After last nights session on Elluminate I fell to thinking about facilitating and communities and this Blog is about what I came up with.
- To sustain a community there needs to be rules and boundaries that clearly define what a community is. These can start with what the philosophy of the community is and why we meet, why we are a community.
- There needs to be a clear structure on how to join and leave the community and some process in place that monitors ongoing activities or lack thereof.
- Once the community starts to develop through warming up exercises, or structured internal community activities then the community can invite or entertain guests, but only with the communities approval. This can be facilitated by the facilitator who should possess expert knowledge as to what can be offered from outside.
- Have a Plan A, B, C, D to cope with technology failure
- Community members should be honest in their feedback and processes should be in place to ensure that honesty is met with open discussion.
- Online meetings should have the same standards as face-to-face interactions. No chatting off the subject, keep to the point, observe time. Facilitate well.
- These rules should be subject to debate and renegotiation as the community develops.
I came to these conclusions because I feel as though our online learning community has some difficulties.
I looked at the list of members (that is the official members) in the course and at best, 4-5 of the original 15 members take part in the Elluminate sessions and sometimes only 1 or 2. I have not heard much from Kerry, Grant, Debbie, Kevin, Jackie, Danny (I know has left), Gary, or Donna.
As noted last night the Alumni have largely been absent. What happened to them?
To speculate that members have either left or are negative because of lack of motivation or because they are struggling with the material is malicious in that is unsubstantiated rumour.
It is only plain courtesy to ask to join if you are late.
Reflections in Blogs should reflect what a session says, not what has been read around the subject.
Do we have a community philosophy? Do we all buy into the notion that Web 2.0 is a wonderful new tool that is revolutionizing education? Here is an interesting article that looks at how we might apply some critical analysis to our Web2.0 experience http://www.techlearning.com/story/showArticle.php?articleID=47102021.
Do we think that face-to-face teaching is forever doomed to be paternalistic?
Do we all buy into the notion that using the best of all teaching methods is a better way to go?
Here is an interesting link to the world of Virtual Worlds
http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2007/10/digging_deeperyour_guide_to_vi.html
It sums up a lot of my feelings (and frustrations) with this new technology.
The hype is greater than the reality. Here’s a down-home take from a banjo player http://tangiersound.wordpress.com/2007/06/15/digital-folklore/
Some random provocations
In New Zealand broadband is so crap that YouTube, Virtual world, and even some things like Elluminate just don’t work fast and well enough that they cause frustration and therefore are not a viable teaching tool
There is no intellectual rigour with Web 2.0 content. Here is a link to a site which shows some promise in developing effectiveness practices
http://www.sloan-c.org/effective/
Most Bloggers can’t write to save themselves and a large proportion have nothing useful to say (that’s partly why they Blog). Some useful advice
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/writebetter
There is some use for this technology but we should not blindly accept it. What are the organisational factors that have driven us to think this is the next best thing?
14 comments:
Hi Graeme,
I like your principles of communities especially 1 & 2.
A few queries/observations
Re: 6) I personally often allow some off the subject chatting in my f2f classes if it is related to the subject, or if I feel that it's important for the socialisation of the group. I'm not sure I see the need to ban this in the virutal classroom.
However I think you might be referencing the use of the messaging window in Elluminate. I find this to be a mixed blessing. Sometimes it's good to get other peoples perspectives running through the window, but it often distracts me from what the person who is speaking is trying to say. This seems to me to be at odds with cognitive load theory (which I personally find quite useful for understanding online learning). Also I've noticed that often people have conversations through the window which aren't directly related to what the speaker is saying. This to me is analagous to texting your mates in class - disrespectful and disruptive.
I was wondering actually if it's possible to turn off the messaging window from time to time???
You say
"Reflections in Blogs should reflect what a session says, not what has been read around the subject."
It seems to me that one of the real benefits of reflection is to make connections between fragments of knowledge. Why do you think content outside of what has been covered in a session should not be discussed/related?
Re: technology & hype
I agree that there is a fair amount of hype around this as there has been previously when other teaching tools have been introduced, and you're right - we shouldn't just drop other means of teaching & jump headfirst into online facilitation necessarily. However I think that the technology does offer some real benefits, and it does make sense as educators to familiarise ourselves with these benefits so that if the opportunity presents itself we can make use of them in our teaching. Personally I'm quite excited by the potential, and we are making some major changes to our programme to make use of some of this potential however I recognise that there are still components of our programme that are best taught f2f, and that will always be the case.
Also thanks for your pointer to Sloan-C. Looks like a really useful resource.
Thanks for the comments David. I was being deliberately provocative in order to drag out some comments.
1. I talked about reflections because I wanted to emphasis that the content on the 10 minute lectures is often sparse (probably because its only 10 min) and that I would like to see the reflection say that the writers reflection is about extra reading that was done and where that came from.
2. I agree about the off the topic talking being useful sometimes but not when it becomes distracting to the main topic(which I found on Monday).
Once again thanks for responding in a constructive way
Hi Graeme
I like your set of guidelines.
What kind of 'rules and boundaries' are you thinking about? Do you think this is something the group should set up at the start - perhaps this could be the ice-breaker?
The 'clear structure' seems an important one for me - still getting the 'lost' feeling with this paper. In a face-to-face class we would have a handbook or student guide - same idea do you think?
What do you see as the "processes" which "should be in place to ensure that honesty is met with open discussion"? Do you think this is not apparent in our course?
