Posts made by Sarah Haavind

Cindy, Syl and I have been around this virtual block long enough -- as have so many of you! -- to know that all the learning afforded by our presence in this seminar is not evident here in the pages of our brief, albeit engaging discussion. For myself, I will say that agreeing to collaborate on this event was a great way  to gain a deeper understanding of Cindy's challenging critique of a framework that has helped so many of us, including myself, to "see" the patterns of dialogue in asynchronous learning networks, and to draw useful conclusions about effective practice. I hope our forum was beneficial for others as well, beyond those who actively participated.

That said, a major thank you to Curt, Nick, Barbara and David for jumping in, and to Cindy for crafting such a thoughtful article that clearly advances our collective understanding of how to foster high quality communities of inquiry.

Sylvia mentioned some messages she received from others who sent their regrets -- thank you to those thoughtful colleagues as well! And most of all, thank you Sylvia, our unfailing Scope Coordinator, for organizing this opportunity.

Warmest regards to all,

Sarah

I have kept my ear to the ground these last eleven days, listening with anticipation for which directions this richly pre-loaded dialogue might point us in this open environment.

David jump-started us with his observation: our students expect more and would already be yawning in a discussion environment like this. Curt followed up with a plethora of stimulating ideas for situating asynchronous, text-based dialogue within a larger, more widely orchestrated course arena with his 30+ ideas and counting. Fabulous!

Nick mulled over the inherent concepts of community, openness and the goal of fostering a disposition towards learning and each other questioning the concepts and wondering out loud whether we have or have not yet found a cultural format for thinking together globally and indicating an intended disposition towards each other (as much as towards any particular content). He asks: Does social media point us to other 'dispositional' and 'design' alternatives?

In my current work I believe I am building on that helpful question by combining a social (ning) network platform with more formal professional development for teachers. They do their own PD independently, using the collaborative social environment to support and scaffold their personal professional learning. It is sort of a closed Classroom 2.0 with specific learning targets for improving teaching effectiveness – but open design, as far as participants deciding what to do and how to do it. We still include asynchronous discussion forums among other synchronous, video, links to resources, etc. for pursuing deepened knowledge co-construction. The jury is still out, I think, on whether social media can support real work getting done more fruitfully and effectively (and engagingly) than academic papers and discussion forums (David quietly yawns in my ear).

At my first read of Cindy’s critique, I resonated with her insight about the difference between identifying presences broadly and more specifically considering multiple “communicative functions” in order to “examine the dynamics of the dialogue in terms of how it engages the participants at each moment and develops the subject matter over time (page 4, printerFriendly Xin). Clearly the attention CoI has drawn since it was first presented alludes to its usefulness for seeing learning dynamics in broad terms. As Cindy notes: The CoI encourages one to think about what a successful conference would entail, it does not adequately account for how to get there or make it happen (p. 5). The “what” indeed helped, but now for the “how.” As Barbara notes, It’s a deep dive! and then she wonders, “how does the CoI help me to understand and explain my own behaviours in online discussion?”

That made me think of parallel processing, right? Syl suggested we try using the Marginalia to code our own experience in this seminar. Any takers? In the spirit of Gadamer’s (p. 6) insight noted by Cindy that ‘play’ lies at the heart of every conversation…(and that the) aim is not so much winning as improving one’s game (and that movement) is not tied to any goal that would bring it to an end” I want to add a term. Cindy tells us that all dialogue is inherently social. Nick points to the open disposition towards learning and each other that keeps the dialogue “ball” in play. When communicative functions (CFs) include weaving, recognition, prompting, these seem to me to indicate the “hows” of collaborative presence, or continuous improvement by playing in a way that builds, extends, mulls over, queries, refers – everyone facilitating everyone’s learning all the time. Our remaining days together are just a few; I am hopeful that just a few more balls cross our cognitive court. Thanks for so many rich insights here already…

~Sarah

Hear hear, David (technology before pedagogy) and Deirdre (unconscious incompetence when it comes to instructional design. Like a child watching skaters on a pond, they really believe the design process is easy until they strap the skates on for the first time...). Exactly my experiences.

I have also been challenged to design "universal" templates in my teacher professional development/university online course design work, and agree with Deirdre that it only works to a point, perhaps for introductory learning or "training" where many must master similar skill sets.

As David points out: Many teacher/designers develop their courses in isolation. Here's a place where conversation, whether through blogs, forums or face-to-face can be a benefit. I don't believe that the design process can be automated. Quality is acquired through reflection and conversation.

One tool I employ all the time now is Bonk & Zhang's book: Empowering Online Learning: 100+ Activities for R2D2. If a talented face-to-face instructor with strong pedagogical sense and background has a manual like this, higher quality learning activities can emerge online with BACKGROUND rather than foreground IT support.

Here's my pet peeve: IT designers who also, albeit unintentionally, create formatting requirements for courses in a program or institution that fly in the face of ease of use/ubiquitous technology/flow and by association, learning! 16 clicks to get to the actual directions for an assignment, or materials sequenced from top (first) to bottom (final) so that as the weeks go by, the scrolling down to find the current xyz actually adds significantly to "class" time! It seems a rare combination to find an IT designer who comes with a sense of "user friendly" and learner-centered when it comes to general (template-like) formatting decisions in their own presentations/online trainings...instructors new to online adopt what is modeled.

All these "pet peeves" are emerging, I think, because the tension between template and high-quality/high-end learning experiences are, I believe, why David claims, it just doesn't happen automatically.

But I'm still listening...a good manual (like Bonk and Zhangs) can be a start, perhaps there are other bridges?
~Sarah

I got intrigued by Inge's health care example, which has more universal applications, I believe, and then I saw this: http://scimaps.org/maps/map/inspire_map_107/

What do you think of an inspire sort of tool, could it be useful in your world? Or does it help to clarify how visualization and background analytics could open up more knowledge to be usable?
Sarah