Learning = Connecting

Just over a week ago, I wrote a post called Learning = Remembering? In it, I questioned the idea of learning being equated to simply being able to recall a bunch of facts. I had been to a presentation where the facilitator spent a lot of her day talking and demonstrating brain based learning strategies that were great for "improving recall" in her words. This worried me.

Over the past week, I've spent time thinking about this. If learning isn't remembering, what is it?

I've crawled up the side of the mountain slowly, and who did I find sitting there? George Siemens.

Although I am a great fan of George's work and have written about his ideas many other times, I am interested to begin to understand a bit more of the truth behind what he has been telling us: learning is about connections. Connections between people. Relationships between people and their information as well. Learning is an inherently risky, personal act. It involves changing our thoughts about an issue, our opinions, our understandings. Before this takes place, the relationships and the trust need to be there. Do I trust you enough to value what you are saying? Do I trust you enough to believe what you are saying?

This fall we've heard over and over again about the wonders of tools like Twitter and the power of the network of hyperconnected international educators we can now have almost instant access to. But I'm also realizing that this is moving my ideas beyond tools. The tools have changed and continue to change. We all have chased accounts, setting up at places like Voice Thread, Ustream, Operator 11, etc., etc. The tools will continue to change. So the tools are not important. What is important is that we realize the power of these tools and what they add to our classrooms. The tools let kids connect with each other on a personal level. This is not scary or creepy; this is life. We all connect to each other around us all the time, this is what relationships are about. We do it face to face and over the virtual learning networks we design and participate in. We cannot allow ourselves to be frightened of letting our kids getting to know others on a more personal level. We cannot expect them to delve deeply into academic issues under consideration without first allowing them to spend time with each other learning about others and their ideas and perspectives.

Today we have a third chat session scheduled with our partners at St. Elisabeth in Los Angeles. I guarantee that the first questions issued will be about the tragedy of the fires that are consuming southern California. This isn't what we have on the agenda for the chat session today, but this is about them and their connections to each other. They are humans, not unconcerned, unconnected robots. Last Friday they had a scheduled long weekend at St. Elisabeth's and it felt to me like half my class was missing. I missed talking to their teachers and their students. I wondered where they were and how they were spending their day.

These ideas of relationships between people, between information sources and about the power of the network are central to meaningful learning; much more than any tool will be.

Tags: georgesiemens, connectivism, relationships, learning, john pederson

Comments

[Michael Umphrey]

But surely remembering has something to do with it? It's hard for me to imagine someone has learned something that he or she can't remember.

Remembering is not a small thing. It is huge.

It's vital to good relationships, the best of which are built of promising and remembering.

And there are dangers involved in too much openness, which teachers need to keep in mind. Solitude, loneliness, quiet and contemplation are also important to learning.