When I am asked in an ict_pd cluster “tick the box” questionnaire,
What is your preferred mode of communication with me individually?
Email; Phone; Skype; Video; Online Forum; Live chat; Face to Face Workshops; Other.
I find it easy to go with OTHER - I concur with Illich on this one, and prefer to talk to people who are within the reach of my voice. Like Illich I treasure the balance between auditory and visual presence. The communication methods so boldly proposed all require a disembodiment, and all cost less. Cj is right “cash is king” when it comes to decision making in education. Communication with others outside the reach of my voice necessarily leads to an aural, verbal, and sensual paralysis that compromises the communication the question claims to seek to improve. The technology mediated options in the check boxes contaminate what it is to “talk” with another. And the presence of too many others in a F2F workshop negates the sense of “individual” communication asked for in the question stem .
But when I am asked
If you would be interested in sharing discussions about common matters, which mode would you prefer?
Email; Audio Conference; Skype; Video; Online Forum; Live chat; Face to Face Workshops; Other.
I find myself looking for a box with blog or wiki next to it I have learned so much from the comments from other bloggers on the Artichoke blog that they would be my preferred fall back options after face to face with wine.
Blogging is "Bozzetto" for me.
Bozzetto is an Italian term for a sculptor's small-scale model, usually in wax or clay, made in preparation for a full-scale work in more permanent material.”
“With its low degree of commitment and expectation, it gives high value and ongoing reward as a creative tool. Lending itself to the magical ploys of series and set, it frees the mind of great obligation and prepares the groundwork for visual freshness.”
“Because of its casual nature, bozzetto-making simply and directly self-teaches the painterly virtues of audacity, paucity, experimentation and elan.” Robert Genn Twice Weekly letter July 21 2006
When I blog I get to play with ideas, adopt quite contrary and often self contradictory arguments, take my thinking to the edge of the precipice, howl at the moon and tease out new meaning.
I could claim blogging is a powerful pedagogy for professional reflection for teachers who like to write down what they navel gaze. But it is hard for anyone who doesn’t do this to judge the effectiveness, the value added when “blogging is claimed as bozzetto”. – Blogging for most of us is quite a solitary act.
I have never shared a blog with any one else, apart from an ill-fated attempt to co-write an erotic novel on blogger several years ago, so I don't really know for sure what collective knowledge building happens, or how you would track it. I guess bloggers who adopted a less obfuscatory style than mine might track the increasing complexity of the blog group thinking through something like SOLO taxonomy.
Christopher D. Sessums suggests a series of questions on the nature of asynchronous online participation that I reckon would help address the validity of the claims for collective knowledge building through blogs and wikis but would also be pertinent for thinking about those dire online forum conversations raised or should I say scuttled in the Centre4 community.
Sessums questions reminded me of the litmus test I use for the effectiveness of my classroom teaching – not “What questions am I asking students in class?” but “What questions are my students asking in class?”
He suggests that we might understand the value of asynchronous online participation by asking
- Who is making significant numbers of comments?
- Can participants be categorized based on the nature of their participation -- e.g., questioners, critics, one-liners, topic leapers, etc.?
- Can patterns of interaction between participants be identified? Who is talking to whom? On what topics are they interacting?
- Are there participants who garner more attention than others? Who is ignored?
- Do participants feel they are part of a larger learning community or do they feel like individuals operating independently of one another?
- Are comments taken up in other blog posts? If so, which ones, by whom, about what?
- Does a course blog go through identity changes? If so, do these changes reflect the changes associated with participation?
- Do participants comments and/or perceived attitudes change over time? In what ways do they change? Do they change based on the participation/contribution of others?
- Does the idea of participation and sharing appear related to the notion of the co-creation of knowledge?
Recent Comments