Experiences Learning Across Platforms

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Subject: [PD 5023] Experiences learning across platforms
From: Jackie A. Taylor
Date: Tue Aug 3 23:20:56 EDT 2010

Dear All,

Several of you mentioned in your reflections that you either signed up for more than one group, facilitated more than one group, or had experiences learning more than one technology tool in order to achieve your learning goals.

Please say more about that. What are your observations of your experience learning more than one technology in order to achieve particular technology or content-related learning goals?

What are the implications for teaching with social media or using it in providing professional development?

How might you factor these considerations in when planning for teaching or PD?

Thanks, and looking forward to hearing from you,

Jackie

Jackie Taylor
PD List Facilitator
Jackie at jataylor.net

Subject: [PD 5025] Re: Experiences learning across platforms
From: Bonnie Odiorne
Date: Wed Aug 4 09:06:01 EDT 2010

I think that signing up for more than one group, and then not being able to do anything of significance on any of them, is symptomatic of the social media and other electronic formats: i'ts easy to get lost, to overload, to stay "in the shallows". My only consolation is I did save discussion posts and I can at least catch up on them if the links stay active. I did start a blog, but instead of considering why or for whom I might want to post it, or even what key words would get the audience I'd want, I just wrote what was on my mind at the moment in the general field of the importance of the relationship between writing, thinking, and learning. I have a Facebook page, or should I say, it has me: if I don't stay active and update, my friends' posts take over my wall and "my" message and purpose get lost. Perhaps one could design an electronic media plan: a sort of decision-tree of priorities...

I wish I'd been on vacation, but it was my busiest three weeks, so little time...

Bonnie

Bonnie Odiorne, PhD Director, Writing Center Adjunct Professor of English,
French, First Year Transitions, Day Division and ADP
Post University, Waterbury, CT
Labyrinth Facilitator, Spiritual Director

Subject: [PD 5027] getting lost in social media
From: Paul Rogers
Date: Wed Aug 4 09:34:41 EDT 2010

Bonnie,

I sympathize with you 100%! We do need a decision tree of priorities. I became involved in YouTube almost out of necessity (see below). I hope that out of this discussion will come some What For and How To kits or essays that will make it easier. In the meantime, here is my observations on the You Tube discussion. Paul Rogers

  • What were some successes you encountered learning and using this social media tool?

I first started using YouTube when a student asked me about lessons on prepositions. Instead of using my own material, I thought I would try something new, so I searched on You Tube and was very impressed. It served as a good way for the student to learn the lesson and also as a good introduction to using the internet to learn English or anything she wanted to.

  • What were some considerations or challenges you faced?

There needs to be a directory for ESL with a method of ranking or describing each lesson.

  • What are your recommendations for using this tool in teaching or professional development?

Every lesson in a classroom setting can be related to You Tube. I use songs a lot, especially songs that have been translated on pages like: aprendiendoinglesconcanciones.com.

  • For what purpose(s) – if any – do you plan to use this tool in your practice?

You Tube is also an important way for students to learn Listening and speaking skills. For example, in my classes I use the lyics to songs "bilinguified", meaning accompanied by a bilingual vocabulary list. Followed by other lessons related to pronunciation. The students each read a verse out loud while translations are offered, and then we listen to the song with the text, followed by listening without the text. Many students are loading their Ipods up with these songs.

Subject: [PD 5030] experiences learning across platforms
From: LHarlow
Date: Wed Aug 4 11:30:11 EDT 2010

Bonnie,

If your posting had been a song, I would have been a part of your chorus!

A good lesson for me though. Too much to learn, a high need to experience the new tools, and so very little time to do everything.

Laura Harlow
Virginia Commonwealth U
Richmond, Va.

Subject: [PD 5033] Re: Experiences learning across platforms
From: George Demetrion
Date: Wed Aug 4 11:41:30 EDT 2010

Hi Bonnie,

Thanks for sharing that. To be sure, technology can take on a life of its own and that is a powerful tendency that is built into the many opportunities for new types and formats of learning which digital technology, especially the more intense social mediums have opened up.

A couple things come to mind:

What may be viewed as highly constructive to some may not be so to others. What is provided is a menu which for fine dining requires discriminating tastes and the capacity to distinguish between sampling and fully indulging in the gustatory delights that our imagination might evoke whether or not we are actually hungry The need to keep the ends in view in the very selection of means; thus what is the educational /professional value of the "tool" that I am selecting. Will it open up or deepen learning or is it, in one way or another a distraction. (Here, the maxim different strokes for different folks applies). On this, too, what may at first seem a distraction; a true waste of time, may only feel so because I have not mastered a given technology or really explored its potential. This too takes a lot of discrimination to discern since there is so much out there; but the question still remains on whether we are shopping in a candy store or have entered into a first rate book or clothes store.

For us hybrids (of which perhaps you and I perhaps might be) who have a very solid history in the work of books, and yes, deep scholarship in a truly interdisciplinary mode, while at the same time having found much creative space through at least some of the digital modalities-for us hybrids in particular. perhaps less with quality is better than more that involves merely surfing and multi-tasking.

Question: To what extent has serious book reading diminished given the pervasive nature of the new media? Moreover, is there an equivalency there or is there less an inclination against sustained consecutive thought in which one makes or ponders a complex argument that if reasonably mastered or grasped does have its own many rewards? Without being dogmatic here, I do wonder.

On utilizing less technology with depth I have primarily drawn on:

  • The Internet as a powerful research tool, with much distractive pull built into it
  • The listserv (in philosophy and religion as well as adult literacy) as both a powerful source of developing and disseminating serious, sustained thought, learning from others and networking. As we perhaps all know, the listservs hold much distractive potential as well
  • The Blog (for both reading (selectively) and writing). Writing and sustaining a blog over a sustained period of time takes a lot of work and commitment
  • Blackboard (as a teaching tool)
  • Youtube in a very selective way in teaching

I sample other technologies. For example, I've created my own diigo page and am using it at this time to highlight texts I would like to refer others to. There may be other uses there, though I haven't taken the time to figure out what to do with the other functions or, more importantly; why I would spend time doing so.

As an old Latin teacher once said:

De gustibus non est disputandum (In matters of taste there are no disputes)

That's one thing of no minor important. The other is a continuing probing into the nexus between content and methodology in working with the subtle relationships between what we learn; what we even focus on and how we learn; the methods that we use.

Final question (extra credit). To what extent do we think that Marshall McLuhan's maxim that "the medium is the message" is truly the case.

Okay, now back to my "real work."

George Demetrion

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