tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-43379973614269324402024-03-13T00:48:15.185-05:00The Learning LotRob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.comBlogger59125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-43829470168840691142015-10-26T11:08:00.000-05:002015-10-26T11:11:58.390-05:00Thinking about Curating and Sharing for #OpenTeachingOUWe're hosting <a href="http://openteachingou.blogspot.com/2015/10/chat-planning-join-us-friday-october-30.html" target="_blank">the next #OpenTeachingOU chat this Friday</a>, and I've been giving some thought to why I think curation matters and how I manage it personally. And by the way, you haven't viewed them yet, Laura Gibbs has three great posts about <a href="http://onlinemythindia.lauragibbs.net/2015/top-3-curation-tools-for-reading" target="_blank">curation tools for reading</a>, <a href="http://onlinemythindia.lauragibbs.net/2015/top-3-curation-tools-for-sharing" target="_blank">curation tools for sharing</a>, and <a href="http://anatomy.lauragibbs.net/2015/10/part-2-content-curation-and-student.html" target="_blank">curation and student choice</a>.<br />
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I was actually all set to write down my thoughts when I ran across this piece by Jo Wikert on <a href="http://jwikert.typepad.com/the_average_joe/2015/10/how-readers-will-become-curators-and-resellers.html" target="_blank">the future role of readers as curators and resellers</a>. While the post targets publishers and the evolution of reading digital reading, this particular example hit close to our learning home.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Now imagine that same use-case in a digital world where there are no barriers. Think of the textbook as one long web page the reader can manipulate and add to. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The original textbook content forms the foundation but the reader can add to it as they see fit.
So while Jane is studying chemistry<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><span style="color: black;">she comes across <a href="http://www.ptable.com/" target="_blank">a slick periodic table</a> website that allows her to dive deeper into any given element. Today she merely bookmarks the site in her browser; tomorrow she drags the url into the textbook, perhaps configuring it as a pop-up element inside the ebook, thereby enriching the reading experience.</span> </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Maybe she also finds a few terrific videos online that explain some of the more complicated concepts in this chemistry course. Why not drag those into the book too? </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
At the end of the semester, Jane has managed to curate an entirely new product. The textbook is the foundation, but web elements and widgets curated by Jane help round it out. This has been useful for Jane, but what if she’s also able to sell her annotated edition to other students next semester? Maybe Jane’s edition sells for $5 more than the standard edition and Jane gets a cut of that price difference.
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While I've never believed in a scaled marketplace for student-curated material, I'm a big believer in both the importance of learner curation as well as the need for connectable tools to manage the activity. What Joe imagines is a type of reading that facilitates easier, embeddable connections both within e-books (or web pages), as well as between students. Not surprisingly, I'm all for that vision -- tools that allow us to curate and share --and you can see that support via my activity and the number of tools I actually use for curation.<br />
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Like Laura, I use different tools for different needs or habits. As I look at the list, it seems that part of the reason there are so many is because I have refused to change old analog habits and have, instead, selected different tools to map to different analog and digital preferences. In other words, if I had never researched or curated extensively prior to the Internet and, in particular, the rise of great online curation tools, I might be more content using fewer tools.<br />
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At any rate, looking through the list and reflecting my workflows has been both fun and instructive. Without further ado, here's what they look like.<br />
<ul>
<li><i><a href="http://feedly.com/" target="_blank">Feedly</a> (for reading)</i> -- I use Feedly for managing the feeds of the many blogs and news sites I have curated over the years. This list, by the way, ebbs and flows constantly, based on my evolving interests and changes in the information sites I follow. I have been curating blogs and news this way for over a decade and I like Feedly because of its interface, ease of use across all devices, and, well, because I'm getting too lazy to change. I am a big fan of <a href="https://www.inoreader.com/" target="_blank">Inoreader</a> and have used it (like Laura) for curating things like Twitter and Google+ hashtags. But I don't utilize enough of its other great features to make me all that interested in moving away from Feedly.</li>
<li><i><a href="https://www.diigo.com/user/xplanarob" target="_blank">Diigo</a> (for bookmarking and sharing)</i> -- Once I find things that interest me on Feedly, I open the website and then use Diigo for bookmarking. My Diigo account began with <a href="https://delicious.com/" target="_blank">Delicious</a> and has been evolving for the past 7 years or so. I have almost 10,000 items bookmarked using more than 3,000 tags. This has developed over the years as my personal research database for my professional edtech work and is particularly helpful with consulting and blogging. Because it's public, it's also a convenient place I can point people to when they are looking for a particular reference.</li>
<li><i><a href="https://flipboard.com/" target="_blank">Flipboard</a> (for bookmarking and sharing)</i> -- As my life has grown increasingly mobile due to travel, I have done more and more bookmarking on my phone and iPad. While I could do this via other apps or tools, I was an early user of Flipboard and have found it works best for me given how I bookmark on the go -- essentially in short intervals while I'm sitting or standing around waiting for a plane or meeting. I bookmark everything of interest on Flipboard, saving it to <a href="https://flipboard.com/@edudiner/edudiner-38rqvagny" target="_blank">my Edudiner zine</a>, which anyone can see or subscribe to. When I find things that are particularly useful for my research, I e-mail a link to myself, open them on my laptop or desktop browser, and save them to Diigo.</li>
<li><i><a href="https://twitter.com/xplanarob" target="_blank">Twitter</a> (for sharing and discussing)</i> -- I have traditionally used Twitter for sharing links to items and for participating in group conversations. The latter inevitably leads to curating ideas and posts/websites from participants, but I move those over to Diigo. I have tried to use Twitter for information curation on a number of different occasions but it has never taken root with me.</li>
<li><i><a href="https://plus.google.com/u/0/+RobReynolds314/posts" target="_blank">Google+</a> (for sharing and discussing)</i> -- I'm not sure I needed another tool/place for curation and sharing, but I jumped into Google+ to keep up with Laura's active posting and have enjoyed it. I do some curation here, mostly recommendations from trusted sources, but I thoroughly enjoy the interaction and conversations. It's a bit too hard for me to find things on Google+ for it to be truly central to my own process, but I think it's a great place for talking about information and ideas.</li>
<li><a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">The Learning Lot</a> (my personal blog for sharing) -- I use this particular blog to think through my own processes and for teaching or learning out loud. This a personal space where I can write more informally than I do at <a href="https://nextthought.com/thoughts" target="_blank">NextThought</a>, as well as on topics that are not necessarily part of my professional life.</li>
</ul>
Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-63507356611035607272015-08-17T10:01:00.004-05:002015-08-17T10:02:21.539-05:00#Agoratry80: My Left HandFor today's Daily Try (<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/agoratry80">#agoratry80</a>), we're asked to tweet a your back of the hand photo. Since I'm always at the keyboard, I opted for this photo.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKpyGldLZao_R8YKV1IxXx0WbHY9F4Y6yt_70ivq63N34mg9AhIzAKc_m4rfkX0a0SW-M_2sdSVQBp1TtWIRs9Js637pDaMBcDMPsKQwNsky2Q5KnCvIP30v7aRJTZgqUmddGmXcFI2-bU/s1600/IMG_0425.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKpyGldLZao_R8YKV1IxXx0WbHY9F4Y6yt_70ivq63N34mg9AhIzAKc_m4rfkX0a0SW-M_2sdSVQBp1TtWIRs9Js637pDaMBcDMPsKQwNsky2Q5KnCvIP30v7aRJTZgqUmddGmXcFI2-bU/s400/IMG_0425.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
This mostly what it appears to be. The ring and watch add details for those who are interested. One thing less obvious is the little finger, which is permanently bent. I earned that souvenir while attempting, quite foolishly, to ride a child's bike off a ramp in 2001. I flipped over the handlebars and tried to catch with my left hand on the sidewalk. Needless to say, I was not entirely successful.<br />
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<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: #eaf0f0; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 1; word-spacing: 0px;"></span><br />
<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: #eaf0f0; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 1; word-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-converted-space"></span></span><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/agoratry80" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #337ab7; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 1; word-spacing: 0px;"></a>Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-16421795613193167132015-08-06T15:24:00.001-05:002015-08-06T15:24:31.351-05:00More Improvisations: Where is Clippy?For <a href="http://udg.theagoraonline.net/daily/agoratry69/" target="_blank">today's Daily Try</a> (#agoratry69), we're asked to answer the question "Where is Clippy hanging out these days?" and to create an image that shows where Clippy is now.<br />
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I imagine Clippy is happily performing street art in Luxembourg.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwkuau7Jnujd7CEpc0ziFJv3vZNj5bor-ERKMrAKtect0j5IeKyqqgE3qbWfO8-9_lwh7302PVHUo5uMjlwvpMfSpBI80CJBajbh0-uqSk1NHWtXgOIXbfxx518x8vdPMiGRyhxTRs6Blu/s1600/Luxembourg_City_7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwkuau7Jnujd7CEpc0ziFJv3vZNj5bor-ERKMrAKtect0j5IeKyqqgE3qbWfO8-9_lwh7302PVHUo5uMjlwvpMfSpBI80CJBajbh0-uqSk1NHWtXgOIXbfxx518x8vdPMiGRyhxTRs6Blu/s640/Luxembourg_City_7.jpg" width="480" /></a></div>
Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-82640812494064850452015-08-05T13:29:00.001-05:002015-08-05T13:30:40.692-05:00The Value of Modeling When Designing for Student Engagement<br />
I've been a big Dan Meyer fan for some time, and have always appreciated his real-world, participatory approach to learning. His recent post -- <a href="http://blog.mrmeyer.com/2015/literally-everything-i-know-about-modeling-with-mathematics-smp-4/">Literally Everything I Know About Modeling With Mathematics [SMP 4]</a> --provides links to some of his most salient work in modeling, as well as a general summary of modeling in mathematics education.<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>Modeling asks students a) to take the world and turn it into mathematical structures, then b) to operate on those mathematical structures, and then c) to take the results of those operations and turn them back into the world. That entire cycle is some of the most challenging, exhilarating, democratic work your students will ever do in mathematics, requiring the best from all of your students, even the ones who dislike mathematics. If traditional textbooks have failed modeling in any one way, it’s that they perform the first and last acts for students, leaving only the most mathematical, most abstract act behind.</i></blockquote>
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In his post, Dan links to one of my favorite modeling examples, <a href="http://www.heinemann.com/blog/smp4/" target="_blank">Is the Checkout Line a Scam?</a> (the answer is "yes," by the way). In it, he models several things that we can all do to bring the real world into our course design in order to make our content more relevant and the concepts we're teaching more meaningful.<br />
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<ol>
<li><i>Use interesting examples from the real world</i> -- A big part of fostering student engagement is presenting course content in relevant ways. The best and easiest way to do this is by using meaningful examples from the real world. This not only makes learning concepts relevant -- it also allows participants to make personal connections and applications.<br /></li>
<li><i>Get participants to think about possibilities and assumptions before the formal concept is introduced</i> -- Contextualization of learning concepts is a critical part of student engagement. Participants want to know why these concepts matter. By sharing models from the real world, and by allowing participants to reflect on and discuss these models before ever introducing our formal learning concepts, we provide a foundation of purpose and interest for our lessons.<br /><i><br /></i></li>
<li><i>Present concepts within the framework of a relevant example instead of sharing them in the abstract and then trying to link the real world to the concept at some later point</i> -- When we lead with relevant, real-world models as opposed to formal concepts, we establish a narrative context for all subsequent information and discussions. It gives us an important anchor point for our explanations.</li>
</ol>
Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-64244045523002363022015-08-04T12:54:00.000-05:002015-08-04T12:54:18.710-05:00Improvisation Practice: Today's "Daily Try"<span style="color: black;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9T9LDS_IJNJATnzAqPRqpTfWJ-0JN9TsDRdj8YuXStqIVE8mAyOLZjY6ulxpDFHp_muBmwHAeWgvnPG7wWwyPYVTxSjWiho_s0ln16BfZN6-P8mcBeJiJVmpmqjWkcniMKtWOzEU2hyphenhyphen0/s1600/Luchador_Name.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtk0DK0eeBFqrZUKYIbu-0CUwApqGGtKvUsVkYLjzRgCwH62AQOC1TIlnExZM_DVyTQ7_2Muzc7mCneOjI30snU6idxpzMD_Brswknf1LyPb4Hq2fCJWFuyV1YRrFRTsr0Of5txPgSDWM9/s1600/Luchador_Name.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="147" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtk0DK0eeBFqrZUKYIbu-0CUwApqGGtKvUsVkYLjzRgCwH62AQOC1TIlnExZM_DVyTQ7_2Muzc7mCneOjI30snU6idxpzMD_Brswknf1LyPb4Hq2fCJWFuyV1YRrFRTsr0Of5txPgSDWM9/s320/Luchador_Name.png" width="320" /></a></div>
