Is there structure in the Virtual Choir project?

Q. Part of the Virtual Choir experience seems, as you describe it, very structured — in what ways do you see the project as being an example of informal learning?

As with many informal learning experiences, some structure is necessary and is a good thing.  Perhaps the single most important aspect of choral singing is following the cues of an instructor.  In this case, having a recorded instructor track with an accompaniment helped to keep singers together and singing in the same key.  There were also good guidelines of how to record and upload the video.  Maintaining correct file formats for the videos and a logical submission process is critical when dealing with thousands of people from around the world.

The informal learning that was unstructured occurs first as this is outside of an educational curriculum, as defined by Livingstone. Also the methods of learning the music were very unstructured.  You could use the guide tracks that were provided, but based on my study, many people learned the songs by watching other postings and following along.  Some printed the music and practiced at a piano.  The setting is also informal and unstructured, which would put this down in the bottom of Sefton-Green’s quadrant. One participant from the most recent project is a deaf & mute singer that participated in the project by submitting a video of herself signing along with the music.  Even though she didn’t fit the original mold, she created her own learning and changed the structure.  Her contribution touched many people that participated in the project.

So while there was some initial structure to the project, both the setting and the curriculum would be considered informal.

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walking-around-lived-experience-that-results-in-new-knowledge. Is this informal learning?

Q. If informal learning can be characterized as all the learning that doesn’t take place in school, what is the difference between informal learning and the walking-around-lived-experience-that-results-in-new-knowledge? Who are the populations of interest within informal learning research?

In some definitions they could be one and the same. I would agree that walking-around-lived experience is absolutely a part of informal learning and should be considered as learning.  That is one of the Sefton-Greens arguments as well. He argues that, “learning in out-of school settings needs to be accorded status and understanding as we seek to enhance the education system more generally” (p. 6, 2004). But this is too broad of a scope for me.  That is why I am focusing on online informal environments.

The populations of interest in informal learning vary greatly.  Sefton-Green and others focus on children in out-of-school contexts. My minor advisor in the Learning Sciences, Dr. Kylie Peppler, has focused much of her research on children and the intersection of the arts and new media in informal spaces. Other researchers from the Learning Sciences such as Dr. Kevin Crowley, from Pittsburgh, study museum learning and its connection to STEM. Business consultants and researchers, such as Jay Cross, focus on encouraging informal learning in the workplace. Our own recent work with Dr. Bonk on MOOCs and self-directed learning environments has shown examples from all ages.  There is high emerging interest in these populations.  The virtual choir had participants ranging from under 10 (with the help of a parent), to a woman in her 80’s from over 100 countries.

If I can go back to Sefton-Green’s criteria notice that he focuses on both structure and intentions. “the distinction between informal and formal learning…, can more clearly be made around the intentions and structure of the learning experience” (p. 6, emphasis added). Perhaps having the intention to learn could distinguish informal learning as an academic field from every-day lived experience. However, I would still consider those everyday experiences as informal learning, even though trying to investigate and research that would be very difficult.

Is “informal” the same as “unstructured”?

Q. In your view, as you have adopted Sefton-Green’s criteria, would the term “informal” be equivalent to “unstructured”?  What do you see as the elements of “structure” applicable to curriculum and setting?

It depends on how you are defining structure, but in my definition, yes I would say that they could be equivalent. Julian Sefton-Green is a Principal Research Fellow at University of Oslo working on projects exploring learning and learner identity across formal and informal domains, and is someone that I have started reading over the past year. (Appendix A) In fact in his literature review, Sefton-Green (2004) takes this idea of informal and structure a step further and says that, “the distinction between informal and formal learning…, can more clearly be made around the intentions and structure of the learning experience” (p. 6, emphasis added). As Sefton-Green points out, there is a quadrant when looking at informal learning.

One of the contributions that Sefton-Green adds to the definition of D.W. Livingstone (2000), is that Livingstone refers to only, “the curricula of educational institutions.”  I still follow this definition as it does encapsulate my work, but adding the quadrant of Sefton-Green provides more clarity and focus.

For example, two years ago my W210 students and I helped facilitate a “passions project” at the local Bloomington Project School.  The passions project was a three-week project where we helped the students learn about Lego Mindstorm robotic kits.  These were 6^th -8^th grade students in a classroom setting, with an instructor, and visiting education majors from IU.  In other words, this was a pretty formal setting.  But the activities and curricula were very unstructured.  The objectives for the project were to work in groups and pick something to build out of the lego kits, and ultimately program the object to move or do something.  Each group could set their own objectives. One group made a car that could change directions when it hit an object. One of the kids was much more interested in learning about the computer programming of the object while others had more interesting in building the car and making it stronger so it wouldn’t break. These activities were less structured, but still in a formal setting. These could also include the Boys and Girls Club or a neighborhood Computer clubhouse. My minor advisor Dr. Kylie Peppler from the Learning Sciences, has done extensive work in researching the role of informal learning at the intersection of the arts and new media in these spaces.

Contrast this with someone participating in something like the Virtual Choir, which would be lower on the scales of curriculum and setting. Online learning, or some MOOCs might be informal settings as you can participate from your home or anywhere, yet have highly structured (more formal) curriculum with set assignments and objectives

Traditional K-12 schools would be generally highly structured and highly formal.  Adventure Learning, which I mentioned before, might be right in the middle of both scales.  Some AL projects start with a designed curriculum, in a school, but they may deconstruct that curriculum and iterate on it during the project depending on the findings of the explorers and researchers. Students may follow the curriculum during the school day learning about an ‘animal of the day,’ but they also interact with the adventurers/researchers after school or by following along on blogs, webcams, or webcasts. There are many other examples that I could place on this, but these are ones that I am most familiar with.

This is a pretty long way of showing how yes; I do think that structure could be viewed in the same way as informal.  But this explanation has also shown how the different definitions of informal learning are important. Sefton-Green’s definition built on Livingstone and provides clarity.

Since I am also following Sefton-Green’s definition, structure is a part of both curriculum and setting.  So I think that as they relate to curriculum and setting, it is not a simple question of marking something as ‘yes, this is informal’ vs ‘no, this is formal.’ They are degrees and there are times and situations where each may be more or less appropriate depending on the learner.  In some cases more structure may be appropriate, where others it would be less appropriate. This is an area where my background in IST may help to understand how more structure could be beneficial in some informal learning environments. It’s all about creating structures for learners. These structures may be dependent on age, familiarity with the context, may be more structured at first then become less structured at the end.  The environment needs to be able to be flexible and so does the structure.