Proceedings of I-KNOW ’06 Graz, Austria, September 6 - 8, 2006
Next-Generation Web. Building a Social Middleware for Knowledge Society Antonio Fumero (DIT - UPM, Spain
[email protected])
Abstract: The paper proposes a way of characterizing the Next-Generation Web in terms of some ‘social middleware’, composed of social software technology supporting its emergence and some process ‘fabric’ that permeates from the individual’s interaction and innovative usage patterns. We will be especially interested in its impact on the educational environment, briefly presenting a converging approach for adult learning in both corporate and institutional environments extracted from the initial stages of iCamp project. It is intended to show you how the key elements under this new stage in Web evolution impact the educational environment, not only in higher education but in adult learning and professional training. It is intended to be useful in managing the changes we are putting up with in educational institutions and all kind of organisations. Keywords: Web 2.0, education, eLearning, TEL, pedagogy, social software, collaboration. Categories: K3.m
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Introduction
Many emergent processes have been considered as an integral part of a new evolutionary stage of World Wide Web (WWW) that has been labelled as Web 2.0 and that will be referred to as Next-Generation Web (NGW) throughout the article. Such an NGW can be identified as an integral part of the Digital Universal Network (DUN) behind the rising of the “new techno-social environment” [Sáez-Vacas, 05] challenging our Information Society and the future of the Knowledge Society we are supposed to be building up from the current Information Society. First of all, we are going to present a simplified visualisation of NGW, introducing the ‘social middleware’ as a way of getting together the social software technology and the social networking processes generated by the individuals interaction on top of it. After that, we’ll briefly review the theoretical framework enabling us for talking about some convergent model for adult learning both in higher education and professional learning, where we naturally will integrate such a concept of the social middleware. Finally, iCamp project will be shortly presented as the first pedagogy-driven project for designing and developing an innovative learning virtual environment based on the paradigm shift imposed by the NGW.
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Next-Generation Web
Behind all the hype surrounding the ultimate buzzword on the net, there’s a “multifaceted” phenomenon driving an evolutionary process towards a whole new Web. Scraping a little bit the surface of such a phenomenon, we can identify a series of technologies and services that are been built through a growing number of “user innovation” processes. We are talking about a certain kind of user, the super user or digerati – some kind of “digital literati”. Blogs, wikis, syndication standards and aggregation services, collaborative semantic tagging services or social networking services like openBC, Linked or Tribes can, all of them, be considered as social software in the way it’s defined in [Boyd, 03]. The key characteristics of the blog phenomenon, for instance, are far beyond the weblog as a web-publishing format with its characteristic updating frequency, hypertext density or its inverse chronological order. The emergence of NGW is driving a process of socialization, i.e. the structure and dynamics of the Web are acquiring “social” significance for individuals and the organizations. We can create, edit, publish, share... content (every kind of content) by collaborating through the Internet in a social manner i.e. giving our actions a social significance. If we can try to visualize the NGW conceptualization in a layered scheme [Fumero, 06] an image like the one in Figure 1 will arises, where the Web itself appears as the platform supporting a growing and emergent amount of new services we can consider as belonging to a single Social Software layer. Upon this layer, we can realize the existence of a ‘processes’ layer where takes place the emergence of new individuals relationships –with the technology itself. Finally, we find the social networks and the relationships individuals build, considering they are built within a new (cyber)social environment that resemble some kind of “real virtuallity”, bridging the current gap people usually see between their lives in the real world.
Figure 1: Layered vision of NGW If we refine such a layered visualisation (Figure 2) we can consider the existence of some ‘social middleware’ layer that is being built with joint elements from Social Software Technology (SST) and Social Networking Processes (SSP). A composite layer that appears as the result of getting together a technology that is gaining social ‘flavour’ for the services delivered and supporting the emerging NGW itself, and the hybrid or “blended” processes defined by the on- and off-line complementary activities carried out by individuals (as themselves or as part of any organization) that permeate from the social interactions on top of the first scheme.
