LOST IN TECHNOLOGY BLENDED, ELECTRONIC OR AUGMENTED, IT’S JUST LEARNING

Lost in technology, with so many e-tools at our disposal, so many options and different routes to try, we often forget the main goal of any platform: learning.

Having newer technologies does not mean that they are necessarily “better”, too often we overestimate the role of the technical means, fostering a blind acceptance of the online learning platform developments and forgetting completely the pedagogy that should direct its improvements.
At the same time, it is of pivotal importance to fine-tune the pedagogical approaches, and the consequent organization of the learning activities, in order for them to be effective in their objectives and coherent with the available technical means; otherwise, they remain a mere expression of educational theory.

Finally, we need to create a well-organized learning path and tailor its contents to both the technological platform and the pedagogical approach. An excess of unstructured information, in fact, would be highly ineffective for learning.
In this context, choosing a platform cannot be disentangled from the creation of new learning paths, based on innovative yet coherent pedagogical approaches.

Taking into account this reasoning, at the University of Urbino we tested and compared, against more than 100 indicators, five among the best augmented learning solutions: OpenLoL, moodle, docebo, adobe connect and it’s learning. Via this research, we were able to identify “it’s learning” as the learning platform which was best for our specific educational needs.
This article describes how new pedagogical approaches are experienced and best practices established, considering the innovative tools that the platform offers. Scope of this pilot period with “its learning” is not just to exploit at maximum the pioneering and sometime original tools that the software provides, but also to explore new learning paths for augmented learning.