http://metaledblog.blogspot.com/

Other trade related web 2 stuff:
http://del.icio.us/leighblackall/web2trades

I think the 3 points you make are:

1. Some people do courses because they are simply interested in the topic.

2. Some people do courses because the topic may be too boring to do “alone”.

3. Some people do courses because they don’t have access to the resources needed to learn the topic.

I suspect you take offence at the idea that YOU may be a novice learner in some topics. Just as I would accept being a novice learner in some topics. Perhaps I should go back a reread my rant and see if I need to be clearer about that. So in all 3 cases you put up, in their particular topic area, were you a novice learner in the field? Did you lack the motivation, connections, resources, and subject area info skills to be able to learn for yourself? If so then you’re a novice in the field.

If I were to consider learning how to weld for example, I would certainly be considering taking a course - although with the price of courses these days I might seek alternatives - and I would enter what ever learning path I chose as a novice looking for a bus ride. (BTW, did you take a look at the diagram?) But by the end of the course I’d expect to be an expert learner of welding by the time the course was finished. I’d expect that if a new technology or practice for welding came along, that I’d be networked and capable to adapt and learn for myself.. otherwise I’m back to being a novice again.

So, some of the criteria I would have for a welding course would be: at the end of the course will I be able to communicate effectively with others in the field? Do I know how to access information and new ideas and tools in the field? Am I inspired and motivated to continue to learn about welding, or do I feel more like I have taken a pill and know everything I need to know and can go on being a welder.

Its about here that I start to falter as I don’t know enough about the practice of welding. Is it being affected by the info age? Is the technology and practices for welding changing?

But in many areas today, the practice is undergoing radical change. Not just that but the likelihood for people to be in the one area all their life is changing. The tools for design have changed heaps, teaching is changing, communications, media and journalism, nursing, oh the list could be huge. Basically any area where the influx and access to information is causing change. Do the people who do courses for these areas leave that course confident, skilled and motivated to stay connected to information and continue learning so as to be adaptable? Are they adequately networked, does information come to them? etc.

As for those who do courses for paper, I wasn’t meaning to belittle them, I was meaning more that there are increasing numbers of occupations that require certification these days. Teaching for one.

Thanks for taking the time to articulate your points mouse, if you’re the same mouse as before, and I’ve no doubt you are, I appreciate the more constructive comments to my ideas. I’m not sure why you take such emotional issue with the things I write in my blog, they are not intended as authoritative statements, just statements of my thinking for others to engage with if they choose. Perhaps some day you’ll reveal yourself and we can laugh about our hostile beginnings.

A lot of your early morning rant seems to rest on these assumptions which I believe are false.

True - some are novices - thats why there are novice courses. But as for the experts - well I am one. And I have attended courses at your institution. I can assure you that I would not take any course just because I need a bit of paper. I have enough. I don’t need to chase paper - most of my colleagues are in the same boat. I attended courses for one reason and one reason only - I believe that there are things I can learn via the classes which I could not learn as well on my own.

Sometimes this is because I find the topic too boring to study by myself (and I do a LOT of self-study) perhaps I need the motivation of classes and a structured program.

Sometimes it is because I respect the teachers expertise in a particular field or topic and value spending time learning from them and with them.

You totally misrepresent ME (and I suspect most experts) when you claim we are blindly chasing paper. I don’t give a shit about paper, if I get some then it just happens to be coincidental on me taking a particular group of courses over time.

And of course - if your initial assuptions are wrong all of your conclusions are possibly off beam.

oh - there is one other reason I took a course, I waanted to learn welding and didn’t have the gear which was provided in the course. Good course too - worth doing. And NOT one to learn by the seat of your pants.

hence my decision, long agonised over , made yesterday and actioned today. I spitball that I have much to offer beyond pointing to best practice.

The finger has been pointed at me often enough requesting assistance to enable others to realise what I as a teacher take for granted. More steps forward into the idea of connected, distributed, networked knowledge realising happiness and communication between learners of any age.