#rhizo14: W5: Community as Curriculum: Poetry as a Mode of Inquiry?

Rarely have I been so time poor – sad that it coincides with my engagement with the brilliant #rhizo14 led by Dave Cormier. This one might be a MOOCers MOOC: there is no set reading – scant introductory remarks – no trail of video tutorials or lectures… just trickster questions designed to get us thinking – posting – commenting – blogging – FBing – Google+ing… and lo – the community IS the curriculum. It is emergent – it emerges – it is what we want it to be! This post is a little reflection - and an invitation - let us write some poetry as a collaborative means of researching #rhizo14?

Declare

My project – if you can call it that – for #rhizo14 has been to bring as much of this busy fizzy messy stuff as possible into my first year #becomingeducational module and see what it sparks in first year students who in the end want to become educationalists.

In the process I have shared DogTrax ‘Steal this Poem’ (http://dogtrax.edublogs.org/2014/01/16/rhizo14-steal-this-poem/) and with him used the concept of cheating as a tool to analyse the power structures of education. I have re-blogged several #rhizo14 blogposts directly to the handful of students who actually follow the class blog. I don’t know if the excitement sizzles through – but I hope so!

Research: Collaborative writing as inquiry

Some of us in the rhizome are exploring the idea of collaborative writing as a form of inquiry about #rhizo14. We are thinking about exploring (as radical un-content) the blogs that have emerged – the words that have touched us, weaving a paper in, around and through our own responses to the ones we choose – and our responses to the writing of our fellow flaneurs.

In this, I have been very influenced by Ken Gale – who has himself studied Deleuze through collaborative writing…  (see Ken Gale http://www.aldinhe.ac.uk/ojs/index.php?journal=jldhe&page=article&op=view&path%5B%5D=222 )

Poetry and Inquiry?

Given the power of the rhizome – and the huge creativity in this ‘wonder’ (my collective term for us all – rejecting community – network – group); do #rhizo14ers want to generate poems (in the broadest and most multimodal sense) of our experiences – either as our own collective mode of inquiry for capturing (dead word!) our collective learning – that could be posted on a #rhizo14 website for just that purpose???

OR - for the LinkedIn Group: Higher Education Teaching and Learning and their Call for poems and creative works. Confession – I haven’t performed a rigorous back check on all this – but it serendipitously appeared in my email in-box from a friend who knows I like this sort of this. I am sharing it with a community that I know also loves this sort of thing…

Anyway – here’s their invitation - Submission Deadline: June 20, 2014:
Teaching as a Human Experience: An Anthology of Contemporary Poems
An edited anthology volume by Dr. Karen Head (Assistant Professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Literature, Media, and Communication), and Patrick Blessinger (Founder and Executive Director, Higher Education Teaching and Learning Association)

Volume one of the anthology series, Contemporary Teaching and Learning Poetry Series, Patrick Blessinger, series editor.

Submissions should be submitted electronically to:

https://www.hetl.org/poem-submission-form/ 

Volume One Overview

The poems in this collection will deal with the real life-worlds of professors, instructors, and others working in education and it will cover contemporary teaching experiences in education. The poems will be written mainly by college and university professors, instructors, lecturers, and others in the field of education, and will cover the many roles teachers play, including instructing, lecturing, mentoring, facilitating, coaching, guiding, and leading. This volume will cover the manifold life experiences and perspectives of being and working as a teacher in education and the epiphanies (experiences of deep realization) experienced in that role.

This volume seeks to give creative voice to the full range of experiences by teachers, students, and others. It seeks to empower readers with personal agency as they evolve as self-creating, self-determining authors of their own lives, personally and professionally. In short, it seeks to expand our consciousness of what it means to be a teacher in contemporary life and within diverse learning environments and cultures. The poems will be based on teachers’ meaningful experiences in and out of the classroom and will provide artistic inspiration and creative insight to other teachers who work as teachers.

