There was an interesting Audioboo being tweeted about this afternoon that suggested it would be a good idea to have a standard VLE across the UK. My initial thought was – oooh, that sounds interesting. Then I had a bit of a think. Just because we have different networks, different mobile phones, doesn’t mean we can’t communicate with others effectively. Perhaps what is needed more are common tools, ways to link up the VLEs to support collaborations and communicate with each other. Common apps, crowd-sourcing for resources and resources that work on more than one type of platform. If we all had the same type of VLE, would there be the same onus on the provider to continually improve what was available? Lack of market forces to drive competition and therefore develop even better learning experiences for our students? I’m a great advocate of collaborations and co-construction – common ground does make those easier. I’m a great believer in sharing resources, ideas, creative commons etc. But I wonder if we would lose something of the individuality of school/college learning platforms by using a standard VLE and if we would simply provide homogenous learning experiences that lacked creativity, flair, individuality and innovation? Maybe standardised, but not standard please!
Common Ground?
– November 21, 2010Posted in: collaboration, learning, reflecting, tools
