Interview with Burks Oakley (Life in the E-Learning Organization Series)

This week's interview is with Burks Oakley, trailblazer in online learning programs, who has received numerous awards and accolades, including ones received from the Sloan Consortium. This interview is a part of Life in the E-Learning Organization, a series of interviews with e-learning and distance professionals.

What is your name, and what is your involvement with e-learning?

My name is Burks Oakley. I have been involved in the e-learning field since the late 1980’s. I currently am a Visiting Research Professor at the University of Illinois at Springfield, and in this capacity, I teach an online class and I am involved in research about online education. I also work as a consultant in the field of online learning, and give a number of faculty development presentations and workshops on college campuses throughout the country. I’m technically a Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which is a nice way of saying that I am a retired engineering professor.

How did you get interested in distance education?

I actually was an award-winning classroom teacher in a former life (a long time ago). When students began to have access to PC’s in the late 1980’s, I developed some stand-alone software to help improve student learning in my on-campus class on electric circuit analysis (I worked as an electrical engineering professor at that time). The success of this software led me to develop a networked version, where the students could submit homework over the Internet (using FTP) and get instant feedback on how well they understood the concepts. In the Spring 1994 semester, I added asynchronous computer conferencing to this, so that students could contact TA’s or other students online and ask questions if they were having difficulties. All of this experience helped land me a position in the office of the Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, and when the Vice President started a university-wide initiative in the area of online education (what you are calling distance education), she asked me to direct it. And I worked as the Director of the University of Illinois Online initiative for the next ten years, assisting the three campuses of the University of Illinois (Chicago, Springfield, Urbana-Champaign) develop their online programs. So you can see that I sort of got into this field in a round-about manner.

What is your favorite new trend in distance education?

Without a doubt, my favorite new trend is Web 2.0 and all of the Web 2.0 technologies that we can use to improve student learning. For example, I have my students post their introductions in a class wiki, I have asked them each to start a blog where they can reflect on their learning, and I produce weekly podcasts for the class, in which I summarize our discussions and highlight important points.

What is your favorite technology?

Wow, that is a tough question. Do I have to pick a favorite? I assume that you mean among all of the many technologies that are used in the e-learning field. I’ll re-phrase your question – what is the one Internet technology I wouldn’t want to do without? OK, Susan, if that is what you want to know, my answer would have to be Google. I use Google multiple times each day – and more and more, it isn’t just the search feature of Google, but it is the personalized Google page at iGoogle, having my calendar in Google Calendar, blogging using Blogger, creating web pages with Google Page Creator, collaboratively authoring documents in Google Documents, reading and sending e-mail using my Gmail account – well, I could go on and on. Why didn’t I buy Google stock when it was only $100 per share?!!!!!!

What kinds of instructional materials do you use in elearning?

I guess that I am fairly traditional here. I use webpages for handouts (and I still author them in Netscape Composer, version 4.8 from 2002), PDF files (see more below – a great replacement for textbooks), and I use Blackboard for the weekly discussions in my online class. As I just mentioned, I also am podcasting for my online class, and I use a blog to distribute the RSS feed for this podcast series. Oh, I guess I also produce some short PowerPoint presentations with audio, and I use Impatica for this purpose. One other thing that I do in my online class that is somewhat unique – I attach a thumbnail photo to each and every one of my postings in Blackboard, so that the students see me as a “real” person, rather than an anonymous instructor in cyberspace. I have a small digital camera, and take photos of myself everywhere – at a conference in Florida, on the golf course, in my home office, and so on. So they get to see me in my everyday life, which I think helps build our learning community, something that is so very important in any online class.




How do you use textbooks in e-learning?

Susan – I actually don’t use any texts in the online classes that I have taught. For example, this semester I am teaching a course called “Internet and American Life”. In this class, we are exploring the many ways that the Internet is impacting our lives in the United States today, and the laws and public policies that are related to the use of the Internet. The course is based primarily on publications from the Pew Internet and American Life Project (see: http://www.pewinternet.org/). And we supplement this material with current articles from various online sources – ranging from the NY Times and the Washington Post to blogs written by Internet experts. The nice thing about this course is that it is so relevant to the lives of the students – so we use the principles of social constructivism – and the students do a lot of searching on their own to find relevant articles.

What is your favorite quote? Or, what book that caught your eye recently?

One of my favorite quotes is from Larry Ecton, of Summit Electric Supply in Albuquerque, NM. He said “In times of change, learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.” For more of my favorite quotes, visit my website at:

http://www.burksoakley.com/quotes.html

Articles of Note: Corgi Catches, Nov. 4, 2007

We dig through databases, online journals, an e-learning magazines for online learning articles of interest. In this weekly series, we present a few articles that you might find useful, thought-provoking, or simply interesting. Instead of giving you only the citation, we'll give you more. We'll provide a brief overview and synopsis of the article.

We hope you find this to be helpful!

Articles that caught the Corgi’s eye this week:


Woodward, D. (2007) Work-life balancing strategies used by women managers in British "modern" universities. Equal Opportunities International. 26:1, pp. 6-17.

This article takes a look at how women managers of university programs balance work and their outside life. Although this article looks exclusively at women in British “modern” universities, the findings may apply to many other situations, and can give insight into the challenges and commitments faced by women working outside the home, which can include time with family, raising children, professional development, and education. In this study, it is clear that women are faced with a variety of time-consuming obligations and it is important to establish priorities and manage their time. How they make the decisions to prioritize and why certain choices are made depends on the urgency of the demands, and how critical they are to one’s primary survival. It is assumed that women managers need the work, and, on some fundamental level, they like it. Thus, women are willing to sacrifice time to it.

