Knowledge Communities

Virtual teamwork is increasingly becoming a characteristic way of working within and between organisations in the digital economy, bringing both opportunities and drawbacks. This article considers communication in virtual teams and ways in which information and communication technologies (ICTs) can enhance or impede it. It is recognised that the richness of face-to-face communication cannot be captured fully by the tools on offer, although important steps to create team belonging in virtual presence have already been taken. While the tools go some way to permitting distributed team members to interact informally, they cannot go all the way to building and maintaining the personal side of relationships, nor provide stress-relief in many instances. Information overload is highlighted as an example of this failure, and ways to address the problems inherent in ICT-mediated communication and its usage should be sought via inter-disciplinary approaches. On the other hand, the virtual paradigm leads to new organisational forms and organisational culture that tend to strengthen the individual's role in the organisational grapevine.

Technology supplements to college textbooks, such as self-guided quizzes and exercises available over the Internet, have become commonplace. The current study examined student perceptions regarding the utility of technology supplements that accompanied a public speaking fundamentals textbook. At semester's end, students reported the supplements to be less useful than they had expected. The supplements were perceived to be more useful by females than by males. The supplements were reported to be more ...

Almost everyone in India is conscious of the importance and urgency of the Challenges in Education and these are reflected in several other parts of the world as well. Some of these are the challenge of numbers, of relevance, of Quality, of access, of costs and of speed. There is sometimes a sense of paralysis at the enormity of the challenge and the apparent impossibility of managing conflicting expectations. But we need a change in direction, as suggested in the scenario painted by Edward de Bono. “Imagine a ship at sea that is in trouble. The lights keep going out. The engine is faltering. The rudder is unreliable. The first mate is drunk. The crew is very demoralised. The service is appalling. The passengers on the ship are very dissatisfied. Then a new captain and first mate are brought in by helicopter. Very quickly everything changes. The morale of the crew is lifted. Service improves. The engine is fixed. The rudder is fixed. The lights stay on. Everything is fine. But the ship is still heading in the wrong direction.” The solution to these multiple challenges probably lies in a number of disruptive innovative solutions. These include inculcating self-learning (building on meta-cognition), measuring learning, collaborative and co-operative learning, personalisation of learning and learning analytics. However, in addition to new systems or technologies, we need a fundamental change of perspective. Education is seen as the responsibility of the State and the system is based on authority and licenses and permissions to allow education to be transacted in modern times this is unlikely to work. As Henry Maine had said ' as society progresses, it moves from status to contract'. So must the educational system build contractual relationships between the learner and providers of learning as more important than statutory authority. A very promising technological and pedagogical model that has received a lot of attention during the last few years and adoption by Stanford, Harvard, Duke and almost 100 of the world's top ranking Universities to teach millions of learners is that of the MOOC. The MOOC is considered on the one hand as a panacea for education and on the other as a defilement of the sanctity of the higher education tradition. The truth will probably lie somewhere in between and we must explore the potential of MOOCs to create a model of simultaneously teaching on-site and off-site learners, using synchronous and a-synchronous teacher learner interactions to deliver high quality learning to large numbers , maybe evolve a model for a classroom of 10,000 learners. This event is a step in that direction. We are experimenting here with mounting 10 MOOCs in a variety of subjects, for different target groups delivered by a team of Internationally renowned resource persons. We will be exploring several technological platforms and pedagogical models to find answers to a few interesting questions:
 What is the right size of a learning cohort that is empowered with technology?
 What is the right price for tuition?
 What would be the most appropriate technology platform for mass education?
 What is the best way to cope with linguistic diversity?
 What course programs are best delivered as MOOCs?
 What skill sets must learners have to benefit most from MOOCs?
 What skill sets must educators acquire to teach effectively with MOOCs?
I welcome and thank all those who are contributing to make this unique exploratory endeavour a success.
M.M. Pant

