Learning Research Network Research Articles

The ties that bind us as a community

This manuscript was concerned with the extent to which the definition of the networked learning is manifest in the networked learning research. To this end, it explored how the definition is utilised in the design and application of the research. Technology (mediation and/or facilitation), connections (interactions), and network (community and/or context) were the three categories I explored the networked learning research. While the definition of the networked learning is open-ended in nature, the findings show that the networked learning researchers have enough commonality in their approach to the networked learning.

The Mode 3 Networked University

The idea of a modern university is a constantly changing and often contested concept. This paper traces the idea of a university using three modes. These modes are the Mode 1 Ivory Tower, Mode 2 Factory and Mode 3 Network. This framework draws upon higher education literature as well as three modes of knowledge production. I use these modes as a framework to describe the genealogical and historical development of the university in the Western world. These however are not purely historical and elements of their characteristics can be found within and between university institutions today. A genealogy shows a historical path dependency (i.e a teaching and research institution) of the idea of a university and a new materialism perspective shows the coming together of the many elements of the network assemblage which includes the discourse on the idea of a university clashing with new ideas, technologies and policy. The growth and development of the modern university from small, autonomous, elite and autonomous in mode 1 to large, mass regulated factory with marketplace outputs within neoliberal societies is well documented. The Mode 3 Network University is emerging with a potential for universal access with networked societies and technologies and has many actors influencing its becoming and idea. The 2020 Covid-19 pandemic and a broadening multidisciplinary approach to the field of Networked Learning has been called for and I introduce the possibility of theoretically analysing the becoming and enactment of the Mode 3 Network University using concepts and frameworks from the broad field of New Materialism. Such approaches take into account the complex assemblage and network of actors which are human and non-human in the growing and diversifying university. The growth and marketisation of the university has added to this complexity with commercial 'unbundling' taking place. Degrees, institutions and functions are being unbundled and rebundled and this active complex network of actors including technologies, humans (academics, students, employers, wider public) and the residual path dependency of the three modes are in tension and conflict but come together to enact the modern university. New Material methodologies allow for these many influences to come together in a 'flat ontology' to allow for a more nuanced and new approach to research in Networked Learning.

Symposium 3: Evocative writing and lived experience descriptions for networked learning research

The present paper introduces evocative writing, advocated by autoethnographies, as an effective research method to capture the subtleties of real-life networked learning experiences, enabling researchers to observe and make sense of both the beautiful and the ugly of the phenomenon. Evocative writing practice can liberate researchers from the established academic tradition that unnecessarily devalues their subjectivity and limits their creativity by imposing the problematic normality of research objectivity. Writing is a central research act that needs to be successfully performed throughout the entire research project—not only to present project outcomes but also to formulate research problems, collect data, and validate outcomes. Despite its aesthetic and communicative merits, however, evocative researchers as human beings cannot fully grasp the structural essence of the lived experiences of networked learning phenomena beyond their own frame of reference. Here, the author believes that lived experience descriptions and related methodological techniques devised by phenomenologists can provide evocative networked learning researchers with a possible breakthrough. Based on the author’s own experiences, the author will demonstrate the effective use of evocative writing complemented by lived experience descriptions for networked learning research.

Faculty Attitudes and Response to Online Learning in Transnational Higher Education in Qatar: A Promising Future

This paper presents preliminary results from a doctoral thesis investigating faculty attitudes, preparedness, and response to adopting technology-enhanced learning during the 2020-2021 pandemic. The current events that affected teaching and learning worldwide necessitated a re-evaluation of the traditional higher education system and imposed an immediate adjustment to teaching approaches. Using a survey and semi-structured interviews with faculty members teaching at transnational higher education institutions in the state of Qatar, this paper presents the recent pedagogical shift experienced during the pandemic. Using a case study approach, this paper examines the impacts of this shift on student learning from faculty perspective and discusses the implications of this shift on networked learning research and practice. Findings suggest that faculty found online teaching more difficult than previously perceived which encouraged them to be creative and innovative in their teaching approaches. However, there does not seem to be an agreement as to whether online learning is the future of higher education as some faculty still see more value in face-to-face teaching. Furthermore, student assessment is an issue for some faculty. Overall, faculty members seem to appreciate the online teaching experience as it allowed them to try new teaching approaches, use new technologies, and integrate new assessment techniques that they would not consider in their pre-pandemic classes.

