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Questions to Guide Your Discussion

 * **How do you see teaching changing in a connected learning environment? How does connected learning facilitate a move to personalized learning?**
 * **How do you see teaching nurturing creative and critical thought changing within a connected learning environment? How does nurturing creative and critical thought facilitate a move to personalized learning?**
 * **What does online collaboration 'look' like? What distributed learning tools would be integral to nurturing collaboration online?**
 * **What would a personal learning space be like? What distributed learning tools would be integral to this space?**

Just a personal thought- as teachers we have been trying to move away from a "knowledge given, student memorizes, test" style of teaching for years. In the 80's it was about incorporating the arts and the 90s were all about multimedia and one on one. Now we are all into computer tech. I find the tools outlined in this course amazing and very exciting but are they just another wish for the Utopian teaching environment. How can schools justify the cost of computers to Parents? How can we justify saying we are throwing out textbooks (parents get upset when they find out there are not enough tables in the lunchroom). How do we ask teachers who have taught one way for years to suddenly switch over to e teaching? How do we get the time for retraining? I realize this is the wave of the future but I see great danger in leaping in with both feet. Perhaps a slow evolution is needed. Just my starting off point. What say you all...?? arrrg brendan

HI everyone- Thanks for getting this going Brendan! I am excited to be working with you all. First I wanted to respond to your Brendan's comments. I will put in my two cents about the actual questions in a subsequent post. I have to say I agree with you, Brendan. I think the changes that are happening need to be gradual, yet persistent. As a classroom teacher, I see tremendous potential to use e-learning as a supplement to what might be considered more 'traditional' teaching methods. I don't know, however, that the older methods should be completely thrown out. Two challenges I see: 1) Money. Computers are expensive- and so is the additional equipment that goes along with them- software, smartboards etc. Some families still do not have a home computer. Some young people still do not have blackberries etc. On the other hand, textbooks are costly too. I used to teach my language programs with a VERY small (almost non-existent) budget. I didn't have a class set of decent textbooks for any one single course I taught, nor the finances to purchase any. I wasted HUGE amounts of paper in photocopies. This was inefficient and expensive in other ways. If the course content could be accessed online, this would save a lot in the long run- (ie: potential justification) however, adequate, regular access to computers for all students would be necessary. 2) Time- as Brendan mentioned- changing to a more distributed learning environment would require a LOT of PD for some. This would require more than just a 'tech day' once a year. I think a paradigm shift is needed in many ways (myself included), in order to understand how using these new technologically enhanced teaching methods can actually make teaching and learning more efficient, personalized and effective. Have to pick up my little guy from school...

Hi all, I think the keyword here is //**purposeful**//. I think we're far enough along now to get past the old paradigm of "if you give them technology they will learn". The question now moves to how do we leverage the technologies that we have to best engage our students? In Foothills we're approaching this in a number of ways. Most significantly, we've moved to an open wireless structure. Now anyone in FSD that has a computer login and any personal device can login to the wifi and browse the web, access their online classrooms (in moodle), check email, etc. We still provide technology in the schools, however more and more students are beginning to bring their iPads, Netbooks, iphones, etc to the classroom. The bigger part of this is building a culture of online collaboration amongst our staff. Most of our face to face staff learning is now supplemented by an online collaboration space. This provides them with more time to complete the work and ultimately share it with their students. I've found that the technology is secondary to the culture piece in this. Most teachers get how these technologies work, but don't necessarily feel comfortable participating in an online community. Anyway, love to hear your thoughts,

I have to agree Doug. P//urposeful// is the key. I know several teachers that use their smartboards to show notes they used to show on overheads (what a waste). There is also a move to get most Calgary schools on a WiFi network as well. This wonderful but what will the reaction be when Johnny tells his parents he was watching internet pages his parents have baned at home on his friends notebook at school? I love the idea of all teachers being connected in the school. One of the things I find frustrating is the lack of collaboration amongst teachers. What are we afraid of? I could see if one teacher was teaching another teachers lesson plans before they could but why not combine some lessons on line. Why can students not study WW2 by researching casualty numbers in math and governments in social. Why not study Shakespeare in English and history of diseases in Health? I hope connectivism means more sharing amongst teachers.