Woodward uncovered several findings that could be useful to individuals. First, in this study, all the participants reported unmanageably large workloads, with some seasonal variability. This seems to be a universal in programs and with women managers. The main problem reported by women is that unanticipated urgent items would arise and would interrupt the normal flow. Lunch breaks were a rarity. Many women arrive early and stay late. They did so to avoid rush-hour traffic and to give themselves some quiet time before the majority of workers arrived. All the women interviewed worked in excess of contracted hours, and usually ended up with 50 to 60-hour weeks. Few women took all their annual leave, and when they did take leave, it was often used for childcare purposes. Women had different attitudes about work, which ranged from finding work enjoyable to seeing work as an all-consuming malign force. Recreation, well-being, travel, and continuing education were challenging issues for women as they were often required to take work home. Because of the workload issues, boundaries between work and home were often fuzzy. Flex-time and work-from-home schemes would not necessarily solve the problem except in cases when it might help with childcare issues. For Wodward, the most useful finding was in organizational culture with respect to gender. Women are expected to be workaholics, concludes Woodward. For women to be able to dedicate time to family and continuing education, organizations must find ways to discourage negative work habits and workaholism. A woman who is mired in a culture that requires 60-hour work weeks just to manage the work flow is not given the opportunity to keep current with skills or knowledge, and will start to lose currency.

Interview with Garth Wigle (New Series - Life in the E-Learning Organization)

Welcome to Life in the E-Learning Organization, a series of interviews with e-learning and distance professionals. This week's interview is with Garth Wigle, who is involved in training for Canada's air navigation systems.

What is your name, and what is your involvement with e-learning?
Garth Wigle. I am an education specialist with Canada’s air navigation service provider looking for new ways to deliver training to a workforce of approximately 5000 people that is deployed throughout the country from coast to coast to coast. I initially became involved in e-learning as a way to continue my own edification while working shifts and traveling extensively.

I completed my Master of Arts via a combination of face-to-face and asynchronous e-learning. I also now facilitate online in a Bachelor of Education in Adult Education program with an Ontario university.

As a result of these activities, I suddenly became the “e-learning expert” in the company, hence my current focus on locating and implementing appropriate new learning technologies for training air traffic controllers, flight service specialists, and electronics technologists. My most recent project has been the acquisition and implementation of a virtual classroom platform to allow us to engage in synchronous e-learning activities.

How did you get interested in distance education?
My first foray into distance education was 30 years ago via a “snail mail” correspondence course as part of a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics.
The program was completed largely via audiocassette and mailed in assignments. The only face-to-face component would have been the required lab work. Needless to say, the long lag time between submitting assignments and receiving feedback made it difficult to stay motivated to complete the work in a timely fashion. With the advent of the Internet and the near real time communication capability of email, distance learning became a much more engaging prospect for me. Since 2000, I have garnered considerable experience both as a learner and as a facilitator in asynchronous e-learning environments.

What is your favorite new trend in distance education?
I am becoming intrigued with the idea of mobile learning: using personal audio/video devices, cell phones, PDAs, etc. to deliver just in time knowledge nuggets to people as they need them.

What is your favorite technology?
At the moment, I would say my favourite technology is the virtual classroom as it allows us to combine the personal interaction of face-to-face learning events with many of the advantages of computer-based training (e.g. reduced travel costs, engaging interactivity).

What kinds of instructional materials do you use in elearning?
In my asynchronous work I generally use assigned readings, asynchronous discussion boards, assignments, and some small group work. In the computer-based training or synchronous e-learning packages I use a combination of assigned readings, audio-visual aids, application sharing, polling, quizzes, group work, assignments, and discussions.

How do you use textbooks in e-learning?
For me, textbooks have always been additional resources in any learning environment whether online or face-to-face. In the e-learning environment textbooks may be either hard copy or electronic, but they are still resources for additional information beyond what is provided in the lesson itself. They are one place learners may go to help them make sense of the new knowledge or skill they are learning.

What is your favorite quote? or, what's a book that caught your eye recently?
My favourite quote, and one that is perhaps foundational to my personal philosophy as an adult educator, is from Einstein: “I never teach my pupils. I only try to provide an environment in which they can learn.”

Interview with Leah S. Piatt (New Series - Life in the E-Learning Organization)

Welcome to a series of interviews with e-learning and distance professionals. This week's interview is with Leah Piatt, Duke University, who is involved in corporate training and adult education.

What is your name, and what is your involvement with e-learning?
Leah S. Piatt. Relatively new to corporate training and adult education, I've been leading the way in our departmental work with e-learning. I've worked with Elluminate. I'm eagerly awaiting the day when I will get to actually moderate a class using this tool.

How did you get interested in distance education?
Some of our participants live and work an hour or more away from our training facility. We're really trying to alleviate travel and time obligations. I anticipate that e-learning will also help with the number of instructor lead classes we teach and bring about a more blended learning approach.

What is your favorite new trend in distance education?
I love the idea of continuing education via distance education. This could open up the amount of guest speakers we have both by eliminating travel time for the speaker as well as allowing someone who'd missed the session to hear the recording and view the presentation later.

What is your favorite technology?
Elluminate

What kinds of instructional materials do you use in elearning?
Power Point, Word, clip art, Snag-It, Captivate (soon, hopefully).

How do you use textbooks in e-learning?
We don't use textbooks, rather participant guides and job aids. These can be emailed before the session begins or converted to power point.

What is your favorite quote? or, what's a book that caught your eye recently?
quote: "While you teach, you learn." -- based on the words of Seneca the Younger, 4BC-65AD

book: The Primal Teen: What The New Discoveries About the Teenage Brain Tell Us About Our Kids --- Barbara Strauch

Louisiana Launches Grade-Level Expectation Training, NCLB Preparedness

Louisiana will provide teachers with online (or face-to-face) training to prepare them to meet No Child Left Behind requirements and other standards-based education and assessment. The program has been developed by the Louisiana Department of Education and consists of five individual modules, the first of which will launch September 24, 2007.

The program is known as GLEEM, which is an acronym for Grade-Level Expectations Educational Model. The program was developed by the Louisiana Department of Education (http://www.louisianaschools.net/lde/index.html), and is a statewide pilot initiative which, according to its website, is designed to do the following:

---Provide participants with a deeper understanding of the Grade Level Expectations (GLEs) and the state comprehensive curriculum.

--- Enable participants to deepen their understanding of effective instructional practices by exploring research-based strategies and instructional resources.

