Jo talks to Alex about her experiences over the past year teaching, and working with other teachers, on a range of diverse projects using weblogs, wikis, Second Life, podcasting, to support people such as media students and teachers in metal trades, to name but a few!

Jo talks about blending face-to-face with online to help develop a holistic network so that learners (and teachers too) have a “space” - connecting the projects together to build student communities AND connecting teachers across projects, so the network remains sustainable and vibrant. Capturing the learning from the projects has also been an important aspect - sharing the knowledge so that best practice guidelines can be shared for others, not just about technology and “how to” on using the tools, but also reflecting on how these tools have supported learning outcomes, teacher development, community-building and so on.

As Jo and Alex discuss, it’s a challenge to sustain this kind of activity within an institution in our current financial climate, where there is always the risk that funding will cease (especially as projects are often funded only once) and that the value placed on using social networking and web 2.0 tools may not be seen at all levels of management or teachign and learnign for that matter. Having the opportunities to advocate the use of these tools in learning continues to requirebroad based support and understanding.

And the future? As Jo points out, this level of activity helps to develop digital literacies and develops an awareness of teachers and learners to monitor/manage their work-life activities. 3D environments and gaming are likely to be familiar to young people both in their work and in life and learning, so we need to be prepared to engage with these tools and environments now to make future-capable our moves in learning and creativity; looking into 3D environments, MySpace, mobile phones, and so on. We need to also grow the value of connectivity so people can identify support networks, creative networks and learning opportunities.

For more on the projects, check out the NSW Learnscope projects here. Thanks Jo, Alex, an awesome efforts guys

Image: Jo Kay