Tear Down the Wall

There's a lot of talk about the "walled garden" of the LMS, but I see a lot of wall and not much garden. Tear down the wall, and then you'll see a whole new world online. [next]




Additional comments:

I consider the standard LMS (we use D2L at my school) to be the single biggest obstacle to making real progress in online teaching. The constraints and assumptions imposed by the architecture of the LMS make it impossible to really explore the social and student-centered possibilities that online learning can offer. The LMS I use in the year 2015 is not fundamentally different in any way from the LMS I was using back in 2001, yet the social web has changed completely during that time with the advent of Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking platforms. I've written about my frustrations with the LMS here: The LMS... again.... In sum: I use the LMS for exactly what needs to be locked down and secure — the Gradebook. For everything else, I rely on the open, connected spaces provided by blogs, wikis, and social networking platforms like Twitter and Pinterest.


The image above is another item from the Proverb Laboratory: Someone who stands behind a wall can see nothing else.

2 comments:

Ken Bauer said...

My favourite slide so far Laura (still working through in order).

Laura Gibbs said...

Oh, I am so glad you like it! That is from my big "summer of proverbs" a few years ago.... and since I picked proverbs based on what clicked with me, of course I was thinking of the LMS when I chose that one. :-)