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Beyond Constructivism
The evolution of Web technologies towards such an NGW [Fumero, 06] has its parallelism in the theoretical background behind the constructivist approach adopted by European Higher Education Institutions (HEI). Even social constructivist theories regarding the knowledge contraction through the negotiation of meanings applies in that process of evolution. But, nowadays, we have to take into consideration new theoretical approaches beyond the constructivism in order to properly develop Next Generation TEL (Technology-Enhanced Learning) environments that must be able to go beyond the simple integration of Web 2.0 labelled technologies in the traditional architectures. We need to go further avoiding the simple matching process of traditional models with innovative tools like the one proposed in [Baumgartner, 05]. Hence the approach in the innovative pedagogy-driven projects must be based on developing a brand-new pedagogical model and using the NGW technologies for developing a new TEL environment upon it, beyond the traditional LMS (Learning Management System) and Learning Objects Repositories (LOR). Connectivism [Siemens, 05] is intended to unify chaos, networks theory and complexity yielding a new theoretical framework for explaining not only individual but also social and organizational learning processes too. This approach goes beyond the constructivism itself and even the latest “versions” of social constructivism including social interactions without avoiding the same inside-out limitations of the original theory. The starting point for this concept is that the knowledge exists by itself. Individuals mustn’t build it. They are supposed to realize that knowledge by connecting the nodes where it's located; being that nodes other individuals, organizations, different clusters weakly tied... “It is changing the Know-How and Know-What for Know-Where the Knowledge is” [Siemens, 05]. Next-Generation is the adjective not only for Web but for Network Generation (a.k.a. N Generation or Millennials) that was grown up with the Internet as an integral part of their lives. They are the social side of the “E-Learning 2.0” equation tried to be solved in [Downes, 05] combining some principles from Connectivism itself –learnercantered design, teachers and learners (students) considered as peers within social networking environment- and NGW paradigm shifts: “From a web of documents to a web of data” with the emergence of “microcontent”, “From a Web as Media to a Web as platform”, “From Communities of Practice to Social-Networking” and From traditional learning applications and systems managing learning objects within a predefined learning architecture to an open learning environment composed of interoperable loosely coupled open-source platforms and tools aimed to support the social interactions of peers on the N-Gen EduWeb, the Educational Web 2.0. The same way we observe emerging processes in (social) networks that are mainly related with their dynamics, we can think of the knowledge itself as an emerging process that emerges from the interactions taking place between individuals as nodes of such social (overlaying) networks –personal, professional, organisational.
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Figure 2: Social Middleware getting together individuals and NGW All these ideas that are supposed to be some way “beyond constructivism” are been translated into technology through new approaches like Personal Learning Environments (PLE) that – as they’ve been defined by the London Knowledge Lab in their Knowledge on Social Software wiki1 – are systems that help learners take control of and manage their own learning. This includes providing support for learners to: set their own learning goals, manage their learning – managing both content and process – communicate with others in the process of learning, and thereby achieve learning goals.
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Towards a converging approach for adult learning
The new techno-social environment is pushing the enterprise training and institutional education to meet together via the paradigm shift from educational to learning approach, and its impact in developing innovative TEL systems. NGW is gathering a growing amount of such-called ‘social software’ tools aiming at the “socialization” of the Web. We understand “socialization” in this context as the process of making available online some social networking and content management services supporting processes like personal and group relationships management or content online editing, publishing and sharing. Hence, we’ve focused on tackling two sides of the same equation, social networking as the core ‘blended’ process, supported by social software and enabling the application of social instruction and peer-supported scaffolding models on behalf of the social constructivist approaches. The main challenge we’re putting up with is a psycho-social one. The arriving of digital natives (as they are represented by network generation or Millennials) not only in our HEIs but in the enterprise is changing the way corporations run their businesses. One of the characteristics of this new generation that many studies highlight, confronting them with Gen-Xers, is that “Millennials are unbelievably gifted at building, maintaining, and tapping into networks” [Emory, 06].