Submission Requirements

You may submit up to two poems or creative works per person. Any poetic form is accepted, but each poem should be limited to 300 words, unless the poem of longer length is exceptional in quality and highly unique in insight or style and appropriate to the poetic form used. Thus, poems and creative works expressed in a pure economy of words and that are able to distill the human experience down to its bare essence are highly valued as are creative use of voice, passion, imagery and the interplay of intellect and emotions.

The poem “Lecture” by Tami Haaland and the poem “Student” by Ted Kooser are a few examples of the type of work this volume seeks.

Submissions

We invite submissions of high quality poems and creative works for Volume One entitled, Teaching as a Human Experience: An Anthology of Contemporary Poems. We are interested in poems by teachers (e.g., professors, instructors, lecturers, faculty) as well as other practitioners in the field of teaching and learning.

Submission Deadline: June 20, 2014

Submissions should be submitted electronically to:

https://www.hetl.org/poem-submission-form/ 

#rhizo14 W4: Is books making us stupid?

What’s taken me so long to post this week? Partly – I came over all pithy and just wrote: The trouble with books in HE could be exactly that weight – that sense of reified knowledge – that implacability – and ... the Reading Lists. I have seen students on just one module (of four) expected to read 8-12 books per week before each new seminar. Of course the lecturer probably means ‘dip into’ rather than read in depth – but the task is impossible and makes the students feel like failures every week. It also leaves them in no doubt as to their role: shut up – read this – you have nothing to say here… So – we have this juxtaposed with the more fluid, potential space of the oral – and of the quasi-oral which is the web. It feels more participative, engaging and engaged. Unique among media it invites transmission rather than just consumption. We evoke the camp fire and the tribal elders telling their tales of a shared collective history. An ever-present. Cool. But who gets to tell the tales – and who gets to hear them? These societies also ‘other’ the inconvenient and rebellious…

Just a small point about the task itself: wasn’t Dave in his paraphrasing of the ‘Is Google making us stupid?’ question, not really posing an either/or question – but challenging the peremptory nature of such questions? And wasn’t he also challenging the arrogance of the book-bound with their dismissiveness of all things web? I cannot imagine how many right-wing politicians must have nodded their heads in self-congratulation when they saw the Google = stupid proposition. Nothing seems to terrify them as much as a free and risky web. No, no they say – we need to make it safe – wrap it all up – tame this thing. The only point of ICT are the skills needed by business. Books embody the safe and controllable for them – whilst we know they also ‘light a fire in the mind’… We aren’t the ones who burnt the books but we might be the ones to sail the web as Digital Vikings as Amy Burvall suggests… 

So Karen sang:

http://karenatsharon.blogspot.ca/2014/02/books-is-making-me-stupid.html

And Jenny Mackness said:

http://jennymackness.wordpress.com/2014/02/05/rhizomatic-learning-knowledge-and-books/

And so many replied… The rest is silence ;-)

#rhizo14: W3: Embracing Uncertainty

I’m really setting my own curriculum this week - too busy yet to engage with much of the course - except reading a few blogposts - and wrestling with my own version of uncertainty. So we co-developed and hosted ALDinHE’s Look-Make-Learn Visual Transformations in Learning, Teaching and Assessment Conference - and that was us embracing uncertainty. 

I couldn’t quite believe how nervous I was at co-running an event that was supposed to be *fun*… but perhaps that was the point. In these target-driven, league-table-orientated times; the notion of running an event designed to be enjoyable and inspirational – with spaces for participants to set their own goals, define their own learning, take away their own messages…suddenly seemed not only uncertain but quite literally foolhardy. Oh good grief – are we ready for that!!

So on Tuesday 28^th January we transformed our teaching room: tables were covered with sugar paper, there was plasticene, fat colourful felt tips, multi-coloured paper, collage materials – and beautiful golden toffees… The space was joyous, the people willing… the activities engaging (and – dare to say it – jolly good fun) … The day was joyful.

