Failure and failing

So this week's topic in our Openspokes fellowship is failure, something we are all intimately acquainted with, for who has not failed at a task, at a crucial moment, sometimes with serious consequences? Who ends up a goat and goes to hell? Failure has been the gristmill for religion, literature, history, science, psychology and philosophy for eons. We all know who arrived at the North Pole but rarely do we find out about who didn't. Fail and failure have always been negative words so it is interesting to see so many people trying to turn it into a positive just lately. I have failed spectacularly in the educational setting, more than once. 

Since beginning my exploratory journey of online educational communities, failure has been a constant thread running throughout the discussions.   Brendan Murphy and I discussed failure in April, Kirsten and Erin have already posted this week about failure and what it might mean in regards to learning and students. I like Erin's belief that what we are attempting to do is teach resiliency and I think that Kirsten is spot on when writing about learning as a cyclical process, that failure has no part in since it is seen as an end and not a beginning. And yet, we use the term fail/ failure constantly in education, particularly in summative evaluation/assessment. In fact, we're addicted to it.

As we move to change our curriculum to reflect the circular nature of learning, perhaps we may also finally let go of the idea of summative assessment and banish failure from the classroom and from the educational discussion. After all, who is the summative assessment for? The student? Not at all. They know where they are from personal experience and the formative evaluation they have been receiving during the year. Parents? I used to dread report card time, when it seemed to be a litany of what my child needed to do to improve and having to argue with my husband about the value of the report card. (Sadly my children told me this was how they viewed report card grades: A-could have done better, B-bad, C-death.) Teachers? Do we crave designing multiple choice tests? Close sentences?  Having students study for provincial standardized test? How do we feel about the cookie cutter remarks we have to use in report cards where we've had to tell a seven year old they are limited in their ability? What kind of accounting system are we using to evaluate our students when you're a failure at seven? Where does our belief in allowing children to develop at their own pace, to explore and play as they learn and grow fit in with our bureaucratic school system and its need to be validated through summative assessment? So who's to blame for the word failure being bandied about?

We all are.

This is a world wide problem tied to long standing ingrained cultural practice. Parents and students expect grades, teachers comply as part of their job, the school system and governments use grades and pass rates to be accountable to the public for their spending on education. We have to re-frame the discussion, not only within our own practice as teachers (how much summative assessment can we strip out of our teaching particularly as we move to allowing students the ability to govern their own education and develop skills of self-regulation) but also with students, parents, our school boards and our governments. Until we all begin to question the role of failure in our system, we'll continue to talk about what to do about failure instead of looking at the education of a student as a continuum, where students meet challenges, work to overcome them and move on to the next challenge at their own pace so they can be successful.

P.S. I am fascinated with what happened to our good old fashioned English words that meant failure before the use of failure became widespread in English. There are multiple words that mean something similar to fail/failure in Old English: dwelain- to deceive, mislead, lead into sin or error (this one is closest to the original Latin meaning), aleogan- to fail to fulfill, misbeodan- injure, do wrong to, gedreosan- fall, perish, fail and abreoðan- fail, perish, be destroyed. All of these were replaced with the single word fail which is why there are so many definitions.

Hybrid Pedagogy: Leaders in Innovation

I’m biased. I admit it. I’m partial to the  Hybrid Pedagogy team of Pete Rorabaugh, Jesse Stommel, Sean Michael Morris, Robin Wharton and Valerie Robin.  How can I not be? These are the folks that brought us Twitter vs. Zombies where I learned to use Twitter as a communication tool through a game with Pete Rorabaugh. (I make an excellent zombie!)  I had participated in MOOCMOOC (a Hybrid Pedagogy playground) where I was introduced to the collaborative nature of Google docs. (No limit to the number of participants- write a paper in a day!) MOOCMOOC brought me to ETMOOC, a collaboratively run mooc which blew my mind away! I’ve written gushing posts about ETMOOC before but it can never be stated enough: Best learning experience ever! I felt renewed , rejuvenated in my learning, inspired by the brush with some amazingly creative people.  Jesse Stommel was a participant in ETMOOC and guided a collaborative effort in writing a poem. ETMOOC lead to postetmooc, because once you’ve ETMOOCed you want to maintain those collaborations, the positive energy that swirls around when your mind is being stretched and you’ve got a group who care about collaborative learning as a support network. You can see how Hybrid Pedagogy has become so much a part of my learning. In the spirit of collaboration I want to share!

When I contacted Pete Rorabaugh and Jesse Stommel about spending a month on Hybrid Pedagogy for postetmooc they were more than open to the idea. They have graciously agreed to participate in our discussion about digital publishing, networking, and community. 

