Building beyond the course
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Transcript of Building beyond the course
Building beyond the course, or even the program: how can virtual worlds extend the learning environment and create community?
SUNY CIT 2012 – Stony BrookEileen O’Connor, Ph.D.
[email protected] State College
Agenda
• Background – Teaching & learning – different connection & modalities, always
being tried (review)– Including other faculty – Research island – island design; virtual shifting
• Framework of a learning environment • Expansive efforts to date
– Teachers coming / student research / outreach to other students / outreach to admin/admissions – how can you extend beyond a course too?
– Considerations and issues – development, maintenance, support ; sharing design – reality and feasibility
http://commons.esc.edu/open/
http://commons.esc.edu/open/2012/05/04/call-for-papers/
On August 22-24, 2012, SUNY—Empire State College will be hosting a virtual conference on open education. The conference is global in scope and will be occurring over multiple time zones; therefore, the event will be conducted in a virtual world called Second Life. The modality will be a synchronous/asynchronous mode—participants can attend sessions as they occur, or session presentations will be recorded for play back at later times. Currently, we seek individuals to participate in the conference.Call for Presentations (and Posters)The OP*EN Virtual Conference welcomes presenters and posters that integrate one or more of these themes, as they relate to the concept of open education. As the aim is to cover open education for a world-wide audience, we would value a range of presentations, challenges, and discussion-starters around these areas:Philosophy: what conceptual, sociological, institutional, and educational underpinnings separate open education from other forms of teaching and learning? What are the core issues in defining openness, and what other forms of openness are required for open education (open leadership, open science, etc.)? Are there related concepts, constructs, and paradigms that serve or enhance openness as a concept? Process: what ways can a resource, course, learning experience move into the process of becoming “open”? How can current courses and resources be moved from behind ivory towers into open educational areas? How can current post-secondary institutions transform themselves into open universities? Projects: what are the examples of projects within your experience, personal, institutional or within your learning sphere that you would like to offer as a model or best practice? Policy: are there institutional issues that surround Open Education within your educational sphere? Have projects and ideas been brought forward within your institution and what organizations, governance groups, unions, or professional organizations have spoken to these issues? What areas do you expect might influence policy within your educational and learning sphere? What public policies effect openness (regulation, legislation, grants, accreditation)? Practices: in what ways have you or your colleagues begun to consider and develop open resources and practices? We encourage a variety of presentation styles as well as topics. The only common element we ask from all presentations and posters is that it should in some way challenge your audience to take openness to the next level.
Abstracts/summaries/battle plans or other treatments should be emailed to [email protected] by June 22nd, 2012.
Call for Presentations (and Posters) On August 22-24, 2012, SUNY—Empire State College will be hosting a virtual conference on open education. The conference is global in scope and will be occurring over multiple time zones; therefore, the event will be conducted in Second Life. The modality will be a synchronous/asynchronous mode—participants can attend sessions as they occur, or session presentations will be recorded for play back at later times. Currently, we seek individuals to participate in the conference.
The OP*EN Virtual Conference Abstracts/summaries/battle plans or other treatments should be emailed to [email protected] by June 22nd, 2012.
Continuing to advance in collaboration & community through tech – instructor techniques Over time, I have solidified an approach to
getting students into the virtual environment Various types of meetings / experiences
Integrating multiple interactive technologies – no need to wait for Learning Managements Systems to do it all
Soliciting student perspective and ownership Continuing the cycle through ongoing course
development Generative . . . and fun too ; engaging more, different,
and new types of learners Examining emerging “ideas” – open / badging
Invest in
yourself
(In my situation), why is community & continuity so important?
Many challenges face new teachers – what is needed in your content area?
Attitudes that can help an instructor grow towards valuing “community”
Willingness to experiment with emerging tech
Testing, evaluating, improving (publishing)
Valuing the social/professional
Starting prof. relationships among students (then letting them operate
independently)
Looking for new ways to connect & grow your
courses
Can your courses grow with more professional
connections among students?