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http://octette.cs.man.ac.uk/jitt/index.php/Personal_Learning_Environments
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A social network can be defined as “a social structure between actors, mostly individuals or organizations. It indicates the ways in which they are connected through various social familiarities ranging from casual acquaintance to close familial bonds” [Wikipedia, 06]. The same source estates that social networking also refers to a category of Internet applications –usually known as online social networks— to help connect friends, business partners, or other individuals together using a variety of tools. “Social networks operate on many levels, from families up to the level of nations, or even the enterprise” [Cross, 05] and play a critical role in determining the way problems are solved; organizations are run, and the degree to which individuals succeed in achieving their goals. A social network service [Wikipedia, 06] can be defined as social software specifically focused on the building and verifying of social networks for whatever purpose. Many social networking services are also blog hosting services. According to [Boyd, 03] the “phrase” social software can distinguish software built around the premises of supporting ‘conversational interaction between individuals or groups’; supporting ‘social feedback’; or supporting ‘social networks’. Social networks enable individual’s access to Social Capital [Lin, 02]. Social capital consists of resources embedded in one’s network or associations, so they can be reached through individual’s social network. The Social Capital theory applies to hierarchy social structures, like wealth, power and reputation. It could be also considering in knowledge, as it may also form a hierarchical structure. All these propositions encourage the building of “learning networks” between individuals. These networks may take different aspects and proprieties. Learning networks involve social, informational and technological ones. A more specific approach must consider that learning networks as containing the social (organizational-, personal- and community-related), informational (content-related) and technological dimensions of the individual performance in the different environments. There is some common understanding of the necessity for dealing with organizational complexity in terms of social networks, even in the corporate environment. The traditional organizational theories are being substituted by the modern network theory approaches switching from pyramidal and matrix models to cellular and networked dynamic structures ruled by emergence and synchronization trends like show the results from [Economist, 06]. There are research studies whose results recommend the combination of network analysis and cultural assessment for change management [Cross, 05]. We must take into consideration that all these elements we’ve just briefly listed here apply not only in educational institutions and their relation with society, but in the organizational landscape shaped by Live-Long Learning (LLL) and the personalization of employee skills portfolio as a way that makes it possible to be interoperable with standards adopted by modern educational institutions. The other way around, we must consider the implications of Self-Directed Learning (SDL); we are shifting from educating to learning, and from institution-driven to learner-driven environment.
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N-Gen European Educational Web
The iCamp – innovative, inclusive, interactive & intercultural learning Campus – project starts in October 2005, with the participation of ten associated centres from nine different countries as consortium partners –Jozef Stefan Institute (Slovenia), Tomas Bata University (Czech Republic), Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (Spain), University of Leicester (United Kingdom), Tallinn University (Estonia), Centre for Social Innovation (Austria), Vienna University of Economics (Austria), University of Science and Technology (Poland), Kaunas University of Technology (Lithuania), Isik University (Turkey)- fully compromised with the vision of having a such-called iCamp Space becoming “THE Educational Web for the enlarged Europe of 25+”.
Figure 3: The gap between Institutional and Personal Learning Environments The main objective of the project – driven not only by pedagogical, but by technical and social challenges too – “is to create an open virtual learning environment for university students across Europe by connecting different open source learning systems and tools, and provide interoperability amongst them. This new learning environment is a learner-centred space where students and educators will work collaboratively on assignments across disciplines and across countries” [iCamp, 05]. The early stages of our research efforts have yield a series of useful findings2: • We have to take into consideration the growing gap that exists between the institutional platform-like environment, traditionally associated with the “corporate” LMS and the instructional design world, and the emerging reality of the PLE approach that comprises a lot of social software tools the people use for organizing their work and relationships in the “online world”. Figure 3 represents the different usage patterns and interoperability levels causing the gap, expressed in terms of some components and services normally associated with each one of both worlds. • There are a lot of efforts for bridging that gap. It could be useful to identify the different “settings” we can find in between both, the institutional and the 2
These findings are quoted and slightly updated from other paper – “Next Generation Educational Web” – submitted to ICE 2006 that is pending of final acceptance while I’m writing this article.