On the nature of social interactions and cognition in learning communities

Whether explicitly used as a research aim or implicitly discussed as an outcome, the concept of community is central for the networked learning research as it allows networked learning researchers to study how people perceive the networked environment as a space, wherein the members can develop relationships among one another. The underlying premise for this work is that it is erroneous to assume a learning community is a unified concept, functioning in the same way for everyone under same circumstances. Taking the contextual factors into account, this research questions the characteristics of a community that are related to learning. I explore how different types of relationships among members of a learning community are related to learning. In particular, I conceptualise the concept of community using social capital theory. Since the central tenet of social capital theory is that different relationships within networks of people hold different values, I argue that it can inform the ways by which the perceived level of learning is understood with respect to interaction patterns. The findings suggest that both distributed–diverse communications and strong–close communications are manifest in learning. However, the impact of diverse relationships on learning is considerably larger and stronger compared to denser relationships. The implications are discussed.

Symposium 1: Analyzing Special Needs Support through Networks and Learning Analytics in Primary Education

In this short paper, analytical issues of networked learning are related to special needs support and learning analytics research in primary education. Very brief suggestions for these analytical issues are discussed for the networked learning research field to continue to expand upon. In part, the discussion is intended to form the underpinnings of a work-in-progress research project with cross-disciplinary networked connections across multiple universities. Currently, teachers are faced with an expansion of their professional role that may be too economically demanding, which may result in consequences that is not beneficial for children with special needs. Researchers that aim to study inclusive education face the challenge to represent findings in a way that does not increase workload for teachers in primary education. Any failings in this regard may strengthen the intertwining of educational results and economical interest, which to a large extent could be considered as opposed to networked learning theory, dualistically separated from pedagogical concerns. The inclusive goal of addressing diversity for children with special needs may be promoted by providing an educational setting with networked connections that enhances variation to modes of behavior, by addressing specific and contextual strengths and challenges of students appropriately. With learning analytics, specific and contextual strengths and challenges of students might be easier to highlight with new database schemas, algorithms, and user interfaces to represent networked data. Radical behaviorist methodology may further emphasize specific contextual findings from primary education through strictly defined events of behavior, which may be of interest to the networked learning research community to further expand upon. Thus, this paper proposes suggestions for networked learning research of primary education, with approaches commonly implemented in special education, such as radical behaviorist methodology. The suggestions are based on networked consequences from three social dimensions: political, economic, and technology-developmental. 1 The political dimension is discussed through the notion of inclusive education for children with special needs and its current state, 2 the economic dimension is discussed through the 21st century role expansion of teachers, 3 the technology-developmental dimension is discussed through learning analytic research and its connection to bodily and biological associations. This dimension is especially noteworthy, as learning analytics is currently underutilized in primary education research as opposed to common higher education research.

Digitalisation of engineering design education: structured freedom, flipped engagement, hybridity, and transparency

ABSTRACT This paper contributes to current discussions of digital teaching and technology within the field of engineering design education. We enter this dialogue by analysing a hybrid digital learning design for a 15-ECTS engineering design course. The course design pedagogically integrates principles from networked learning research, Problem-Based learning (PBL), as well as established pedagogical traditions. Specifically, we analyse and discuss the case based on four pedagogical principles underpinning the course: structured freedom, flipped engagement, hybridity, and transparency. The purpose of our discussions is to understand and contribute knowledge of digitalising engineering design education. Specifically, our pedagogical approach to hybrid and digital modes of learning rethink and expand the integration of digital technologies in physical design studios in a PBL context by employing networked learning principles. Following this, we draw out interesting contributions that have emerged and use the discussions to feed into the ongoing research on digitalising engineering design education.