---Broaden participants' knowledge of standards, benchmarks, GLEs, and technology by applying them in the development of standards-based lessons and assessments.

--- Explore the potential of learning communities as they relate to professional development and student learning through collaborative learning experiences.

GLEEM is offered to participants in the form of five learning modules which may be taken sequentially as a series, or standalone. Upon successful completion of each module, each of which requires approximately 2 weeks, if taken online, the student will receive credit for continuing education and professional development.

Module 1: An Introduction

Module 2: Effective Classroom Practices

Module 3: Enhancing a Standards-based Lesson Plan

Module 4: Effective Assessment Practices

Module 5: Making the GLE Connection

While the courses are offered face-to-face as well as via the internet, the online version provides individuals with an opportunity to develop a learning community. Participants may be K-12 teachers in Louisiana, or individuals who are interested in the following:

Obtaining a deeper understanding of the grade level expectations and Louisiana’s state comprehensive curriculum;
Increasing his/her understanding of effective instructional and assessment practices as they relate to the comprehensive curriculum; and
Obtaining a deeper knowledge of standards, benchmarks, GLEs, and instructional technology through applications in the development of standards-based lessons and assessments. (from the GLEEM website)

The GLEEM program is impressive and it correlates well with the stated goals, vision, and mission of Paul Pastorek, Louisiana State Superintendent of Schools, who articulated his commitment to teacher development in his statement issued in July 2007.

Louisiana continues to meet challenges in the post-Katrina era, and GLEEM to be an inspiration for all states facing change and challenges.

Articles of Note: What Caught the Corgi's Eye... Aug 24, 2007

We dig through databases, online journals, an e-learning magazines for online learning articles of interest. In this weekly series, we present a few articles that you might find useful, thought-provoking, or simply interesting.

Instead of simply giving you the citation, we'll provide a brief overview and synopsis of the article. We hope you find this to be helpful!

Articles that caught the Corgi’s eye this week:

Ndasi, H. (2006) The use of innovative methods to deliver technology education laboratory classes via distance learning: A strategy to increase enrollment. Journal of Technology Education 17(2): 33-42. http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JTE/v17n2/ndahi.html

Ndasi reports on advances in the delivery of technology education laboratory classes using distance learning. The author addresses the decline in technology education and suggests that distance education can help correct the problem. “Technology education programs with a history of hands-on learning at the undergraduate level have been slow to implement distance learning techniques and strategies” (Ndahi, 2006, p.34).

The author analzyed where attempts are being made to incorporate distance lab classes and found that they include engineering mechanics, environmental monitoring, electronics, heat transfer, thermodynamics, strength of materials.

Instructional technologies and lab course delivery methods utilized include two-way audio and video, compressed video, Internet CDs, virtual software (simulations), and videotapes.

Instructional events and activities studied included learning kits, demonstration labs (especially if / when too dangerous), field trips, and residential and summer schools. The study concludes that the effectiveness of distance learning in replicating technology education laboratories is mixed. There is a need for more technology to result in more sustained student engagement. Assessment is very important as well.

The author concludes that technology education laboratories delivered via distance learning can be effective, and that they are improving. They, however, should not replace face-to-face labs, but should represent an alternative form. The study seems to reinforce a hybrid model of education.

Simpson, V. and Oliver, M. (2007). Electronic voting systems for lectures then and now: A comparison of research and practice. Australasian Journal of Education Technology. 23(2): 187-208. http://www.ascilite.org.au/ajet/ajet23/simpson.html

The authors report on the results of two separate literature reviews on the use of electronic voting systems in online education, the first conducted in 2002, the second in 2006. They also compare and contrast the results, with the goal of finding strategies to address the problem of lecture-dominated online learning: “Lectures are still seen as the dominant form of teaching and are associated with the tendency to emphasize content transmission over student engagement (Simpson & Oliver, 2007, p. 188).

The search included indexes of journals and scholarly publications, as well as web-based search engines. In 2002, the study found that electronic voting systems were often used in science and engineering disciplines. In 2006, articles had also been published on the use of electronic voting systems in economics, management, psychology, philosophy, medicine, and statistics. In 2002, electronic voting systems were used mainly in large groups. In 2006, large groups still prevailed, but small groups were also beginning to use them.

The electronic voting systems helped students and instructors know more about themselves and each other. On the instructor side, the systems helped the lecturers increase their understanding of the students and gauge effectiveness. On the student side, the systems helped them understand the material, check their knowledge, gain an idea of instructor expectations, and helped mastery of difficult materials. Pedagogically, the systems address the fact that content transmission is not the most effective way to teach, and that in order to achieve student learning goals, it is important to improve student engagement and to provide quality feedback. The electronic voting systems address those pedagogical issues. The electronic voting systems also can be used in order to provide an environment of constant attunement and to help improve teaching and teaching methods.

Falowo, R.O. (2007). Factors impeding implementation of web-based distance learning. AACE Journal, 15(3), 315-338. http://www.editlib.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Reader.ViewAbstract&paper_id=21710

This is a good web-based distance education overview for a person who is new to web-based learning and who would like to have an idea of definitions, history, contexts, opportunities, expectations, and challenges. The article begins with current definitions of distance learning, and then follows with a discussion of the demographics of distance learning and characteristics of distance students.

The reader will find basic, yet useful discussion of student, faculty, and organizational institutional barriers. Student barriers include technological problems, lack of instructor feedback, and ambiguous directions. Faculty barriers include legal issues, copyright and ownership questions, perceived negative impact on the pursuit of tenure, lack of prestige, inadequate training. Organizational institutional barriers include undercapitalized and under-funded distance learning efforts (insufficient personnel, supplies, budgets), lack of funds, lack of training and technology, and finally, course quality concerns.

The article provides a very nice overview, especially for someone new to the field, or an administrator who is seeking to add distance education to face-to-face offerings. This is not a report on the latest research, but a useful overview for newbies.

