bronwyn hegarty

thx Paul
as you can see I got rather waylaid so this response is probably right out of kilter.

I agree totally about the need to provide students upfront with the course expectations and part of this is to have a transparent schedule, and easily accessible content.

As an example, let me tell you about a new approach to open learning we are trying on WikiEducator. This is for a course called Designing for Flexible Learning Practice.

As well as formal enrolments, we welcome informal enrolments. We provide a weekly schedule with the activities and resources embedded in the schedule. as well as a cohort/community approach with communication around individual blogs which the students keep as part of the assessment, we also encourage self-paced learning. This helps people who are falling behind due to workloads, illness etc.

This might fit with your ideas Paul on open teaching and the need to make learning more explicit.

We are trying to be open, inclusive and flexible, so far so good the students are enjoying it. We welcome feedback on this model.
bronwyn

Jim
I love your descriptions of the pow wow and the attraction to the knowledge of the elders. I agree "wide-open communication in our on-line instruction" is just so soooo important.

The use of blogs in language learning is working well where I work - the lecturer has a course blog which is chatty and friendly and encouraging and each student has their own blog. The big driver for this is so their families in Japan can see what they are doing and stay in touch more easily. It helps their reading and writing skills no end as well as their digital information literacy. When helping a group of students set up their blogs one lunchtime, however, they were blocked from accessing blogger. Timely words with the IT folk have now addressed this.

So far I have not experienced reticence by First Nation people to be involved in open ways of learning - it appears to be more of an issue related to the need for a big shift in attitude for academic staff - in other words a cultural shift away from the power stance provided by traditional learning and teaching. The teacher knows all, the students do the learning and assessments to pass.

Learning through the use of a reflective blog shifts the power base to the students. The teacher who keeps a blog becomes one of the participants and the course blog is used for announcements. The class becomes more open and communicative and connected.

The digital information literacy skills of academic staff are improved no end by keeping a blog and I teach in two courses using blogs. The participants have control over their blog and their learning. They have free expression to write about what they are learning. Because the blog is assessed and progressive it is a very powerful learning tool.

Surprisingly there are still some academic staff learners who feel threatened by "exposing" themselves to the world. I have found once you "get over the hump" it is a fantastic way to communicate ideas with colleagues and students.
We now make it compulsory in our courses, and explain the importance of the medium for communication and connectivity; the blog is used to develop projects, plans, ideas etc for assessments. So no longer are students working in isolation on assignments, they are openly sharing their ideas and writing. I have two questions, I hope someone can answer:

• How can we can we help the really reticent students "get over the hump" and connect?
  
• Have people come across situations where blogs cause cultural exclusion?

Bron

thanks Colby
Its great to read stuff like this. This will be very useful for two courses I am teaching - Designing for Flexible learning practice and Facilitating eLearning Communities. We use course blogs for both so you can follow what is happening. We have also been running a 10 minute lecture series in Facilitating eLearning Communities with well known people in the online communities arena e.g. Nancy White, George Siemens, James Farmer etc - there are links to them on the course blog.

It will also be a good resource for an action research project we are about to start working with participants - staff and students in tertiary organisations - to extend their digital information literacy. Title: Developing digital information literacy of staff and students: An action research project.

We have been doing some work in this area on WikiEducator - Commonwealth of Learning - Digital Information Literacy and also a project - Online Information Literacy modules - there is one there specifically on digital information literacy (DIL). The 12 modules are open to all and are customisable - the online nature of them should assist people in developing their DIL skills - they will be the basis of the research project.
Bronwyn

here is a larger version of the diagram you requested Jeffrey. I also have a template which people can fill in - it has prompts as well.
Bronwyn

hello Ignatia
I really like the sound of your Videolearning example. "We ask the students to post relevant material on a video and discuss that material on the videoblog that is provided for that purpose."
do you have any examples we can look at?
bronwyn