It takes some courage . I enjoyed your open perspective on what this blog represents for you and what you hope to get out of it. I found while I don’t have time to blog often — when I do get the chance it’s a fulfilling moment to realize the work put into myself intellectual takes form through writing (especially if it’s outside my discipline). Is this your first blog?

HI Khaled,

When you talked about being receptive to students and their personal learning styles, that really resonated with me. One of the things that I think about a lot is that we must meet our students where they are. So if online learning isn’t clicking with them, there is a different method that will and it’s our job to find it! The piece about experiential learning is key, too. Instead of telling our students the content, we should be facilitating experiences where they will make the discoveries on their own. The first time I heard that, I felt like I had been hit by a lightning bolt and I shifted my approach thereafter. How do you think you will approach teaching differently now after engaging with this week’s material?

I’ve been extremely fortunate in my private career to have had interactions on a personal basis. The largest my internal team ever got was eight(!), so it was easy to foster those types of relationships. However, my experiences of having that on a large scale is limited. I don’t know how deep it can go with A) such a large group and B) in a short amount of time (~3 months?). It’s a great question, Tim.

Last semester, I was the physical avatar (if you will) for a classroom with remote instructors. The class was 33 people. I didn’t get to know them all personally, but I knew each of their first names by mid-October. Hiccups happened early in the semester, and we decided to have an offline pow-wow; not to cut out the instructors, but to separate student frustrations from the looming big-brother image of the screen. We hashed out ideas, came up with a few solutions, and quickly implemented those changes (along with the professors’ later input) within two weeks. Students approached me individually and as groups throughout the rest of the semester with words of gratitude. By listening to the students and proactively addressing issues, we were able to give them a voice.

Now I’ve a class of 60+, and figuring it out all over again. Walking around the room helps. I’m back to learning new names. I’ve always tried to get to know everyone on some kind of level, whether as simple as the name or remembering a shared moment. The small companies I’ve worked for ultimately become families, and the newest members are the first I’ve tried to say hello to (cue John Prine’s Hello in There). It’s as much relationship building as it is teaching. Just my experiences, my friend. I certainly hope it continues when I become a full instructor. We shall see!

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Hi Raymond,

I am going to chime in on podcasts with several others. While I’ve known about them for a while, I hadn’t gotten into them until recently. I find that they’re really great for when I’m working around the house and I can have it going in the background. It’s such a relief to my system to be absorbing information without having to stare at a screen!

I completely agree with your concern on the side effects of a web-based information system. As blogging and any social media have been more powerful and influential to the public, you really need to be responsible for what they write. I found out that some researchers, journalists, and bloggers themselves began to think about ethical issues of blogging. I would like to introduce a set of code of ethics that Martin Kuhn came up with; accountability, accuracy, independence, and tone. It is important for bloggers not only to be transparent, honest, and critical of the information they interpret and publish but also to be respectful of others’ opinions.

Hi Cindy,
Learning being about questions and the process of discovering how to find the answers (versus learning by rote) is such a crucial part of students developing into critical thinkers. And I also connected with the notion “learning should be fun.” When I read/hear that I think “YES! More of THIS!” And I think you are onto something when you talk about all the benefits of taking up the practice of blogging. It really can be cathartic to share research, engage in discourse or just taking the time to write what you’ve got on your mind. Even if it’s not public, just having the space for practice writing and personal exploration can be super helpful in developing one’s communication skills. Do you think that you will try and incorporate blogging and platforms like Twitter into your future classroom culture?

Interesting perspective on blogging and twitter posts. As a political science student would you be worried of bias in these blogs, podcasts, or social media in general? Are there vetted facts pointed too when information is spread? While the journal looks to be a 2 year process — is the rigor put forth in those journals outweigh those perspective? Or merely complement them? I hope to hear your input on this!

Beautiful story Ben. I’m glad to see the “employer to employee” took on more of a “mentor to mentee” relationship where mutual respect for each other fostered. Which has me wondering on a couple things: do you find it beneficial to carry this kind of relationship into a classroom? Even one that might scale to a high tens of students? Will it be different when you are the instructor versus a TA?

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Hi Deborah,

I heard someone once say “you have to either ride the wave or get swept up in it.” (Regretfully, I don’t know who to credit with that beautiful gem, I have forgotten.) So thinking about the concern you mention in your post about being able to “compete,” I wanted to tell you that little saying to hopefully inspire you as it did for me when I first heard it.

Expecting and accepting (way prematurely) that you’re going to fall behind means that you’re going to be swept up in the wave. (Nobody wants that!)

On the other hand, to ride the wave means looking at it with a positive perspective that you’re going to keep up, that you will continue to grow as an educator and that you are determined to do whatever it takes to facilitate the best education for your students. (Because it’s what we do!) Yes, future innovations will invariably alter our teaching, learning, pedagogical philosophy and behaviors. I argue that if we care about what we’re doing (as educators), we’re going to keep learning and growing right along with our students.

Thanks for the comment Dr. Nelson! Sure — after rereading the question it appears I may have been a tad sleepy when finishing that up. What I was trying to ask was “How can we re-approach networked learning when personal data constantly being sorta after?”. Essentially, I’m wondering how can we move forward with the current state of affairs. I would think — could we “reinvent” this space? What works and what doesn’t? What trade-offs can we live with while maximizing the benefits of this networked space, but minimizing the consumerism on personal data. As a computer scientist my intuition says it’s impossible to go back to not utilizing some form of information. A lot of the services we now rely on draw from this corpus of personal data.

The wiki article you posted is interesting, indeed I’ve had similar thoughts before Zuboff’s seminal articles on the matter it looks like. The question posed at the end “will we be the masters of information, or will we be its slaves?” is interesting and I want to push it further. I want to know who is the collect ‘we’ (that seems to refer to those whose data is being utilized) is and if this question bares fruit on the idea of some humans are the masters while others are slaves or machines are the masters and all humans are slaves. Or if this question is more cyclic given a temporal dimension where as more data is consumed we as humans all eventually become the slaves to each other. I could continue this thought forever I think.

Lastly, I don’t want to gloss over that idea of surveillance that is focused on, but my thoughts on this matter is best suited for audible conversation. But I will say there are huge positive and negative outcomes to this surveillance. The stakes are high for both society and technology advancement.

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