Acknowledge the pedagogical value of community in your educational context
Developing virtual environments, present ideas & past practices – ideas to consider
• On a shoe string ; without programming or artists (at least initially) – Images & design – inelegant but practical & growing– Gained insight from ongoing pilots with my students –
expanding my knowledge regularly – Considered grants (no luck) then worked ideas into
courses • Having courses do “real” work within a professional masters
– Having virtual locations that serve as teacher resource areas; creating simple and useful
– Involving others – pros and cons
At the outset, students across the state give simple virtual presentations & guest speakers
came
The dean
speaking
ESC has an island
Over time, a more elaborate learning
space emerged; a private island
NOTE: and, although Second Life became more expensive, new ways to develop virtual environments are growing rapidly
In the new science center, meetings, presentations, and discussions expanded
Students began to design pods with their own science projects (sum. 2011)
Community & innovation expanded in spring 2012
Involving other faculty
Advancing interactive
design - integrating
shared video into
discussions
Advancing interactive
design - having poster session and
judging
Introducing badging, soliciting student
feedback
A faculty-led affinity group began - VirtualESC
A cross disciplinary and cross center (ESC is distributed across NYS) effort to share knowledge & applications and to “save our island” in the time of rising costs
• Meetings: basic to advanced techniques; application sharing; outside speakers
Including other faculty members
Brought in faculty in other disciplines that could present their areas of expertise to my online students
Before the presentation – helping with getting ready . .
. and any stage fright
Which requires some “training” Quick start guide Animations / tutorials
For the casual visitors &
presenters, headsets/speech
are the most complex problem
Running the show Being the sage
behind the machine – the Great and Powerful Oz
During the presentation
OTHER TECHNIQUES ---DESIGNING FOR IN-COURSE COMMUNITY – LOOPING, INTERACTIONS, FEEDBACK (ACROSS MEDIA)
Discussion board
Virtual meetings –
discussions
Talk alouds – discussion boards before new topics/
projects
Multiple media loops
(YouTube too)
Encouraging communication & idea sharing
For instance, working online, students watch and discuss videos about the course contents
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hz1ld2AUTUQ
Each group meets in a separate, sound-
isolated location; later they post a PPT summary of the
group’s ideas & join in a discussion board w/
the whole class
APPLICATIONS BECAME
MORE SOPHISTICATED
THIS SEMESTER
Here’s a link to a 2 minute video overview of this project:
Looping across time and venues -- using technologies, interactions,& evaluations
Assignment
Presenting
Voting
First, the virtual island was expanded to add the conference center
The science lab assignments included the creation of a poster in PowerPoint
These posters were put into pods for the students for this course
Students came and presented to classmates & to “judges” (former students)
Judges & students (optional) voted on posters for a variety of characteristics
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=hz1ld2AUTUQ&NR=1Here’s a link to a 2 minute video overview of this project:
Another new technique: a virtual speaker addressed badging
• After the presentation, students broke into groups and discussed the possible role of badging – in K12 & in graduate courses
• (Badging will be incorporated into the summer course requirements too)
• Here are YouTubes from the video discussion: – http://youtu.be/FECB2m3QNPg
http://youtu.be/gDXdhjZHeVI– http://youtu.be/-N2LtOp4XBs
New ways appearing for peer assessment valuing and extending learning (https://wiki.mozilla.org/Badges)
Use badges to make web-
evident learning more valued
and identifiable and to ensure quality work &
governance without constant
supervision
Grad course• Create, model, make
criteria, require, assess• Elect which stays
Dean award• Ensure follow-up
Badges: ongoing / generative• for input, continuity, and
ownership
Revisions /review• in later Grad course
EXPANDING WITH MORE INNOVATIONS – USINGHIGHER-ED COMPLEX PROJECTS TO GENERATE OPEN RESOURCES
Determine if any grant funding would be possible