Prof Digby Warren opened the event making a pithy case for the value of the creative arts across the disciplines; to encourage deep inquiry and alternative modes of thinking and being. Pauline Ridley had us drawing on the table – and inspired me all over again with her arguments for visual practices. I especially love the account of the Community Arts Project where the overalls were the embodied Learning Logs – instantaneous and alive – and when mounted on mannequins a bizarre but beautiful exhibition of the learning that had taken place.

Debbie Holley and Phillip Howlett from Anglia Ruskin’s Education Dept. demonstrated a project they ran with trainees science teachers – where they made stop-frame animations of scientific topics… and had us making our own stop-frame animations to boot. I have never before seen so many adults having such meaningful fun with plasticene!

Tom Burns and I (Sandra Sinfield, that’s me) celebrated the cool MOOC learning (you know who you are #edcmooc, #artmooc, #artinquiry, #ds106 – and, yes, #rhizo14) that we’ve embedded in the deleuzian module (oh yes!) Becoming an Educationalist. Fun was hopefully had exploring the role of Collage, Cabinets of curiosities, Memory envelopes, Installations and Digital art - for teaching, learning and as creative research methods – especially when everybody got cutting, sticking, making, doing, looking and learning.

Chris O’Reilly introduced some of his reflective animations before prompting everybody to produce their group animation of the day – and Visual Scribe Raquel Duran in a coup de theatre recorded the whole event on the wall!

But as I’ve said before - those are just words! Check out Chris’s website of the day:

http://learning.londonmet.ac.uk/epacks/look_make_learn/ It’s chock full of the animations, the wall art, the voices, resources, PowerPoints and PDFs… and links to a host of pictures that just burst with the energy that was there – and no – that wasn’t a kids’ party – that was what happens when academics do it with colour!

I started the day literally shaking with uncertainty: would there be confusion – revulsion – revolt – hostility? Worse – would there be laughter – derision – shame? I don’t know – may be somewhere there was – but you know what – it looked like a great day – it sounded like a great day – and I experienced an uncertain joy!

#rhizo14 – week 2: Seeding independent learning: wrestling with writing

Lots of wrestling in FB this week with what could be argued to be an essential ‘issue’ with MOOCs – they are open – free – out there… surely this is thus egalitarian learning at its very best? But no – some are still silenced – some are still feeling the pain of not being good enough – that ‘fish out of water’ feeling that is the experience of so many non-traditional students in the traditional classroom.

We have some strategies that work here to overcome this: say hello – be welcoming – comment – reply – extend a welcoming hand to other students. In doing this we ARE the community, all of us, everyone who does this friendly human thing in this strange and potentially impersonal world.

I blogged about this before – how doing the MOOCs really reinforced the need to bring the human back into the physical classroom. To make time for students to get to know each other – to bond – to feel that it is okay to speak – to listen to and be with their fellow students.

This year we found that role plays and simulations in the trad ‘lecture’ time really helped this to happen. We had a Post-apocalypse scenario running over several weeks:

Who would you keep in your bunker and why?

What education system would you build – immediately on leaving the bunker; five years later; ten years on…

What cultural activities would you save and why – and how would you build a sense of self-efficacy in future students?

The students were puzzled at this strange ‘lecture’ programme at first – but leapt into the discussions and found their voices – and found that they could speak to and with their fellow class mates. I think they formed a ‘cohort identity’ (BLAH) – and the classes definitely FEEL different.

We are also using creative techniques: drawing, collage, poetry… to help us all to think differently – to find our voices in different ways and in different media… And we are asking the students to blog about their learning hoping that this semi-academic space which is open for their colonizing develops their voices in powerful ways.

At the same time, they are going to have to wrestle with the slow, painful and iterative process that is academic writing.

How can we encourage and support our students in this struggle? How do we keep the flow going – and hopefully the joy – when this mountain does have to be climbed?

It’s really hard because writing is hard and the fear of failure is so PRESENT. That fear of making a fool of yourself – of not getting it right – of making your own ignorance visible to the world – of being judged. (Yes folks – let’s check out our FB page – we fear it too – you know!)