Today's Daily Try from the ADG Agora project: <br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><i><a href="http://udg.theagoraonline.net/daily/agoratry67/">#agoratry67</a> Randomly Generate a Luchador Name and Announce Yourself to the World</i>.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">As you can see, I went with the Spanish version of my name, Roberto, and was awarded a fabulous luchador handle: El Hijo del Relámpago (Son of Lightening). I'm thinking I should get to work on my mask later this afternoon.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This is really a great, entry-level student creation activity because it requires little to no skill acquisition, it's fun, and it connects users to valuable cultural information. </span></span></div>
Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-71463845168779697752015-07-29T23:16:00.002-05:002015-07-29T23:16:50.267-05:00#NTPoC Unit 3: SNA Artifact ChallengeIn Unit 3 of our Power of Connections learning experience, Stacy asked us to <a href="http://blog.thepowerofconnections.org/2015/07/unit-3-sna-artifact-challenge.html" target="_blank">map our social network</a>s using <a href="http://blog.thepowerofconnections.org/2015/07/unit-3-mapping-your-social-network.html" target="_blank">the tools she had suggested</a>. Here are some of my "findings."<br />
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My Twitter map doesn't show anything surprising. Most of my connections are in the US, with the exception of a small group scattered throughout Europe and the Middle East. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO0gsAtcpc5ZdmYF3Tg0-FPPMdjv9i4rdaa8hwsD0FFoeVl7dB8muxlNfDm2Mqjd1dDyoglvwpz_FU2wEVKGuSIvEgYYzGI5BMJTkA7kuU2-DjVQ9C4ZpjytNvXmOuEW9LBBrUlUbIZvYC/s1600/Twitter+Map+1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="187" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO0gsAtcpc5ZdmYF3Tg0-FPPMdjv9i4rdaa8hwsD0FFoeVl7dB8muxlNfDm2Mqjd1dDyoglvwpz_FU2wEVKGuSIvEgYYzGI5BMJTkA7kuU2-DjVQ9C4ZpjytNvXmOuEW9LBBrUlUbIZvYC/s640/Twitter+Map+1.png" width="640" /></a> Here is the second map of my Twitter connections and it tells the same story, only in percentages. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkD4yTOskT0ltZyN3eWpTYMxmH4ohd3Qfs-O4j-vskobiJ-kCq7ODAlLnaPKOAuOv-wWclPpK7dv8iVfirekUHtSo_f7Qg8hpsxOey3Dxz_UE-E1duM2GhNyu4BDZ5f1zzJzO46oyotmWz/s1600/TweetMap2.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="264" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkD4yTOskT0ltZyN3eWpTYMxmH4ohd3Qfs-O4j-vskobiJ-kCq7ODAlLnaPKOAuOv-wWclPpK7dv8iVfirekUHtSo_f7Qg8hpsxOey3Dxz_UE-E1duM2GhNyu4BDZ5f1zzJzO46oyotmWz/s640/TweetMap2.png" width="640" /></a></div>
My LinkedIn social network is actually much more interesting.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_q_nxuX5gCtKAwq89GC7wJ-F49B52fEOEDAD1Z0aiV9XM1Lrx1AL0sHzohYckkRz_TVL1gxrZYMPdQfwsgyTMXpTbcBDnu3y_w5MZeLGr9LwYjk1Z_NmRXqDjH7FwiMcLymBIENDV-6dE/s1600/SocialNetwork3.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="297" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_q_nxuX5gCtKAwq89GC7wJ-F49B52fEOEDAD1Z0aiV9XM1Lrx1AL0sHzohYckkRz_TVL1gxrZYMPdQfwsgyTMXpTbcBDnu3y_w5MZeLGr9LwYjk1Z_NmRXqDjH7FwiMcLymBIENDV-6dE/s640/SocialNetwork3.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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For starters, it is much more diverse than my Twitter network. My connections on LinkedIn have been formed while I was at different companies focused on different parts of the education industry. I have contacts in publishing, educational technology, publishing technologies, content management, Higher Education and learning design. Not surprisingly, while my network is sizable, it is not incredibly interconnected. In other words, few of these people would not be connected in any way without me.<br />
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Interestingly, that lack of "connectedness" does not diminish the value of this network, at least in the way that I use it. For me, LinkedIn is about staying connected to multiple industries, and about having access to experts in those industries. It's like a professional reference (a professional Wikipedia). In that context, it continues to serve me extremely well.Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-50787445411533550232015-07-23T15:16:00.001-05:002015-07-23T15:16:05.520-05:00An Early Timeline of My Personal Computers<br />
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<a href="https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/f9/8f/0b/f98f0b5eff0504f1152cf17f1ae6887b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" src="https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/f9/8f/0b/f98f0b5eff0504f1152cf17f1ae6887b.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Stacy Zemke created a great Artifact Challenge for Unit 2 of our <a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/" target="_blank">Power of Connections </a>learning experience -- <a href="http://blog.thepowerofconnections.org/2015/07/unit-2-framing-connections-through.html" target="_blank">Framing Connections Through a Personal Archive</a>.
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The task is to make connections with your past by creating either a history of your Web presence or of your personal computing life. I opted for the latter as it says a great deal about the practical or adaptive approach I've taken to personal computing over the years.<br />
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You can see pictures of my primary personal computing devices from 1983-2005 on <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/reynolds1901/an-early-timeline-of-my-computers/" target="_blank">this Pinterest page</a>, and here is a bit more detail on some of the specific machines shown.<br />
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<i>Commodore 64</i> -- My parents gave me this personal computer as a graduation gift when I received my M.A. from Texas Tech in 1983. Until that time I had done all my typing on a Remington manual typewriter and an old IBM Selectric. The Commodore 64 had two joystick ports (you played four-player games by having the other two use the keyboard), a 5 1/4" floppy drive, and hooked into any small TV. I bought a third-party dot matrix printer that allowed be to change fonts by changing dip switch settings, and used this for much of my coursework at the University of Texas.<br />
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<i>Apple IIe</i> -- A friend was selling off some equipment in 1986 and I bought an Apple IIe. This was an eye opener for me as the Commodore had required me to type in commands such as "Load" and "Run" just to access programs. The Apple IIe was my first experience with self-loading programs and something resembling and actual menu.<br />
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<i>Apple IIc</i> -- I like my IIe so much I couldn't wait to by a IIc (circa 1988/89). I typed the first chapters of my dissertation on the IIc and my daughter, born in 1987, played Treehouse and other games on it in her early years.<br />
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<i>IBM PC</i> -- When I took my first faculty job in 1990, the department issued me an IBM PC with dual floppy drives (3 1/2"). You booted Word Perfect or some other program from a disk on the left drive and stored data on a disk in the right drive. I had used WordPro and other PC-based word processing systems in the past, but this was the point at which I converted to DOS-based Word Perfect for much of the 90s. I knew all the keystrokes, created my own macros and, in general, couldn't imagine computing getting much better. I finished my dissertation on this machine and also wrote my first article on it.<br />
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<i>Macintosh Classic </i>-- My personal life went through some changes beginning in 1997 and, not surprisingly, so did my computing life. I moved to a new teaching position in a new town, and along the way picked up an old Macintosh Classic. While it didn't connect to the Internet (I did all my Internet research and e-mail at the University library during this period), it was amazingly reliable and also provided my introduction to Microsoft Word.<br />
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<i>Compaq Armada</i> -- By 1998 my writing projects were increasing rapidly and I wanted something cheap that was also portable. Enter the used Compaq Armada laptop that ran DOS and has Word Perfect installed. It was blazing fast and really familiar. It allowed me to teach at multiple institutions, write on the go, and be extremely productive.<br />
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<i>Dell Laptop</i> (2003/4) -- I actually owned a number of desktops and Dell laptops at the university from 1999-2003, but this laptop is memorable because it came with the founding of a startup in Boston and represented a whole new way of thinking about productivity and communication. My wife worked for the company as well as still has hers (that she uses daily!).<br />
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<i>Fujitsu Laptop</i> -- The Fujitsu was my first experiment with "tablet" computing and, except for the limited computing power, was an enjoyable little machine. I like taking notes by hand and used One Note with great delight during this time (really!).<br />
<br />Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-59455308444733831112015-07-19T19:30:00.001-05:002015-07-19T19:30:05.863-05:00The Mashup Report: "MOOCs"I've been working on a new feature for the Learning Lot and am happy to roll it out today. So here, in the the maiden voyage of <i>The Mashup Report, </i>I present<i> </i>an interview with MOOC visionary and expert, Dr. Simon Lafoon. Hope you enjoy it.<br />
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[<i>The Mashup Report</i> is compiled by Rob Reynolds and Vicky Woodward]</div>
<br />Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-24618913672853927552015-07-14T10:46:00.002-05:002015-07-14T10:46:28.108-05:00Power of Connections: Make a Connection<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The first Artifact Challenge in our <i><a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/" target="_blank">Power of Connections</a></i> learning experience is to introduce yourself through a picture of your desktop, bookshelf or some other selfie that captures your identity.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I started out by taking a "staged" picture of my bookshelf (the shoes were an addition).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi468_IzcI2dXF2FQlkogSBlyuxqXaKnSO91ZthjiHqg28gswlgj047cFzjqKLr3fYwJxU6Msmf0RghFJS6Wlw2JoPJfw6_u_Fyh8CMJpF7oBHpPEpfQbRG-NNlpatqllivERi-YURi7ZcG/s1600/IMG_0417.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi468_IzcI2dXF2FQlkogSBlyuxqXaKnSO91ZthjiHqg28gswlgj047cFzjqKLr3fYwJxU6Msmf0RghFJS6Wlw2JoPJfw6_u_Fyh8CMJpF7oBHpPEpfQbRG-NNlpatqllivERi-YURi7ZcG/s640/IMG_0417.JPG" width="480" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Unfortunately, my bookshelf mostly consists of the sad remnants of a former life in which I actually collected print books. What remains are a few literary and Latin American novels (top shelf), religious books and more literary stuff (second shelf), math, science, and notebooks (third shelf), and then more notebooks, running shoes, and, last but not least, my FAVORITE TRILOGY OF ALL TIME, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Chronicles-Thomas-Covenant-Unbeliever/dp/0006473296" target="_blank">The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever</a> (bottom shelf).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">While all this says plenty about me, I suppose, It's not the clear, iconic lens I was hoping for.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Then it occurred to me. I do have an object that sums me up in a whole different way. My favorite belt buckle.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6kswbj34s3A4Q44HB2KrE0EgOZNFxS6WevAvNlKtAl4hb62oerx0kI6Viyoq28sOdh4mhXHzHPUZ54tJoGa2LOX1LejBN-yrCTCzGJqLDUu22qdToArRimScL1qUDeX6SKRVgBFGcIHyk/s1600/IMG_0418.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6kswbj34s3A4Q44HB2KrE0EgOZNFxS6WevAvNlKtAl4hb62oerx0kI6Viyoq28sOdh4mhXHzHPUZ54tJoGa2LOX1LejBN-yrCTCzGJqLDUu22qdToArRimScL1qUDeX6SKRVgBFGcIHyk/s400/IMG_0418.JPG" width="400" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In its own way, it is a great snapshot of an either-handed, bilingual kid who has deep roots in the Southwest, loves Westerns (movies and books), but who is also at home in a big city.</span>Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-49484262403372238562015-07-14T06:00:00.000-05:002015-07-14T09:55:59.594-05:00The Power of Connections: The Power of Constraint<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifz-2NXEZYmjH16z3Ejo9bQaq2lwVmGmWpSf3aajNff9xYvkl6vtai83C_UbdTkNb_Rscd8dH3mhOI2RN-5wqlOgGWEzD1mP6rm6gNCexqx-0nw_tf9BtwX5YGRfYDgAau3gsVDAvVuw_d/s1600/4814587193_e08085b700_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifz-2NXEZYmjH16z3Ejo9bQaq2lwVmGmWpSf3aajNff9xYvkl6vtai83C_UbdTkNb_Rscd8dH3mhOI2RN-5wqlOgGWEzD1mP6rm6gNCexqx-0nw_tf9BtwX5YGRfYDgAau3gsVDAvVuw_d/s320/4814587193_e08085b700_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">One of the best ways to expand thinking is to impose constraints. <br /><br />Discipline on thinking makes us think in new ways. This happens regularly in product development. There can be market constraints, materials constraints, research constraints, and those constraints force companies to be more innovative. They have to look at their products and markets differently to meet the demands of these constraints. And that’s one of the ways they improve.<br /><br />This works in education as well. Constraints can force students to think differently, more expansively. In other words, constraints can help students learn.<br /><br />A valuable technique to impose constraints in education is through classroom improvisations. Improvisations focus the mind on a limited number of items and situations that can be taken under consideration, and thus they require students to dig deeper and think in new ways.<br /><br />Here are some principle values of constraint when it comes to critical thinking:<br /><br />1. <i>Constraints encourage us to see the same things in a new way</i>. We’re patterned to see the world and the objects and ideas in it in a repetitive, non-creative way. We are prisoners to our thought habits. It’s difficult to break through the patterns of seeing and thinking that we’ve become accustomed to. We’re stuck with what we know. But if we take away some of the elements of the normal narrative, all of a sudden the world looks and behaves differently. We have new perspective.<br /><br />2. <i>Constraints prompt us to explore paths we probably wouldn’t ordinarily consider, paths we might not even ordinarily see</i>. If you ask students in a class for solutions to particular problems, they’re like to throw out the same-old same-old they’ve grown used to. If you impose constraints it’s likely that the usual solutions won’t work anymore, and so they have to consider new alternatives.<br /><br />3. <i>Constraints allow us to re-consider solutions we’ve previously marked as “This will not work.”