blogs/discussion boards/wikis

This is a chart I used with my group on Teaching with Technology Day. Our session was called “Cultivating Conversations worth Having” and I started with this quote from Ken Bruffee:
“…any effort to understand conversation requires us to understand the nature of community life that generates and maintains conversation. Furthermore, any effort to understand and cultivate in ourselves the kind of thought we value most requires us to understand and cultivate the kinds of community life that establish and maintain conversation that is the origin of that kind of thought. To think well as individuals we must learn to think well collectively—that is, we must learn to converse well.”
Kenneth A. Bruffee, Collaborative Learning and the Conversation of Mankind

I really believe that the social technologies enable collaborative learning in ways we couldn’t have imagined before. And those ways are not readily obvious just from the tools themselves. When I first started using discussion boards, I was trying to get traditional class discsussions “arguments” going outside of class. Many theorists talk about this as the first stage of technology adoption–using new tools for old jobs. I quickly found this was not a great way to use them. I watched the ways that students DID use the tools. They would write on the boards and think aloud. They would read others thoughts. They would make some intial responses, but not much.

At first I viewed this as a failure. They weren’t really discussing. But then I began to see that it was a great gift. They were offering windows into their own minds in these spaces. What could I do with these windows? I felt like those early medical researchers who put the windows into the cow bellies so they could watch digestion! I could watch my students digest ideas while they were still mid process. AND their fellow students could also watch this digestion. I started to think about what that might do for our “face time.”

Now I use social softwares in ways that capitalize on this idea. I used discussion boards for group processing: there is a new one each week where the class decides what the most important things were that we discussed during the face time. What things did we leave unanswered? What is coming next? They keep individual blogs when they do research, but all their blogs are linked so they can pop in and see what everyone is up to!

Conversation with other faculty members in the session revealed that many faculty have been trying these socail softwares (except the wiki–that is still on the horizon for most) and are still at the stage where their experiences have been relatively unsatisfactory. Many haven’t yet reached “stage 2″–seeing how the tool can do new things. I am only just getting there myself!

Here are the rest of my notes from the session:
Some Examples:

My class’s wiki project this semester:
http://learning.richmond.edu/twiki/bin/view/HSWritingCenters/WebHome
(you can also see it on wikipedia under “writing center”)

link to one research blog (all the rest are linked there):
http://meganbresearch.blogspot.com/

a class (group) blog: an attempt to help freshman in a 103 class keep track of what we were doing and take more responsibility for what we were doing as a class
http://plasticplate.blogspot.com/

blogs for students abroad:
http://keillor.richmond.edu/blojsom/blog/bombay/
(many countries have lots of internet cafes—this is becoming a really interesting way to create community with our students when they are away for the semester/year and to bring the study abroad experience to Richmond in a new way!)

How does this create community?

1.My students said the research blogs, linked together, (plus the wiki and blackboard tools) made the group project do-able and enjoyable and not frustrating. Part of what they liked was that they allowed for easy cooperation—anywhere, anytime– but still allowed for individual evaluation! There is an electronic “paper trail.” It helps them feel held accountable. Even just something as simple as knowing your journal will be date and time stamped forces you to keep up, and then you get more out of the class. (Note: THEY recognized this– and reported it.) They told me they dropped in on each others’ blogs a lot, though they usually did not leave comments.

2. When it comes right down to it, this kind of work is writing! And writing is thinking. They thought more. And they thought regularly and reflectively. And they looked at what other people thought..

Which leads us to the other kind of conversation worth having: metacognition (thinking about thinking) conversation with yourself (or your “other self”). Journaling. Journaling online, whether on the net or in a blackboard space allows for accountability and interaction. If students know they are being time stamped, it keeps them from trying to create a journal at the end of the semester, which does not have nearly the learning benefits of keeping a weekly log.
http://caitlinapprentice.blogspot.com/2006/05/final-post.html

This thinking and “seeing each others thinking” outside of class made our in-class conversations amazingly rich and fruitful.

A Few Resources:
http://www.tltgroup.org/blogs.htm
Resource page on blogs and wikis in higher education

Web 2.0: A New Wave
of Innovation for Teaching and Learning?
http://www.educause.edu/apps/er/erm06/erm0621.asp

Social Software in Academia
http://www.educause.edu/apps/eq/eqm06/eqm0627.asp

I am interested in hearing about your experiences as you try to use these tools to accomplish your own teaching goals. Call me (x6038) or email (tdolson@richmond.edu) to have coffee tell me more!