Especially when this fear is manifest in a vision and practice of writing that seems to tell students that they must get it right first go. That writing is the pouring out of perfectly formed, pre-digested learning - rather than the stuff and process of learning – and anything else is just pure visible, recorded proof of personal inadequacy and failure.

Below is what I have just sent to a student who has already written her Project – all of it: the proposal part is not due in till W19 (this is W15) and the final report part of it is not due in till W30. She is engaged. She is a motivated student. She has started early. It’s a great first draft – yet I fear that any feedback that suggests that it needs revision will wound.

So this is what I wrote:

I can see that you are going to be a tortured perfectionist! Apart from the pain (!!!) - this will make sure that you do get a wonderful degree. But you are going to have to give yourself permission to write stuff which will not be perfect first go (and nor should it be!) - and then go over it a few times to knock it into shape.

So, yes, there are some bits of the writing that need a little 'smoothing' - some bits are better than others - but there is a project sitting there - waiting to be 'emerged' through a revision process.

This is one reason we *try* to get students to write early (but most of them never do!). When you first write something it is great and so are you! After a little while, because your brain has continued to wrestle with your ideas, you go back over your piece, you see that it is not perfect - and you start to tidy it up. 

You change a bit here and there... you realise that those two longish sentences can be cut down into one short sentence that actually makes your point in an even better way... 

This is the struggle to write - and it is what we all should do to get our ideas across. It is a brilliant, slow and sometimes painful process - but it is the writing process. 

We have to give ourselves permission to write something - and then to change it. So - give yourself a couple of days - then go through your writing again yourself. Try to be shorter (we always need to be shorter!) - make sure you are saying exactly what you mean - change it a bit... Remember to *Save As* the versions: v1, v2, v3 and so on (we often go through 17 or more versions to get to something we are happy with). It is great to keep all the versions - especially as sometimes we delete whole sections of our writing - and then think that it was really important and needs to be in the piece after all...

We need to learn that this IS proper academic writing: this PROCESS is... (and also - it will give you data for future auto-ethnographic studies!). Most people think writing should be 'right first go' - or that if they have to change something - then they are a 'bad person' or a 'poor student' - but no - this is the necessary process of writing. 

Think of it as having a structured academic conversation with yourself.

This is the hardest thing for us tutors to get students to do. It is also hard to get other academics to realise that THIS is what we need to help students to do. It's not about shouting about spelling, punctuation and grammar - important as they are - but making time and space for this slow and thoughtful process to happen - especially when our students do not want to do this. It all feels too slow and painful.

Anyway - once you have improved it a bit yourself - print all of that off - and bring it to the class on Wednesday. We can give you feedback and hopefully help you to the next step!

But these are just words!

When I was a first year student we had no high stakes assessment that I can remember. All the first year stuff was designed to get us to think – to engage – to learn… It was brilliant – it was a bit like… a MOOC!!

Since I went through HE, ‘they’ broke it a bit more – made it harder – more formal – with more opportunities to fail – and then they let a few more non-traditional students in – and started to blame them for their failure or their fears – or their ‘fragility’ – instead of trying to fix the problem of education…

And now I don’t know how to get these bullied students to embrace this horrible and beautiful struggle with writing….

I am enjoying #rhizo14 so much – and as the community is the curriculum – this is the issue I thought I’d pop out there this week. I do hope for some Comments here folks. I need your thoughts!

#rhizo14: the Community is the Curriculum

This week I sort of started two MOOCS – NovoEd’s Storytelling for Change and Dave Cormier’s Rhizomatic Learning: #rhizo14: The Community is the Curriculum.

I had a go at both of them – and they do both look good. BUT – I’m only going to proceed with #rhizo14 – it is more flexible and self-directed – it is setting us free to work together - and I already know and like quite a lot of the other participants.

Here’s some info on Storytelling for change in case it appeals – then I will paste in some cool stuff about #rhizo14 – including links to some of the best blogs that I’ve already stumbled across.

#storytelling-change

Home:

https://novoed.com/storytelling-change/home

Key Learning Outcomes

By the end of this course, participants will:

Be confident in using stories, especially personal stories, as part of their communication toolkit.

