Learning Online will explore the shape of the room we find ourselves in when we learn and teach online. This is not a course about "online learning", but rather about learning and the Web. We'll explore ideas forwarded by Howard Rheingold, Cathy Davidson, Audrey Watters — and how those ideas interact with some of the early education theorists like John Dewey and Paulo Freire. We'll take the perspective that the Internet is a learning environment, a tool, and that our lives and work have become inextricably digitized. As well, we'll consider the nature of learning itself, and make connections between human beings as ravenous learners and the Internet as food for thought.

Over the weeks of the course, we'll explore learning as it actually happens online — in networks, socially, rhizomatically, emergently — by engaging ourselves as learners in new digital spaces. Participants will each complete a project of their own design, independently or in groups, and will have the opportunity to teach the class about their discoveries and accomplishments.

Instructor
Sean Michael Morris is Director of Digital Pedagogy Lab. He is also Instructional Designer in the Office of Digital Learning at Middlebury College. He has worked in digital learning for fifteen years, as a designer, a teacher, a program chair, a research editor, and curriculum developer. Sean is interested in the practice of critical digital pedagogy as a social movement, while also strongly identifying with the post-digital. He learns, teaches, and theorizes from a contemplative perspective.

Recommended Advance Readings

• Sean Michael Morris and Jesse Stommel, "10 Things the Best Digital Teachers Do"
• Jesse Stommel, "Online Learning: a Manifesto"
• Howard Rheingold, "Introduction: Why You Need Digital Know-how—Why We All Need It", from Net Smart: How to Thrive Online
• Cathy Davidson, "Shifting Attention"
• Seymour Papert, The Children's Machine

[Image "The only real prison is fear..." by Caroline licensed CC BY 2.0