Introducing Phenomenology in Action for Researching Networked Learning Experiences

This Round Table aims to introduce and discuss the book Phenomenology in Action for Researching Networked Learning, forthcoming (2024) in the Springer Book Series Research in Networked Learning. The wider aim of the Round Table is to continue our explorations of the place of phenomenology in networked learning. After a brief introductory overview of the book, our four invited discussants will present their response to the book, thus initiating general discussion with the audience on the roles, possibilities and challenges of using phenomenology to investigate networked learning.

Exploring Digital Lifeworlds

Networked Learning (NL), originally presented by Goodyear et al. (2004), has recently been reimagined to embrace a richer, more context-sensitive understanding that incorporates the entangled, emergent and “messy” nature of learning (NLEC, Gourlay, Rodríguez-Illera, et al., 2021). Postphenomenology was cited as one of the multiple methodological frameworks relevant to this redefinition. Matthews (in NLEC, Gourlay, Rodríguez-Illera, et al., 2021) recommends postphenomenology for its focus on human-nonhuman mediation and questions of agency in sociotechnical networks. Similarly, Thestrup & Gislev (in NLEC, Gourlay, Rodríguez-Illera, et al., 2021) draw on postphenomenology to reconceive the learning network as a media ecology where “technology, not being neutral, but multistable (Ihde 1990), mediates the perceptions and actions of the participants (Verbeek 2005), and by that co-shapes the space, the connections, and the network” (p. 346). But what is postphenomenology? This workshop will introduce participants to postphenomenology as a philosophy of technology, a theoretical framework, and a pragmatic approach to doing NL research. Postphenomenology emerged from philosopher Don Ihde’s (1975, 1979) early phenomenological investigations of specific technologies being used in everyday life: chalk, eyeglasses, telephones, etc. His inquiries led to several key discoveries including the occurrence of distinct forms of human-technology-world relations (embodiment, hermeneutic, alterity and background) which can be further characterized by their amplification-reduction structure. Today, Ihde’s approach to studying technologies “phenomenologically, i.e., as belonging in different ways to our experience and use” (1993, p. 34) is known as postphenomenology and has evolved into an increasingly popular posthuman form of qualitative inquiry in education and the social sciences (Aagaard, 2016). As a theoretical framework, postphenomenology views technology not as a neutral tool but as an active mediator in shaping and co-constituting human actions, perceptions, and interpretations including interactions with others and their world (Ihde, 1990; Verbeek, 2005). Peter-Paul Verbeek (2005) expanded postphenomenology to include key insights from Actor-Network Theory, drawing especially on the work of Bruno Latour (1992, 2002), and thereby broadening its theoretical reach to include the morality of hybrid beings and the ethical design of things. As an approach to research, postphenomenology allows for in-depth explorations of how digital technologies mediate educational experiences (Aagaard, 2017; Adams & Turville, 2018). It is especially well-suited to studying how technologies shape ethical actions and decisions (Verbeek, 2011, 2023). Through “investigating how technologies help to shape human practices, perceptions, and interpretative frameworks, [postphenomenology] makes visible a moral dimension of technology itself” (Verbeek, 2023, p. 49). Postphenomenology employs a variety of phenomenological and empirically grounded methods to capture the everyday, lived experiences of different technologies including disciplined observation of humans employing specific technologies (Aagaard & Matthiesen, 2016), “interviewing objects” (Adams & Thompson, 2016) and “thing writing” (Adams & Yin, 2017). Here, doing postphenomenology demands an out-of-the-corner-of-one’s-eye attentiveness to everyday life, “an ear for meaning and an eye for materiality” (Aagaard & Matthiesen, 2016, p. 41, emphasis in original). Postphenomenological analysis often begins by first reconstructing “posthuman anecdotes”, that is, descriptions of human-technology-world interactions as they are lived, then subjecting these “reassembled resemblings” (Adams & Thompson, 2016, p. 31) to a set of postphenomenological analytic tools to help untangle how humans and different technologies in use are mutually shaping and co-constituting each other. Analytics include studying breakdowns (e.g., the “broken hammer” strategy), attending to the invitational quality of things, and discerning the spectrum of human-technology-world (HTW) relations (Adams & Turville, 2018; Adams & Thompson, 2016).