Know how to tell stories and use a specific set of storytelling skills so that they connect with the hearts and minds of their audiences (an audience of one or many).

Have developed, rehearsed, and received feedback on one personal story as a replicable model so that they can build a personal “library” or “back pocket” of stories that can be used in different situations.

Be able to use a 5-step process to integrate story into presentations for change, work, or many other situations.

Forums:

https://novoed.com/storytelling-change/forums

#rhizo14: And so it begins:

https://p2pu.org/en/courses/882/rhizomatic-learning-the-community-is-the-curriculum/

The tour:

http://davecormier.com/edblog/2014/01/12/your-unguided-tour-of-rhizo14/

The FB group:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/260654857426965/

Dave’s opening blog posts thoughts:

http://davecormier.com/edblog/2013/12/29/unravelling-a-model-for-an-open-course/

http://davecormier.com/edblog/2013/12/27/rhizomatic-learning-an-open-course-rhizo14/

“Rhizomatic Learning posits, among other things, that the community is the curriculum. That being able to participate with and among those people who are resident in a particular field is a primary goal of learning. In each of my classes the curriculum is, of course, filled with the ideas and connections that pre-exist in the field but the paths that are taken by the students are as individual as they are, and the path taken by the class is made up of the collected paths chosen by all the students, shaped by my influence as an instructor and the impact of those external nodes they manage to contact.”

W1: https://p2pu.org/en/courses/882/content/1796/

Week 1 Things to do:

Introduce yourself, follow one of the threads of discussion somewhere. Comment on someone's work. Get acclimated.

Week 1 Challenge - Use cheating as a weapon. How can you use the idea of cheating as a tool to take apart the structures that you work in? What does it say about learning? About power? About how you see teaching?

Bonus - Do lots of rhizomatic teaching? Tell us about it.

Some cool blogs:

Alan L: http://cogdogblog.com/

Ary A: http://fearlesstech4teachers.wordpress.com/

Emily P: un content ed – Blog http://t.co/E00BGoyCsi Challenge everything!

Jenny M: http://jennymackness.wordpress.com/2014/01/15/rhizomatic-learning-and-ethics/

Mariana F: http://mdvfunes.com/2014/01/15/i-am-not-doing-rhizo14-but-i-guess-im-in/

This fits:

Failing Superman: http://t.co/6aDQHGGhts - curriculum as endurance.

As does this:

Everything is a re-mix: http://t.co/LjNmTlLvRa - especially the richly textured beginning.

I just love this:

Irrational art series: http://danariely.com/2012/06/15/creative-dishonesty/ Not dishonesty as much as a really cool research method.

And @dkernohan’s daily create challenges: http://t.co/OQ6j7uUMpp 

A big takeaway for the weekend:

https://vimeo.com/videoschool/lesson/483/weekend-challenge-20-steps

And if you’re holding back cos the tech scares you… this PPT essay on technology made me smile: http://t.co/Q3IzZMjufF

But the best note on cheating to learn comes from Ary’s wonderful blog: A small plot of land (http://fearlesstech4teachers.wordpress.com/):

“I am a former high school teacher with rhizomatic tendencies so I have been at war with public education for the last 20 years, defending my students’ right to think, question, create and express themselves, so hell yeah I’ve cheated! …for one I never taught from a textbook or assigned a workbook. I always got to know my students to discover what they wanted to read and write about. I asked them what they wanted to learn, and I listened. …It took months to set up this type of infrastructure and culture in my classroom, and honestly there were always those students and (their parents) who preferred to passively learn, answer questions at the end of the chapter, or complete a worksheet than to rewrite, remix and modernize an act of Romeo and Juliet, podcast it, or perform it live for their classmates. Some people prefer traditions. It‘s safe. My students took risks.  They weren’t students; they were actors, producers, writers, directors, poets, pod-casters, radio show hosts, bloggers, analysts, reporters, detectives, mentors, lawyers, teachers, game show hosts, artists, mimes…they did it all!  They created “stuff” all the time…”

Frankly in awe of Ary here for being able to do this in the public education system, and for younger students. I like to think that I managed a fraction of this in my evening A’level classes, mainly attended by adults wanting to wrestle with Shakespeare and Chaucer. I definitely try to mix it up in my University classes … but against the sheer monolithic power of state education ???!!!!! That is an achievement!