Integrating student ideas & badging into
future course planning
CREATING OR EXTENDING PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATIONS —TO STUDENTS & NEWBIES
Host website, locations (Facebook; virtual), topics, purpose, governance, and meetings-with-practitioners to connect students and others moving into new careers with ideas, jobs, & personal connections;
Develop, model, create, peer-review, define-assessments, and promote the initial projects within a graduate course; follow-up with a dean letter; task later courses with revisions;
Extend to appropriate interest groups – evaluate, improve, continue, & sustain: delegate ownership and revision to a later course, seek ongoing oversight & maintenance thru badges
For e
xam
ple
BENEFITS & USES Strengthen connections within
and to an organization (job searching)
Develop resource gathering; create an organizational present with the aid of a social network & virtual meetings
For e
xam
ple
BADGES – reinforce, validate & value Use badges to promote, extend,
monitor, and support the endeavor; For example, badges for:
Creator of a Professional Development Day Website Organizer and Moderator Gold Star Meeting Attendee $5K Fund Raiser Bronze Star New Member Mentor (based
on resumes reviewed by practitioner, perhaps)
Facebook Organizer
Badge
For e
xam
ple
Citizen Scientist: All-Sorts-of-Science
Host a website or e-assemblage for media, science links, data-gathering activities, tutorials, and the like focused on topic-based, field-science studies that can support real scientists
Develop, model, create, peer-review, define-assessments, and promote the initial project and website from a graduate course
Extend to the public – evaluate, improve, continue, & sustain: delegate ownership to later course, a school
partnership, or a professional organization seek ongoing oversight; use badge system to
ensure quality & encourage sustainability
For e
xam
ple
BENEFITS & MOTIVATION
REAL connections with & support for science (Cornell; www.globe.gov; www.nasa.gov)
Science literacy; science sharing; extending & creating new knowledge and understanding; helping other nations
For e
xam
ple
BADGES – to reinforce, validate, value, & sustain
Use badges to promote, extend, monitor, and support the endeavor;
For examples, badges for: 10 Great Pictures or Videos of Bugs or Crazy-
landforms or Star-clusters or Red Oaks Badge Bronze Helped-Fellow-Researcher Badge (entry
level # of Likes by other citizen-scientists who found this badgees discussion-boards tips to be helpful)
5 Useful Science Data Points Badge (generated by scientist who assert validity / utility of data gathered)
Can I get a Best Brain Badge?
For e
xam
ple
New considerations – making online more real but . . .
• Schedule for synchronous– but when moving to collaboration that can be a
problem– Online work is not necessarily independent work by
students / a new paradigm now within online itself • Plan for yours’ and students’ growth over time • The detailed startup helped / but they need to
have good computers– server issues too can happen; challenges with
headsets
Adding new pods for upcoming course in summer 2012
Ways of thinking – generating & valuing new outcomes in classrooms & programs
Implement research on learning
(constructivism)
Value more than just papers
Evaluate both collaborative & individual work
Start small (part of a course) evaluate
improve
USE YOUR COLLABORATION AS A WAY TO TEST NEW
APPROACHES FOR LATER USE IN
CLASSES
Ways of thinking – expanding scholarly & committee work
Initiate a collaboration within your content area
or committee
Structure store (web resources), scheduling,
meeting locations
Create criteria & evaluation for materials
to be saved
Determine governance & maintenance; consider publication & sharing
Considerations . . . in general, for effective collaborations
Timing / scheduling –
when will interactions
occur?
Saving interactions
and materials – how will you
save the results
achieved?
Ownership / governance – what will make
the collaboration
efforts sustainable?
Creating opportunities . . . & requirement
• Becoming firmer in my own beliefs and values – Progressing despite the odds
• Mapping to professional organizations – Empowering students – Immersive, enriched environments • Threaded with empowering conversations
• Valuing knowledge, growth, and ideas – Seeing growth in more then “just papers”
Thank you – [email protected]