About the Corgi (the Queen's companion animal of choice):


The Corgi digs through databases, online journals, an e-learning magazines for online learning articles of interest. In this weekly series, we present a few articles that you, dear reader & faithful E-Learning Queen (or King), might find useful, thought-provoking, or simply interesting. Instead of simply giving you the citation, we'll provide a brief overview and synopsis of the article. We hope you find this to be helpful!

Learning with Audio: Lessons from Television - Monk, House, MD, and NCIS

Borrowing the "in media res" techniques of popular programs, Monk, House, and NCIS, among others, can help make online and untethered mobile learning more effective. In the early days of e-learning, it was common to tape a classroom lecture, digitize it, and then stream it over the web for students to view. Sometimes it was synchronous, and one had the opportunity to use a whiteboard and text message. Needless to say, that approach was quickly discredited as passive. To solve the problem, designers started adding overlays of learning objectives and outcomes, along with review questions at the end.

Podcast / downloadable mp3 file

Television technique: switch to "in medias res." Literally meaning "in the middle of the thing," this technique is employed in almost all programs designed for television, as well as a significant percentage of feature-length films. It's a familiar technique: the viewer is catapulted immediately right into the middle of the action, usually a dramatic pivotal moment upon which the rest of the plot is constructed. For example, in NCIS (Naval Criminal Investigative Services) a spin-off of JAG, the episode opens with a 2 or 3-minute dramatic situation, usually resulting in a murder. The investigation of the murder is what constitutes the rest of the episode.


NCIS
Similarly, in House, M.D., the episodes open with a medical crisis, which takes one by surprise. We see a person going about their daily life when a catastrophic medical emergency besets them. The medical condition is life-threatening, and time is of the essence. Will the team of forensic diagnosticians be able to determine the cause before the patient dies? This adds to the urgency, as well as the emotional involvement of the viewer.

In rhetorical terms, what is activated is emotional involvement, "pathos," to use Aristotelian terms. The situation engages the emotions, and the viewer is held, rapt, in a state of hyper-involvement and hyper-identification with the victim, and the race against time.

Typically, authority is invoked in the persona of a "difficult" voice. In this case, "difficult," means that there is distance between the audience / listeners and the voice. Distance is created through formality, power differentials, subject-matter knowledge gaps, intimidation (shaming or threatening harm), refusal to be admitted to an "in" group.

The danger with this approach is that authority is off-putting, which can war against learning. Sometimes the most off-putting authority comes in the characters of "the professor" or the "scolding parent." The content delivered by the authoritative voice can be more accessible when it comes packaged in a character who begins to approach that of a tragic hero, which is to say that the protagonist hero is flawed, which makes the audience identify with him or her all the more.

To be effective, authority must be mediated with human frailty.

Gregory House, M.D., of House, M.D. is a brilliant diagnostician, but suffers from chronic pain from a nerve-damaged leg and has become addicted to painkillers.

Adrian Monk, of Monk, is a brilliant detective who can hold forth on a number of technical areas, but he never bores the audience. Instead, they feel for him, they cheer him on as he seeks to overcome his obsessive-compulsive disorder, and his grief over the loss of his wife, Trudy.

Monk

Likewise, the team of agents and investigators of NCIS are brilliant, but quirky. In fact, the concept of professorial lectures is lampooned by Special Agent Jethro Gibbs, who typically cuts off the endearing yet long-winded medical examiner, Dr. "Ducky" Mallard, and asks him to keep to what is relevant. The other technical experts in the team fare no better - Abby, brilliant in all manner of forensics - computer and biological - loves the long-winded technical explanation, which is also often cut off abruptly, with the question, "How does this relate?" stated in so many words. Special Agent McGee, an MIT graduate and computer whiz is also cut off. As an audience, we gain knowledge by seeing the theories in action, applied to the case.

In NCIS, technical details, analogues, personal anecdotal asides are permitted, but only to the degree that they contribute to an understanding of the case at hand. What this means, in some terms, is that we are looking at "situated learning" in action.

In the case of House, M. D., the fact is clear that we are observing an open critique of education, and a subversion of the typical classroom lecture, filled with professorial quirks, long-winded digressions, asides, and self-serving ego inflation in front of a captive audience.

The action takes place at Princeton Medical Center, a teaching hospital, and many of the episodes incorporate scenes from the lecture hall, where medical students regurgitate concepts they have memorized from their texts, and demonstrate that they have no idea how the concepts apply in real life.
Similarly, in the comedy series, Scrubs, hazing of the "newbies" often centers around the gap between "textbook" knowledge and situated, operational knowledge. The amount of information that is presented in a television drama, crime procedural, or sitcom can be quite surprising. It's not trivia, but is situated in a real-life or life-like setting, which makes understanding, retention, and application more effective.

In a world where distance learners are likely to be very film and television literate, it is likely that they, too, feel a deep-seated disdain for subject matter authority that is dislocated from its objective correlative, which is to say, the way the subject exists in the world of phenomena.


Scrubs

What this means to all the programs seeking to repurpose old-school lectures delivered by rambling, self-absorbed professors who managed to tape themselves at a chalkboard for 30 or 40 hours is that every dime they invest in digitizing those old assets will be utterly wasted.

The charismatic professor of the past ruled through a cult of personality, and he or she elicited all the emotions that one might expect of the leader of, say, a cult or a gang of grifters.

The charismatic professor of the untethered world of mobile learning reigns supreme by encouraging extreme identification - by imbuing authority with anti-hero or tragic hero elements. If not, the dehumanizing aspects of technology will prevail, and students will simply move on to educational interactions they find more engaging.

To conclude, a few ideas and suggestions can be made, and lessons can be learned from the failures of educational programs to interest the learners. In a pragmatic sense, what this means is the following:

a) Structure audio and video in a way that dramatically captures the imagination and reflects the very heart of the concept being presented in the module or unit. One effective approach is the "in medias res" approach.

b) Find a persona who will be your subject matter expert and make him or her deeply flawed. The flawed authority figure does not need to be morally reprehensible; quite the contrary. He or she should have flaws that are more exaggerated than those of the general public, but only to the degree that the audience finds the character to be very human, engaging, and ultimately disarming.

c) Consider moving subject matter authority around. For example, if one is discussing psychological disorders, instead of focusing on a professor who will discuss facts and figures, write a script that features a person who is suffering from one of the issues under discussion. She can discuss her condition, and the compare and contrast her situation with that of others. This allows the listeners to begin to relate to it, and to connect her situation to their own. It situates the material within a real person's experience.