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personal world. The degree of intervention we can achieve in this kind of projects will be different in each of that settings or scenarios. • It’s useful to preserve, to some degree, the diversity of the learning/educational tools ecosystem. We will need both, institutional scalable and extensible learning platforms, and innovative flexible “hackable” personal learning tools that individual users can play with outside – or even when they are engaged with – any Educational Institution. In such an ecosystem, standardization will be a key driver for interoperability. • The social component of NGW native services is the key element and driving force in bridging, not only the personal – institutional gap, but even the corporate – institutional one, enabling the building of new conceptual approaches and architectures both, for enterprise and educational system enabling them for finding a half-way meeting point supported by a new techno-social environment. The ongoing work within iCamp project teams is following two main directions aiming at tackling the complexity of these new learning environments. • One direction is trying to gather the tools, platforms and systems from the different project partners for offering learners and facilitators a selection tool – building upon a soft-ontology approach and traditional LMS platform – for composing their own learning environments from a HEI-provided building blocks database that is supposed to be extended with current and future social software services and components. • The other slightly overlapping direction is intended to develop an effective PLE from a collaborative point-of-view, linking the learning communities and individual’s requirements, i.e. developing user-centred components for collaboration – not specifically designed for an educational scenario – that must eventually be added to the iCamp Space building blocks offerings. While coordinating these two approaches, in order to have them meeting a complex and evolving set of requirements, comes up the ‘social middleware’ approach, combining the composition of innovative – even user-developed – services and atomic functionalities extracted from existing institutional platforms, tools and systems.
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Conclusion
The Web is becoming an actual “social environment” experiencing itself an organic transformation driving by technological and social (socio-economical) changing forces combined for create a New Techno-Social complex Environment. This transformation impacts every industry and Education is no exception. Furthermore, institutional and corporate educational environments are converging into a learningdriven framework based on SDL and LLL requirements in a networked society. We do have, not only the technology (NGW), but the theoretical and cognitive tools too for changing the challenges we are putting up with in such a change process into opportunities, allowing us to integrate the innovative social patterns that are emerging within our models.
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The iCamp project is an European initiative willing to adopt challenging and innovative approaches in the way the future learning environments for a true Knowledge Society are designed and implemented; and it can be useful for current and future initiatives the effort of sharing the findings of our ongoing work and even our experiences as case study. Acknowledgements We wish to acknowledge our gratitude and appreciation to all the iCamp project partners, and each one of the project team members, for their contribution during the development of various ideas and concepts presented in this paper.
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[Economist, 06] The Economist, The new organization, The Economist Surveys, January, 19, 2006, http://www.economist.com/surveys/displaystory.cfm?story_id=5380483 [Emory, 06] Knowledge@Emory, Is your firm ready for Millennials?, March, 08, 2006, http://knowledge.emory.edu/index.cfm?fa=printArticle&ID=950 [Fumero, 06] A. Fumero, EDUWEB 2.0, Proceedings of WEBIST 2006, April 11 – 13, 2006, Setúbal, Portugal. [iCamp, 05] iCamp Project’s Official Website, http://www.icamp.eu [Lin 02] N. Lin, Social Capital: A Theory of Social Structure and action Cambridge University Press, 2002.
(Chapter 5),
[Sáez-Vacas, 05] F. Sáez-Vacas, Beyond The Internet: The Digital Universal Network, Upgrade vol. VI, Issue no. 2, April 2005, http://www.upgrade-cepis.org/issues/2005/2/up62Upenet.pdf [Siemens, 05] G. Siemens, Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age, eLearn Magazine, ACM, 2005, http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/connectivism.htm [Wikipedia, 06] Wikipedia, “Social Network”, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_networking