</i> We tend to operate under the mantras of “We’ve tried that and it didn’t work,” or “But that’s not what it’s designed for,” or “This is the only way it can be done.” But constraints can be the mother of invention and encourage us to question our previous assumptions. This is what happened in the movie Apollo 13. “We only have this much time, this much amperage, this much oxygen, and by golly we have to make it work!” Most importantly, it was a situation the engineers had never dreamed of. And those seemingly impossible constraints made the ground crew think beyond the limits they’d previously set for themselves. <br /><br />4. <i>Constraints help us see the real value of certain elements or information.</i> We operate with unquestioned assumptions regarding solutions we need, and we lazily do not stretch ourselves to consider novel ideas to recurring problems. But by taking away some of the parts of a solution, we’re often able to see the remaining parts in a new light, recognizing value we previously ignored.<br /><br />I’ve watched student and student come out of their shell and surprise not only me and their classmates but themselves as well with remarkable creativity when put in a situation that forced them to consider the variables in a whole new light. It’s a fulfilling sight to see.<br /><br /> </span>Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-74598186931962342592015-07-12T14:21:00.000-05:002015-07-16T21:03:13.800-05:00The Power of Connections: What Is Student Engagement?<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHKrd78WmnmNROoSmUfpGz-y0Xu1pHBv4fVr6y6mAcERTfNIFE4Xc-x0aXt7rIlU9ImrqXtYskf4n-t1JTJZGCgJaWlqXTjNDYSPWt0gQSDgCGqJrQay2rb2s1XeCFuVlAXcWhqa5neusV/s320/15404705223_cfef46ff90_z.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Julie Lindsay: Social Entrepreneurship Student Workshop<br /><a href="https://flic.kr/p/ptg9aV">https://flic.kr/p/ptg9aV</a></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Student engagement is something we talk about all the time. But what are we really talking about when we’re talking about student engagement? <br /> What we’re talking about, simply put, is how to get students to be more active in our courses. <br /><br />We want to see evidence that students are participating in ways that are meaningful to them, but I think we struggle with understanding what makes participation “meaningful,” particularly in online and hybrid courses. <br /><br /> We need to ask some fundamental questions about student engagement – why it’s important, how to design for it in our courses, and who is ultimately responsible for making it happen. Specifically, we need to ask:</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What is the relationship, if any, between student engagement during the course and learning that endures beyond the course?</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Can meaningful participation be tracked through assignments and recorded in a gradebook? If not, how do we measure it and design for it? </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">If we define student engagement as network activity and/or connectedness with other learners, learning communities, and information sources, how do we measure that engagement? </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Is meaningful student engagement about designing better assignments, aligning those closely to course objectives, and working to get students to complete those assignments? If so, what do we need to do differently in our content design to foster greater student engagement? </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What role does the instructor or facilitator play in student engagement? </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Who bears the responsibility – or the greatest responsibility – for student engagement in a learning experience? </span></li>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">One of our purposes with <a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/index.html">Power of Connections</a> is to ask these questions and to build exploratory, collaborative models to help us begin framing answers to them. Naturally, we want to ask our course participants and teaching colleagues – we’d be crazy not to take advantage of crowdsourcing opportunities – but most of all we want to ask ourselves these questions. </span> <span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />Personally, I’m sympathetic with institutions and their emphasis on measuring student engagement by hard data points – attendance, measurable participation in class activities, and grades. Institutions are not teachers. They’re trying to solve macro problems such as retention. <br /><br />And yes, student engagement can certainly be an important factor when we’re talking about retention, but there are other factors as well. From my experience, discovering new ways to increase student engagement doesn’t come from macro analyses. There are too many dynamic elements and too many personal ones, and they simply can best be discovered and cultivated in the day-to-day teaching and learning “weeds” of a course. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /> So now let’s come back to the question, “What is student engagement?” or, better yet, “What do I think student engagement is?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /> To be honest I’m still working on my final answer, or at least my next iteration of it, but here is the foundation for my thinking and exploration – student engagement is about helping learners grow their personal learning networks. <br /><br />In other words, I believe we should replace our course-centric model with a learner-centric one. <br /><br />We should think of each learner as the center point of a vast network of nodes. Each node in that network represents a connection to a person or a source of information. The learner’s network can also intersect with other learner networks and communities. And perhaps most importantly, these nodes, if student engagement has been successful during the course, those nodes will evolve and expand over time.<br /><br />Our proper role as teachers and facilitators is to foster the greatest possible increase in connections within each learner’s personal learning network that will benefit the learner over the course of a lifetime. That will lead to the biggest impact on learning.<br /><br />And that’s what we’re talking about when we’re talking about student engagement.<br /></span> <span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></span> Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-5321047208879518782015-07-10T14:33:00.002-05:002015-07-10T14:33:49.031-05:00Power of Connections: Teacher Engagement and the Iceberg Dilemma<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJPhbnpVi7Xcc4_KViEfbVQFLGqH7nXvbr27jfaUiltaEJdGD3Pl9UYMbI6P4NFulpqBXhuzzjpnpuM1CvIYet8mfsBNW_iei6HElB5WI_Tg2B0AIF4YT2O543gkDntuMEJMn6tJCpUpWh/s1600/Icebergs_in_%252BGreenland.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJPhbnpVi7Xcc4_KViEfbVQFLGqH7nXvbr27jfaUiltaEJdGD3Pl9UYMbI6P4NFulpqBXhuzzjpnpuM1CvIYet8mfsBNW_iei6HElB5WI_Tg2B0AIF4YT2O543gkDntuMEJMn6tJCpUpWh/s320/Icebergs_in_%252BGreenland.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
As part of the build-out of <i><a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/index.html" target="_blank">Power of Connections</a></i>, I've been giving a great deal of thought to the notion of teacher engagement (see <a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-power-fo-connections-teacher.html" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-power-of-connections-real-time.html" target="_blank">here</a>). As part of this reflecting process, I've been thinking about how course creation and delivery differ in online and face-to-face environments.<br />
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Specifically, it seems to me that we often fall prey ot what I call the "iceberg dilemma" when it comes to online design and instruction. This dilemma, I think, can be attributed to a fundamental difference/assumption between teaching face-to-face and online.<br />
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When we're preparing and teaching face-to-face courses, we generally look at the course content as a foundation for the actual course, but are keenly aware that this is only a point of departure. Once the content is prepared we, as instructors, must go in and present that content. We must also elaborate iteratively throughout the course of the curriculum based on feedback we receive from students, and work to connect students and information beyond the base content. Using my iceberg model, we realize that content, and even initial delivery, are only the tip of the iceberg. The real teaching engagement and learning happens beyond that (beneath the content surface).<br />
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While it certainly doesn't have to be that way, many of our models for online course design and delivery focus almost exclusively on content, or just the tip of the iceberg. We design our content and build it within a platform, and then we allow the platform to do the majority of the delivery. This is the majority of the course apart from managing assignments. In other words, there is little in-course iteration and sparse effort at student engagement through connection.<br />
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The realization I am coming to is that, in online learning, teacher engagement is what happens after the content is built and delivered (with exceptions like Laura Gibbs who build her content openly and engages even at that level). Again, it doesn't have to be that way but it seems to be the rule as opposed to the exception.<br />
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What excites me about Power of Connections is that we are going to be spending so much time "beyond the content," working on the part of the iceberg beneath the surface. I think this is where teacher engagement really happens (at least for me), and it's certainly where I'll have lots of fun.Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-26006746638788005432015-07-09T15:15:00.002-05:002015-07-12T14:44:44.275-05:00Power of Connections: Real-Time Design Inquiry and Teacher Engagement<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0crEjLDIJG2UaTEgYtwA_D0xjYDMNNlnjq_a9r7yK2TrvO9NsuyxN02HX13J9qWxXFmsaj0MkwkGI_MkDwUtYAYWQ09NofF3u1mnTfxJkmIKI2dRH0lDdqIMNJOLUmKpgIBHfAO5QMZM4/s1600/For_My_Teacher.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0crEjLDIJG2UaTEgYtwA_D0xjYDMNNlnjq_a9r7yK2TrvO9NsuyxN02HX13J9qWxXFmsaj0MkwkGI_MkDwUtYAYWQ09NofF3u1mnTfxJkmIKI2dRH0lDdqIMNJOLUmKpgIBHfAO5QMZM4/s320/For_My_Teacher.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Stacy and I had a great meeting on <i><a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/index.html" target="_blank">Power of Connections</a></i> yesterday. The main focus of our discussion was on how to make our learning design decisions transparent to participants, and how to engage them in different forms of elaboration and feedback.<br />
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Practically, what this amounts to is creating reflections and comments about all course content, and posting those comments contextually, in the "margin" of each reading or assignment. Participants will see these as they go through the experience and will be able to join our dialogue if they are interested. Since the course in on student engagement, we wanted participants to be able to see in-the-moment, ongoing dialogues from the "teachers" about their decisions and thinking. We wanted them to overhear us talking about "why we thought this was a good idea (and, perhaps, realize now that it might not be exactly what we intended)," or "how this content is linked to an assignment way down the line that you can't see yet (and asking if that makes sense)", or "can you think of a better way to present this activity (we like the activity but know it could have been more)?"<br />
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In some ways, this means creating both a "course" and a "meta-course," but the result, at least for the two of us, is lots of fun. Obviously, we hope this will be something that engages our course participants, but the benefits of this "designing out loud" make it a worthwhile process regardless.<br />
Here are two reasons why.<br />
<ul>
<li><i>It reemphasizes that the learning experience we've designed is a point of departure rather than a destination</i> -- Since participants can see our decisions, expectations, and doubts, they can also see that we do not envision either the content or the thinking about our subject as something that has been resolved. I believe the evolution is/will be apparent.</li>
<li><i>It makes us care what participants think about our process almost as much as we care about what they are getting out of the process </i>-- This is an interesting one. Normally, when we think about teaching we tend to focus almost exclusively on student outcomes and how students are benefiting from what we have planned. It's simply a matter of the ends proving or justifying the means. In our model, we are constantly concerned with "how could this be better," and admitting up front that we require learner contribution and assistance in making the experience truly meaningful. We are now engaged, as teachers, because we have invited evaluation as a core part of the experience.</li>
</ul>
Once Power of Connections kicks off next week I'll begin showing examples of this "teaching out loud" process and writing about participant feedback and the evolution of our thinking.<br />
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<br />Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-17534470173061701382015-07-06T21:52:00.003-05:002015-07-12T14:44:54.843-05:00Power of Connections: Teacher Engagement and Reimagining Learning<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyGi_O391shRFDGamZjiuZlY9TLwQYKiuMlEE8WjK0OJqSAkskjGtveo1BkuET6Et5a90kXM_I79vaKjix3yDYi38RXbLZSpry3bTiuan2fM0_cI__lFVATwK46DttHh_O06JaQAlepnK-/s1600/Hub.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyGi_O391shRFDGamZjiuZlY9TLwQYKiuMlEE8WjK0OJqSAkskjGtveo1BkuET6Et5a90kXM_I79vaKjix3yDYi38RXbLZSpry3bTiuan2fM0_cI__lFVATwK46DttHh_O06JaQAlepnK-/s320/Hub.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
In response to my <a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/07/power-of-connectins-what-do-we-mean.html" target="_blank">last post</a> on student engagement, <a href="https://plus.google.com/+RobReynolds314/posts/AcQkkXVDXs9" target="_blank">Laura Gibbs commented that student creation has also been a primary path for teacher engagement</a> in her courses.<br />
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I couldn't agree more. In fact, not only do I see student-engagement pedagogy (driven by creation, agency, and personalization) as being a key to teacher engagement, <i>I also see it as being a primary transformative force in thee way we think about education and educational institutions in general</i>.<br />
<br />
I say this because pursuing educational models based on student engagement pedagogy will necessarily:<br />
<ul>
