The virtual symposium last week was very interesting and informative. While I knew learning spans all sectors and careers, the theory behind learning in each sector while different have similar roots. I was especially taken by Dave Cormier’s idea of the rhizome. How learning can take various twists and turns when unrestricted, like ‘weeds’. I’ve seen diagrams similar to the learning ecosystem that he presented and had always wondered what an ideal online learning environment should look like. In my work, I have a project which looks at hybrid learning and I believe rhizomatic learning is worth exploring, at least for the online component. We have had issues with students building an online community organically. Hopefully, by allowing an encouraging a free space, more students will take up building such an ecosystem.
A common theme that came up over the course of the week was open learning and what really constitutes open learning. I’ve learned that open is not just restricted to free or close to free, but also about access. I agree with Catherine Cronin’s opinion on open educational practices and the use of open educational resources. There is a little murkiness in terms of licensing, but I believe truly open resources should be fully shared and there shouldn’t be ambiguity in usage.
Gary Rosorough’s perspective on leading a team to create courses was also very motivating for me. I really agree with his philosophy of ‘acknowledging expertise’ and promoting the ‘yes we can’ culture. I’ve often found that the knowledge that team members bring to the table is not being utilized enough which can be a loss on many fronts including devaluing each team member’s contribution. Shared leadership has recently been promoted at my organization which I hope will translate into having each member of a team being able to voice their opinions and contribute to the direction of where a project is heading. Gary mentions that the educational analysts being ‘gatekeepers’, but as an analyst myself, I don’t really see myself as a gatekeeper. The faculty or in my case teachers or other senior staff are at times the true gatekeepers in my mind, because they are the ones who are front line and ‘subject experts’. Perhaps the staff that Gary works with have slightly different roles than myself or what we have in the K-12 system.
I really appreciate the fact that students from the last cohort have been able to share their research and findings. Their insights into the program have been inspiring. From looking at the padlet and also viewing Lillian Chumbley’s presentation, I can see some students gravitated towards researching topics that included learning with mental health (e.g., PTDS) or special education needs (due to FASD) which is very worthwhile.
Overall it’s been a whirlwind of a week, but I’m fired up to start getting my hands dirty and really think about my own research question(s).