Good question! It's funny, we've finally got to a point where the technology isn't the issue anymore. Most online tools are intuitive, and most adults have at least used email and thus "get" online learning. Still the social aspect of putting yourself out there for all to see is still the big inhibitor for most adults. Watching server logs its easy to see teachers that will enter a collaborative space, read all of the content and yet not post. Our kids have grown up in this culture, and therefore feel very comfortable with a public audience (indeed many of them tweet/blog/facebook/etc). I wonder if the fear of judgement - that we come by honestly through the assessment practices we've grown up with - that's the culprit. Thoughts?

This is an interesting thought. As schools we are expected more than anything else to keep our students safe. The question becomes what is safe? For example, at our old house my boys walked to school each day. That walk includes all sorts of dangers. They had one major road crossing, multiple houses (that I couldn't possibly know all the residents of), etc. Still, with all of this danger I sent them every day. I could do this because I knew that I and the school had both instilled in my boys the skills to be safe on the journey (don't talk to strangers, cross at the lights, look both ways, walk in groups, etc). The online is just another dangerous space that our children ARE currently occupying. I wonder if this is simply another instance of the same worry. Instead of simply keeping the kids away from personal use of the technology, should we instead work to teach them how to use these technologies safely and responsibly? Cheers, Doug

I think that in many ways it is our responsibility as educators to keep up with these trends in technology by knowing what our students are capable of and what is available to them - good or bad. We can't control everything they do outside of school when they can connect with anything or anyone from the device they carry around in their pocket but we can guide them to make smart decisions when using that technology and connecting through it. If there is a way to integrate different forms of connective technology into our lessons and it helps them achieve our intended outcomes while teaching students to use what they are already using in their daily lives, we need to embrace that. Though I used to teach in the k-12 system, I am now working at the post secondary level. When I taught my first class at the college level, I couldn't believe how young my students seemed. It was hard to think of them as adults, yet they have been given the responsibility of managing their own levels connectivity which can be very daunting and scary if they were not taught how to handle it before.

Jackie

Hey everyone! I took another look at the questions and a few more thoughts came to mind. I will copy and paste over my original responses for these questions from the DB after.

For me, at first, I found these online courses really hard. Although the learning environment was in some ways highly personalized, I found it hugely impersonal in certain respects. Call me old-fashioned, but I really missed the face to face interaction because I felt like something from the online learning experience was lacking. For example, I missed being able to hear the inflection in people's voices when they contributed to a discussion- so that I could better understand what they were saying. I didn't like having to wait two days to get an email response to a question from a prof. I like people and being around people. I like to talk and to listen. Perhaps I am an auditory learner. I found it lonely (and boring) to sit by my computer. Regardless, I persevered and managed to do quite well. By course six, I have since adapted to this style of learning and I actually really like it and find that I can learn quite effectively. It took some getting used to, some changes in the way I get things done and some time! That being said, I am now in my 8th year of university studies and have always had success at school. But that`s just me.

I would love to explore this topic, however, from the perspective of a high school student with average to below average achievement. I am curious to know more about how the ability to personalize learning through a connected environment (perhaps combined with the motivating appeal of learning with the trendy tech tools young people seem to love so much) helps struggling students to learn more effectively. Strong students tend to do well because of the (innate or trained) factors that make them successful students in the first place. It`is the ones who struggle that I worry about.

