In the conversation economy, dialogue rules.

to teach, you have to approach an issue from all directions, and then push it up against all pressure points — text, sound, images, video.  Knowledge is a key, and the tumblers of the learners mind are nuanced.  It takes many grooves that are precisely machined, to align ideas into knowledge.

When I speak of connectivism, I'm focusing on initial cracks of change where light is seen through the traditional wall of content, knowledge, and learning.

Before mass media, ordinary people painted, wrote poems and short stories, sang and played the piano. Then mass media not only took over all our discretionary time, it intimidated us with its multi-million dollar production budgets, its worship of celebrity and its stranglehold on the public consciousness. With web 2.0, the staus qou has been re-established. People once more feel empowered to be creative again; no more just voyeurs of the supposedly clever and talented.

"People think that kids today somehow grow up magically knowing how to use new technologies," he adds. "They don't. The difference with this generation is that if students don't know how to use a technology, they aren't afraid of learning."

A beautiful design will give the user the impression that the site is easy to use, whether it is or not.

<p>I believe there are three primary reasons why an enterprise would want to “manage its knowledge”:</p> <p>One, to share learning, so that the same mistake is not made multiple times.</p> <p>Two, to share learning, so that activities get sped up.</p> <p>Three, to share learning, so that people are motivated to learn and to teach.</p> <p>To share learning.</p>

Knowledge management is not really about the content, it is about creating an environment where learning takes place. Maybe we spend too much time trying to create an environment where teaching takes place, rather than focus on the learning.

Heck, as an absolute amateur in everything I do I've noticed that, in this day and age, being expert is not about getting more and more knowledgeable about a narrower and narrower field. It's all about being as clued up on the reasoning behind a wider and wider range of fields. Expertise has been redefined. It's just that academics like Keen have trouble swallowing it. There, folks, is the real digital divide.

If I were writing a manifesto for 21st century teaching and learning, one of the items would be, “The 21st Century classroom does not teach writing — it teaches communication.”&nbsp;&nbsp;

It is not whether we can meet the same learning outcomes <br> with technology, but how do we use the technologies to enrich the experience, to go beyond what can be done in the face-to-face or other delivery environment.

<p><font color="#0000ff">“The Reality is</font></p> <p><font color="#ff6600"></font><font color="#0000ff">Learning has changed…… from being about reality….. to verifying reality…… to creating reality.”</font></p> <p><font color="#ff6600"></font><font color="#0000ff">Stephen Downes, &nbsp;<em><a href="http://www.downes.ca/presentation/170" title="Kaliedoscope of Future Learning" onclick="javascript:urchinTracker ('/outbound/article/www.downes.ca');">A Kaleidoscope of Futures: Reflections on the Reality of Virtual Learning.</a></em></font></p>

In fact, Michael Moore, of the American Journal of Distance Education, wrote that interactivity between a learner and the content is “the defining characteristic of education. Without it there cannot be education, since it is the process of intellectually interacting with content that results in changes in the learner’s understanding, the learner’s perspective, or the cognitive structures of the learner’s mind .”

William Horton, a leading expert in the field of web-based instructional design, in his work titled Designing Web-Based Training. Horton writes, “Interactivity boosts learning. People learn faster and develop more positive attitudes when learning is interactive.”

As Chris says often, “Technology is not additive; technology is transformative.”

Finally, the one real head twister that I got yesterday was during Chris’s own session when he was talking about how his thinking is moving away from the “having kids publish globally to the world” product piece of all of this a “let’s focus on the process of community building and publishing within the walls” approach.

The culture of sharing and participation that is created within the local community is more important almost that making those connections outside.

When we assume each student has an inner teacher within their minds, we will stop interfering with the discovery, cultivation and trust building with that inner teacher. The inner teacher will come to the fore of the students learning experiences and and reconfigure how they picture learning occurring. Problems with a particular learning challenge or patterns of learning efforts will get worked out between the student and the inner teacher who already knows what the underlying problems are.

When immersed in learning from everything that happens, people will appear very fascinating to each other. No two people will be the same and offer so much more to explore as their mysterious nature captivates other learners. The process of getting learned about by others-- will give each a feeling of being understood. A context of mutual respect, insight and acceptance will dramatically reduce the urge to get attention, get even or act out frustrations.

The sculpture demonstrated a fascinating idea: given fewer rules, people actually behaved in more creative, co-operative, and collaborative (or competitive, as the case may be) ways.

Any time you construct specific rules of engagement, they are instantly open to interpretation and circumvention, and we want our members to negotiate their place with each other, not with The Authority.

Any community—online or off—must start slowly, and be nurtured. You cannot “just add community.” It simply must happen gradually. It must be cared for, and hosted; it takes time and people with great communication skills to set the tone and tend the conversation.

We also tried to create an egalitarian playing field. At a glance, visitors can’t differentiate a professional photographer with an enormous lens from an enthusiast just getting started in photography. There is no indication of “quality” apart from the content itself.

Participate in the community you’re trying to build. Add content, make contact, show yourself as a person and have fun.

A little while ago, <a href="http://www.jarche.com">Harold Jarche</a> sent this quotation: “”Information overload does not exist. Failing information strategies do exist. ”

Information overload does not exist. Failing information strategies do exist. We were brought up with information strategies based on scarcity. We live in times of information abundance.

Teachers are learners. If they’re not, they shouldn’t be teachers.

If an electrician was too afraid of electricity to touch a wire, he'd be an electrician no more. So if an educator is afraid of the information and communication technologies of his/her age, then he/she can no longer be an "educator" in any meaningful way.

An LMS is just an e-learning vending machine.

The debate is not about whether e-learning is useful or efficient, but whether the e-learning of today will meet the skills of tomorrow.