Designing learning simulations for cognitive absorption

‘The future of learning is immersive. In the future, learning will take the shape of a story, a play, a game; involving multiple platforms and players; driven by dialogue and augmented with technology, an interplay of immersive experiences, data, and highly social virtual worlds’ [1]. Our simulation was designed to raise aspirations as to what is ‘possible’ for our wider faculty as we expand our simulation-based education (SBE). The ‘Godzilla’ multi-casualty exercise offered a fun and engaging theme to the serious focus on student development and assessment. Facilitated at a music venue enabling creative visual and audio backdrops, to a dynamic and immersive learning space. This exploited sensory boundaries in the form of challenging environments, whilst focusing expectations for our student cohorts to demonstrate clinical praxis. The directing staff (DS) included academics, Critical Care Practitioners, Nurses, and Paramedics who ensured a multidisciplinary overview of students’ safety and feedback discussions, appraising decision making, treatment, and management of multiple patient scenarios. Drawing upon the multimedia and interdisciplinary expertise from the faculty, a holistic set of skills brought together the creation of an authentic educational experience, with the evaluation of the students against clinical expectations of a modern healthcare response. The main points of contact were at ‘handover’ post patient extraction and assessment, to senior clinicians. This exercise modelled inclusive approaches, reflected in the seminal Delphi study that identified requirements and opportunities in Immersive Learning namely: Facilitating Authentic Learning Experiences and Developing the Capabilities of the Future Workforce [1]. This approach aligns with the NHS Simulation Strategy [2] but also with the psychological concept of flow and deep absorption in learning proposed by the Open University Innovating Pedagogy report [3]. Premised on the innovation of best learning moments, our student tasks were designed to engender deep involvement through memorable learning activities. 36 level 4 Paramedic students and 24 level 6 Paramedic students undertook the simulated challenges. Facilitators and learners reported high levels of satisfaction and attainment of praxis. Comparisons were recognised between cohorts that informed future adaptations and design, evaluating tasks for future ambitions, fusing interdisciplinary endeavours. This successful exercise met the key learning objectives and students identified this as a ‘memorable’ point in their learning. Inclusion of our allied health professions had handover scenarios filmed with 360° and conventional cameras, and videos were edited for future curricular inclusion. The learning from this inaugural event will inform the diversity and complexity of future tasks set for students. Further feedback capture methods will be used to quantify further investment into future simulation-based educational endeavours. 1. Lee MJ, Georgieva M, Alexander B, Craig E, Richter J. State of XR & Immersive Learning Outlook Report 2021. Immersive Learning Research Network, Walnut, CA. 2021. 2. Health Education England (HEE) A national vision for the role of simulation and immersive technologies in health and care. NHS: 2020 3. Kukulska-Hulme A, Bossu C, Coughlan T, Ferguson R, FitzGerald E, Gaved M, Herodotou C, Rienties B, Sargent J, Scanlon E, Tang J, Wang Q, Whitelock D, Zhang S. Innovating Pedagogy 2021: Open University. Innovation Report 9: 2021

Research priorities in immersive learning technology: the perspectives of the iLRN community

This paper presents the perspectives of the immersive learning research network community on the relevance of various challenges to the adoption of immersive learning technology, along three dimensions: access, content production, and deployment. Using a previously validated questionnaire, we surveyed this community of 622 researchers and practitioners during the summer of 2018, attaining 54 responses. By ranking the challenges individually and within each dimension, the results point towards higher relevance being placed on aspects that link immersive environments with learning management systems and pedagogical tasks, alongside aspects that empower non-technical users (educational actors) to produce interactive stories, objects, and characters.

Exploring Changes in the Emotional Intelligence of Law Students

Welcome to our 2017 edition of the Legal Education Review — and my first as Editor in Chief. We are spoiled for choice in this edition, with a general volume and two special editions: one on teaching animal law, and the subject of a separate foreword by guest editor Meg Good, and another special edition put together by the Legal Education Active Learning Research Network (‘LEARN’).