Thanks again Brendan for setting up this wikispace

☼ Heidi Hi Heidi, I agree with your assessment about online courses. This is my first round of courses and at first I found it very daunting. With no day to day asignments I found it hard to figure out what to do? The checklists certainly help. Perhaps this is answering some of the questions. 1. Teaching in a connected enviroment seems to allow the teacher to become a faclitator more than just someone who passes on material. Personal learning spaces include (for me) three or four open screens at one time. One screen has a reading I am working on, on has a dictionary (some people seem to use obscure words for the Tartarus of it). One has a word document for notes and one has a networking or media screen. The teacher seems to have little to do with the day to day teaching and more about guiding where the course is headed.﻿ I just finished reading Dr. Doug MacLachlan assigned reading;  Ng, W. & Nicholas, H. (2010), A Progressive Pedagogy for Online Learning  With High-Ability Secondary School Students: A Case Study. // Gifted Child // Quarterly, 54 (3), 239-251. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;"> // ﻿ // <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">﻿ and I think it helps answer some of the second question. I think the connected class had the opertunity to construct very meaningful research on their own then come to the group discussion with info or concerns and share it with the class. In a face to face enviroment the boldest student is usually the one who gets heard and the safe students can comfortably wait it out. There appears to be more people willing to take a risk in the discussions online rather than face to face. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;"> <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">﻿ I also found this quote from another course interesting; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">The decision to use a particular form of representation influences not only what can be represented, but also what will be experienced. We tend to seek what we are able to represent. The representational process is normally regarded as a means through which the contents of our consciousness are made public. This conception is all too tidy. We represent not only what we aim at, but also what we discover in the course of expressive action. But even more, the medium we choose to use and the particular form of representation we select— say, sound rather than a visual form— affect our perception of the world. If we are to represent something through a medium, we try to find qualities of experience or features of the world that will lend themselves to the medium we have selected. Thus, representation influences not only what we intend to express, but also what we are able to see in the first place.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Eisner, Elliot W. //Arts and the Creation of Mind.// <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">New Haven, CT, USA: Yale University Press, 2002. p 23. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">http://site.ebrary.com/lib/ucalgary/Doc?id=10170753&ppg=38

**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Copyright ? 2002. Yale University Press. All rights reserved. **  **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">﻿ ** Any thoughts? Brendan Hi everyone, This is actually my first online course which is pretty crazy as I've been designing them for several years now. I really enjoy developing for online education which makes it that much more surprising that it is not coming as easily as I thought it would. I am feeling like you did, Heidi when you first started- a little lost. But I am eager to find my place as I think this is ultimately where education is headed. Though I personally am not there yet, the thought of what online education already has to offer and what it will offer in the future is really exciting to me. I'm not sure who wrote after Heidi but I have to agree with you on what your perception of personal learning spaces are. I rarely ever have one screen open and usually find myself navigating back and forth from one to the other with ease. Sometimes I just keep screens open so that I can easily go back to them, even though I also use my Diggo account for the same purpose. I also find that my phone has become a part of that environment as well. I love how no matter where I am, I can find the answer to my question with just a few clicks. The other day, my husband and I were having a debate about which route was quicker to his parents home town from ours. Much to my dismay, he was correct by only 2 minutes- darn google maps! I had to cook supper that night. Though I never really used an online environment when I taught high school, I use it all the time with my college students. I often find that those who do not communicate much in class really are able to express themselves more freely online especially if they are strong writers. And for those who aren't Voice Thread has been a great tool for some of my courses because it allows participants to express their ideas in more than one way- by writing, recording or even drawing. Anyway, I'd love to hear about other ways you are incorporating connectivity in your classrooms. I'd also love to hear about some of those stories where it might have failed or not accomplished what you were hoping to achieve and what you would have done differently. thanks! Jackie Hi Jackie Sorry that was me. I forgot to sign it. So how connected should we allow the students to be? If phones are allowed ( and I think everyone is keen on a tweeter feed) what is stopping students from googling the answer or texting a friend in a another class? There is more than dinner at stake here. I think being connected is wonderful but students always seem to find ways to make their job easier. On a recent C.A.L.M. course that I was involved in students would word search a key word in a article to answer a test question. Many students scored high in the test but in an oral exam knew nothing about the topic and it was clear few of them had actually read the material. So how do we police this(iI know bad word). Brendan Hi Brendan, I think we just have to find different ways of regulating our assessment strategies. If you don't want students to google the answers, then make it more difficult for them to do so. But is googlling the answers always such a bad thing? I often allow my students to bring in a cheat sheet for the final exam. It has to be no bigger than a recipe card but other than that, they can cram as much information in any way they know how. They will often type out the answers in ridiculously small font and fill up every square inch of that card. The thing is, in most cases they rarely have to use it because creating the card helped them study. Maybe allowing the students to use their iphones during an exam wouldn't be such a bad thing. If the exam is timed, they would still need to know their information ahead of time or would risk not finishing the exam. As for texting the answer to a friend. . yes this would definitely be a possibility but I really think that if a student is going to cheat, they can find any numerous ways to do so no matter what the format of the assignment or exam is.