Maya Angelou in Stamps, Arkansas

Maya Angelou writes a memoir about growing up in Stamps, Arkansas, in the segregated South. Her depiction is searingly honest, and it gives faces, places, and specific names and feelings to what could be viewed as the collective experience of many growing up in the South in the first 100 years after slavery was abolished in the U.S.

videography: dave feiden

As young African-American females, Maya Angelou and others are automatically relegated to the position of being marginalized by white society. The sense of being on the outside looking in is made even more poignant and harrowing by the fact that antebellum aristocratic values of European origin are imposed on blacks. They consciously or unconsciously buy into the vocabulary and practices of elitism by embroidering knick-knacks for a dowry chest, learning the rules of etiquette involved in setting an elaborate table, and using the language of the debutante to describe one’s coming of age. Such activities primarily function to reinstate difference as the only way of knowing each other, and reinforce the distance that exists between white women and the black women who present such a potent threat to them. To Angelou, the linguistic and social practices of the South are a cruel joke, particularly when the more typical role of a young black girl was to be a servant in a white woman’s home.

The young black female is considered an outsider – an outsider who possesses little or no power. Her powerlessness is illustrated when the white woman has the power to erase and then reconstruct identity by renaming. Angelou provides an example of this in the selection printed here. She is working in a white woman’s kitchen, in what Angelou characterizes as a perverse finishing school, where she learns the finer points of setting a table, etc. Her employer, Mrs. Cullinan, is descended from Virginia plantation owners. She surrounds herself with white friends who consider themselves entitled to “culture” and to be waited on by black servants, in an ugly echo of “the good old days.” The sense of the employer’s power becomes ominous with the power of naming. “Margaret” is deemed too long and is shortened to “Mary.” “Hallelujah” was long ago renamed “Glory” in a creepy echo of The Battle Hymn of the Republic.

If renaming can dehumanize, negate, invisiblize and nullify, does the act of naming have generative powers as well?

The mindset examined in this selection is one that looks closely at the way language is used to either empower or strip away entitlement or rights. Conversely, there is an awareness that one can empower oneself by naming, and it can be used for the good.

In writing about how black girls and women were subjected to nullifying linguistic and social practices in Stamps, Arkansas, Angelou also corrects the misconception that silence denotes acquiescence or agreement. The women to whom the psychological assaults are not sufficiently empowered to be able to question or counter the practices directly. Indirect rebellion seems to be their only way to resist. Thus, when Angelou considers her situation, she seeks revenge rather than rapprochement, and obtains it when she deliberately breaks a family heirloom from the old plantation in Virginia. Sadly, no one understands the message behind Angelou’s gesture, so her speaking and acting out are misunderstood and worse – processed through the unknowing and unenlightened mindset of her employer.

One does see how erasures of identity are always a part of the outgrouping process. A key lesson is that the converse is possible: ingrouping and inclusion are possible when one names oneself into it.

Angelou, Maya. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. 104-119.

Short Answer: Maya Angelou
(questions by Elaine Bontempi)

1. How was Maya marginalized by white society?

2. What does the author have to say about naming?

3. How does the author resist psychological assaults?

4. Explain the irony in the location of the author’s finishing school, and the irony of it all.

5. What was the purpose of Maya’s learning the things that she was taught where she was working?

6. Why was it so insulting for the author to be called Mary? What did this mean to her and others in her community?

7. How is the author’s status as an outsider with little or no power made evident in this reading?

8. Explain what the author meant when she wrote, “Her husband remains, in my memory, undefined. I lumped him with all the other white men that I had ever seen and tried not to see.”

9. Explain how Maya’s identity was stripped away from her.

10. What does re-naming do to one’s sense of inclusion?


see other authors: http://www.fringejournal.com

Video Clips / Vodcasts for Online Literature Courses: The Allure of the Moving Image

I started incorporating digital video in online courses about ten years ago. I wasn’t following the lead of the “streaming lecturer” or “talking head.” Instead, I filmed myself with my Logitech MiniCam and kept the discussions to about 3 minutes or less. I also recorded a number in a studio in Oklahoma City that was incredibly ahead of its time. They had the idea of being a YouTube or a Google Video, and were helping film and host digital libraries of digital video.

It was a great idea, and they even hosted the video, so that one would not need to worry about bandwidth or capacity in one’s own server.

It was not a viable business model. No one paid for the service. Worse, it rarely worked on everyone’s computer. In theory, the mpeg file could play on the latest or next-to-latest version of RealPlayer, Window Media Player, or Quick Time. In reality, users had trouble downloading the right version of the media players. Even when they could get the media player to work, for some reason, the video would not always play. Sometimes, there was insufficient bandwidth and sometimes the connection was too slow.

Times have changed – note the recent acquisition of YouTube by Google Video. Now, people regularly host video they’ve captured on their digital cameras, cell phones, or laptops on YouTube or Google Video, and they embed the video in their websites and weblogs and social networking spaces such as MySpace, LiveJournal, Xanga, Blogger, etc. They can even e-mail their video casts.

What is the difference? The difference is in the “jukebox” – the little portable media player that does not have to be downloaded, but sits inside your website and allows you to click a button and it plays. You do not even have to download the video file! What is nice, is that services such a YouTube and Google Video will optimize your uploaded file. Say, for example, you upload a 80 MB wmv file that came straight from your Fuji F-10 digital camera. If it is in Google Video, your viewers can download the file to their iPod. When they do that, the file is converted into a mp4 file, which might have 4 MB instead of 80 MB. Amazing!

The bottom line is that basically everyone can capture and incorporate video in their websites, and basically everyone is.

The fact that the video will play does not mean that it is of high quality, though. In fact, there may actually be very little educational value beyond engaging initial interest.

