Mike Caufield

Mike Caulfield is an academic, expert on digital literacy , and the author of an essay called “The Garden and the Stream” (2015) that is often cited as the origin of the digital garden idea. According to his website, he is a proponent of open education resources (OER), having worked on MIT’s Open Courseware project.

He has worked with Ward Cunningham, whose Federated Wiki wiki was an inspiration for Caulfield’s seminal essay.

Mike Caulfield is currently the director of blended and networked learning at Washington State University Vancouver. An early believer in the idea of civic digital literacies, his work in this area intensified in spring of 2016. His February 2017 work, Web Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers, won the Merlot Award for best open learning resource in the ICT category. He was a runner up in the Rita Allen/RTI International Misinformation Solutions Award (2018). His SIFT model, a practical approach to quick source and claim investigation, encourages readers to take a minute or two to seek out basic information about sources and claims before they engage more deeply with media, and, if necessary, to move on to better material. It is based on research of Sam Wineburg and his own experiences helping faculty to teach critical consumption in the classroom.

Mike is also known for his use of collaborative technology in the classroom, and worked with wiki inventor Ward Cunningham from 2014-2016 on the use of federated wiki in education. His 2015 essay The Garden and the Stream is credited with launching the “digital gardens” movement. He was an early proponent of the use of Open Educational Resources, and worked for MIT as the first director of community outreach for the OpenCourseWare Consortium in the mid-2000s.

• Source: https://hapgood.us/about/