<li><i>Change the way we think about information</i> -- An educational model based on student creation and learner engagement necessarily envisions information as dynamic and open-ended (as opposed to static and closed). It places new emphases on critical inquiry and prioritizes creating with information (being able to do relevant things with it) over processing it passively;</li>
<li><i>Change our definition of learning</i> -- Better yet, a student-engagement pedagogy forces us to re-think and re-imagine what learning is really about, as well as the purpose of education in general. It brings us to the inevitable conclusion that enduring learning, the meaningful acquisition of knowledge that can lead to wisdom, is directly dependent on learner engagement;</li>
<li><i>Changes our perspectives on teaching and its purpose</i> -- Yes, it also makes us come to grips with why we teach and how we should measure our efforts. It requires us to examine our purpose and actions as teachers and to evaluate those efforts in the context of learner engagement.</li>
</ul>
I'm particularly mindful of this because Unit 4 in <a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/index.html" target="_blank">Power of Connections</a> is on The Power of Imagination. In this unit, we're wanting to look at how student engagement and connected learning can contribute to the way we think about universities and the teaching enterprise.<br />
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I've also been contemplating how this relates to Laura's inspiring work with Inoreader and her efforts to curate <a href="http://growthmindsetmemes.blogspot.com/2015/07/an-inoreader-hub-for-growth-mindset.html" target="_blank">Growth Mindset Memes</a>. Here is her introduction to this project.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
In this post I'll explain how I am setting up a blog hub and combination
RSS feed for growth mindset memes and reflections. I'm designing this
for my students (<a href="http://growthmindsetmemes.blogspot.com/2015/07/growth-mindset-blog-challenge-something.html"><b>here's the project I'll be working on with my students</b></a>),
but since it is conceived as an open project, it could go in all kinds
of different directions based on anyone who wants to hook up via this
blog hub. </blockquote>
There's so much to like about this idea -- leveraging the open Web for dynamic information, encouraging students to create and connect across the Web -- and it makes me imagine the university, or any educational institution, as a similar hub.<br />
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It makes me wonder, for example, if we can imagine models for teaching, learning, and educational institutions that function much like Laura's work and her Inoreader feed (and all the pedagogical assumptions behind it). Might this be a way to re-imagine the educational enterprise through innovative engagement?<br />
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In terms of <i>Power of Connections</i>, I am ready to scrap some of the preliminary thinking Stacy and I have been doing related to this unit, and focus instead on the student-creation/engagement/learning hub as a model for re-imagining our institutions and their purpose(s).<br />
<br />
And, if they have the time (I know they are willing but do not want to impose on valuable time), I would like to invite Laura and <a href="https://twitter.com/moiraozias" target="_blank">Moira Ozias</a> to help us facilitate this unit.<br />
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What does that mean/look like? Well, we'd like to, at a minumum, feature our basic unit content types (example below), but you could feel free to mix and re-mix, or to create additional content tyoes and ideas as well <br />
<ul>
<li>Unit 4</li>
<ul>
<li>Lesson 1</li>
<ul>
<li>Explanation (a reading, podcast, video, or combination)</li>
<li><a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/06/showing-vs-telling-using-dialogues-for.html" target="_blank">Dialogue</a></li>
<li>I<a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/05/what-in-improv.html" target="_blank">mprovisation</a> (<a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/05/improvisation-activity-1-improvisation.html" target="_blank">another example</a>)</li>
</ul>
<li>Lesson 2</li>
<ul>
<li>Artifact Challenge</li>
<li>Twitter Chat (#NTPoC)</li>
<li>Resources </li>
</ul>
</ul>
</ul>
You are welcome to create a piece of the unit, take it over completely (we would still be willing to do any work necessary to make it efficient and easy for you), or to take it in a different direction. In other words, the offer to collaborate is a fairly open one.<br />
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As always, we are wide open to suggestions.<br />
<br />Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-58831455773989234512015-07-02T07:00:00.000-05:002015-07-05T14:42:33.395-05:00Power of Connections: What Do We Mean When We Say Student Engagement?<a href="https://plus.google.com/+RobReynolds314/posts/WzREGFUqS9C" target="_blank">Laura Gibbs commented on my Google+ post yesterday</a> that she was voting for <b>PARTICIPANT CREATION</b> (all caps and bold are hers). She said this with regards to <a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/07/power-of-connections-initial-design.html" target="_blank">my post on design decisions</a> for our <a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/index.html" target="_blank"><i>Power of Connections Course</i>,</a> and it reminded me why Stacy and I have been working on this in the first place -- <i>we believe that learner creation is a core component of student engagement</i>.<br />
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Without it, in fact, we would argue that it is highly difficult to create learning that endures.<br />
<br />
Admittedly, talking about learner creation as a key part of what we call student engagement doesn't explain the different ways we can facilitate such creation in our courses, or how/when it leads to meaningful learning engagement.<br />
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This question or learning design challenge -- how/when do we create learner creation that leads to meaningful student engagement? -- is actually a driving philosophical force running through <i>Power of Connections</i>. And, as we have worked through the learning design process, we have designed with the following guiding principles.<br />
<ul>
<li><i>Effective learner creation is about the "why" as much as it is about the "what"</i> -- Stacy and I have been working on Artefact Challenges for <i>Power of Connections</i> and, while there are so many cool things we could have participants create, we find that the value of their creation is directly dependent on its purposeful integration into a learning objective objective. Meaningful engagement comes when we can get learners to move past the act of creation into the acts of learning and accruing wisdom through experience.</li>
<li><i>For optimum student engagement, learner creation should be personalized/personalizable</i> -- Good creation prompts appeal to a diverse group (meaning they are valuable or interesting to a heterogeneous class cohort), but they are also activities that can be personalized to a degree by each individual learner. This makes every creation truly unique and personal, and gives the learner creations greater meaning.</li>
<li><i>Ideally, learner creation should be sharable if we want it to result in real engagement </i>--For creation to be engaging it must matter. It is important that the created work having visibility within the learning community, that it get out of the learner's head and into reality. This leads to multiple possible levels of impactfulness. It also, quite oftten, leads to greater reflection.</li>
<li><i>Creation is more than just making stuff -- it can also be active engagement with and personal internalization of information</i> --This last one may seem strange but it is extremely important. Learner creation is also about students engaging in the formation (creation) of their own ideas and opinions about information. It is about helping them move beyond passive consumption, which is fairly antithetical to real student engagement. A key to facilitating this type of creation is to find good models for turning information into something that feels more "active" and "dynamic" to students. In <i>Power of Connections </i>for example, we do this with dialogues, which are intended to invite learners into a discussion about the information. By doing this we model information engagement as well as create a gravitational pull that, hopefully, gets the student to do more than skim the information at a surface level.</li>
</ul>
Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-41900392369171696612015-07-01T08:11:00.002-05:002015-07-01T17:17:34.473-05:00Power of Connections: Initial Design Decisions<br />
Yesterday, I posted about the <a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/06/power-of-connections-course-design.html" target="_blank">self-imposed design constraints</a> Stacy and I have placed on our<i> </i><a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/index.html" target="_blank"><i>Power of Connections</i> course</a>. Today, I want to elaborate a bit on some of the initial course design decisions we have made based on those design constraints. In the spirit innovation, I would like to think that our constraints have made us more creative. However, I am aware that we are at the early stages on our design thinking and that some of our decisions may prove problematic once the actual learning experience begins July 13.<br />
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Here, in a nutshell are, our initial design decisions for <i>Power of Connections.</i><br />
<ul>
<li><i>Focus on a limited set of content types that can be elaborated in many ways</i> -- We have tossed out many, many content types and ideas as part of our planning. In the end, we decided to go deep instead of broad. We have stuck to a few, basic content types -- those available to everyone and that can be executed by pretty much anyone -- and have focused our design on elaborating these types in different ways. We believe that this will help us achieve out goal of modeling student engagement activities for the largest audience set possible.</li>
<li><i>Focus on a limited set of activity or technology types</i> -- We do not want Power of Connections to be about cool technology or student engagement activities that necessarily require learning new technologies. So, as with content types, we are sticking to the basics when it comes to technology. We want the activities we explore and discuss in this experience to be accessible and usable by instructors with a broad range of online/hybrid teaching experience and technology expertise.</li>
<li><i>Encourage as wide a range of participant creation as possible</i> -- The first two design decisions certainly address our goal of making <i>Power of Connections</i> work for teachers and course designer with different backgrounds and differing levels of expertise. However, we also want participants to be able to "engage" according to their own personal preferences with regards to how and where they create content and conversations. We also want participants to be able to engage <i>when</i> they want and with only the content that interests them. That means designing the experience in a modular fashion so that someone can engage only with a particular activity from week three and still receive tremendous learning benefit. </li>
<li><i>Encourage dialogue in as many places as possible and make it our responsibility to aggregate and connect the community</i> -- Of course, all of this puts a bit pressure on Stacy and me because it means we must be committed to supporting/integrating both a closed learning environment as well as open Web activity and communication (for blogs, social media, and public access to course content).
It's usually an either/or proposition when it comes to course design, but we're trying to do both (and it could be a miserable failure -- i.e. there may be a good reason we never mix the two).</li>
<li><i>Ensure
that all content can be accessed from multiple environments</i> -- both
open and closed -- One of the goals of Power of Connections is to create a catalog of sharable information, activities and ideas related to student engagement. We want to make sure that all the work created in this experience lives on after the experience and remains discoverable, editable, and sharable by others. We also want to encourage participation in our experience by everyone, particularly those who don't have time to engage in the course experience but who want to view what's going on or add to the conversation casually through social media.</li>
<li><i>Commit to engaging with the community as facilitators for as long as its active</i> -- As I have said, this is not a traditional course, it is a learning and community experience. And, Stacy and I are not acting as instructors, but rather as facilitators for the learning community. To that end, we are committed to supporting community conversation and the curation of community content/ideas as long as people are interested.</li>
</ul>
<br />Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-29252136629927469982015-06-30T07:31:00.000-05:002015-07-01T08:12:08.022-05:00Power of Connections: Course Design ConstraintsOkay, while it's taken some time in various planning stages (mainly because my attention has been pulled away by other projects), <a href="http://guides.ou.edu/OER" target="_blank">Stacy Zemke</a> and I are happy to announce our <a href="https://connect.nextthought.com/index.html" target="_blank">Power of Connections</a> open learning experience, which will commence July 13. You can follow the link above to watch our promo video and enroll, or check out <a href="https://nextthought.com/thoughts/2015/06/what-do-we-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-student-engagement" target="_blank">my more formal description post here</a>.<br />
<br />
What I would like to do in this post is begin sharing information about our actual approach to designing this experience, and to explain some of the decisions we are making about the experience structure and platform/technology usage. To kick this off, I want to talk a bit about our self-imposed design constraints.<br />
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<b>Constraints </b><br />
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To begin with, I should note that part of our thinking is informed by beliefs about the importance of constraints in shaping innovation and creativity. Essentially, we find that teachers and learners are often more inventive and willing to stretch their thinking when they have fewer options to work with. You will see us model this notion of constraint throughout the experience n the form our improvisations and artefact activities.<br />
<br />
For the purposes of designing this experience, we established the following as our initial design constraints. <br />
<br />
1.<i> It should be more of a learning experience and not a course in a traditional sense</i> -- We felt that we should design something we would want to take, something that was more about doing and connecting with others, something from which participants could take away valuable experiences and ideas that could incorporated easily into their own teaching or learning design.<br />