Enhancing the Impact of Research: Experimenting with Network Leadership Strategies to Grow a Vibrant Nature-Based Learning Research Network

Research can fall short of having societal impact due to traditions of the research enterprise as well as the perceptions of researchers about their appropriate role. What if researchers saw their work as part of a social movement to make change, and the research enterprise was designed to encourage that view and to facilitate relevance, rigor, activation of research, and a collaborative approach to address research questions aligned with a common goal? What would such a research enterprise look like? In this article, we describe the application of “network leadership strategies” to develop a “generative, social-impact network” to support the efforts of a nature-based learning research network to advance knowledge of the natural environment's impact on children's learning and educational outcomes. The activities and achievements of the nature-based learning research network are examined through the lens of network-building approaches aiming to create social impact. Though inspired by and grounded in these approaches, the reality is that certain constraints influenced our ability to function collaboratively as a generative, social-impact network and to fully realize the potential of this approach. We describe these challenges and offer recommendations for other researchers interested in enhancing the social impact of research.

Ethos and Practice of a Connected Learning Movement: Interpreting Virtually Connecting Through Alignment with Theory and Survey Results

Virtually Connecting (VC) is a connected learning volunteer movement that enlivens virtual conference experiences by partnering those that are at the conference with virtual participants that cannot attend. In looking to articulate the ethos and intentions of VC, a manifesto was developed by a group of core members and presented at the Digital Learning Research Network in 2015. This paper connects the group’s ethos, as defined in this manifesto, to various learning theories including Connectivism, connected learning, and the practice of online communities. The paper reports on both quantitative and qualitative results from a survey sent to members of the community over February and March of 2016, as well as some information obtained from blogs and other forms of social media, and ties these results to the manifesto items. This alignment of theory and participant feedback shows continuity between the stated ethos of the community and the impressions of those living the volunteer experience.

Preface to the Special Issue on Immersive Environments: Challenges, Research and New Developments

Immersion could be defined as a subjective impression of participating in a comprehensive, realistic experience [1]. However, immersion should not be treated as a unique property, as it is achieved from a complex interaction of representational fidelity and learner interaction, holding a dependency on other aspects of the environment [2, 3]. The use of immersive environments which create a feeling of ?presence? naturally allows for more complex social interactions and designed experiences [4]. A particular use of these technologies is in educational settings, where they can enhance learning experiences, foster participation, collaboration, creativity and engagement; creating huge opportunities for integration and research. Effective immersive learning experiences can be created with multiple media using myriad techniques and employing a wealth of knowledge that spans many disciplines. This includes but is not limited to computer science, user experience and media design, the learning sciences, architecture, game development, artificial intelligence, biology, medicine, and thousands of disciplinary and occupational content areas wherein immersive learning and training may be relevant. The Immersive Learning Research Network (iLRN) is ?an international organization of developers, educators, and research professionals collaborating to develop the scientific, technical, and applied potential of immersive learning? [5]. The vision of the network is to develop a comprehensive research and outreach agenda that encompasses the breadth and scope of learning potentialities, affordances and challenges of immersive learning environments. The first international conference iLRN 2015 held in Prague, Czech Republic, attracted a number of high-quality contributions. As a follow-up, this special issue was organised as an open call to seek a wider set of contributions from the research community, including extended versions of iLRN 2015 best papers.

Gross National Happiness in the Context of Networked Learning

Gross National Happiness (GNH) has attained considerable interest as an alternative to the prevalent profit-driven global economy. It is a general prescriptive theory of development, putting happiness at the center rather than economic growth. This theory is originating from Bhutan, but can be applied in any society or area of society; in business, in government, etc. Education is seen as instrumental in implementing a GNH society. With the intent to infuse GNH in the Bhutanese education system all school principals, district education officers, heads of the Royal University of Bhutan (RUB) colleges, and selected academics from RUB colleges were trained to infuse GNH in the country's education system in 2010. How to implement it is a exhilarating challenge, where some educational efforts will be addressed without technology playing a key role, whereas other will utilize networked technologies. In this paper, we theorize outline what GNH may mean in a networked learning context, and as concretization, how networked learning can support infusion of GNH in education. The unfolding of the possibilities are based on conceptual analysis and existing literature, and illustrated by empirical data from the country where GNH is supposedly most devotedly pursued in Bhutan. For example all developmental activities plans and proposals are screened through GNH lens administered by the GNH Commission before approval for implementation by the agencies and organizations. We structure our finding through three relevant areas of ICT support of GNH; Outcome, message and medium. GNH as outcome concerns learning outcomes, GNH as message is when GNH is included in learning materials and curricula, and GNH as medium regards the learning environment designed according to a certain set of principles. While all areas are somewhat evocative, we find ICT-support for the medium the most promising for further research in networked learning. GNH consists of a number of domains, which can be seen as describing an environment, such as cultural diversity, conscious time use, and organic learning materials and buildings. This can be built into online and blended learning environments, and be followed by investigations on what kind of learning that unfolds in them. By exploring the three areas, we sketch a possible research program of GNH. We find GNH a promising agenda that deserves further design-based inquiry.