 

So what’s so great about Hybrid Pedagogy and why should we spend a month studying and reading and questioning the founders? Let me count the ways:

1.   Promoting links between higher education and K-12: This is a great idea. As a former elementary teacher, I often feel like a poor cousin in the teaching world (particularly when people asked me why I was not teaching at a higher grade level.) Education is experiencing a major shake-up and K-12 is going to be a part of that change. The need to collaborate and rethink the process of learning is critical for all of us, at every grade level.

Jesse Stommel @Jessifer

It's always been a key part of our mission to broaden our network and make connections between K-12 and #highered.

And isn’t this something we’ve wanted to see too?

2.   A community:  Both Pete Rorabaugh and Jesse Stommel see the creation of Hybrid Pedagogy as a community that networks, researches and publishes scholarly articles surrounding the issues of progressive, critical pedagogy. “What we wanted to build was a network, a community for engaging a discussion of digital pedagogy, critical pedagogy, open education, and online learning. At the same time, we wanted to build a collection of resources to help facilitate conversations within that community.” jessestommel.com/blog/files/Pub…

 

As we’ve moved on from ETMOOC we’ve joined different ventures that require us to think about community, networking and publishing. We’ve also begun to really understand the value in developing collections of resources to share with our peers. 

3.   The spirit of scholarly generosity: As a journal, Hybrid Pedagogy has a team which peer reviews everything it publishes. They’ve published lots in a short period of time. But it is the spirit behind the journal that is the motivating factor here. They’re challenging the idea, not of scholarship, but of academic publishing and the rigid format that has evolved over the last 100 years that often favours the publisher and not the scholar. “The notion of an “academic journal” needs dismantling and reimagining. This isn’t to say that we shouldn’t continue to have traditional academic journals, but that we need to considerably broaden the landscape to make way for dynamic collaboration, new media, and participatory culture.” jessestommel.com/blog/files/Pub…

As we move forward, we too need to think about how we are going to share our academic work with the world. 
 

4.  The use of play as a teaching tool: This, to me, is critical. I believe strongly in the value of play as a facilitator for learning for students of all ages. I rarely see it within the adult learning setting. The creation of Twitter vs. Zombies was eye opening to me. It wasn’t just that I learned the use of a technology I was struggling to understand through a game, but I also experienced the sheer joy of learning through play. As I said before, I haven’t played such a great game of tag in years. Through the process of game playing (because I am a highly competitive tag player) I learned to post pictures in Twitter, add sound, use Bitly, etc and finally create a popcorn video. Much of what comes out of Hybrid Pedagogy, including MOOCMOOC also incorporates this aspect of play. As Pete Rorabaugh wrote to me: “In short, we want to promote digital interaction -- our own and those of our colleagues -- that are open, collaborative, experiential, critical, experimental, rigorous, and playful. We want to promote collective pedagogical and scholarly work that empowers student agency and challenges established educational binaries.”

And really who doesn’t want to be a part of that amazing transformation?

So for the month of June, follow #digped (they do a twitterchat on the first Friday of the month about various topics), check out their website, follow some of the Unconference suggestions and prepare to ask Hybrid Pedagogy your questions in the hangout and in our Twitterchat #etmchat!

Being Open and the Open Web

Well, currently I am enrolled in Inspiring Leadership through Emotional Intelligence (Coursera) and Teachtheweb through Mozilla, plus being a member of several communities so I am feeling a little s t r e t c h e d. Both physically and mentally, so the power outage last night that shut the computer off and sent me to bed early was probably a good thing.

Synchronicity often happens in our lives and right now in the multiple groups I belong to we are discussing what is openness and what is the open web, so I thought I would throw in a few ideas into the pot.

Teachtheweb is about making content for the web and sharing that content. Funny how my mind works because I started thinking of Western history. Once upon a time, we were all makers. We had to grow, harvest, hunt, butcher, spin, weave, pot, bake, make our own ale, make our own tools, collect our own water, start a fire, etc. We went to bed when it was dark and rose when it was light. And we had to share with our community to survive. As our communities got larger, we began to specialize into guilds and start to communicate within and with other communities through verbal messengers and written messages. Society was no longer based on strictly face to face communication with those you knew intimately. Our standard of living began to increase the more we interacted with our groups and societies, as we traded ideas and discoveries, but we also began to consume more and make less. As the industrial revolution occurred, our making became further removed from the larger community. How many of us could or would be willing to do any of the tasks listed above? How many of us grow, harvest, collect water, spin or weave? Instead of a society of mainly makers we've became a society of mainly consumers. People who make or do physical tasks today are called "tradesmen" or "factory workers" and are often derided within Western society. Perhaps that's why we've sent those jobs to other countries.