<br />
2. I<i>t needs to be both structured and unstructured</i> -- This may seem like a strange one to some, but if you've taught with journals or blogs you probably know what we're getting at here. Some find the completely unstructured, "build your own experience" adventure to be exhilarating. Others find it terrifying because they want a much greater sense of linear structure. By the way, this seems ot apply to teachers as well. So, for this experience, we wanted to constrain oursleves to a design that would, the the greatest extent possible, satisfy both those wanting to explore freely as well as those desiring more structure.<br />
<br />
3. <i>Content and content design should model what average instructor can
do in almost any learning environment</i> -- Again, call us pragmatists. Stacy and I both work with traditional institutions and instructors, many of whom are not ready to embrace new technologies or innovative approaches to teaching. With that in mind, we wanted to design content that pretty much any teacher/instructor could create and implement. We also realize that all teachers/designers work with additional environment/tool constraints (beyond their own expertise ar willingness to innovate), so we are also focusing on content models that can work pretty much anywhere.<br />
<br />
4. <i>The experience needs to be both closed and open</i> -- It is important to Stacy and me that we model something that can be incorporated into a wide range of institutions and teaching environments. We want our colleagues at every point on the teaching spectrum to be able to use some of the concepts in modeled in this experience. As a result, we feel like we need to embrace both open and closed environments. For those constrained by traditional LMS environments, and who feel constrained to work entirely within those platforms, we wanted to show that you can create incredible engagement there. However, we also wanted to support teachers/designers working in more open environments, and those wanting to add open options to a closed environment. <br />
<br />
5. <i>The focus should be learner-centric</i> -- If we're going to focus on "student engagement," the design of the experience should place the learner at the center of his/her learning network as much as possible. As much as possible, all energy should be generated by individual learners and learner groups/communities.<br />
<br />
6. <i>Participants should have the ability to see what is going on within the community network</i> -- One of our beliefs about student engagement is that the more genuine engagement/activity achieved by a student within her/his learning network, the more meaningful and enduring the actual learning will be. To that end, we feel it is important to find diverse ways to help "show" learners how both they and the learning community are engaging, and how they might benefit form more or different types of engagement<b>.</b><br />
<br />
7. <i>Participants should be able to join and leave at any time</i> -- If we are designing an experience for the learner (as opposed to for the institution or instructor), it should be as flexible as possible. People should be able to come and go, regardless of whether or not they are talking of Michelangelo . They should be able to drop in for a single activity, a lesson, or the whole experience. They should also be able to do this in the order of their won desire. <br />
<br />
<br />Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-9800495159339879732015-06-04T07:35:00.000-05:002015-07-01T17:18:55.957-05:00Showing vs. Telling: Using Dialogues for Interaction and Reflection<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialogue">The dialogue</a> emerged as a genre in antiquity, and has been used across the centuries as a mechanism for demonstrating an exchange of ideas between two or more people. From a teaching and learning perspective, dialogues are particularly useful as a way to show and invite participation with information as opposed to simply displaying it for passive consumption. They represent the difference between “showing” and "telling."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There are a number of fine modern examples of the dialogue form, but one that stands out for me is Douglas Hofstadter’s <a href="http://www.amazon.com/G%C3%B6del-Escher-Bach-Eternal-Golden/dp/0465026567"><i>Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid</i></a>. In his Pulitzer-Prize-winning book, Hofstadter uses a conversational structure inspired by Plato’s dialogues to demonstrate his thesis on consciousness and, through this construct, has been able to make highly abstract and advanced concepts both understandable and interesting to a broad audience.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I first read <i>Gödel, Escher Bach</i> back in the eighties, and it inspired me to use dialogues in my face-to-face courses as a device to structure student participation and understanding in literature classes (admittedly, this may have seemed like a particularly easy transition based on my experience as a beginning language instructor, a discipline that has long championed model dialogues as a tool for helping students internalize natural language forms). For my literature courses, I would take character dialogues from works we were reading, add several lines to those in order to demonstrate what I had in mind, and then ask the students to elaborate on the dialogues according to specific themes. The purpose of the assignment was: 1) to give students a purpose for reading selected portions of the text carefully; 2) to provide a framework for gaining a deeper understanding of character, motivation, and viewpoint, and; 3) to facilitate a fun way to stimulate interaction and conversation.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I had pretty much forgotten those dialogue assignments until, one day, Stacy Zemke showed me how she was using dialogues in her online courses. She was using them as a form of instructor mediation at the beginning of her lessons, as an alternative to posting "one-way” reading or reading assignments. What I found really valuable was the way she used the form to model conversations she might have with a student about the topic or information being covered. This approach, based on her cumulative experience covering the same information with real students, afforded her sever advantages. Fist she was able to “show” the topic being discussed as opposed to simply “tell” about it. In addition, she was able to engage students as active participants int he reading process by including them through her composite student participant int he dialogue. Finally, the form also allowed her to answer frequently asked questions in a way that was completely contextualized and, thus, more valuable.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As I’ve designed training courses and other learning experiences over recent years, I have resorted more and more to the dialogue as a valuable tool for creating increased student engagement around concepts and information. I have found that this kind of modeling can be particularly valuable for the students, and it is also a fun way for me to teach. And, like our improvisations, it is a highly flexible model that can be used in any learning environment, and that can be morphed easily to match different teaching styles. Equally important, experience has shown me that sharing concepts through dialogues often results in deeper and more extended reflection by students.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Taking all of this from me telling you about it to actual demonstration, here is an example of a dialogue I created for a linguistics course.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;">Dialogue: The Gap into Meaning</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><u><br /></u></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline;">[TO BE READ ALOUD BY TWO STUDENTS]</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">: So we might say, then, that language is evidence of our fall </span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">from Grace?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Ignorance, your Worship?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">: Yes. With each turn of the game human language inevitably moves further from the Meaning from which it sprang.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">: Come again?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">: From the derivative comes the derivative comes the derivative. Each iteration becoming more moronic as it proceeds.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">: This is dour news indeed, your Worship. It weighs heavy on my heart and robs me of what little courage I have.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Perhaps this understanding would weigh less heavily on me if I were able to grasp it with greater clarity.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Perhaps. Knowing the depth and breadth of a mortal enemy, seeing the many weapons he has to vanquish you – this can bring a clarity of purpose to a knight’s battle.</span></span><b><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Your courage is a valiant comfort.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: A knight’s courage comes through faith, loyal squire.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: But, your Grace, assuming that Meaning exists apart from human language, that it is something altogether different, then where did it come from?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Where did the triangle come from? Or Pi?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Obviously these existed in in the universe independently of human awareness.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Precisely.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: And these, along with many other wonders, were discovered by human civilization, which in turn created a special language called mathematics to describe them.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Also correct, Sancho. And let me say again how I marvel at the distance you have traveled in your learning.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Your Grace is too kind. But my understanding is still incomplete.</span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: What aid can I provide?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: I understand that the marvels of our universe have been discovered through empirical observation and rational thought.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: This is true.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: What I cannot see is a path for discovering Meaning. It does not seem to be open to empirical observation, and I can think of no rational argument for reaching it, particularly as the starting point would always seem to be human language, which is only moving us further away from Meaning with each passing generation.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Ah, yes. I see your dilemma now. Perhaps I can lead you through another thought experiment to help you understand more fully.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: I would be forever in your Grace’s debt. What I mean to say, of course, is that I would be even more eternally in your debt.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: I understand what you mean, Sancho.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: What a relief. I have begun to despair that all communication was hopeless!</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Very well then, let us imagine that we are standing on a blank sheet of paper.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: There is nothing on it?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: It is completely empty of markings. And, since any markings would represent possible language, can we not assume that this piece of paper represents every possible sound, word, phrase, and thought in the universe?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: How is that?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: No choices have yet been made about what will be written. There are no limitations. This blank sheet of paper, through its very silence, represents an almost infinite number of available meanings.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Yes, I understand now.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Next, imagine that my sword is a pen that I take and make a mark on the paper. [Don Quixote removes his sword from its scabbard and draws an imaginary mark on the ground with its tip] It is a single stroke of ink. It is the beginning of some letter or sound but, in this form, is only a small individual line. The start of something bigger, perhaps.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Yes, it could be any combination of lines or sounds at this juncture.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: By making this mark, however, even though it is small and unformed, I have also reduced the number of possible meanings for this page. Can you see that?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: I can see that there is less space for future marks than there used to be.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Exactly, This is because each mark on a page necessarily defines a limitation. The blank page, the one without any language, contains all the possible expressions of meaning in the universe. Anything and everything is out there for the choosing. With each mark, however, the writer makes a decision. A particular line increases the likelihood of the next stroke and eliminates the possibilities of others. One or more possibilities are inevitably covered up, obliterated.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: And this will continue as you draw more marks, will it not?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Indeed it will, good Sancho. As I draw more strokes the process continues. I form an entire letter, and then a syllable. This letter and syllable preclude other letters and syllables.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: [With great enthusiasm now] And before long, you will have written an entire sentence. This sentence will naturally suggest new sentences, ones that would seem to follow logically or make sense. It will also eliminate the possibility of other sentences that would make no sense within the context being created.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Yes, yes, and so it goes. The more marks I make on this page, the more writing I do, the more limitations I place on meaning. Once I have filled the page with words, I move onto a second page but this new page is now confined by the context of the first. Whereas the first blank page represented the entire universe of possible meaning, this second page has a much more modest body of meaning from which to draw.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: This is incredibly helpful. Your Grace! I see how the possibility of Meaning is constrained by the continued use of language.