Symposium 1: Challenges and possibilities for Design Based Research with semantic web technology

This paper addresses the first conference theme of Theories, methodologies, perspectives and paradigms for Research in Networked Learning. The three key themes of the symposium (Designs for learning with the Semantic Web) are discussed by exploring the methodological challenges and advantages that one may experience when conducting design based research with emergent technology. In particular, when technological solutions are developed more or less from scratch, simultaneously and in interaction with the pedagogical practices which make use of these solutions. The outset for this paper is a Design Based Research (DBR) project, which we are currently carrying out at a Danish high school. The project involves development of technological tools based on semantic web (web 3.0) technology. These tools are developed simultaneously and in interaction with the pedagogical practices utilizing the tools. We seek to address the aforementioned main question of the paper by, first, reviewing the stages of DBR-processes as presented by Amiel & Reeves (2008), second, presenting the specific DBR project which is our outset, and third presenting a set of methodological challenges and advantages we have experienced in our work on this project. Through the discussion presented in this paper, we draw attention to several noteworthy challenges and advantages of developing and utilizing emergent-technology-based tools in DBR. Some of these challenges concern the potentially intangible nature of emergent technology and the difficulty of communicating the potentials of the technology to practitioners and other involved parties. Other challenges are more strongly connected with the practical development process. Similarly, we explore noteworthy advantages such as emergent technology potentially granting a greater level of creative freedom in development of solutions and tools while greatly encouraging teacher and student involvement in the development process. This further provides an opportunity for a stronger focus on designing with practice in mind. In addition, the paper argues that DBR projects like the one described in this paper, are actually paradigmatic for investigation of educational contexts in rapid technological and pedagogical change because they not only take this change into account, but fundamentally and significantly build on them.

The glow of unwork? Issues of portrayal in networked learning research

In this paper, we suggest that portrayal of research is often undervalued and seen as ‘unwork' (Galloway, 2012). Portrayal is often seen as an issue that is relatively straight forward by qualitative researchers, and invariably refers to putting the findings of the study together with excerpts from participants and usually, but not always, some interpretation. It tends to be seen as the means by which the researcher has chosen to position people and their perspectives, and it is imbued with a sense of not only positioning but also a contextual painting of a person in a particular way. Yet there are an array of issues and challenges about what portrayal can or might mean in digital spaces. In this paper we argue that researching education in a digital age provides greater or different opportunities to represent and portray data differently and suggest that these ways are underutilised. For example, for many researchers legitimacy comes through the use of participants' voices in the form of quotations. However, we argue that this stance towards plausibility and legitimacy is problematic and needs to be reconsidered in terms of understanding differences in types of portrayal, recognizing how researchers position themselves in relation to portrayal, and understanding decision-making in relation to portrayal. We suggest that there need to be new perspectives about portrayal and concept, and ideas are provided that offer a different view. Three key recommendations are made:1. Portrayal should be reconceptualised as four overlapping concepts: mustering, folding, cartography, and portrayal. Adopting such an approach will enable audiences, researchers and other stakeholders to critique the assumptions that researchers on tour bring to portrayal and encourage reflexivity.2. Researchers on tour should highlight the temporal, mutable and shifting nature of portrayed research findings, emphasising the need for continued and varied research to inform understanding.3. There is a significant need for greater insight into the influence of portrayal, as well as the difference between representation and portrayal. Future studies should prioritise this, and ensure that portrayal is considered and critiqued from the outset.