What Teachtheweb is attempting to do is return us to the time when we consciously made things of value for the community, except that it is made digitally. This is a paradigm shift in our thinking, from consuming the web to creating the web. The web no longer just the purview of Silicon Valley but open to all. Are we all of the same skill level? No, but that is okay. Making the rounds right now is a stop action movie created by Kindergarten students. The teacher has asked us to remix it and share. And we are. So what is our community now? It is anyone who has access to the Internet, the tools to create content and the willingness to share their knowledge. Does that mean everyone? No it does not. Access, tools and sharing are the prerequisites of this community. So this is not yet a global movement. But it will be. So in twenty or thirty years we will be working in a fully networked world.

Ah but then comes the dreaded word...copyright. Think Creative Commons everyone. It is no use sharing our work if others can't use it. Why create if you're not willing to share your ideas? As so many have said, openness is a state of mind. It is about being willing to share, to collaborate, to be willing to look at a different perspective, to remix, reuse and recycle. To be willing to say, "I don't know, does someone else?" or "Take this idea and make it better." Being human means we're programmed to share and grow together. We're hardwired to be a group, but also to be kind to each other. So be open and think about what you can do to help spread access, tools and a sharing mentality on the web, globally. That's why you're on the web, isn't it?

Teach the web, Postetmooc and other activities

So I am about to embark on another mooc type endeavour, with Mozilla's Teach the Web. I'll see how it turns out. I am already feeling a little anxious because of course I've forgotten how to connect my blog to an aggregator (and the assumption that it is easy is to figure out ticks me off! and is one of my pet peeves about Mozilla.) But given that I start most moocs feeling a little anxious I expect that I'll enjoy the learning once I cross all of my little Rubicons.

Postetmooc is turning out to be a great extension of ETMOOC and I am so glad. I was missing my Wednesday twitterchat, and the Google + coffee group meeting every second Tuesday has been great for sparking new ideas and discussing topics that we were introduced to in ETMOOC. I am particularly interested in our current topic, branding and digital identities. Will Richardson and others have written recently on this topic so it should be a great discussion. Primarily though, we're going to be reading the blogs of Seth Godin over the next week or so simply because we find references to his ideas in everyone's blog. Why not just go to the source!

I've also been lucky enough to join a few other communities with similar interests such as OOE (open online education) and Open Spokes (vlogging). I am so glad I am making the effort of maintaining my PLN!

One of the things I love about the web is that I can find out what other people are thinking and talking about. In the last six months I've taken the bold leap (at least for me) of being on Twitter and blogging/vlogging. However, like many newbies to the social media verse I was afraid of what this might do to my sense of privacy/identity. In looking for information about branding/digital identities I found this gem of a video that reflects my justifiable fears of big data and the companies that use our data to generate wealth. This has nothing to do with education and everything to do with becoming a continuous target for advertisers.

Lo and behold, I hadn't realised I had given up all rights to privacy when I signed up for Facebook which is how I keep up with friends and family spread all over the world. So, I am going to consider giving Facebook the boot. I may have to resort to more traditional forms of communication. Ah well, at least I will end up supporting Canada Post!

Post ETMOOC -April

So I promised a more analytical response of why etmooc was so valuable as a learning process and here it is. What is interesting is that even though I am no longer in the weekly/biweekly task mode for etmooc, as a post etmooc blog group member our group has maintained that biweekly format, I expect for continuity's sake. Even though I am a member of different groups now, I miss that etmooc feeling. I expect it is because etmooc made sure to expose us to different thought leaders every week and kept our brain humming at peak intensity. (So am I a knowledge/new experience junkie?) I often wonder how many weeks/months/years of planning and knowledge went into the creation of etmooc.

So a few reasons why etmooc worked:

• Emphasis on exposure to new ideas/technologies and thought leaders
• Discussion of new ideas in multiple formats with multiple avenues for exploration
• Creation and expansion of PLN encouraged and facilitated
• Creation of content by the learner (us) for consumption by fellow learners using both old and new technological tools in creative ways (I still feel Haiku Deck deprived as a pc user)
• Comment on content by peers encouraged
• No assessment except through voluntary peer to peer assessment
• Learner control of knowledge accessed, consumed and conveyed
• Positive reinforcement of any knowledge acquired by peers and moderators

So I would be interested in how many etmoocers actively participated in the journey, was there a difference in the level of engagement between those who started in the beginning vs. those who started later, and what was the overall retention rate for the program?

There are other questions of course. How do we import this model of engagement into the classroom (both K-12, higher ed and training of adults)? Could/should we use this as a model for the future in education? How would the majority of teachers react to giving up control? How would governments react to this type of approach? How does this approach challenge current practices in the field of assessment which is really government's way of maintaining control of what is taught?