This paper reports on an investigation into the online visibility of work undertaken in South Africa in the field of poverty alleviation. An experiment with
Google searches was undertaken, motivated by concerns about the visibility of South African research and development work, particularly in a context where social
inequality is extreme and poverty such a critical issue. Aware that much attention – through research and the practice of development work – is being paid to
poverty alleviation1
, the authors set out to examine whether that work could be found easily, and what the nature of the search results would be. Significant sums
of public money are invested in research, which should result in the production and dissemination of locally generated knowledge as a public good grounded in
local realities. A great deal of national and international funding is also spent. Thus, research published online should inform and reflect on national and regional
development practice, while contributing perspectives from the South to the global corpus of poverty research. Research to understand poverty and inform the design
and targeting of poverty alleviation programmes needs to be freely available and actively shared in order for it to accumulate value. In this regard it is argued that
there are exponentially beneficial linkages between research, scholarly publication and social development, which originate with local knowledge production and
are amplified by the availability and discoverability of that research. Availability and discoverability add breadth and depth to the potential use, value and impact
of the knowledge produced

"Block Printing is the process of using an object to make an inked impression upon a plain surface. It is one of the oldest and most enjoyable of all the crafts and has given color and pattern to paper, cloth, and other surfaces for nearly 4,000 years.
Today the process is essentially the same. As it is simple and impressive, it is ideal for the beginner. "

Communities of practice's approaches have been proven to be effective in enhancing students' learning as well as helping them to cultivate inter personal skills, especially within the higher education system. An important development in relation to participation in communities of practice is members' identities. This study was conducted with the aim of understanding students' identities in relation to their participation in an online community and how the dimensions of their identities correlated to each other. The research participants were 123 first-year students who were involved in collaborative sharing activities via an online community, using Weebly. Data was collected using a set of questionnaires that discussed four main dimensions of identities: personal, professional , as learners, and as members of communities. Data was analysed using SPSS version 22. The overall findings offer a detailed description of students' identities. A high positive correlation was found between students' prior knowledge and their motivation, commitment and beliefs with regard to the benefits of online communities. The only dimension of students' identities that lacked correlation with other dimensions was students' openness. The findings highlight the importance of understanding different aspects of identities and how this helps to enhance engagement in online communities. The findings are significant in terms of establishing a deeper understanding on learning process within a social learning theory.

Op de website van Velov lezen we: “In team dragen we een gezamenlijke verantwoordelijkheid in de opleiding van toekomstige leerkrachten”. Met het thema “Team” willen de organisatoren van Velov de discussie over het belang van samenwerking tussen lerarenopleiders aanzwengelen. Dit symposium richt zich specifiek op “teacher design teams” (TDT) als strategie om lerarenopleiders te professionaliseren. TDTs bieden ruimte aan lerarenopleiders om zich te professionaliseren in een bepaald onderwerp en tegelijk curriculummaterialen te ontwerpen. De vraag is echter hoe dergelijke professionaliseringactiviteiten succesvol geïntegreerd kunnen worden in een lerarenopleiding. Dit symposium bundelt drie studies die elk vanuit een ander perspectief dit vraagstuk bestuderen. In een eerste presentatie worden de bevindingen gerapporteerd uit een Delphi-studie. Deze studie gaat na welke condities van belang zijn voor de implementatie van TDTs voor ICT-integratie in de lerarenopleiding. Een tweede bijdrage richt zich op de uitkomsten van teacher design teams en hoe de processen tijdens de interventie geleid hebben tot nieuwe curriculummaterialen. De derde onderzoeksbijdrage gaat na hoe de participatie van lerarenopleiders aan onderzoekende leergemeenschappen, in samenwerking met leraren, kan bijdrage tot hun eigen professionele ontwikkeling.

a. Les avancées technologiques

Les avancées technologiques ont toujours existé et ont eu un impact important sur les différentes dimensions de la vie. En ce début de siècle, les nouvelles technologies ont mené au développement de nouveaux outils pédagogiques, qui, avec les nouveaux modes de communication ont créé un nouvel état de fait au niveau des formations délivrées jusque là par les moyens classiques.

b. Les acquis de la Psychologie Cognitive

D’autre part, et au delà du simple emploi de l’appareillage technique, l'aspect purement éducatif s’est enrichi des nouvelles avancées de l’approche cognitive, ce qui a mené à éclairer d’un jour nouveau tous les aspects opérationnels qui sous tendent la formation universitaire: La Langue et son rôle formateur, l’appropriation de la connaissance, l’action et son impact sur la conceptualisation et le développement des compétences dans les formations.

c. Problématique et Hypothèse

Ces deux données d'égale importance mettent les éducateurs devant la nécessité d'adopter une nouvelle approche qui se différencie des schémas classiques par son ouverture, sa flexibilité et son efficacité. Est-ce qu’une telle approche nécessite l’adoption d’un nouveau paradigme pédagogique ? Et lequel ? Existe-t-il une stratégie éducative qui répond aux exigences de succès de tels projets académiques? Quelles sont les conditions de succès d'une telle stratégie?