So, it is good to look at where we are, and to review the fundamentals of using instructional media for positive educational effect. I’ll use the case of an online literature course, because it makes an interest example of how something that is essentially textual (a work of literature) translates to the moving image, with audio, often with spectacular success. There can be spectacular failures, too – and we want to avoid those.

videography: dave feiden

Video Clips in an Online Literature Course: What Works

*--Create ideal conditions for learning by capturing the students’ attention. Say something provocative about the work or the author. Find the heart of the issues that surround the work and focus on them in order to engage your reader.

*--Arouse emotions and curiosity.

*--Do not drone on too long. Keep it short – usually between 45 seconds and a minute and a half. Remember, you’re engaging the learner and trying to inspire him / her to want to delve in to the text and also to ask questions and engage in a dialogue, even a debate.

*---Go for sizzle. Have fresh settings, nice backgrounds, interesting venues.

*---Keep it real. Students respond in a positive way to the real presence of their professor or a subject matter expert, and if it is a bit rough around the edges, it comes across as authentic.

*---Try for the human interest angles. Find intriguing factoid about the author or the work itself and mention it. Establishing a connection with your viewer within 3 – 5 seconds is absolutely critical. In those first seconds and nanoseconds, the viewer makes the decision whether or not to pay attention or to switch to something else. You have 5 seconds to get their attention. Do you like challenges?

Video Clips in an Online Literature Course: What to Avoid

Here are a few natural mistakes that will result in less-than-ideal implementation and outcome.

*--Don’t focus your eyes on the ground or the sky. Keep your eyes on the camera. The direct eye connection makes a difference.

*--Avoid the “talking head” approach. It doesn’t work! Talking heads (a head that fills the screen and drones on and on) do not engage viewers. Learners become passive and stop paying attention, even if you think you’ve fancied it up with whiteboard.

*--Avoid the endless script. Don’t tape yourself writing on a chalkboard and trying to approximate the experience of reading. Don’t try to imitate the classroom lecture, either. Students stop paying attention.

*--Don’t read poetry from a script that you hold in your hand. I tried it. It is horrible. While watching myself, I immediately felt as though I were attending a painful poetry reading in which the poet has gone on entirely too long. I just wanted out. I clicked “pause.”

*---Don’t recite statistics. Avoid being too “canned.” Biographical details and statistics may be important pieces of information, but the mind does not hang onto them. Our minds love narrative in conjunction with the moving image. Therefore, it is good to connect the moving image with a story.

These are just a few practical suggestions from an “in the trenches” point of view. While the technology has improved immensely and it has made the incorporation of video both inexpensive and easy to use, it is clear that we are in a “rapid evolution” phase of technological development. So, keep an open mind, be willing to experiment, and keep up to date by continuously scanning the environment and trying technology.

The key is to uncover the real behaviors of your students and design a use of video that builds on how they are comfortable with using the technology.

Don’t try to impose an artificial behavior or awkward way of using technology. Instead, learn how it is being used, and incorporate that activity into your instructional strategies.

Perhaps the most compelling reason to try incorporating video clips in your online courses is that it is fun and effective! You’ll find that you are engaging students’ interest, creating conditions that are ideal for learning, accommodating learner preferences and styles, rehumanizing the e-learning space, and inspiring students to delve deeply into the text -- make connections, analyze in a new way, and think critically.

videography: dave feiden

Wi-fi and Computer Labs for Every Nursing Home Now

Podcast / downloadable mp3 file.

Prevailing views hold that seniors are computer-phobic, but the reality is that seniors use and benefit from blogs, podcasts, myspace (etc), Skype (etc), as well as from e-mail and access to the Internet. The truth is, seniors are avid users of the Internet, and there should be no reason that failing eyesight, hearing, mobility (arthritis, etc.), or cognitive disabilities should cut them off from the world, and from regular contact with loved ones – even if they are in assisted living, a nursing home, and no longer able to live at home or with family. In fact, assisted access to the Internet could serve as powerful motivation to stay intellectually engaged with the world, to maintain healthy habits, and to combat the loneliness and depression that often follows a senior as they move into their new habitat.

Granted, the man or woman who came of age in the 1940s or 1950s has seen huge changes in terms of communication, information dissemination, and technology. Chances are, they came of age in a time when all data entry and processing was done by someone else, and the computing capacity you hold in the palm in your hand used to require a city block of computers.

Nevertheless, we tend to forget that older citizens do not categorically resist technological change. How could they? If the stereotypes were true, not one senior would be able to function in a society that has been typified by rapid and persistent technological change.

After reading an article about elder neglect in nursing homes, I started to think of how one could help combat the problems. After discussing the issue in an online forum, I started to formulate a few ideas about how to start implementing access to e-mail, etc. in a nursing home.

Here are some of the benefits of having a three or four-station computer lab with a college intern tech-support person to help, and with low-vision and low-hearing equipment, with accommodations for mobility issues and cognitive impairment.

1---Stay in touch with relatives.
-send and receive photos and movies of relatives
-send and receive daily updates from relatives and friends, which can provide a real boost to the senior, who now has something to look forward to.

2---Overcome disabilities due to low vision, low hearing, arthritis, cognitive issues
-using large icon navigation on 17-inch monitors gives seniors a renewed sense of self-efficacy and self-determination;
-Skype and other voice-over telephony can help with low-vision, especially with the kind of headphones that fit over hearing aids; vodcasts and image-enhanced telephony can help gain a sense of a real person on the other end of the line.

3---Provide updates on conditions in the nursing, which gives the administration a chance to
-showcase positive aspects and to have website and weblogs to answer questions.
-post photos to show conditions, which could be great publicity, marketing, and a wonderful generator of goodwill and a spirit of openness.

4---Answer questions via bulletin board and discussion forum.

5---Send electronic greeting cards, keep key birthdates in calendar.

6---Use expertise to design cards, create online art, providing consulting and expert advice, and otherwise stay engaged in one’s former life / area of expertise.

