Pamela McLean and David Pinto: An Exploration of the future through a mixture of fact and fiction.

in "Alice in Wonderland" -  or maybe "Through the Looking Glass" -  Alice is exasperated by Humpty Dumpty. It's all about the way he's using language. Humpty insists on using words  to mean what he chooses them to mean - never mind what they mean to other people.

I'm with Humpty Dumpty on that.

I can see his point.

It's hard enough to find words to capture enough meaning to explain things to myself. Maybe I should stop worrying if the words mean something different to other people. People have different cultural reference points. Words are rooted in individual experiences. We construct our own meaning as we live our lives  - even the simple words "parent", "school", "breakfast"  - are deeply rooted in our personal lives and times and cultures. As for using words to share ideas ...  maybe we are even crazy to try.

We don't think in words do we? We think in thoughts. And those thoughts don't come in straight lines – they come through connections. That's why it's such a struggle to express thoughts in a linear way, when inside you they are all churning and bubbling, connecting and exploding, combining, reforming, doing whatever it is that thoughts do when you're thinking them (or maybe, in fact, the thoughts are simply using you...in order to get themselves thought) anyhow they just do whatever it is that thoughts and ideas do when they are happening.

It's hard putting things into words.

I can drive people crazy when I talk.

I keep failing to provide a linear narrative. i start sentences and don't end them. I interrupt myself. I seem incapable of choosing between what people must know, what they should know, and what they could know.  I wave my  arms around. (I wave them around when I'm on the phone as well. I can't think out loud without using my hands.)

if you've read earlier episodes of the Dadamacadamy story then you'll know that I'm a Dadamac learner at the Dadamacadamy. There is no accreditation for Dadamac learners. Instead of accreditation there is the opportunity to develop a digital footprint that serves as evidence of learning - a kind of learning profile.

Earlier episodes

• Dadamacadamy - Don't share an idea - show a prototype
• Dadamacadamy - dream or reality - an action research project

Starting my learner's diary

This blog is my first entry to my learner's diary, which contributes to my learning profile. My main area of study is “educational systems in the post-web world” (of course the precise title may vary over time). The easiest way to learn about my topic is to do my own studies in a “post-Web way”–i.e. on the Internet and outside of any educational institution that was established “pre-web”.

My dream for the Dadamacadamy  is that it will become a centre for research and learning. This is already starting to happen in a small way.

The Dadamacadamy will not provide taught courses. It will do three interrelated things:

1. Provide an environment for practice-based learning and reflection.
2. Create a repository of knowledge.
3. Make available its knowledge and networks through collaborative research and consultancy.

Provide an environment for practice based learning and reflection.

People who have shared concerns will cluster together in the Dadamacadamy to consider what they're doing, and to share what they are learning. The Dadamacadamy will enable peer-based learning of the highest order - driven, not by a desire for accreditation, but by passionate concerns and the need to know.

Create a repository of knowledge.

The knowledge that people bring, and the new knowledge that they create together,  will be collected together at Dadamacadamy and made freely available.

Dadamac and People's Uni have joined forces to develop a Sickle Cell Disease course. This is coming about in typical Dadamac "responding to need" fashion. The description below serves two purposes. It introduces the way things happen in Dadamac. It provides possible collaborators with an idea of where we are now and the steps we are taking.

So... how is the Internet actually changing opportunities to learn? Does the phrase "death of distance" really mean anything? Here's a quick example from this afternoon (February 25th) when John Iruaga who was in Nigeria sent his first Tweet, helped via Skype by Andy Broomfield who was in the UK. It was a spontaneous bit of teaching. It happened simply because Andy was sitting next to me, working on his laptop, when I bumped into John Iruaga on Skype.

i knew that John Dada had asked John Iruaga to find out about social networking, so Twitter was on his learning agenda. True tweeters may think the whole thing is totally intuitive - but I, for one, didn't find it so. When I first went to Twitter I had never seen any one else Tweeting and had no idea what to expect. When I logged in (because someone told me I should) I had no clue what I was trying to do or why. I went round in circles a few times and ended up none the wiser. I knew that John Iruaga, like me, would start out as a complete Twitter newbie. 

Hi Bala

You were asking me about visibility so I will share some thoughts here - in this visible online space. You are interested on behalf of the newly forming Appropriate Power Special Interest Group. I hope what I write here will help not only that group, but also other Special Interest Groups (SIGs) that we may set up later.

Push, pull and park

So, let us look at the Appropriate Power SIG and how we can encourage people to find out about it. For now I am just going to look at some ideas about information flows. Later we should consider what information you have, the kind of people you want to share it with, and what you want them ot do as a result of reading the information. This post is just about visibility and  "pushing","pulling" and "parking" information. 

Visible and invisible

You and I have been emailing about the Appropriate Power SIG for the past week - "pushing" information to each other. Email was a useful and appropriate way to get started - but its disadvantage is that it is invisible to any wider audience. By replying to you through this blog (instead of just sending you an email reply) I am "parking" some information about making the Appropriate Power SIG visible, and I have parked it in a place where other people can easily read it (no need to log in or anything like that).

I am back from the Video Bridge  Streaming Sharing and Learning workshop in Vienna. Over the next few days I will be reflecting on what went on, looking for patterns, and seeing how things might continue in ways that are relevant (both to the Dadamac community and to me as a learner). This may result in a flurry of blogs - if it does please forgive me.

At the workshop Franz did a great job of enabling the participants to become a community. The participants all represented communities of some kind.

Franz ran a video bridge session, linking us with a group in Graz. He used TV quaility technology which gave us an idea of how distance link-ups may move on from our usual Skyping etc.

Jakub made a good point that when we went back - back to our communities, and back to presently avaliable technology - our next step would be to make a community of communities.

I am included in a wonderful workshop in Vienna - and we are about half way through

The organiser, Franz Nahrada, has laid on such a feast for us - literally and metaphorically.

Dear Pam,

Here is an interesting piece on the role that pulses and oilseeds play in nutritional security. Though the article talks about the state of Indian agriculture, it has some interesting points on increasing agricultural productivity.

In order to progress, the mindset with regard to the following two factors needs to change, says Dr Lux Lakshmanan, Director, California Agriculture Consulting Service. Factor no 1: It is not the farmer who makes the food: he is only a facilitator. Food is actually made by plants. Since plants do not talk, their needs are understood through research and experimentation. Factor no 2: The mindset that assumes that breeding is the solution to all maladies has to change. Nurturing of plants is several times more important in crop productivity improvement than hybrid seeds per se.