La théorie des Champs Conceptuels forme le canevas théorique de l’approche préconisée. Il s’agira alors de montrer comment ce canevas assure la complémentarité entre une formation par projets, la flexibilité de l’enseignement à distance et les critères de qualité requis. D’où l’hypothèse : Il est possible de mettre au point des formations à distance couplées avec une approche cognitive de résolution de problèmes qui répondent à l’esprit d’innovation et aux exigences de qualité.

Every profession has a core body of knowledge (BoK) that at the very least, uniquely defines and differentiates that  profession within the crowded global landscape of all professions, particularly those that are closely related in terms of purpose, educational and skill requirements, intended audience or market, and tools and practices. Ultimately, a profession's BoK is what legitimizes the profession as a true "profession" in the U.S., as defined by the U.S. Department of Labor.

This article was originally published in the March, 2008 edition of 'Forum' magazine of the Association Forum of Chicagoland. It was targeted at the stakeholders (professional members, leaders, staff, affiliated vendors, ...) of associations/societies that support a designated profession. Although not specifically targeted at them, this article can also provide food for thought for academic fields, industry associations, and other types of organizations within the tax-designated "not-for-profit/NFP/non-profit" sector. However, many in this sector prefer to call it the "social sector" because the social purpose of the organization is much more important to us than its tax status. It also aligns better with the concept of the NGO - non-government organization, used in Europe and a few other areas.

It can also be employed on a universal scale to differentiate and enhance the potential value and interrelationships of professions or specialties by governmental bodies, educational institutions, businesses, and even the public. A dramatic example of the need for a better differentiator between professions/specialties is the American healthcare system, that almost everyone agrees needs a major overhaul. Obamacare is just a baby step or experiment in this direction. It's still a long way from making sense of all the specialties, providers, practices, technologies, services, fees, funding models ... as one critical key to beginning to solve the dilemma of the world's highest healthcare costs (more than double or triple the costs in comparable countries) delivering very poor results (in terms of public health, when compared to those comparable countries).

Typically the BoK of a profession is viewed from the limited perspective of the association function who leads the association's initial attempt to define the BoK of the profession it supports, as evidenced by the typically narrow focus of that project, for example: credentialing standards, exam content, education curricula, web content, best practices, research findings,.... Without something to connect and guide these perspectives toward a common direction, they are likely to sub-optimize the strategic potential of their profession's BoK. This article presents a different approach to BoK based on a belief that the ultimate strategic potential of BOK emerges out of being envisioned, leveraged, shared, and managed as the most valuable asset of the association and the profession it supports!

This paper provides an introduction to the process of of creating a knowledge management system for a small to medium organisation. It looks at a range of strategies and policies which can be used to help capture, transfer, share and create knowledge.

This paper accepts the contingency view of knowledge management and recognises that different approaches to knowledge management are not mutually exclusive and no one approach is instinctively preferable to another. When improving KM or implementing a new system, one must consider the characteristics of the existing KM infrastructure and establish policies and strategies aimed at addressing current, and sustaining future knowledge needs of the organisation necessary to achieve its strategic vision.

What might it mean to use books rather than read them?

This work examines the relationship between book use and forms of thought and theory in the early modern period. Drawing on legal, medical, religious, scientific and literary texts, and on how-to books on topics ranging from cooking, praying, and memorizing to socializing, surveying, and traveling, Carla Mazzio and Bradin Cormack explore how early books defined the conditions of their own use and in so doing imagined the social and theoretical significance of that use.

The volume addresses the material dimensions of the book in terms of the knowledge systems that informed them, looking not only to printed features such as title pages, tables, indexes and illustrations but also to the marginalia and other marks of use that actual readers and users left in and on their books. The authors argue that when books reflect on the uses they anticipate or ask of their readers, they tend to theorize their own forms. Book Use, Book Theory offers a fascinating approach to the history of the book and the history of theory as it emerged from textual practice.