Discursive psychology as a methodology to explore how multiculturalism affects use of learning technologies

Networked learning remains a new field and many methodological, theoretical and other perspectives are used to learn more about it. Moreover, there is encouragement for the field's interdisciplinary researchers to take alternative methodological approaches. This paper provides valuable insights into a methodological approach which is little used in networked learning research. It reports an exploratory study to establish the value of a discursive psychology lens to understand uses of technology by international learners, and specifically how the language students’ use conveys their practices. The study was prompted when I questioned how multiculturalism might affect an institution’s virtual presence and whether students from alternative cultures had varying online learning needs. Discursive psychology was selected as the methodological approach as it has the potential to show how the social world is enacted in a more insightful and sophisticated way than happens when qualitative data are accepted at face value. The study involved secondary analysis of an ESRC-funded dataset and this paper illustrates analysis of talk by four undergraduate learners from Africa and Asia. The paper shows how participants constructed their identities and gave meaning to their talk. It also exemplifies the dynamics of talk and the work undertaken via the expression of thoughts, and how these supplement the descriptive meaning of words. Aspects of what is emotional about participants' talk are highlighted, including their sense of struggle. A gap is found between students’ uses of technology for learning purposes and what would be required in a networked learning environment. There is also evidence of threshold moments within learners' positioning. It is clear that educational experiences could be enhanced by educators recognising that students' needs vary, evolving over time. An argument to place the learner at the centre and to design from learners' perspectives to be better able to lead them forward from where they are regarding use of technologies to where learning can take place is made. Given this paper's focus on talk from international students it is particularly relevant that those in global online learning contexts appreciate the extent of meaning suggested by this paper's findings. A lack of such awareness carries with it a risk of not sufficiently appreciating what learners are thinking and this gap will leave educators ill-prepared to provide optimal learner-centric support structures.

Symposium 3: Synergies, differences, and bridges between Networked Learning, Connected Learning, and Open Education (#NLbridge)

“We have to build our half of the bridge, no matter who or where we happen to be.” -- Colum McCannThis interactive symposium interprets conference themes in terms of the dialogical phenomenon of boundary crossing, examining the future of networked learning through its relationships with other digital pedagogies, educational practices, and increasingly ubiquitous digital elements of everyday life. In it, we will frame digital networks as boundary objects and modern Þingvellirs: heterotopic (liminal, fleeting and even transgressive, yet potentially empowering) parliaments that facilitate the meeting, negotiation, and decisive action around culture, belief systems, and behaviour. We will argue that to remain relevant in the changing world, the networked learning community must look beyond ourselves and our interpretation of the digital network to “build our half of the bridge” towards other entities existing just beyond our boundaries. The symposium presenters/facilitators will explore with participants why and how the networked learning community might bridge beyond itself and into a broader context, one that situates us in relationship with other pedagogies such as connected learning (Ito et al., 2013) and open education (Weller, 2014); places us intentionally within the rising but potentially productive turmoil between informal and formal learning advocates; and studies our assumptions of both networking and connection through exploration of the apparently “other” practice of disconnection. The symposium papers will be synthesized rather than treated independently, beginning with a précis of the interlinked ideas explored in the three papers. You will then be invited to participate in reflection and conversation. Our conversation prompts will include the following -- please come with your ideas, questions, and insights:• Negotiating openness as individual scholars, educators, and citizens.• Blending informal and formal learning spaces, practices, and networks, and negotiating expectations between students, instructors, and institutions.• Exploring the limits of the network by engaging with the concept of disconnective practice, as a critically reflexive practice of open, networked, and connected learning. Acts of bridging often begin with the process of exploring the core identities of the entities that share a boundary, legitimizing the coexistence of multiple narratives. Then communication and translation take place, with an expectation not of consensus, but of shared understanding and construction of new knowledge (Akkerman & Baker, 2011). Using the symposium hashtag #NLbridge and the conference hashtag #NLC2016, the symposium conversation will begin online before the conference (via our blogs and Twitter), carry on during the conference, and hopefully continue afterward. We hope to facilitate bridging within and beyond the networked learning research community in the form of ongoing reflection, conversation, collaboration, and transformation.