- wow! lots to comment about... 1. A discussion board is a great forum for all students to share their ideas. There will always be a couple of more outspoken students in a class (of any age) and often, the ideas of those who are more shy go unheard in a traditional classroom. I am curious to know more about this Voice Thread system. It sounds really cool!
 * RE: discussion boards**

//- Voice thread is great! Here's the link if you haven't already found it. If you go the the "Browse" section, you'll find all kinds of examples.// //Jackie//

2. I think the notion of moving towards inquiry- based learning is good preparation for those who plan to go on to post-secondary studies-(as well as for life outside of school and in the workplace). I have observed that for many, first -year university is a bit of a shocker because the student is suddenly largely responsible for the brunt of the learning that needs to happen in order to get the credit- often with little intervention on the part of the professor. I think, for the most part, high school students have become accustomed to teachers going that extra mile to scaffold learning and to make it engaging and exciting. University can be a totally different experience, however. The teaching ablilities and instructional style of the prof is really luck of the draw. In some cases (not talking about my U of C online experience here) the learner may sit in a lecture theatre and have to listen to the prof lecture or worse- read from the textbook he/she wrote- for 90minutes at a time in a class with 200 other students...no discussion...no hands on...no attempt at differentiation etc... I think we do our students in high school a disservice if we don't expose them to the chance to start weaning off the constant intervention of the teacher. Learning to work with a 'teacher as facilitator' and to manage one's own learning process is an important skill that really is key to success in University.
 * RE: connectivism and inquiry -based learning as preparation for the future**

The teacher I was working with was really keen on computers. He taught French and somehow hooked up with a high school in Haiti- and the students in his class frequently exchanged email penpal letters and sometimes video podcasts with one another. The students on both ends LOVED this experience and they both learned a lot from each other- and our students had a chance to use their French in an authentic way and to broaden their horizons without leaving the classroom! Fabulous experience overall! Same teacher had the idea that for one month, our class would produce an imovie film. He had just got a new IMac and was excited to try it out. He left another student teacher and I to team-teach this 'unit' and went off to the staff room to work on his other projects or drink coffee- I assume. I didn't really see him for about a month. I had no prior training with this technology- neither did my partner, nor did any of the students. In theory, perhaps it was a really good idea- but in reality, it was a mess. The planning, writing and filming process took waaaay longer than planned and putting it all together on the computer was really time consuming. The other student teacher and I ended up having to do a lot of the splicing etc. ourselves (which defeated the purpose of the task in many senses) because there just wasn't enough time or enough computers with the right software. Honestly, I don't think the kids learned much French in the process. It was a frustrating experience on many levels.
 * RE: Good experiences/bad experiences with technology** Both of these anecdotes come from my student-teaching practicum.
 * The good-**
 * The bad-**

In the end I learned a lot from this experience: a) teachers need adequate training with the technology at hand in order to maximize on its ability to enhance the learning experience. b) such projects should only be done if they are well-conceived beforehand. c) the technology itself should not be the focus of the learning- rather a tool to allow for the learning to happen. In this case, it became a consuming focus- because we didn't know what we were doing with it...

--This again gets to the idea of the purposeful use of technology. Before technology can be chosen and infused, the teacher needs to be very clear on what the enduring understandings are, and what it will look like if the students understand. Too often teachers stop the learning process to use a piece of technology. Like you said... "technology itself should not be the focus of the learning..."