This book, based on a library exhibition at the University of Chicago, has been put online by the University of Chicago library and thus has no restrictions on use.

Introducción
1. La comunidad como explicación y construcción de realidades sociales complejas.
2. Encuadre y perspectivas para la acción comunitaria: del peso de la tradición a los procesos de cambio.
3. Formas y expresiones para la acción-intervención comunitarias.
Bibliografía.

Science communication as an interdisciplinary field of study has always
been concerned with issues of knowledge utilisation. This theoretical paper focusses on the “knowledge” part of knowledge utilisation and provides a conceptual frame to distinguish between different types of knowledge in science-based practice. A practitioner’s knowledge store is portrayed as a dense set of personal knowledge, consisting of procedural knowledge, factual knowledge, potential factual knowledge and opinions/beliefs; the totality of which is continuously refined through more experiences and additional information received from people, documents or events. Implications for future studies of knowledge utilisation in science-based practices are highlighted and a number of questions posed to science communication as a profession.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between broad and select narrow personality traits and knowledge sharing behavior of employees in workplace. This study especially contributes to literature of personality by uncovering the unexplored affective states in the context of knowledge sharing behavior. Sample was drawn by using simple random sampling without replacement technique. To test the hypotheses, correlation, regression and bootstrap mediation procedures were applied to the sample data. Testing a sample of 274 university teachers, significant associations were found between big five traits, proactive personality, creative self-efficacy, and knowledge sharing behavior. Openness to experience, conscientiousness, agreeableness, extraversion, proactive personality and creative self-efficacy were positively related to knowledge sharing behavior, whereas, neuroticism was negatively related to knowledge sharing behavior in workplace. The relationship between extraversion, agreeableness and creative self-efficacy was partially mediated by positive affect and the relationship between neuroticism and knowledge sharing behavior was partially mediated by negative affect. In conclusion, members of organizations, at all levels, should be trained to manage their emotions and affective reactions intelligently to share knowledge effectively and gain maximum benefits from knowledge based assets. In addition, organizational tasks must be assigned to employees with suitable narrow or broad personality traits to maximize the performance level. All the sophisticated, scientific and technical works requiring high level of knowledge sharing should not be assigned to neurotic workers. However, agreeable, extrovert, conscientious and open individuals may handle all knowledge sharing activities effectively. It is also suggested that the works requiring scientific innovation and creativity could better be performed by people high in creative self-efficacy, whereas, knowledge works requiring manual dexterity like technology transfer, industry academia linkages and knowledge based networking can best be done by proactive people.

There is no proper definition about knowledge management; however it can be defined as an approach that is used by the organizations to achieve their objectives with the best utilization of knowledge (Levinson). It is basically a concept in which the enterprise focuses on gathering, organizing, sharing and analyzing its knowledge in different forms like documents, resources and its skilled people. Most of the organizations generate values from its knowledge and intellectual assets. The generation of values involves codifying what the employees and customers know. Moreover, the same information is shared among the enterprise to share knowledge so as to device new knowledge management practices. In knowledge management, the main goal is to push information to people and that involves some processes like data mining. There are a few components of knowledge management that are used by the organizations and enterprises. It is used to generate new knowledge for organizations. Moreover, the knowledge that is accessible from outside sources is also utilized in decision making (Rouse, 2013). The knowledge gained from inside or outside resources is embedded with the products and the processes in organizations. Knowledge gained in one part of the organization must be shared with other parts of the organization. Knowledge management system is important for managers as it helps them in locating the specific knowledge required for specific business processes. Knowledge management is important for organizations in a number of ways. Most of the Businessmen and economists have declared it as the biggest advantage to the modern firms (Levinson). It helps in utilizing the knowledge of the firm and taking further decisions. It is helpful in accelerating the speed of change in organizations. Global interaction of the organization with other organizations has also increased with the help of knowledge management. The intensity of knowledge goods is also increased. Here are few examples of usage of knowledge management in different organizations. An organization that has a database for getting feedback from its employees and its customer benefits from it by gathering knowledge from them. In this way, every customer and employees of the organization will provide its feedback and that information will be shared with other departments like research and development department.

