FOECast Ideation Week – A Global Collaboration, an opportunity for Connectedness

A few weeks ago I blogged about the end of the Horizon Report, brought about by the closure of New Media Consortium. Since that time, Bryan Alexander has been instrumental in bringing together those interested in leveraging the space left by the Horizon Report, a global collaboration which I have been following with great interest.

As the weeks have passed, the group and the project has moved rapidly, deciding on a name – FOECast (Future of Education foreCast) and a very active community, debating and discussing possibilities. This week has been FOECast Ideation Week – a week of “brainstorming, ideation and prototyping” which has been conducted in blogs, on Twitter, on a very rich and active Google Doc, the Slack channel and through Zoom meetings across the globe.  The week has has been summarised and co-ordinated by Bryan Alexander through his blog, who has offered a flexible process for the week with provocations, readings and discussion points to focus on. Please take the time to visit these posts – there are so many ideas being shared, it is impossible to do it justice here.

Sadly for much of this week I have been absorbed in family health issues, but as the week ends I am emerging from this period offline, to discover SO MUCH dialogue, information and so many ideas to process which have been generated by the group. Wow! It is inspiring that there are so many passionately interested in the future of education, and who wish to be a part of ensuring we continue to grow and innovate in this space.

I have yet to get my head around the information shared in its entirety, but having skimmed what has been shared so far on the Google Doc, I was inspired to see how what has been discussed aligns with the Connected Learning Framework outlined by Mimi Ito et al.

As I read what had been discussed, it became more clear to me that although the Connected Learning Framework was originally designed to explore learning opportunities for young people, this framework may also act as a powerful lens for viewing how a globally connected, openly networked community might work together to explore the future of education (and everything) :-).

For me, Project FOECast is not only focused on the production of information for others – it in itself is a learning community. As the dialogue and discussion continue, we learn from each other, and help each other grow and shape our ideas. This flows on to what is created. Although it may have been initiated to explore how the gap left by the Horizon Report could be filled, what I have drawn from the conversations so far is that the outcome will not be a static report. It will be the expression of the learning community, and a learning opportunity in itself.

The idea of a view from orbit has been floated – that the FOECast may provide global insights in the way that the space station may offer a larger view of planet Earth than what may be seen on the ground – but just as this view from space is constantly changing, so too with the FOECast. It may draw upon elements of Wikis, with editable, trackable, flexible publication so that the perceptions of many may be drawn together. And so while information and knowledge will be constructed and published, I believe that Project FOECast could be perpetually in beta. Just as education should never be static, nor should our exploration of its future.

So how does this relate to the Connected Learning principles? Let me be more specific :).

These are just initial thoughts. The Coggle Diagram can be shared so that others may edit, and if anyone wishes to add to or refine it in any way, please let me know. I wanted to make a contribution to this important week in Project FOECast, and I would love to hear your thoughts.