Christina's Blog

 

Upon beginning this exercise, my intention was to divide work, from education, from personal, however as the plotting exercise began it became evident that there is no clear delineation of those sectors within my online presence.  It also became evident that I tend more toward being a resident than a visitor.

There are certainly times when I am a visitor, entering my shed to “select an appropriate tool which can use[d] to attain [my] goal.”  (White & Le Cornu, 2011).  There are many aspects where I am very much a resident “A proportion of their lives is lived out online where the distinction between online and offline is increasingly blurred.” (White & Le Cornu, 2011).  I have made many long-term friends and mentors through online interaction.  Some of these have greatly benefited my personal and professional lives.

Slack is the tool that is currently impacting my online presence the most, this is why the representation in the graphic above is so large.  Slack is the primary communication tool in my place of business and also where I am part of many social groups.  However, you may note that the graphic skews towards visitor.  The nature of the free platform (used by most social groups) makes much of the content semi-permanent.

 

White, D. (2013, September 13). Retrieved from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSK1Iw1XtwQ

White, D., & Le Cornu, A. (2011). Visitors and Residents: A new typology for online engagement. First Monday: https://doi.org/10.5210/fm.v16i9.3171

What a week! I spent most of the last seven days out of the country for work, as such I was only able to attend two sessions live which was very unfortunate. Like Carolyn Levy, I “work at a distance but do some on-site visits” (Levy, 2019, 8:40). I was in San Diego meeting with a communication and satellite company about a new blended curriculum. An exciting opportunity which took the majority of my time this week. I felt a kinship with the “apples and oranges” analogy on the profile of traditional student vs online student. (Bates, 2019, 27:30) I think many within the cohort are proof of that juggling work, family and a Masters program. Thankfully, the recorded sessions have provided me with a tremendous resource. I did not expect that binge-watching videos would be part of my Master’s studies, but I am happy for it.

I dug into the MALT student Padlet and got lost for an afternoon. I am thankful to Darin Faber for explaining cognitive load (Faber, 2019, 11:13). Understanding what my brain is going while I try and process all of this information is very helpful.

Many of the sessions resonated with me, and I found Tony Bate’s talk particularly intriguing. The information he shared about HEQCO’s research was, and I would like to read further on this work. (Bates, 2019, 30:27). Also found his example of the web-based tool used to teach scientific argumentation fascinating. (Bates, 2019, 33:08).

My final thoughts on the Virtual symposium is that it has been a whirlwind of information. I imagine these sessions will be revisited time and again over the next few years. I genuinely wish I had been able to be more present during the conversations the week, but still, the recorded sessions have only emphasized my love of video as a learning tool.

Faber, D. (2019, April 15). Design Principles in Digital Learning Resources.
Retrieved from https://youtu.be/daJmgBwDDzc

Bates, Tony (2019, April 15). Rethinking the purpose of Online Learning.
Retrieved from: http://ow.ly/gJlx50qwmbq

Levy, Carolyn (2019, April 15). Designing Learning Environments for a Global Context.
Retrieved from: http://ow.ly/PSyN50qn5QV