I'm curious to know if anyone is formally using web 2.0 concepts in e-learning?

I say "formally" because for years before the label came along many e-learning environments used aspects of web 2.0 (e.g. social networking, user-generated content, and an approach to designing the online experience that was very user-centric). Of course many did not (the expedient one way "delivery" of canned content being still very much with us).

Has anyone been leveraging the buzz and learning from shared experiences in their learning designs? What have the problems been? How has it worked out?

I have always found that encouraging learners to contribute - particularly examples and experiences that really humanize and contextualize course content - makes the learning experience so much more relevant and valuable. Yet I still have ongoing "political" problems with project sponsors who feel that learners should absorb what they are given in a highly structured environment, and not contribute to the process.

Godfrey Parkin

Godfrey, you might be interested in the Powells' review of the book "The Social Life of Information." About two-thirds of the way into the review, the reviewer describes how Xerox went from a one-way to a two-way system to help field technicians diagnose problems. A snippet:

"Any technician who had solved a difficult case would simply write up his findings and a committee of technicians would decide whether the material merited inclusion in the Eureka database. Since Xerox adopted it, Eureka has achieved spectacular results. In its first three years, it logged 30,000 case histories from employees, and is estimated to have saved Xerox $100 million."

Here's a link to the review:
http://www.powells.com/review/2007_09_10.html?&PID=18

Also, Tom Kuhlmann has blogged about some ways to include chat features in elearning:

http://tinyurl.com/2294hs

Cathy

Thanks for the links, Cathy.

Web 2.0 is very much a component of what we were calling "informal learning" a couple of years ago.

A long time back (in the mid to late 1990s) I ran an elearning business that leveraged group chat extensively. Part of the required learner work was participation in several hour-long instructor-led chat discussions where they were encouraged to share their practical experiences relevant to what they were learning. Learners could pick topics of interest at times that were convenient.

All those sessions were logged, proper names were removed, and then they were archived in a library that was keyword searchable. Over time, with tens of thousands of learners contributing, we built up a massive database of shared experience that had more value than the course content: past learners were willing to pay more per year to have access than they had paid to participate in their courses!

Godfrey Parkin

That archive of learners' experience is a great idea. It's unfortunate that so much elearning is seen as one-way information delivery, especially since we have so many ways we can include the learners' experience (chat, wikis, forums, those widgets that let you leave comments on any site...). I think the underlying problem is a need for control combined with the unfortunately common belief that "teaching" means "lecturing" and nothing more.

Part of the problem is the practical reality of a trainer's life (nobody has time beyond the classroom) and a trainer's political constraints (the job responsibility does not extend beyond the classroom).

While we look to trainers to evolve with what they are learning from their learners, and incorporate that back into ongoing improvements in what they do, their hands are often tied by rigid instructional design constraints.

Any individual trainer can only absorb input from his/her specific learners, and the time constraints of most learning environments mean that only a fraction of that shared experience ever gets carried forward.

The web (especially social networks) can act as a means to collect, extend and perpetuate group memory, and make it accessible to others.

Godfrey Parkin