Personally, will I be able to maintain this level of engagement post-etmooc? Can I continue to nurture and expand my PLN without it becoming an enormous responsibility both professionally and personally? Do I have the technological skills I need to support my connections?  If I feel overwhelmed and need to disengage are my multiple PLNs supportive enough to let me exit and enter at will? What are the social connections of these networks and my responsibilities to the multiple networks? How much do my own personal beliefs about social interactions govern my sense of responsibility to the networks?

Continuing the journey......

A Wonder for My Mental Beach-ETMOOC

As Christina Hendricks first said "This is my love letter to ETMOOC"

It is hard to believe that three months have gone by and that ETMOOC has passed so quickly. If you had said to me on New Year's Eve that, "2013 would be the year you fully reconnect with not only your love of learning but your joy of teaching." I would have snorted in disbelief.

Do you remember when you were small and found a treasure on the beach? The sand was warm as it sifted between your toes, your hair was almost hot from the sun beating down on it and the water made a soft, rhythmic lapping sound where it broke along the shore? And then you spotted it? It could have been a magical speckled rock with golden glints, or a shell with that smooth lustre inside and purply grey knobbles on the outside. Or it may have been a gnarled piece of driftwood that looked like a face or the actual bones of an animal? And you would cup it in your hands and race up to your parents or your brothers and sisters to show them the wonder of what you had found? Serendipitously, I found a wonder for my mental beach. ETMOOC.

Life is full of surprises, twists, turns and opportunities. And ETMOOC has been a tremendous opportunity. Not just because I learned new technical skills, or because I embraced my artistic, creative side, or because I was introduced to new ways of thinking and communicating. These have been enormously beneficial to me. But what I have valued most are the people I have interacted with all along this journey.

I feel like I've been on an exploratory mission to a new territory, with some wonderful guides and an enormous group of supporters who read my blogs, provided feedback, answered my questions and made me stop lurking and actually participate, even though what I may be saying is not original or has been repeated elsewhere. Remixing, repurposing and retweeting are part of my repertoire now. I learned that it is okay to share, to be open and that my incessant need to ask questions is what makes me who I am, so ask away! Jeff Merrell said it best when he used the word authentic. This has been an authentic learning experience for me and I hope that the spirit that has infused me during ETMOOC will keep me connected, sharing and questioning long into the future.

Please leave the lights on....

Collective Wisdom: Using Aboriginal Knowledge as a Guide to Openness

Interesting how sense making converges. Not only rhizomatically but layered and scaffolded. Currently I am enrolled in three courses, ETMOOC, Aboriginal Worldviews and Education (AWE) and WomenLearningTech. I am also reading the Half Life of Facts. Last night we had a wonderful etmooc chat around K-12 open education discussing ideas about what does being open mean, the potential pitfalls and barriers as well as the opportunities openness brings to us and our students. This morning while looking up some information for a quiz in AWE I came across these words in the section about personal knowledge from Marlene Brant Castellano in Updating Aboriginal Traditions of Knowledge (2000) "Aboriginal knowledge is rooted in personal experience and lays no claim to universality. The degree to which you can trust what is being said is tied up with integrity and perceptiveness of the speaker...His observations would not necessarily be accepted uncritically, nor would they be contradicted or dismissed. Rather, they would be put in context." ( I added the bold) This ties in directly with many of the topics we discussed last night, that of building a 'brand,' (I hate that term for carrying my identity forward! Please someone rescue us from becoming part of a marketing campaign!) based on integrity and perceptiveness, building trust and relationships online and the need for placing observations and ideas in context.

I also like the idea that you can be critical of an idea without being dismissive or contradictory. "The personal nature of knowledge means that disparate and even contradictory perceptions can be accepted as valid because they are unique to the person....In other words, people do not contest with one another to establish who is correct-who has the 'truth.'" And after reading Half Life of Facts and seeing how teaching science in elementary school can be changed in a blink of an eye (Pluto is not a planet, Bernoulli's Principle does/does not explain lift) what is 'truth' and who has ownership? And how long does 'truth' last? Perhaps that is an aspect of openness that also needs to be discussed.  Even in science, light is both a wave and a particle and the principles of flight can be explained through Bernoulli's Principle or Newton's laws of motion. Why must, as I have said before, there always be a right answer? This means that we all have the opportunity to pursue making our own truth and knowledge and by each of us sharing and respecting other views we grow together. Within aboriginal knowledge, "collective wisdom is arrived at by a process of 'putting our minds together,'" which seems to mirror the actions we take within the ETMOOC community on a regular basis. I know that I have been enriched by the process of creating collective wisdom, both in my thinking and in my new friendships.

If you do anything this week, please take an opportunity to read this wonderful article. There is also a section on oral tradition, and experiential learning that turns our discussion of literacy on its head as aboriginal knowledge considers the literate approach to knowing one dimensional.

"'I can't promise to tell you the truth; I can only tell you what I know.'"