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CCK11

CCK11 Daily Newsletter

January 17, 2011

Welcome to Week 1 of CCK11!

Welcome to week one of CCK11 - we're looking forward to a fairly fast-paced 12 weeks of discussion and interaction around learning, knowledge, power and control, adaptive systems, personal learning environment and networks, and similar topics.

We've run this course several times before (in addition to several courses on similar connectivist principles, but on different topics). Perhaps the most important mindset to succeed CCK11 is to experimentation. You'll encounter a variety of tools and concepts that may not be familiar. You'll encounter pedagogical concepts that may resonate with your previous experiences in classrooms.

Each week we'll provide several course readings/videos and use those to initiate discussion. But that's only the starting point. For CCK11 to be successful, we need you to share your resources, opinions, and your learning experiences. You'll receive a daily email that will provide a bit of guidance, but ultimately, you drive your own learning - you select topics to pursue that you find relevant. We have a discussion session planned mid-week that will serve to orient you to the course method and content. Until then, dive into the readings, set up a blog, and enjoy a bit of planned chaos :).

Getting Started

Daily Newsletter

This newsletter will appear every day in your email inbox. We use it to announce events and share materials. Everybody has been auto-subscribed to the newsletter, but if it's not for you (you can always rely on the http://cck11.mooc.ca website) then there is an easy one-click unsubscribe link at the bottom of every issue.

Each week will begin with a weekly outline assigning readings, suggesting activities, and announcing online seminars. You can see the Week 1 announcement in this email below, or view to it on the Week 1 web page.

Discussion Threads

Unlike previous offerings of this course, we are not using Moodle. We are instead using the gRSShopper comment system. It is very simple compared to Moodle's, but at the same time, ought to be easier to use.

To try out the discussion thread, why not introduce yourself in the Introductions discussion Thread?

We will be describing some additional features of the comment system as the course progresses.

Share Your RSS Feed

We would like you to share blog posts and other online content with us. Here's how the process works:
- you create a blog or some other content somewhere on the internet
- you find the RSS feed of that content and share it with is here, on the 'New Feed' page
- we look at your feed, to make sure all the links work properly, and then place it on the course feeds page (note that it might take a day or two to approve new feeds)
- you write a blog post or other content using the tag CCK11 (that is, you put the tag 'CCK11' somewhere in the title or text of your post, or as a category for your post
- we retrieve your post and display it here in the newsletter and elsewhere in the course (more on that to come)

If you need more detailed instructions, you can view one of the videos we;ve produced describing the process for other courses:
- Here it is for the PLENK course
- Here it is for the Critical Literacies course
The only difference between this course and the other courses is in (a) where to add a new feed, and (b) the course tag.

New feeds: http://cck11.mooc.ca/new_feed.htm
Course Tag: CCK11

Week 1: What Is Connectivism?

Dates: January 17 - 24, 2011

Overview

At its heart, connectivism is the thesis that knowledge is distributed across a network of connections, and therefore that learning consists of the ability to construct and traverse those networks. It shares with some other theories a core proposition, that knowledge is not acquired, as though it were a thing. Knowledge is, on this theory, literally the set of connections formed by actions and experience.



Readings



Seminars



Activities

A few simple activities for this week:

1. View the recordings and complete course readings for week 1

2. As an introductory week, this is a good opportunity to define how you will participate in the course. We encourage you to set up a blog (on a service such as wordpress.com or blogger. This course is different from what you've likely experienced in the past - it's open and distributed. It's important for you to define where you wish to begin forming (or extend an existing) digital identity.

3. Use the CCK11 tag in anything you create. Our course tag is: #CCK11

It is especially important to use this tag in del.icio.us and in Twitter. That is how we will recognize content related to this course. We will aggregate this content and display it in our newsletter. Yes – your content will be displayed in the Daily. That's how other people will find it.

If you are using a blog, Flickr, or a discussion group, share the RSS feed. We will offer a separate post on how to find your RSS feed if you don't know how. But if you know how, please tell us your feed address.
You can use the form here: Add your RSS feeds by adding a feed hereSubmit your blog to gRSSreader so we can track and share your activity

4. Attend the course orientation meeting here in Elluminate on Wednesday.

Facilitator Posts

To view the entire blog post, click on the title of the post, and you'll be taken to the blog post itself.

Introductions
Stephen Downes, CCK11, January 17, 2011.

Hello and welcome to Connectivism and Connective Knowledge. This post provides you with an opportunity to introduce yourself, and also to try using the MOOC.ca comment system.

You will find that, to make a comment, you can just type normally. If you want a space between lines, just leave a space. Many HTML tags work in the comment system, so you can add emphasis to your comments if you would like.

Once you make a comment, you can subscribe to additional comments from this thread simply by checking the comment subscription box. There's an easy 'unsubscribe' link with every comment.

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