Saturday, June 29, 2013

The "It" Factor

Community building has been on my mind this week. As one of the few outside guests in another institution's  online seminar for faculty learning to teach online, I've been grateful to be included. During this week's module, we've been discussing what the "it" is that can draw a group of strangers together into true community.

Is there something essential about face-to-face connections for building a community of learners? My experiences with another online group focused on learning teaching confirm for me that face-to-face meetings aren't essential to building community. (However, I learned in that group and again in this summer's seminar that building community in an online-only environment can bring extra challenges.)

If being face to face isn't "it," what is? Is it time? Can a community be built in 6 short weeks? Well, yes--or at least the start of a community. As I can testify from experience, the National Writing Project's Summer Institutes have an amazing track record for developing communities of writing teachers. Long after their initial summer experiences together, these teachers continue to support one another and work collaboratively in their growth as writers and writing teachers.

If location and duration aren't the key, it must be something else. I keep coming back to shared commitments, practices, and language. And I can't stop thinking about Wenger's work on communities of practice--communities that emerge through mutual engagement, joint enterprise, and shared repertoire. I suspect that a thoughtful review of Wenger could help me a great deal as I think about designing significant learning experiences that inspire learners to commit whole-heartedly to building something meaningful together.....whether those experiences happen online or elsewhere. I hope to re-read soon!

I've relied on a quick nod to Wenger to help me define community. I appreciate the way that his ideas and language resonate with scholarship in my field as well as with my work in the context of a faith-based college where we are intentional about helping students to live and learn together in Christian community.

But I'm always interested to hear other perspectives. Who/what do you read, watch, or listen to when you want help thinking more deeply about community?




Saturday, June 22, 2013

BYOD....T? (Bring Your Own Device Technician?)

My adventures in online learning continue. This week, I've been asked to revisit some programs that I've used previously (VoiceThread, Jing) and to check out a few others that I've heard of before (Audacity--which I haven't used because I have a digital recorder) as well as to try one that's new to me (Voki, an avatar creator).

I'm auditing my course as a guest from another institution, and the hardware that I'm using differs from that used by most students in the course. The technical questions I have aren't the kind I'd want to ask my instructor, as they are questions specific to my device. What to do?

When I asked a colleague of mine about this, he shared that in his online teaching, he rolls out the welcome mat for technical questions--but he also advises students to find someone local who can look over their shoulders at their devices when they run stuck. In so many words, he suggests that when they bring their own device, they also ensure that they also "bring" their own technician.

My colleague doesn't require students to make these kinds of arrangements for local technical support, and I can assure you that he isn't trying to push them away. (He really does love to help others solve technical mysteries, and he's a great teacher!)

Rather, he knows that for most of us, it's really challenging to learn a new technology and new content at the same time. Learning a new digital technology means learning a new language--a new set of codes, symbols, and actions--and doing that while learning the practices of a discipline (diction, theories, practices, resources) takes a lot of "extraneous cognitive load" (Clark, Nguyen, & Sweller, 2006). He also knows that many students may be shy about asking an instructor for help--regardless of how much they need it.

I like my colleague's advice to his students: it makes sense when I think about it through the lens of my experience. We have excellent technical support on our campus, and I've been able to take advantage of that in-person help to improve my online learning experience. For me, it's been great to know that I can work through learning the big ideas of the online class -- with the assurance that help is just a drop-in visit away when my computer and I need some help getting along.

But what about students who aren't well connected with someone whom they can easily (and comfortably) access for in-person help? No instructor can expect to offer remote technical support for every technical problem that a diverse array of students (with their diverse array of devices!) will bring to a given course. Given that reality, it strikes me that an institution offering an online course

  1. Is responsible to notify students in advance about the technologies that they'll need to use, and at what level of proficiency
  2. Would be wise to provide students with advance online access to tutorials for the technologies that they'll need to use. 
This two-pronged approach allows students to make informed choices about their readiness for a course--and if they determine they aren't yet ready, it may also allow them to get ready (time and other resources permitting).

Kudos to the instructor for my seminar, who shared this kind of information in advance through the syllabus and also advised us to download programs and apps in advance. The goal, I think, is to help our students prepare in advance for installation and configuration--so that when they come to class, they can focus on application.

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Truancy and Dropping Out

For the first time in my life, I can identify a bit with students who skip out--and perhaps even with those who eventually drop out. Two modules of my online seminar flew by without me in the past two weeks, and now I'm behind. Catching up is going to be tough, and a little part of me wonders if I'll be able to do it. I briefly wondered whether I should even try.....but here I am.

My truancy wasn't anything out of the ordinary: a vacation that I'd scheduled long ago (looooong before I had the opportunity to enroll in the seminar) made it tough to do my homework. Access to the right technologies was one problem--the little tablet I had along made the type of homework I had to do an inconvenience. But there was also another important issue: priorities. Doing homework on vacation would have felt more like work than vacation, and it would have taken me away from the time with family that all of us needed after an unusually hectic year.

It seems that I'm not alone. Stanford-Bowers' study on persistence in online education concludes that for students, convenience and flexibility are major factors in their decision to enroll in online courses--and that "when course requirements and activities tend to conflict with convenience and flexibility, students tend to neglect or leave the courses" (2008, p. 48).

What can we do about it? I'm not sure. But I can tell you a little about why I'm back and chipping away at my catch-up work.

  1. Community. I have a few classmates who I know well and helped to persuade to take this seminar, and I want to jump back into working on this together with them and make sure that I make good on my commitments. 
  2. Personal goals: I want to know more about how to teach online, and I believe that finishing the required experiences in the seminar will be valuable to that end. 


Perhaps those motivators can be instructive to us as we design and teach online courses.

  • Community. If my students disappear for a time, I may need to reach out to them personally to help them reconnect with our community--and while an email might do the trick, picking up the phone might feel more real and therefore more motivating. Perhaps classmates who know the student well can also reach out. 
  • Personal goals. Helping my students to identify how the course helps them meet personal goals--and giving them opportunities to revoice this along the way--may help to reinforce the value of the experience.
  • Valuable experiences. The value I see in the seminar I'm taking goes far beyond a certificate or grade at the end of the road. (In fact, I'm not sure that we get either one in the end!) I've already seen that this course is designed as a series of significant learning experiences, and I want the benefit of those experiences. 
  • Flexibility. My instructor let me know that I'd be able to rejoin and pick up where I left off when I returned. This small move was significant in it's own way. 
Here I am....back "on course" and ready to keep learning.