AT's T509 Blog

“Mama, draw me a helicopter, please” says my 4 y.o. precious daughter after she watched another episode of one of the favorites Robocar Poli (Hyundai’s social responsibility project for children).

Drawing helicopters, to put it mildly, is as far from my expertise as it is from my interest. Add to it lack of time, a hefty to-do list, an infant on my laps, some pressing matters – and this project’s attractiveness deteriorates dramatically.

However!

The retaliation of a disappointed 4 y.o. is a powerful motivator and a push. Basically, there is not time for deliberation, no opportunity for a dialog or negotiation. No luxury of wondering whether I can do it. There is only one option: to draw a helicopter as fast as possible, to smile at all times, make it fun (to cover up for the shortcomings of the horrible skill-less drawing) and to move on, being ready to please my little patron with yet another deliverable, in which I most likely won’t have the right background either.

Interestingly, the helicopter (Heli) sketch was approved by my 4 y.o., then followed the drawing of an ambulance (Amber), a track (Roy) and a police car (Poli). It all happened so dramatically fast, that I haven’t noticed my imagination taking over, materializing in drawing a forest, an ocean (with sharks), an island and more.

What happened? I swear I can’t draw, I am busy and the theme (tracks and cars and all that) is not exactly in the scope of my interest (give me something “girlier” any day!) .

I guess, the motivator outside of anything rational dictated the successful outcome. There was not much of a choice, but to succeed and to do it fast, with the resources immediately available.

I wonder: if we are not aware of the spectrum and criteria (“this is easy”, “this is difficult”, “this is for humanities majors”, “this is for techies”), but only have a task and an assumption that it is doable somehow, would we then trick ourselves (or rather free ourselves from what’s stopping us otherwise) and succeed? The answer would rightfully be “it depends”. But I suspect there will certainly be more room for creativity, leading to succeeding.

Another random thought.

A couple of days ago we had a panel discussion with leaders in massive online education. Many question were touched upon, many themes: unbundle, innovate, free-up.

A mention that students take increasingly poorer notes and increasingly fall asleep during classes. We need to flip [the classrooms]. Well. This is exactly what made me doubt. If the students increasingly disengage in the classroom, what makes us think that the students will engage with the online streaming lectures? Those of us who has taken classes online might have falling asleep experience, regardless of how important the content was. My own strategy was to take notes (stop and rewind, until everything is captured), a proven method against falling asleep.

In other words, how much audience’s attention we are capturing in the flipped content v. a traditional lecture, is yet to be found.

Another questions is this: striving for efficiency and “massivity” in education, are we not compromising the quality of education?

Food for thought indeed.

Steve Kolowich’s “The Professors Who Make the MOOCs” highlighted an emerging category of celebrities (in a good way): academic community.

For a long time now the visual arts performers were able to advance their recognition and reach their audience globally: youtube is one of the outlets in today’s toolkit disposal.

MOOCs are the youtube for academics: they allow the audience to access the source and to gain the knowledge. Naturally, a teaching team becomes recognizable in the circle of the MOOC-takers.

While MOOCs remain costly and time consuming in preparation, technically, a good professor from a little-known college can become well known and recognized/recognizable for his/her work. His/her contribution to the scholarly world can become more visible and maybe more impactful, because of the scale.

Recruitment/professional gain aside, MOOCs are a fresh way to showcase the intellectual treasure (otherwise locked on a local level) and to be known for the expertise and contribution.

It will probably not take long before we start seeing MOOCs ratings and competition in the cyberspace.

Most of my posts are devoted to my discoveries, my thinking, my analysis and perceptions. They are based on what I read and observe. It did not take long to realize that a good portion of these readings and observations are based on yours, my t509 Massive peers, contributions!

In this post I want to reflect the impact you are making on my learning, knowingly or not. Just a few examples here, all with appreciation.

I have always been uneasy/skeptical about multitasking: basically, I don’t believe it’s a good practice (I won’t even name it a skill here), just intuitively. Interestingly, just a few days ago, a tweet on a Forbes article caught my attention, confirming just this(by @RobertsRachelL).

Then there is a MOOC platform comparison tweet (by @CarliSpina), which I thought was interesting and I glanced at that. Then I thought about how overly connected we are and kept browsing through some blogs, and here it is: Life Pre-Internet post (by Allison Goldsberry), where I couldn’t resist leaving a comment and also wondered of the blog’s clean features, some of which I wouldn’t mind learning and implementing into the space of my own. I keep an eye on My life at Harvard (by Merisenda Bills), a beautifully crafted space with a unique view. Being a somewhat follower of Getting Things Done I found out that I am not alone (see Karen Massey‘s blog), but what’s more, there was a useful reference to my earlier painful question of how to organize the sources, and here is Diigo to explore.

We are in a very interesting class: there are readings, videos and activities assigned. Yet, I suspect that no readings are identical for each of us: as we grasp various information, generously shared by our peers, prompting our thinking towards unpredictable directions and, subsequently our reactions in blogs or tweets (circulating back into more resource sharing and thinking further).

It is a live and a sustainable organism. I think I am starting to understand what it means to be connectivistic in a class and how to craft the these connections and this space.

I am deeply thankful to my peers for this perpetuum mobile of enrichment.