Finding EdTech Unicorns is one of my favorite things:
I find data ownership (by the learner) to be such a mythical creature in the world of EdTech. The ability to “carry my data with me” in a digital backpack should be what we are developing toward, but instead we keep on making lots of lockers for people to store their stuff within.
I would also want to think through how the “online” components of these communities aid and influence the offline components. So, meetups yes, but also twitter chats (or their equivalent). Also, capturing real-life learning and reflecting upon it online.
I also believe that we need better ways of organizing our curated information. If we continue to simply stack information or pull it together in piles, we will get very similar results in terms of overload. If we can find intelligent ways of creating small networks of information in the same way that we create small networks of people, I think we will do more to curate and create the future.
I’m not so sure that technology is neutral. I’ve seen tools that enable things that were not previously possible and I’ve seen tech that holds back a learner. Tech is not a panecea, but it’s choosing the right tool for the right purpose and showing that it can transform the learning environment, if done right.
via The Mythical Unicorn of Ed.Tech — The Saxifrage School — Medium.