I have never tried a tweeter board in class. I am curious to know more about how that works. Is it ever more of a distraction than a tool to help students stay focused and motivated? I wonder too about the phones in class. The vibrating buzz of received messages, the constant typing, the potential to cheat and look up and or share answers...sometimes I wonder where we need to draw a line? I hope I don't sound negative- I am really not; I appreciate all that technology can do and I think connectivism is on the whole a good idea. I find it distracting though, when I am talking with someone and they are texting at the same time. I can't fathom teaching while that is going on.
 * RE : How connected to we allow students to be?**

sorry I think I just made a really long post. Am home sick today with nothing to do but think about all this :) Heidi

Wow first your Daughter now you. Hope you are feeling better soon.. I think you bring up a few good points. Teachers need adequate training on the technology and this is where I start to sound negative too. When do teachers have the time to get this training and what would motivate someone who has successful taught a class one way for years to suddenly switch to a more technological style. I realise we are doing the students a disservice by not preparing them for the world they are entering but seriously many of the students are light years ahead of much of the staff at my school (and have better tech on their iphones). I love technology and get very excited when I can bring some of it into the classroom but I don't think this is a universal feeling. Many of my colleagues are intimidated by D2L, never mind blogs, tweeters, wikis etc. and the computers in our school were outdated when they were installed. So where does this leave us...? Well, I love the story of the French class talking to the students from Haiti this is a clear example of using technology to nurture creativity and using (I'm assuming) simply, available technology. So when we talk about what a personal learning space might look like are we addressing today's students (with the current technology in schools) or are we seeking out the utopian school of the future?

Brendan (it's just an illusion that I post every few hours...really I have a life...in fact if the sun keeps shining I plan to mix up some Margs and hit the deck soon) Cheers!

This is so important! To expect this from our teachers we need to also provide meaningful PD. One technique that we have been using within our school division is to include a DL component (in our case using Moodle) in much of our system PD. This gives teachers an initial exposure to the tools and techniques. We then provide training to our technology facilitators (our on site go-to people) in more advanced techniques so that they can provide just-in-time support to teachers. We also have an online course to this effect as well as a number of one offs, but the exposure through PD has by far had the greatest impact.

Cheers, Doug

Thanks for the get-well wishes Brendan....Ahhh the joys of September and the kids being back to school. It was only a matter of time before we all caught something. LOL. Occupational hazard :)

Just because our summary is due tomorrow....could we maybe collaborate a little on some of the themes we have seen emerge from our discussion- narrow this down? Heidi =

= Here's a (very) brief beginning... I'll add more later once my kids go to bed. - Doug =Summary (Key points from the second week of group discussion)=
 * 1) Connectivism is related to constructivism in that instruction needs to be inquiry driven and authentic.
 * 2) Before we can expect our students to become connected, we need to train teachers and parents on what this means and how to do this.
 * 3) To be nuturing a teacher has to familiar with the technology. This way the project is the focas not learning the new system.
 * 4) There are many technologies that support connecting students:
 * 5) Twitter
 * 6) Discussions
 * 7) Wikis
 * 8) Learning online is not a natural state for many learners - both from the technical space and social. It can be unnerving to "put yourself out there" in an online environment.
 * 9) A personal learning space will contain everything the learner needs to be comfortable, that can mean five different apps or only one.
 * 10) Sometimes we need to be careful about how connected our students are as well as how they are connected. A school is charged both with keeping students safe at the same time as preparing them for life. Risk reduction needs to be balanced between filtering and educating.

Good points Doug. I think we also said that to be nuturing a teacher has to familiar with the technology. This way the project is the focas not learning the new system. Also a personal learning space will contain everything the learner needs to be comfortable, that can mean five different apps or only one.

Heidi does this mean your volunteering to post our summary again? You did an amazing job last time but are you feeling up to it? Brendan

Hi again- thanks for getting this started. To be truthful, I wasn't really volunteering LOL ....I thought since the discussion has been quite lengthy, maybe we could work together at isolating our main points and a few supporting details. I have to work tomorrow, if i can kick this flu.... but if nobody else feels up to it, I can work up a summary. Our last discussion got quite a bit of traffic on the discussion board! That is awesome! Heidi

It might help if we each work on the summary above, then all Heidi needs to do is cut and paste. Doug That would be much appreciated. I have to go to work now- and will be home from tutoring later tonight. If you could all put in what you really want others to take from our discussion, to the above main points, it would really help. I will add mine at the end when I work it all together. Does she want references etc? I noticed some people included them in their summaries last time.

btw......next time someone else can have the pleasure! :) Heidi

I just posted it... You can find it on the Db. Heidi

Wow! That looks much more comprehensive than above! Thank you Heidi.