access to (and are being trained in) is vast in comparison to the constraints imposed on many educators working for organisations within a firewall. It’s a misnomer that constant censorship and blockages persists across the board in TAFE Leigh. Cultural change is the issue here, the changes I am seeing in terms of policy and increases in digital literacy on the ground is apparent to me. Early adopters and have suffered frustration no doubt I think the classic uptake of technology on the S curve applies http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innovation#Diffusion_of_innovations

    I’m just leaving but going back to my invite for design suggestions,I’d really like to see some collaboration and brainstorming to evolve from this post with synthesis of approaches between the open (Fostering individual digital literacy for students and teachers ) and closed (Fostering cross institute collabaration within the current constraints identified).

    I think that the usefulness of a permeable cross Institute mediawiki should not be understated..

    Planning the open/ permeable mediawiki project with these criteria in mind will be interesting http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innovation#Failure_of_innovation

    Over the coming months working with TLI (And hopefully other Institutes ;-)) the issues raised in this post will be considered further in the context of open and closed mediawiki spaces (and utilising other open mediawiki projects). Design ideas are welcome.

17. Leigh Blackall on September 15th, 2009 1:51 am

    Ok.. that’s that then. Focus it is (dunno why you cited the Youtube availability when you knew it was nothing like what I was asking..)

    One design we worked on when facing this same issue of unwillingness/inability on the part of staff to go open (for the reasons you cite) was to create a “permeable” Moodle. We encourage staff to source free content, and were possible to place their content externally as well, and to use Moodle thinly for schedule, discussion, quizzes, and copies of otherwise restricted content. (But you’re probably going to need to review your institution’s IP and copyright policies for that to fly).

    That way we thought we would be making a baby step towards more open and networked practices, and mitigating the risk of more content than necessary getting locked away were no one can see or perhaps build on. It was a compromise between having an LMS and not having an LMS. Nice idea, but like I said - the simple availability of a system that reinforces old habits makes it oh so slow/impossible to properly test the alternative proposal.

    Perhaps your wiki could be used very lightly in the same way. Course schedules and lesson plans (ripe for copy pasting into your LMS or where ever), lists of links and resources for those librarians and teachers still unsure about social bookmarking, and the creation of other wise restricted content. I think this is what you originally meant isn’t it?

    I suppose it is the case where your staff can’t see each other’s Moodle courses or whatever, they will at least be able to see the source of some of that in the DET shared MediaWIki. And it will be easier for your staff to copy content from the bigger and open mediawikis like Wikiversity, books and Pedia (because we know they’ll ignore copyrights in the false security of their DET login wiki) and use it in there as well.

    At this point I think I’ll exit the conversation. Quite a difference has developed between our willingness in approaches it seems. Good luck with it.

18. sparkered on September 16th, 2009 7:20 pm

    Thanks Leigh good Mediawiki design suggestions (Read your report, well worth a look for cost savings on utilising open internet content) and to others, who have taken the time to input to this post, very good in getting attention for the issues. The commonality between the educational technologists who have “vigorously” commented is that they would like people to be supported to share and collaborate. I think the issues and concerns around how this can be achieved within the context of Mediawiki technology, the open internet and closed TAFE intranet have been pretty well interrogated, a good sign that the post is on target with a real issue. The Brickie Mediawiki project in a small way should enable us to look at some sharing and collaboration solutions from a design perspective for synthesis between open and closed which will be presented to other Institutes for feedback. Some options currently I’m currently looking at:

    - I’ve spoken to Moodle partners and I believe we’ll be able to get funding to scope and hopefully develop repository integration between Moodle and the Medawiki api for Moodle 2.0. I’d like to see federated search across multiple Mediawiki’s, open and closed.

    - Looking at new repository functionality can be turned on in Moodle 2.0 to bring in Flickr, Youtube Twitter api’s and other open tools. We’ll be planning ahead with Moodle 2.0 beta release.

    - Moving ‘How To’ resources and training for Web 2.0 tools and VLE to the open Mediawiki and negotiating and advocating for collaboration between Institutes to tie into their workflow.

    - Looking at a Permeable Mediawiki with open for access TO ALL, students and teachers within TAFE NSW (Read the posts and comments in this post for an explanation). Any skills developed in this space automatically translate into the ability of an individual to participate in the open MediaWiki projects.

    - Looking at workflow for value adding in taking the stuff from the authenticated spaces (i.e. LRR) and open internet and contextualising to training packages in Mediawiki

    Enabling teacher sharing between Moodle courses using sharing cart in consultation with developers, looking at openshare block to make parts of Moodle courses open.

    - Looking at Eye fi wireless sd cards, I think that this wifi (wow) technology has good scope for managing workflow to post videos to youtube flickr and eporfolios from the multiple devices being used across TAFE NSW i.e. POV cameras, laptop cameras. Etc (Will do a blog post).

    - Advocating for integration (with Mediawiki) of the Learning Reference Repository and TAFE repository i.e Equella

    - Engaging the TAFE networks for sharing and collaboration – i.e this post

    On re-reading, to summarise the items brought up in response to the original post ‘The benefits of a closed Mediawiki for collaboration” the issues that I see that need to be addressed under the banner of change management and enabling cross Institute sharing and collaboration in general are:

    - technological adaptation
    - information design
    - cultural consideration
    - training
    - and WORKFLOW (alluded to but deserves much more attention).

    Big issues! What are the design solutions, how can we collaborate , that’s what I want to know?

    Note: I hope you don’t “exit the conversation” Leigh, perhaps you can present on the benefits of the open Mediawiki projects down the track. Sharing and collaboration will come down to individual people’s motivation and getting their buy in, “Products of a different age” to quote Robyn, the “20%” as I like to call them. It’s all about nutting out a shared vision, both open and closed.

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