Month: May 2017

Unit 3 exposed us to concepts regarding learning with others. Group-based learning is not only more economical (versus one-to-one interactions), but creates a ‘safe and supportive environment’ for learning to occur (Dron & Anderson, 2014).

The Community of Inquiry model has been brought up many times and I can see why the social, cognitive, and teaching presence are so important to a learning environment. We are all used to teaching presences providing structure and guidance through a course. Learners need to be cognitively present to facilitate actual learning instead of just physically being present. Finally, the social aspect is something I had not thought about a lot before this course, but I now see why it’s important to a more rounded learning experience. As noted by Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2000), ‘cognitive presence… is more easily sustained when a significant degree of social presence has been established’.

I hope to be more socially present in my networks and groups, which will challenge my introvertedness ways. In Tuckman and Jensen’s five-stage model for group development (1977), one stage is called storming. It’s the stage of discourse and respectful disagreements. I know that for myself, I don’t particularly partake in this stage, even if it might be beneficial to the group. Garrison and Anderson (2003) coin the term “pathological politeness” for this type of behaviour which I guess describes my desire not to step on anyone’s shoes.

Working in networks and groups are more challenging online due to a lack of social cues, but we shouldn’t shy from discourse if it’s constructive and everyone understands it’s for the good of creation. I hope I can be someone who can do a bit of ‘storming’ without seeming aggressive or ‘pathologically rude’.

 

References

Dron, J., & Anderson, T. (2014). Teaching Crowds. Athabasca University Press.

Garrison, R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (2000). Critical inquiry in text based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(2–3), 87–105.

Tuckman, B. W., & Jensen, M. A. C. (1977). Stages of small-group development revisited. Group & Organization Management, 2(4), 419-27.

Garrison, D. R., & Anderson, T. (2003). E-learning in the 21st century: A framework for research and practice. London: RoutledgeFalmer.

As someone whose online presence is not very extensive, there were still some surprises. I had chosen to map out my LinkedIn connections and a Twitter feed that I follow (as I myself don’t have any followers…).

By using Socilab’s LinkedIn Network Visualization and Analysis tool, I was able to create the visualization seen above. I’m represented by the blue dot in the center. Not surprisingly, I have a cluster of interconnected dots representing my colleagues in the education field. In my experience, I’ve found that the educational researcher community is quite tight-knit (at least in Ontario). I feel I have the opportunity to grow this segment. There are also a number of outliers that aren’t connected to each other and these are some of my social connections that I’ve connected to on LinkedIn. While the differing industries isn’t surprising, it’s interesting that they aren’t connected. Some of them don’t know each other, but I know that some do. The choice of whether to connect on certain platforms but not others is fascinating.

I generated this second image from an analytics and visualization tool called tweepsmap. It’s quite useful in generating reports on who’s following you and which tweets are generating the most activity. I follow the local TV station here in Toronto called CP24 and I mapped out their following with tweepsmap. News media typically get a large following which is not surprising, but the fact that there are followers in 5 countries and 12 cities (for a local station) is impressive. My guess would be many of those followers are expats who want to keep track of what’s going on at home.

Mapping out my LinkedIn connections showed me just who I’m connected with. It’s not a coincidence that those connected closest to me are the ones I work with more regularly. The network could definitely be built out more (both in education and other). Of course I will never have the reach of the likes of CP24, but each connection I make could have a multiplier effect of opening new links.

Before starting the MALAT program, I had never stopped and thought about my digital presence and identity. While like many people I use social media and have a presence online, they were all just means to serve an end. Whether it be a web search to find an answer or Facebook to reconnect with old friends, most of my interactions with online applications have been brief and my resident-visitor typology map reflects that. I have always thought of myself as a shyer and private person and therefore I’ve never really drawn attention to myself, online or otherwise. My Facebook while private, has had very few posts attributed to me. One could say that this lack of digital presence is my online identity. Being an introvert isn’t intrinsically a bad thing and I wouldn’t want my digital presence and identity to represent someone that is not me.

 

Jenkins (2009) notes 4 types of participatory culture: 1) Affiliations, 2) Expressions, 3) Collaborative Problem Solving, and 4) Circulations. I see myself taking part in 2 of them, namely affiliations and collaborative problem solving. I believe they go hand-in-hand since the more affiliations that I’m a part of, the more opportunities that I will have in working collaboratively to solve a problem.

This is all in the professional sense as I feel my digital presence in that quadrant is more lacking. Also, I’m more self-aware of this space as it is intended to be public. Boyd (2010) talks about the persistence, replicability, scalability, and searchability of what you put in a ‘networked public’, which is a public networked digital space. These factors should make one think twice about anything they upload online. ‘Persistence’ means anything that is put up will stay there. Also if your network is vast, the content is also scalable to reach a wider audience than you intend. In today’s day and age, everyone searches everything from nuclear superpowers to their own name. I have papers uploaded to Academia.edu and hope to refine my presence there a little more. Making connections with researchers is also part of my plan. My LinkedIn could do with some spring cleaning as well.

I do have reservations about the ‘invisible audiences’ that are free to come and go on my webpage (Boyd, 2010). Because you don’t know who may view your page, it can be difficult to tailor according to your audience. I have always learned to write to your audience as different people may interpret things differently. This can be challenging when anyone could be your audience (or no one).

In the end, I think the questions that Schryver (2013) postulates are very important in terms of how I will approach digital identity: “Are you proud of your digital presence? Will you be proud of it in ten years? Are there things that are untrue or pertain someone with the same name? What can you do about that?”. As I progress in this program, these will be some of the questions that I will keep in the back of my mind as I make my posts and leave my digital footprint.

Boyd, D. (2011). Social network sites as networked publics: Affordances, dynamics, and implications. In Z. Papacharissi (Ed.), A Networked Self (pp. 39–58). New York, NY: Rutledge.

Jenkins, H. (2009). Confronting the challenges of participatory culture: Media education for the 21st century. MIT Press.

Schryver, K. (2013, February 5). Who are you online? Considering issues of web identity. The New York Times.