The innovative capacity of cities does not exclusively depend on the innovation processes managed by local firms. This paper considers a multi-level perspective to analyze the crucial role of individuals and communities outside firms in the dynamics of innovation in cities. Through a qualitative study of the communities emerging in coworking spaces in Barcelona, we disentangle the different dynamics of innovation involving community insiders and local actors (firms, citizens and governmental bodies). We argue that coworking spaces act as
intermediaries between creative individuals (“the underground”) and innovative firms (“the upperground”), contributing to the interaction between colocated actors through the articulation of places, spaces, projects and events. The results lead to suggestions for policies to contribute to the emergence and development of innovation in cities by fostering
innovative processes outside firms.

This article explores science cities and their basic characteristics. A brief outline of science cities in different parts of the world is given. A more detailed case description is presented on the most significant science city project in the world, Tsukuba Science City in Japan. Lastly, the future of science cities will be discussed in the light of recent trends and developments.

„Ефектът на пеперудата“ е научна метафора за неочаквано големите последици от незначително събитие в точното време и на точното място. Популярната в Западния свят история разказва, че автор на този образ е американският метеоролог Едуард Нортън Лоренц (1917–2008). Едуард Лоренц е смятан за основоположник на теорията на хаоса (Wikipedia, en.: Edward Norton Lorenz, 27.12.2015; MIT News 2008-04: Edward Lorenz..., 27.12.2015; Dizikes 2011). На негово име е наречен центърът за геофизически изследвания на климата на Масачузетския технологичен институт, където той преподава дълги години (MIT Lorenz Center, URL: https://eapsweb.mit.edu/research/lorenz, 27.12.2015).

In the era of the 21st century, the best higher education institutions have more than one role. Not only do they educate and train students but they also create new ideas and knowledge for the short-term contemporary issues as well as long-term complex problems. In the strategic goals, five aspects are critical in higher education: the democratization of knowledge and access, the contestability of the market and funding, the research technologies, the global mobility and the integration with the industry. Universities should have strategic plans including strategic goals. In this study, the strategic models and plans of the public (5) and private (5) universities are analysed from the five different aspects. In order to deeply understand the dynamics at these universities, the phenomenological interpretive analysis is preferred. University leaders
and managerial departments should consider market needs and do strategic plan accordingly. Hence, they should develop the strategic thinking capacity of both their academic staff and researchers for short and long terms need of the industry. Results have shown that most universities have wrong perception regarding the strategic model and plan. Neither private nor public universities possess enough knowledge on the subject.
Keywords: Higher education, university and industry partnership, strategic model and planning, higher education management, financing of higher education.

What is DTH?
Direct to Home, or DTH as it is popularly known is a technology capable of bringing the television signal directly to our home from the transmission station through a satellite and bypassing the cable system. Today's DTH technology has its origins in the Direct Reception Satellite (DRS) dishes used during the SITE experiment of 1975. DTH technology is ideally suited to localities where cable TV cannot reach and technically superior to the transmission delivered through cable, and permits even the transmission or reception of stereo audio. By using DTH technology, viewers will be paying for what they want to see, instead of being forced to accept

Abstract:
Over the past two decades, Information & Communication Technology (ICT) has become an essential tool for all areas of life. In many countries information and communication technology has a clear impact on the development of educational curricula and has fundamentally transformed all business and governance across the world. Education is a very socially oriented activity and quality education has traditionally been associated with strong teachers having high degrees of personal contact with learners. The use of ICT in education lends itself to more student-centred learning settings. Moreover, with the world moving rapidly into digital media and information, the role of ICT in education is becoming more and more imperative, and will continue to develop in this age. In this proposal, a literature review regarding the effective use of ICTs for education will be investigated, along with its effectiveness in teaching learning process; quality and accessibility of education, learning motivation.

În societatea actuala, în care accesul la date si informatii este tot mai usor de realizat gratie ritmului de dezvoltare a tehnologiilor informatiei si telecomunicatiilor, se pune problema de a cunoaste tot mai mult, de a sti cum sa folosesti imensitatea de informatii pe care o poti avea la un moment dat. Astfel, în aceasta lucrare am încercat sa sintetizam terminologia si opiniile aparute legate de concepte relativ noi, precum cunostinta, management al cunostintelor, capital intelectual, exemplificând câteva initiative care s-au bucurat de succes, pe care le-au avut în acest domeniu diferite firme de renume.