Right now we (my partner Tom Burns and I – with Quaco Cloutterbuck) are running ‘Becoming an Educationalist’ (http://becomingeducational.wordpress.com/). Deleuzian in form and content, we’ve started to de-territorialise – we are nomads – we are taking our lines of flight – and our lines of escape… 

So I got tagged in this blog meme…

Well, we can blame Cathleen Nardi for tagging me in a blog meme! Cathleen was tagged in Nancy White’s blog … and so it goes.

Strangely, it’s been good to produce eleven random facts about myself: to see how I would label and place myself in the world. I also enjoyed answering Cathleen’s questions. A small reflective moment totally right for New Year’s Eve.

So I’m passing it on – and even as I do I know that some of the people I’ve tagged below would saw off their own feet rather than join in… BUT – it’s a good way to pass on some of the great bloggers that I’ve been reading this year – so it’s win/win either way!

Random Facts about Me

I left school when I was still 16 (okay a month away from my 17^th birthday).

My first job was as a laboratory technician.

I loved going to Technical College – I found ‘vocational education’ really emancipatory – may be I was lucky.

I have made a low budget and sadly unsuccessful feature film.

With my partner, I have taken a production of Godber’s ‘Bouncers’ on a tour of Crete discos.

My mother was Belgium – and was a teenager in Brussels when it was occupied by the Nazis.

My father was from London and was involved in D-Day when really just a kid himself.

We lived in a flat above a launderette and a shop on a main road in North London.

We escaped to a caravan at the Kent coast at weekends and for the long summer holidays – this was my salvation.

I was the first in my neighbourhood to go to College – I studied Education and Literature and trained to be a secondary school teacher.

I actually taught English A’levels to adults in the evening.

Questions from Cathleen Nardi (http://cathleennardi.wordpress.com/):

1. Where do you go when you want to think?

I walk to think and to de-stress. I can walk in London, I can walk in the countryside – and best of all I love to walk by the sea.
2. What is your comfort food?

Chocolate… cakes … chocolate cakes!
3. What do you do when you want to relax?

I always used to read to relax – I also love to watch video – most recently I have taken to MOOCs to relax.
4. Name one thing on your Bucket List.

I am lucky enough to do a job I enjoy – better than a bucket list!
5. Why is education important to you?

Like all loves, education is flawed, it can be unfair, it can be corrupted (by bad policy) – but it offers space for energy, excitement, potential, engagement, change…

6. What is the Boldest Act of Defiance you’ve ever attempted?

I think making a feature film with my partner. We were both the first in our families to get a degree – but making our film was the moment when we felt we had gained a ‘voice’. It was so transgressive to do this thing – we lost our house because of it – and still it was the best thing to have done!
7. How do you problem solve?

I wrestle with a problem for a while. I may write about it – I may brainstorm – if it is a really tricky one – I go for a long walk and hope that it becomes clear as I tramp over hills… This usually works.
8. What is the last thing that you made?

This week I have been painting quite a bit. I ‘blind draw’ something and then watercolour it; but also this week I made a collage. I tried a picture of my papa – of when he was holding me when I was just one month old. I tried to get his face – and the texture of the background behind him. I got the background okay – and his hair was excellent – but not the face…
9. What is your favourite piece of art in your home?

This sounds terribly solipsistic, but my favourite piece at the moment is the first collage that I did for #artmooc. I had never made one before and I really got into it. I thought of a small poem that I had written as I chose my pictures and then placed them on the board… It is a dense piece – I made it out of dull newsprint pictures to suit the mood – and most people do not like it… But I love it.
10. What’s is the most creative thing you’ve ever done?