7---Take online courses for intellectual engagement. Popular courses could be memoir-writing, writing a historical novel, learning about alternative medicines, exploring culture, science, etc.

8---Create audio messages to download to mp3 player.

The benefits to the seniors and to the nursing home / assisted living center could be staggering. The first benefits might be an alleviation of a sense of isolation. It could serve as an effective intervention for those who are running the risk of running beginning to develop negative beliefs about themselves, and to think of themselves as helpless and isolated. With a well-equipped lab with equipment that accommodates disabilities and special needs, it would be possible to create a sense of access, empowerment, and renewed self-efficacy. Instead of being cut off and isolated, seniors could feel a renewed sense of community and could feel vital, alive, and relevant to their family, friends, and the world at large.

I’d like to see a couple of pilots started and would love to get involved. If anyone would like more suggestions or ideas, please contact me. susan at beyondutopia dot com

[seniors, wifi, nursing homes, assisted living, assisted access for assisted living, elder-computing, eldercare computing]

Fighting Intrusive Thoughts Using Podcasts: A Strategy for Effective E-Learning

Podcasts.

(presented at INSITE, June 2006). Podcasts can be used in e-learning to combat intrusive thoughts. They can be a part of an effective self-regulatory strategy which also accommodates multiple learning styles while overcoming intrusive thoughts and the anxiety that accompanies them. As a result, academic performance can improve, while increasing self-concept and self-efficacy.

For the full article, please visit Proceedings of the INSITE Conference:
http://proceedings.informingscience.org/InSITE2006/ProcNash137.pdf

Best Practices Gaps, Part I

Podcast.

Best practices and online learning benchmarks are good, but limited. They fail to identify the places where institutions are likely to fall short, and they do not provide the kind of information that one needs when all systems fail, and students, faculty, support staff, and administrators are at their wits' ends because demand has outstripped capacity, and the only way to meet commitments is to go desperately into the red (fiscally speaking), and to ignore learner outcomes, although they are now mandated by the State in which the institution makes its home. This article explores gaps. This is Part I.

Committed Institution

Overview. The learning organization must prioritize distance and flexible learning, and in doing so, must demonstrate support that is realistic, appropriate, timely, and expandable for the future.

Possible Gaps.

---Program "force-fit" to institutional mission.
In their eagerness to offer online courses and programs, institutions may force-fit the program to the institution's vision and mission. The vision and mission of a university may be grounded in face-to-face interactions, and the philosophy that underlies the instructional strategy may require an environment that the faculty and staff understand only in terms of face-to-face instruction, or in traditional bricks and mortar arrangement. This becomes problematic because it creates a culture gap within the institution.

Although there may not be open resistance, the institution could find itself confronting underground backlash, and troubled with factions, divisive camps, and a breakdown of the vision itself. In this case, the institution must remember that it is reshaping the vision, and for it to be effective, all stakeholders must have buy-in. In other words, they need to have a role in shaping it, and mapping it to their own lives and agenda.

---Revenue generation perceived as more important than the education experience provided.
Although there are few people who believe this any more, the early days of online education were typified by the academic equivalent of get-rich schemes. Later, it became clear that the initial investment of online courses can be steep, and it requires ongoing maintenance and operating expenses, as well as what can be quite steep costs for instruction and student services. When expectations are not met, there is a tendency to try to retrench and cut costs. What results is a focus on costs rather than quality. Further, it becomes tempting to outsource services and to obtain open-source content that has not be reviewed or adapted to one's own instructional and institutional goals.

Learner-Friendly Environment

Overview.
Students, faculty, and other users find the services provided by the learning organization easy to use, accessible, and thorough. The learning organization provides online services such as registration, records, bursar, and library access. Technology utilized is up-to-date and appropriate for the user's actual environments and work patterns.

Possible Gaps.

---Ambiguous needs assessments. A successful online or hybrid program requires clear and realistic alignment with learner needs. In order to accomplish this objective and to attune courses and delivery with learner needs in the present (and not the past), it is important to utilize multiple methods of collecting data to gain understanding of the needs of the students. Current needs are important, as are what are projected to be important needs in the future. Focus groups, online surveys, random surveys, and interviews are effective methods and should be done on a regular basis.

---Always a half-a-beat behind the technology curve. It is false economy to have outdated technology, or to think that investing in online infrastructure is a one-time expenditure. Some of the most common ways that institutions find themselves behind the technology curve are:

-Insufficient bandwidth, and no plan to do "edge computing" to "load-share" surges in volume.

-Old, unworkable home pages and portals, with outdated java applets, javascript, etc.

-Old websites using out-of-date plugins (old versions of flash or shockwave, etc.)

-Failure to update software, holding on to old versions of learning management systems.

-Failure to hire adequate numbers of appropriately trained staff, support staff, and faculty.

Audience Analysis: A Lesson Plan

Listen to the podcast - downloadable mp3 audio file

This is one of a series devoted to composition and writing courses. The focus of this unit is audience analysis. The goal is to make writers more aware of how to shape an argument based on who one expects to read the article, and how to persuade them.

Unit Objectives: Upon successful completion of this unit, you will be able to

* Explain how you will gain an appreciation of your intended audience;
* Describe the thoughts and questions you will ask yourself as you prepare your paper and keep your audience in mind;
* Describe how you will shape your paper in response to your audience and their values.

Discussion Board Question: Please list your favorite urban legend, alien abduction tale, or ghost story. Did you think it was real? Do you think there may be some truth to the story?

Required Writing: 500 words -- Please choose a new topic & or expand the topic you selected for your invention assignment. As you write, think about the audience you're expecting to read it. Who is your intended audience? Read the notes below and think about them as you write.

Who is your audience? Who, specifically, are they?
As you prepare to write, you need to have a good idea of your audience. This will probably involve more than one stage of contemplation. Of course, you know who your primary audience is likely to be, particularly if it is an instructor or an editor. But who are the secondary audiences likely to be? Why?