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Good. Now, let us pursuing this line of thought to its logical extremes.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: I will defer to your Grace’s wisdom, although I must admit I am hesitant to wander into any extremes.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Let’s imagine a novelist, writing late at night in her study, tapping out page after pager on her keyboard in an effort to create a perfectly clear narrative and Meaning, one that eliminates all other possible narratives or meanings. We might even say that this is what, ultimately, defines the great work of fiction: it eliminates definitively the possibility of other marks on other pages, of every other possible utterance or meaning available in the universe.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: But according to our previous conversation, that narrative cannot actually be complete or definitive. The language the novelist is using too much too loose for wrapping up Meaning.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: That is absolutely correct, dear Sancho. She has been working under a false assumption, an elaborate hoax that human beings have perpetrated on themselves for many generations, actually since the advent of writing itself. It is a hoax founded in our misguided belief that the locus of utterance and Meaning is in the markings on the page. We have convinced ourselves that the music of written language is expressed in the formation of written signs. In reality, this is less true than if we were to say that the entirety of the sounds that can be created on a piano can be expressed by pressing on different combinations of the thirty-six black keys.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: That would be strange and incomplete music indeed, your Grace.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: To answer your original question, friend Sancho, Meaning is found in the white spaces on the paper, in the silence. It is in that silence that Meaning is inevitably wrought and rendered.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Sancho</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: And how are we to interpret this silence?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">: For that, we must learn a new skill. We must learn to listen.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Indeed, Sancho. The magic of von Neumann has allowed us to see this invisible evolution toward ignorance.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don Quixote</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: Dour but inevitable, dear Sancho.</span></span></div>
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<span id="docs-internal-guid-346a5347-3a86-77b6-809e-6f07f28274d3" style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-19947488477917589072015-05-31T14:58:00.000-05:002015-07-01T17:18:36.823-05:00Improvisation Activity #1: Improvisation with an Object<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now that I've provided <a href="http://thelearninglot.blogspot.com/2015/05/what-in-improv.html" target="_blank">a general overview for improvisation activities</a>, I'm ready lay out the learning design philosophy and basic setup instructions for the core improvisation types I like to use in both online and face-to-face learning.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The first type, and the one I often use when I'm working with groups of any kind is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Improvisation with an Object</i>.</span><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> The purpose of this improvisation is the encourage participants to see the familiar differently, from new perspectives. It is an extremely flexible activity, and can be set up easily in any kind of environment.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The basic setup for this </span><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">improvisation is really simple. I tell the group that I'm going to show them an </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">object and then give them a set amount of time to write down as many ideas as possible about what the object might be. The only ting they can't write down is what the object really is or what it's actually used for.</span></span><br />
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the simplest version of this activity, I ask participants to work individually and I set the time limit at 30 seconds. The time constraint works well as it helps provide focus for the activity. It also produces creativity by "forcing" people to accept possibilities that they might reject if they were given sufficient time to evaluate.</span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisXz4Te1pbp2K9M1YFcJ11A0JUsz3y3XzwiaUy5GdULSBm26SePorwTzSFOled0ecPJsS_0c1mIyjaxFjWpDDh_TCm0C3RQiaOX0kTgE7awaPJueNhDeSY2JmR9HRZ7-oFKY2Pz8tToyOZ/s1600/Pencil.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisXz4Te1pbp2K9M1YFcJ11A0JUsz3y3XzwiaUy5GdULSBm26SePorwTzSFOled0ecPJsS_0c1mIyjaxFjWpDDh_TCm0C3RQiaOX0kTgE7awaPJueNhDeSY2JmR9HRZ7-oFKY2Pz8tToyOZ/s320/Pencil.jpg" width="214" /></a></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When I do this improvisation for the first time, I deliberately choose an object that is readily recognizable, such as a pencil. I do this because I want participants to begin with a sense of familiarity, and using a </span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">familiar object helps achieve that. I also want to force them to see things differently, think beyond the familiar, translate the known into what they can imagine. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This jump from the concrete-known to imaginative possibilities is not automatic, however. Typically, when I begin an improvisation series with a pencil, the initial set of suggestions I generally hear are simple translations from one concrete, known object to another. For example:</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's a thermometer</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's a straw
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's a cigar</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As I facilitate further stretching with this activity I will ask participants to work in pairs, and I will also re-introduce objects we have used before. At this stage, both because of group synergies and because they have already discarded obvious translations, the suggestions will evolve into more distant and/or narrative-driven possibilities.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's the model the Beatles used as inspiration for Yellow Submarine</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's a rocket ship from the planet Balsa</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's the Egyptian skyscraper they called the Needle</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At this point, the elaboration portion of the activity is particularly fun. As a facilitator, I'm able to ask questions, extend the narrative and imaginative possibilities, and draw other group members into the discussion.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There are many possible permutations of this improvisation. I have done this online and face-to-face, and as both oral and written activities. I have used it successfully to reinforce concepts with language and composition students, and with software developers and biology researchers. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is also an improvisation that I can implement successfully in any situation with, literally, no advance planning.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The bottom line is that it’s easy, it’s fun, and it’s a great way stimulate lateral
thinking and imagination. It’s also an activity that gets us out of our set
ways of seeing things.</span></div>
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Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-71324271853011463542015-05-23T21:15:00.001-05:002015-07-01T17:18:19.062-05:00What's in an Improv?<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, today I'm starting work on the different kinds of improvisation activities that Stacy and I are thinking about using in our open course course.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">[<b>Stacy</b>: Don't you think this might be a good time to explain about improvisation activities in general?</span><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Rob</b>: Good idea. I can do that now, unless you want to?</span><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Stacy</b>: I'm happy for you to handle it.]</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Like I was saying, I thought it might be a good idea if I shared some of our thinking behind improvisation activities and why they're important in the context of creating learner engagement.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">From a student perspective, improvisation activities are useful for stimulating immediate, focused interaction and reflection related to specific concepts or skills. They also encourage both lateral thinking, or brain stretching, and creativity. Finally, these activities are great for both individual and group activities,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For learning designers and instructors, improvisation activities have four basic traits that make them valuable for student engagement strategies.</span><br />
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<ol>
<li><i style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The are environment independent</i><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> -- To begin with, improvisations are activities that work extremely well for student engagement regardless of the physical or digital classroom setting. In other words, they can be conducted easily in both face-to-face or online environments. That's particularly useful for instructors who teach the same courses in multiple environments.</span></li>
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<li><i style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They are subject independent</i><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> -- In addition to being "environment independent," improvisation activities also work equally well across all disciplines. They can be used effectively in Humanities, STEM, and Business courses alike. So the old excuse of "that's a great idea but it worn't work for _________" just doesn't hold true with improvisation activities.</span></li>
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<li><i style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They are time </i><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>flexible</i> -- Improvisation activities are also extremely flexible with regards to time. You can create improvisation activities that last under 2 minutes, or more elaborate exercises that take up to 10-15 minutes. The choice and design are entirely up to the instructor.</span></li>
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<li><i style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They support many different delivery options</i><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> -- Finally, improvisation activities can be delivered or implemented in many different ways. This means that they can work for any type of teaching style or personality. This means the other old excuse of "that's a great idea but it won't work with my teaching style," is also a non-starter with these activities.</span></li>
</ol>
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<ul>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>So, What's in an Improv?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When we set up an improvisation activity, we generally think about three separate parts -- </span><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1) <i>the setup</i>; 2) <i>the activity</i>; 3) <i>the elaboration</i>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The </span><i style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">setup</i><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> is really important because it explains what the improvisation activity is and why it matters. This also helps everyone feel comfortable with the activity. That's a big part of doing improvs with students since the open-ended nature of these activities causes a certain amount of anxiety for some. Not that discomfort is necessarily a bad thing – a bit of healthy anxiety can generate lots of creative thinking – but we generally want learners to be </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">comfortably</b><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> uncomfortable.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The <i>activity</i> part of the improv is the actual improvisation itself. That’s the part where everyone reflects, interacts, and creates based on the setup. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But a good improvisation doesn’t stop there. We also want to capture the energy and ideas created by the community, and then use that to extend the connectedness of the activity. That’s what we call the <i>elaboration</i>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />In my next post, I'll outline our first improvisation activity example and discuss its many possibilities and permutations.</span></div>
Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-84892675543956285522015-05-19T11:11:00.002-05:002015-05-19T11:18:37.630-05:00So now I'm really starting to put this connected learning course together and...<h3>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I'm Starting Today!</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I am calling today the official "start day" for stitching together the open course that Stacy Zemke and I are co-facilitating this summer. Of course, Stacy is a pro and I'm just a guy with all these abstract ideas that we're not sure how to work into meaningful activities. She gets things done and I keep thinking up new ideas to go on top of the other things I haven't done yet.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But today is the day I get serious about this.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I mean it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Look here, I even have a course overview (yes, it is extremely abstract and could turn out to be anything but I think I should get some points for at least getting this far). In all honesty, Stacy helped with this too, although she should receive no blame for any inadequacies it reflects.</span>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b style="text-align: center;">The Power of Connections</b></span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Overview</span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The </span><i style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Power of
Connections</i><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> is an, open, online course focused on the theme of learner
engagement and collaboration. The course is created within a Connected Learning framework.