"Do we all buy into the notion that Web 2.0 is a wonderful tool that is revolutionizing education?" Er, no, I wouldn't say so from my limited experience! I think that the tools I've been exposed to have possibilities in given learning situations but many educators have no idea of their existence (Survey results from UK http://tallblog.conted.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/survey-summary.pdf ). Finding new teaching/learning tools is mostly an enjoyable experience for me but applying them effectively in context is the tricky bit. This is where your experience of your subject/students/course requirements/institution etc. comes into play.
And yes, NZ broadband is crap :) lol
Cheers
Yvonne
Last I heard, G was on dial up.. all of it is ultimately limited by the quality of the end user's lines :(
I suspect that I would be quite frustrated in your online learning community Graeme. It seems to me that you are considering environments suitable for the lowest common denominator of skills and access to information and communication technology. In many ways this is good in terms of universal access and utilitarian benefits, but how much might you be holding someone back, or restricting their preferred or even (dare I say it) undiscovered "learning styles" by doing this at the exclusion of teh more contemporary or experimental methods?
I guess in this day and age it is inevitable that these disconnects will happen, and I spose the self taught Web2-ites have the www luxury of finding other learning communities in your subject area (should they want to study it) if they feel limited by your sobering limitations.
They main questions I wanted to propose is: by limiting your use of info comms in your consideration of developing online learning communities for the less experienced, are you inadvertently limiting yourself and some of those who subscribe to you as teacher?
Bigger picture.. are there really universals? or is it just a method of grouped efficiency, or two wolves and a sheep you are talking about here? Does this new technology - coupled with traditional teaching methods, not at the exclusion of afford us the ability to individualise more?
Hi Graeme, I must admit, you made me laugh with this last post and obviously it has caused some interest if the comments are anything to go by. I have a couple of comments to make.
1. I like the idea of some guidelines, and some structure may be very helpful especially to newbies who are finding their way around social networking. However, I am concerned that if the 'rules' are too rigid, you will inhibit people's interaction and may lose connection with people. I believe this is just as true of F2F classes.
2. I agree that we must evaluate these tools & that evaluation should be a part of our planning & implementation. At the same time, these are exciting innovations, and I don't think we should be afraid to explore alternative ways of 'being' with students.
3. What people should remember to do on Elluminate is to 'talk' to each other privately away from the main group-maybe we should remind ourselves to do that at the next session.
I think you might enjoy Bill Kerr's blog Graeme. He has gradually been increasing his critical volume on "web2-ism" and points to a great many supporting arguements whenever he posts on the topic. Hope you connect with it.
try that link again: http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2007/10/pity-web20-evangelicals.html
I must admit that I baulked a bit when I re-read some of the comments but I appreciate your feedback.
Leigh,is there something about me that invites prostrate comparisons?
Yes! I am on dial-up at home but it still allows me to participate in Elluminate sessions, maintain a Blog, use emails and albeit, in time, watch some video content. I also use broadband at Poly and still find the technology slow and dodgy, so my comments are not limited by my geographic location or wish to stay with a technology which serves me perfectly well for writing, maintaining a database of sailing in Otago, doing my business etce ewtc. I feel no need to buy the new flash gismo that is redundant in a week.
Sarah, I withdraw a little from the word 'rules' as it is not really what I mean. They are guidelines only but guidelines that would provide much more structure to our work, at least at the beginning of the course.
Hi Graeme,
I see you have been thinking out loud. Great! I'd like to make a couple of points - one is about honesty. While I do agree that this is a good idea, its really important that honesty is also considerate (cf brutal!). There are times when it is better to say nothing than to risk destroying someone. So I think that the issue is that the feedback is constructive. This should be role modeled by the lecturers to set the scene for ongoing exchange of ideas and feelings about the course.
I also do not particularly like the chatting that goes on in Elluminate and have commented in my Blog. However, its great when the comments are constructive and on the topic in hand, otherwise it feels like chatting at the same time as the lecturer.
Keep thinking!!
Hi there Graeme
I agree with some of your observations eg text chatting on elluminate, but I wouldn't want us to get bogged down in rules and regulations.
I quite like this flexible approach but more guidance and monitoring would probably have prevented me from becoming so lost and confused at times. Nevertheless I have made huge gains in my understanding of what goes on in cyberspace from being part of this group.
One of the problems that I'm sure can happen in any community, is that tentative newbies (like myself) often place themselves on the periphery being more observational and less participatory, but where it can be so easy to disappear without being noticed. So I've been thinking about ways to draw in students like myself, which will appear in my next blog post.
By the way your postings are always very thought-provoking and make for good reading.
Hi again Graeme, lol nope - prostrate has nothing to do with the link I sent you. I'm not that black am I?
Bill is doing some deeper digging into a critical analysis of web2. I'm sorry you missed that aspect of his blog. The health issues Bill has been experiencing lately are only a recent addition to his blog.
Regarding your connection speed. The Polytech is by no means a measure of broadband. We have so many users all sharing the same connection that most of the time our speed is not much better than dial up. See if you can try out a friends broadband and see if you notice a difference then.
"The hype is greater than the reality" struck me as a pretty moronic statement - but then again I just got home from a tour of Europe to visit with some of the folks who learned how to play the banjo and the guitar using my printed and web-based instructional materials.
If web-based learning is giving you any kind of difficulty it might be wise to look closely at how you are approaching the problem rather than blaming the technology or the Web 2.0 philosophy.
-Patrick Costello
graeme-aworldaway.blogspot.com; You saved my day again.
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