Trying to live life for joy and with no regrets.
11. What would be the title of a book about you?

Memoirs of a working class zealot.

Questions from Me:

1. What do you love most about your life?
2. What is the best thing you have ever done or made?
3. What is your favourite book/author/film?
4. What is the secret of a happy life?
5. What cool thing have you discovered recently?
6. What are you currently fascinated by?
7. What is the secret of your success?
8. What is the source of your joy?
9. What is the most creative thing you have done?

10. What is the latest thing that you have made?

11. What would you most like to make or do?

Now It’s Your Turn: Tag –You are IT!

1. Eloise Sentito: http://esonlearning.wordpress.com/ @ESonlearning
2. Andy Mitchell http://andydmmitchell.blogspot.co.uk/ @AndyDMMitchell
3. Emily Purser http://uncontente.weebly.com/   @erpurser
4. Willa Ryerson http://wryerson.wordpress.com/  @willaryerson
5. Debbie Holley  http://drdebbieholley.com/ @DebbieHolley1
6. Amy Burvall  http://www.amyburvall.com/ @amyburvall
7. Rajiv Bajaj  http://www.rajivbajaj.net/ @rajiv63
8. Rick Bartlett http://drrbb2nd.blogspot.co.uk/ @rbb2nd
9. Kelcy Allwein http://kelcym.wordpress.com/
10. Angela Towndrow http://angelatowndrow.blogspot.co.uk/  @angelatowndrow
11. Maddy  http://mymoocadventure.wordpress.com/ @maddiekp

When you are tagged…

Acknowledge the nominating blogger.
Share 11 random facts about yourself.
Answer the 11 questions the nominating blogger has created for you.
List 11 bloggers.
Post 11 questions for the bloggers you nominate to answer, and let all the bloggers know they have been nominated. Don’t nominate a blogger who has nominated you, or anyone on the above list… and Pass it on!

At the very least, check out the bloggers I’ve listed – they have all inspired and informed me this year…

And here’s hoping that 2014 brings us all much joy.

#EDCMOOC2: MOOC madness: After the Gold Rush

I’ve taken Edinburgh University’s E-learning and Digital Cultures MOOC (Massive Open Online course) twice this year. The first time it was my first ever MOOC and it provided some of the most immersive and engaging learning in which I have ever participated. 44000 students took #edcmooc that first time – engaging with it and each other months before it started.

We were in FaceBook and on Twitter then Google+ and into Communities… This social side kept me engaged and happy. I found support and encouragement – and made friends of strangers (Fraingers). Brilliant.

I told myself that I needed to take the course again to engage with the technical tools – which I’d sort of avoided … But – then came Penn State’s #artmooc and MoMA’s #artinquiry - courses only tangentially related to my work. I found that so much benefit came from these contingent encounters - and blogged about that (below).

Then #edcmooc came around again and I was one of eight people invited to act as a Community Teaching Assistant (CTA) – and I just could not resist.

My first #edcmooc was to learn MOOC… and now we could learn CTA by being CTA. Fabulous! (Also – frankly – I was really flattered to be asked!)

It was a delicate task to be a CTA attempting to add to the experience of new #edcmooc’ers whilst not in any way diluting their experiences. But we plunged in with good will and optimism and positive regard for the new students … and hey – it seemed to work. Rajiv Bajaj blogged about his #edcmooc experiences (http://pursuingmoocs.wordpress.com/) – and the CTAs. He said that we had been light touch but supportive enough to hold on to those who might otherwise has spun off. We had been friendly and caring and useful and valued.

With my own students, rather than *teach* digital literacy, I wanted them to discover the joy and potential of digital learning the way I had. All were encouraged to join either #edcmooc or #ds106. A final joy for me has been that one of my ‘meat’ world students has taken and passed #edcmooc.

Next http://becomingeducational.wordpress.com/ - blogging about our new module. #becomingeducational has embedded within it everything learned from #edcmooc, #artmooc and #artinquiry. 

2013 – what a year for MOOCs! Happy 2014!