As such, it prioritizes the following core philosophies and pedagogical
commitments:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The
learner is the center of her/his personal learning network</i><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">.
The course provides an opportunity for the learner to extend or strengthen that
network.</span></span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><i style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The
learner’s network grows through connections (interaction) with people and
information (nodes in the network)</i><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">. As such, community – structured and
unstructured is a key component of the course.</span></span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The
greater a learner’s engagement with his/her network, the greater the potential
for learning</i><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">. Consequently, as its primary pedagogical focus, the course
will focus on modeling and facilitating the learner engagement.</span></span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Effective
learning experiences allow and promote “centrifugal” expansion, an outward
focus that encourages learners to make new, natural connections</i><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">This focus necessitates the prioritization of
openness – open pedagogy, open communities, and open content. Through course
design, support for open forms of content, and use of multiple networks and
communities, the course will embrace open and centrifugal learning.</span></span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Network
feedback loops help learners understand the potential of their learning networks
and facilitate their expansion</i><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">. The course will provide multiple form of
feedback to individual learners, as well as the learning community, to
facilitate network expansion and acceleration.</span></span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Organization </span></o:p></h4>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The course is divided into 4 modules, each covering approximately
1 week in time. The four modules and their themes are:</span></div>
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<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The Power
of Connections</i><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> – Connected Learning, networked learning, collaboration, and
learning engagement</span></span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The Power
of Openness</i><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> – Open pedagogy, centrifugal learning design, connected communities,
open content</span></span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>The Power
of Creation</i> – Learner agency, knowledge construction, network analytics and
feedback loops<br /><br /><span class="MsoCommentReference" style="text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-size: 9.0pt;"></span></span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The Power
of Imagination</i><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> – Education redesign, assessing engagement, program design
and certification, lifelong learning</span></span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Okay, So What Are You Really Doing?</span></h3>
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<div>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Wordy and really abstract, right? Okay, so here's the real plan. Stacy and I want to offer up a series of collaborations (structured and unstructured), that are designed to help us deliver a connected-learning and/or connectivist learning experience. We want to leverage our personal networks, as well as others in our community, to crowdsource solutions and examples for engagement in online and hybrid learning environments.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What kind of solutions? Good question. That's still a bit of a work in progress, but our idea is to move through each module using a series of improvisations, dialogues, and artifact activities that, essentially, get su to collectively construct a catalog of great engagement solutions, activities, and examples.</span><br />
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<h3>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What's Next?</span></h3>
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You mean there's more to creating an online course than just coming up with a description? Really? Stacy never said anything about that, daggone it!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I suppose the next step, if there must be one, is to begin designing/sharing/throwing out there some ideas for our improvisations.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That will have to start tomorrow. I'm already worn out today.</span></div>
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Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-47411005294431519912015-04-16T11:11:00.001-05:002015-04-16T11:11:11.991-05:00Learning Subjectives: Week 1 #Rhizo15<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 24px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; widows: 1;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">I'm a huge advocate of centrifugal learning models and <a href="https://nextthought.com/thoughts/2015/04/the-promise-of-connected-learning" target="_blank">Connected Learning</a>, and Dave's <a href="http://rhizomatic.net/2015/04/14/learning-subjectives-designing-for-when-you-dont-know-where-youre-going/" style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; color: #743399; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">video prompt</a> brought up an important question with regards to this model. How do we design learning experiences when we don’t know where we’re going? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">It seems to run counter to all our experiences with formal education, which are based on homogeneous pathways and set temporal spaces. How to we help learners go somewhere if we don't know where they are going?</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 24px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; widows: 1;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">I really like some of the posts on this subject so far:</span></div>
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<ul style="color: #333333; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="http://www.hybridpedagogy.com/columns/embracing-subjectivity/" style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; color: #743399; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Embracing Subjectivity</a> (Maha Bali)</span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="color: #333333; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"> <a href="http://allthingspedagogical.blogspot.ca/2015/04/everything-is-subjective-timely-rhizo15.html" style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; color: #743399; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Everything is Subjective: A “Timely” #Rhizo15 post for Week 1</a> (Ann Gagne) </span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="color: #333333; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; color: black; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="https://fiveflames4learning.wordpress.com/2015/04/15/from-squirrels-to-rhizomes-an-intro-to-rhizo15/" target="_blank">From Squirrels to Rhizomes: An intro to #rhizo15</a> (</span>Helen J. DeWaard's)</span></li>
</ul>
<span style="color: #333333;"><div style="line-height: 24px;">
<span style="color: #333333; line-height: normal;"><span style="line-height: 24px;">I think Helen gets to the heat of the matter with her declaration, "I will not be neutral in Rhizo15." Centrifugal and </span></span><span style="color: #333333; line-height: normal;"><span style="line-height: 24px;">Connected</span></span><span style="color: #333333; line-height: normal;"><span style="line-height: 24px;"> </span><span style="line-height: 24px;">Learning</span><span style="line-height: 24px;"> requires that I have movement, direction, and momentum. I have to be willing to move outward </span><span style="line-height: 24px;">from</span><span style="line-height: 24px;"> the center of the </span><span style="line-height: 24px;">learning</span><span style="line-height: 24px;"> network, and to help others do the same. With that in mind, my learning subjectives are:</span></span></div>
<br />
<ul>
<li><span style="line-height: 24px;">I will have a personal point of view that sets a specific direction or outward-bound trajectory within my learning network;</span></li>
<li><span style="line-height: 24px;">I will connect with others and, through those connections, gain both momentum and clearer direction for my journey;</span></li>
<li><span style="line-height: 24px;">I will keep my options open at all times, and be willing to travel in new directions as my learning network evolves.</span></li>
</ul>
</span><br />
<br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 24px;"><br /></span></span></div>
Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-3903596180349869072014-12-02T09:44:00.001-06:002014-12-02T09:46:13.364-06:00Re-visiting Old Thoughts about Language and Language Learning<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; tab-stops: .5in 1.0in 1.5in 2.0in 2.5in 3.0in 3.5in 4.0in 4.5in 5.0in 5.5in 6.0in; text-autospace: none;">
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Back in 1998, I started writing down ideas for an Advanced Spanish Composition/Conversation "book" to accompany the courses I was teaching at the University of Oklahoma. I haven't thought about that project in more than a decade, but a comment by a co-worker on the limits of language made me go back and dig out the introduction I wrote back then.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica;">For the most part, I hold the same thoughts about language as I did back then. Naturally, here has been some evolution. I am probably less influenced by complexity theory than I was back then, and my thinking is more influenced by non-verbal communication theories.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica;"><b>Introduction</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica; mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"><i>Learning is the accrual and evolution of human
wisdom through cultural patterns of spoken, written, and lived symbols</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It takes place over time and occurs ideally
in environments where real change and interaction are permitted.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica; mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"><i>Language, in this context, is defined as the
symbolic expression of self or communal awareness</i>. The greater a learner's
awareness of her/his self and environment the greater will be his/her desire to
master the symbols of communication.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Most second language textbooks assume such self-knowledge and its
accompanying motivation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
e-text/environment centers first on the learner's need to know self before the
desire to know symbols.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica; mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"><i>Oral proficiency in a language is only achieved
through the repeated use of that language in uncontrolled/uncontrollable
contexts</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>El Camino (the book project) leads the learner
through a rich variety of such contexts by placing the learner and her/his
evolving interests at the center of all learning activities.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Through improvisational and extemporaneous
speaking and writing, learners overcome the obstacles of spontaneity and
self-doubt, and develop a wide comfort zone for use of the target language.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica; mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"><i>Composition proficiency in a language is
developed and achieved via the acquisition of vocabulary, the study of model
written texts in that language, and the practice of different writing modes
both in rehearsed and non-rehearsed settings.</i> El Camino provides the learner
with a wealth of authentic, written texts </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">for study and stimulated composition.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica;"> </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">The many samples of texts included in El
Camino, available in both written and audio formats, are augmented by a vast
library of stored Internet texts and electronic newspapers and journals.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Ideal and efficient second language acquisition
involves the following learning environment assumptions/components:</span></div>
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<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Information is dynamic</i>.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;">It is
fluid and ever-changing as opposed to being static content that is easily
encoded, packaged, sent, decoded, and digested without variation.</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Architecture of the environment is open</i>.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;">Evolution is built-in.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;">There is no attempt to pre-determine what
final outcomes will be or what final form of the system will emerge.</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Change (in any direction) must be possible</i>. Positive feedback (in which small effects are
reinforced and produce evolution to the next stage(s) of development) is
essential. As the learning community
develops particular interests and skills, a unique character for the community
emerges and emphases must adapt to match that evolving character.</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Emphasis of the learning environment is entirely on doing</i> (the
use/misuse of the language by the learners).</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Objectives for any community of learners can only be defined after
the completion a particular stage/chapter</i>.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;">
