That which pervades the entire Universe!

अखण्डमण्डलाकारं व्याप्तं येन चराचरम्
तत्पदं दर्शितं येन तस्मै श्रीगुरवे नमः

Salutations to that respected Guru who showed us the place of the one who pervades the vast universe with all its movable and immovable things.

Alex, had he read this, would have commented, “Wow! Is he talking about Google, Dad?”! For the net generation, if there is one thing that shows them anything at all, it must be google. And how well, this description fits!

In a sense the more things change, the more they appear to remain the same! Taking a random walk through cyberspace, I chanced upon Punya’s blog, and one that especially caught my fancy was his mash-up of an advertisement for an online university! A lecture is still a lecture…no matter what you watch it on! The message of “Create, Explore, Share” comes out very strongly…something that technology now enables you do so well.

And yet, is this all new? I don’t think so. I was just reflecting on the teaching methodology adopted in my son’s school, and they pretty much do the same thing! Only, the old-fashioned way!
The School KFI (where my children go to) has been a pioneer of sorts in experimenting with pedagogy. And yet, quite surprisingly, they have steered clear of technology. It is not as if they are Luddites ;in fact, Gautam anna, the principal can often be seen walking into a meeting with a Notebook PC taking notes even as he participates in the discussions. Well, if this commercial is anything to go by, then it makes imminent sense. The last thing we want is for children to sit and do the same old thing, the only difference being that they will be doing their homework sitting in front of a computer, and not on notebooks!

“Explore, Create, Share” seems to fit very nicely into the ethos and working style of The School. The school has been in the forefront of the Activity Based Learning (ABL) model, which is now being implemented even in government-run schools in Chennai, thanks to the Kuruvilla Jacob Education initiative.

A very successful model of learning / teaching that has been implemented here is the Mixed Age Group (MAG) classes. Here, we see some very real examples of learning, that can actually be transported to the online environment. A teacher plays the role of a facilitator, and is part of the student’s learning process. The entire environment is very student-centric; the teacher introduces the topic and some key concepts. The rest of the learning happens by students learning in smaller and larger groups, and sometimes alone; the results of their learning is shared in the class. This is true collaboration – net generation style. Only all of this is happening within a classroom; students work with dictionaries, thesaurus and encyclopedias. They even walk into the library if they need more information. The teacher is available as an expert to consult with in case assistance is required. They explore, and they create – and all of this knowledge is shared.

I think the key here that more than learning by rote, definitions and theorems, the students learn what to learn….and how to learn. They are guided where to look for information. The content is there…but where to look for it becomes the key learning.
In small part, I am glad that I made friends with serendipity! Quite coincidentally, all the work that I am doing in the knowledge management space echoes these very thought processes. I just hope that this concept can be applied equally successfully in this domain too.
I look forward to your comments on how learning can be different in an online environment, and how this concept can be applied in the KM space too.