</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;">As such, these objectives serve as markers to show where the community
of learners has been as opposed to where it might be headed.</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Process of second language acquisition is clear to all learners and
its discussion is part of the learning environment and community</i>.</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Inquiry and investigation are the active processes of all learning
in the community</i>.</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Creativity, both in terms of target language use and personal
development, is essential</i>.</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Learners are inevitably heterogeneous with distinct interests,
motivations, and learning styles</i>.</span></li>
<br />
<li><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"><i>Learners as community and learners as individuals receive equal
attention</i>.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; text-indent: -0.25in;">In this way learners can
learn from other learners as well as self with the language serving as the only
real classroom authority.</span></li>
</ul>
Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-20038565912153406192014-10-25T21:36:00.001-05:002014-10-25T21:36:14.578-05:00Week 1 Assignment -- DALMOOC<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA8_SNMoCOvjMv20ABxyRFu60lYxIzIzmdg78gNC7V7P0Aq0LVEO8J5S16fnKwvzz45QiPWltBnJIQ4LGHwsMBJ8X3l82p4c-ahGO8i2gwjZq2PYgUfkl-VHeN2NQ1o-LpYPocK5dZT9rt/s1600/FBF_2014_Antiquarian_Books_2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA8_SNMoCOvjMv20ABxyRFu60lYxIzIzmdg78gNC7V7P0Aq0LVEO8J5S16fnKwvzz45QiPWltBnJIQ4LGHwsMBJ8X3l82p4c-ahGO8i2gwjZq2PYgUfkl-VHeN2NQ1o-LpYPocK5dZT9rt/s1600/FBF_2014_Antiquarian_Books_2.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></div>
I had planned to join the course from the very beginning and attend all the introductory sessions synchronously. Unfortunately, the best laid plans and all that... Between travel and some unexpected projects at work, I have found myself catching up asynchronously over the weekend.<br />
<br />
First I want to say thanks to all the instructors and participating experts who have worked so hard and with such thoughtfulness in putting this course together. I had the benefit of joining Prosolo after other intrepid souls had wandered about and asked questions about how to accomplish various tasks, so my experience there was not as confusing as it may have been for some. I think the tool has much potential and it is definitely they type of environment required for more open-ended learning. I have also appreciated the "dual" nature of the course design, which makes it a bit easier for people who haven't either the time/inclination to participate in a fully networked manner. Finally, I have found the recorded video presentations and discussions helpful.<br />
<br />
I liked the idea of the tools matrix as well. I think this is particularly valuable as I am certain most of us taking the course have some experience with data analysis but often in areas other than learning analytics. In my case, for example, I have spent the past four years working on various projects related to price and sales analysis related to e-commerce and, in particular, textbooks. We have used a variety of database/analysis tools, ranging from MarkLogic to Tableau. We have also worked with Google Analytics, and used these tools to mine usage data related to e-textbook reading and resource access.<br />
<br />
When I think about learning analytics, I must admit that what really interests me is learning. How can we understand the process more deeply? How can we use that understanding to improve the learning efficacy and overall experience of individual learners?Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4337997361426932440.post-80055352994590385082014-10-01T20:20:00.001-05:002014-10-02T06:12:33.863-05:00Where Has All the Learning Gone?<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227543788" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Exhibit Hall by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Exhibit Hall" height="150" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3930/15227543788_370f0dca14_m.jpg" width="200" /></a>Another year, another EDUCAUSE.<br />
<br />
Meetings. Meetings. Ah yes, a few more meetings.<br />
<br />
Meetings and plenty of pitches from intrepid sales and marketing people eager to explain how their product is unique and will actually transform Higher Education, or at least some small portion of it.<br />
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This year, leading up to the big event, we had a long online discussion about the LMS and the ills and possible futures of learning platforms in general. For a fairly quick recap, I would suggest these posts by <a href="http://abject.ca/lets-get-systematic-baby/" target="_blank">Brian Lamb</a>, <a href="http://timklapdor.wordpress.com/2014/10/01/lms-week-the-ring-my-hat/" target="_blank">Tim Klapdor,</a> and <a href="http://moreorlessbunk.net/technology/as-the-learning-management-system-turns/" target="_blank">Jonathan Rees</a>.In addition to these discussions, we also had big lead-up announcements like the one from <a href="http://unizin.org/" target="_blank">Unizin</a> and its founding institutional members.<br />
<br />
Exciting times, healthy skepticism, and some potential disruption. What's not to like, right?<br />
<br />
And speaking of disruption, Clayton Christitensen delivered the opening keynote with the message that <a href="http://www.edtechmagazine.com/higher/article/2014/09/educause-2014-online-learning-could-fundamentally-change-role-universities" target="_blank">online learning could fundamentally change the role of universities</a>. The rest of the conference highlights/buzz, which parallel the prevailing trends and business models in Higher Education, were summarized quite nicely by Steven Mintz in his <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/higher-ed-beta/future-higher-education" target="_blank">post on the future of Higher Education</a>. His list includes: learning analytics, microcredentialing, competency-based education, personalized learning, curricular optimization, open educational resources, shared services, articulation agreements, flipped classrooms, and one-stop student services.<br />
<br />
On the floor of the exhibit hall, the vendor booths underscored these opportunities clearly.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227607268" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Analytics 4 by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Analytics 4" height="375" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3927/15227607268_cab3e3e3ab.jpg" width="500" /></a>
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<br />
And more analytics.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15411039321" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Analytics by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Analytics" height="375" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3931/15411039321_40777f1145.jpg" width="500" /></a>
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<br />
And if you want some variety...<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227660107" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Analytics 3 by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Analytics 3" height="375" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2944/15227660107_81d4cd9c8a.jpg" width="500" /></a><br />
<br />
Of course, there was also a healthy dose of...<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227615428" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Flatworld by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Flatworld" height="375" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2948/15227615428_2f38c2eeaa.jpg" width="500" /></a>
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<br />
And a heaping portions of...<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15391157686" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Difference Engine by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Difference Engine" height="500" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3929/15391157686_124e3c0763.jpg" width="375" /></a>
<br />
<br />
Naturally, there were also many smaller companies with worthy products and messages, such as...<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227666467" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Lumen Learning by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Lumen Learning" height="500" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2944/15227666467_eac9f75ea8.jpg" width="375" /></a>
<br />
<br />
and...<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227454719" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Higher Quality Ed by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Higher Quality Ed" height="500" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3927/15227454719_c99ef60352.jpg" width="375" /></a>
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and...<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227662317" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 MyEducator by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 MyEducator" height="500" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2944/15227662317_262ac5d7c1.jpg" width="375" /></a>
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<br />
Then, somewhere in the midst of this...<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227624598" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Floor View by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Floor View" height="375" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2943/15227624598_e445fca28e.jpg" width="500" /></a>
<br />
<br />
I stumbled across this ...<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/125768741@N03/15227460869" title="EDUCAUSE 2014 Analytics 2 by Rob Reynolds, on Flickr"><img alt="EDUCAUSE 2014 Analytics 2" height="375" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3927/15227460869_a56e10b40d.jpg" width="500" /></a>
<br />
<br />
And I paused to ask myself, "What's wrong with this picture?"<br />
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The answer, at least for me, was clear. So many companies, so many products, and so many institutional solutions (almost all endorsed by institutions embracing or investing in them), all driven by the <i>business</i> of education. All driven by that most fundamental of business school questions -- What problem are we trying to solve?<br />
<br />
At EDUCAUSE, it seemed evident that the problem we are trying to solve is that of making our businesses -- our institutions, companies, products -- more successful. Paraphrasing and linking the multitude of signs and signifiers on display in the Exhibit Hall, we want our businesses to be more successful in terms of user-friendliness, user retention, and user satisfaction. Judging from the many displays and demonstrations, it certainly seems that we have the technology to do these things and are devoting impressive amounts of money and human intelligence to reach our goals for success.<br />
<br />
What problem are we trying to solve?<br />
<br />
The question was being asked explicitly and implicitly at every presentation, booth, and meeting. It seemed that everyone had come ready to pitch their solution -- big or small -- for Higher Education, and could elucidate nicely how their solution solved an important problem in education and how it could help the bottom line (for institutions or investors).<br />
<br />
But what problem are we trying to solve?<br />
<br />
The question is a good one, but I felt it was being asked in the wrong context (at least for me). Instead of "What problem are we trying to solve in Higher Education?" I was wanting to hear, "What problem are we trying to solve in learning?"<br />
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That's because Higher Education, like education is general, is only a conduit for what really matters -- learning. Education, for all its temporal grandeur, is but an evolving symptom of a more important, and more fundamental human requirement -- learning. It is a container while learning is the elemental sustenance it is designed to hold.<br />
<br />
Education is a cultural or civilizational artefact. It is tactical, linear, and concerned with corporate outcomes. It is about external achievement and measurement.<br />
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By contrast, learning is an inside-out proposition. It is about ongoing personal growth and is owned entirely by the individual learner. It can be facilitated by other learners but cannot be forced from the outside.<br />
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Education is about tangible measurements and standard outcomes, while learning resists measurement and delivers outcomes that are entirely unique for each learner.<br />
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Education is an institution and a market. It is something that can be quantified and managed. As a result, it condenses nicely into pitch decks and products that can be sold.<br />
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There is nothing wrong with that, of course. Education is a good thing and everyone I talked to at EDUCAUSE 2014 -- educators, administrators, publishers, educational technologists (institutional and corporate) -- seemed genuinely committed to and concerned about education. They were trying hard to create better containers for this thing that is learning.<br />
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But education is only a container, while learning is THE ACTUAL THING. No, learning may not lend itself to pitch-deck paradigms, but it is, ultimately, what really matters.<br />
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So I went to EDUCAUSE again and, as always, had fascinating discussions about educational technology, met really smart people with intriguing ideas, and was mesmerized by innovative products and marketing.<br />
<br />
I also went to EDUCAUSE looking for ideas, for insights, for solutions that target the heart of our our mission, solutions that will help learners grow up and grow out.<br />
<br />
I found much that was interesting and promising for education, but I'll admit, I left Orlando asking myself where all the talk about learning had gone.Rob Reynoldshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13341843233226771456noreply@blogger.com4