Demographics of the audience
As you define your audience, you need to have an idea of their basic characteristics. Where do they live? What gender are they? How old are they? What is their income level? What is their education level? What are the demographics that specifically apply to your topic? That will influence the questions you ask yourself as you try to obtain an accurate idea of the dominant characteristics of your audience. For example, if your paper is on gun control, it is useful to know if your audience is likely to be comprised of gun owners, or members of the NRA.

How will they receive your message? What is the medium? Printed or written discourse? Internet? Graphics? Film? Television?
The medium of the message has a definite impact on audience impact. For example, if they read your article in a newspaper, they will respond to it in a different manner than if they read it on typed pages. If your message is on the Internet, you need to keep in mind such factors as design, color, accessibility, loading speed, etc. If your message includes graphics, how are they printed on the page? In color? Black and white? If the medium is film or television, what are the production values? What are other factors, such as music, set design, mise-en-scene, direction, camera angles, etc.? All these are non-narrative elements that have an impact on your audience because each element carries with it meaning. The mind makes meaning from each of the elements, and, like it or not, it will impact the spoken or written part of the discursive package.

What are the core values of your audience? How can you affirm those while making your point?
What are the core values of your audience? Of course, you will probably never know all of them, but if you understand a bit about the religious, ethnic, group, and/or demographic background of your audience, you may have a fairly good idea about how the audience members respond to certain issues. What do they believe is the appropriate role of government and the state? Is the human being inherently good, bad, or neutral? Is the human psyche malleable or rigidly programmed? The key is to identify the core values that pertain to your primary thesis and the topics in your paper. If you affirm your audience's core beliefs, you can help convince your audience of your credibility and they will be more likely to pay attention.

When do the attitudes and values of your audience shift? This is a key opportunity, but why? What are your audience's situational attitudes?
This is an often overlooked and underestimated element in audience analysis. And yet, it is precisely this area that holds the most promise because these are the points where you may actually be able to wield influence. When the attitudes and values of your audience begin to shift due to a changing situation, or a different speaker, then you know you have an opportunity to create a more effective argument, and one which actually has a chance of working. This is not to be overlooked.

Why will your audience read your document? What's in it for them?
In constructing your paper, you need to keep in mind that your audience is not likely to read past the first line unless they perceive that there is some benefit or utility in continuing to read. With that in mind, you need to structure your paper so that you "positively program or condition" your audience by making the paper readable, relevant, reliable, and rewarding.

What are audience expectations? Narrative expectations? Generic expectations?
Because of the nature of narrative and form, your audience will begin to develop the expectation that your paper will follow along these lines. You must analyze your paper very carefully and decide what basic narrative form it is following. If it is a story, is it a Cinderella story? Romeo and Juliet? A revenge story? If it is a report, is it a sales pitch? An expose? A recommendation? A informational review? Does it take a position and argue a point? Generic expectations have to do with the genre or type of paper that it is. If it is a paper that takes a position, you would hardly expect it to read like an instruction manual. Thus, you need to keep in mind how your audience will typecast your paper and just accordingly.

What are your audience's preconceptions about your topic? The "major players" in your topic?
Is your audience likely to have preconceptions about your audience? If they do, you need to address them. If you do not acknowledge the preconceptions, your audience will think that you are not very well informed. In addition, it is important to determine who the "major players" are and that they manifest themselves as subtopics, statistics, case studies, images, or individual characters.

Who do you consider yourself to be? Who are you, and, more importantly, where are you in relation to your audience? What are the power hierarchies? Who and where is the "Other" in relation to you and your audience, and how does it change the way they approach you, each other, the text?

As you read your paper, think about how you would respond to your audience if you were meeting them face-to-face, then explaining the topic to them. How do you envision them assessing you? Your response to this is a key indicator of how you perceive yourself, and whether or not you believe yourself to be speaking to a group of peers, or to a group of individuals or an individual with more or significantly less power than you. It's absolutely indicative of the post-colonial (and post-feminist, if one discusses the phenomenology of oppression) mindset, and it indicates how you know your own reality, and how you prioritize your perceptions. If you can manage to think in an "Other"-centric way, you will have achieved what Kenneth Burke referred to as "consubstantiality," or the ability to "get under the skin" of your audience.

Change, Disruptive Technologies, e-Learning

Play the podcast -- downloadable sound file.

We want students to succeed with technology. We also have no choice but to help them succeed. In order to retain students, they have to be able to use the technology.

However, what happens when disruptive technologies occur at ever-increasing frequencies? The technologies will evolve – some will disrupt our lives, and others will sustain further innovation. Either way, it represents change. We have to jump on board, or else, be left behind.

In hybrid courses and e-learning, disruptive technology occurs in the following forms:

Technology changes – miniaturization and wireless: Portability and access are accomplished in many different ways. What we’re seeing more than ever is the way that individuals don’t want to be chained to their desktop computer and a high-speed modem in order to do their distance courses. They’d like to be able to bring their work with them, to work on courses whenever and wherever they can.

Nature of people’s lives: Not everyone is ready, willing, or able to move to a university town and take up lodging in a college dorm for four years. If it’s a graduate degree, the situation is even more pronounced. How many people want to relocate to the university where one has been accepted, move into grad-student housing (or lease a place in a Victorian house converted into off-campus rentals), to try to make it by on a graduate student stipend? While this option is still appealing to many, it’s just not possible for others. Students come from all walks of life, and in all geographic locations. They are mobile, career-focused, and interested in being able to take their education as far as they can, with resources available at one’s fingertips.

With online and hybrid education’s focus on planning, review, and instructional strategy, face-to-face instruction is feeling the heat. For some instructors – the highly performative ones – face to face is still a student favorite. But, we’re starting to be able to see the rips and tears in the fabric, and it’s clear that face-to-face instruction is difficult to standardize or make uniformly high-quality.

Changing ideas about the role and nature of education: Do you remember when you expected a college professor to be a “sage on the stage” and you went to class prepared to take as many notes as possible so you could regurgitate the wisdom back on a test? Do you remember when you thought less about what you were getting out of a class, and more about just getting through it, so you could “check the box” and make progress toward the degree? A college experience used to be as much a rite of passage and a way to network as a place to gain useful knowledge about one’s chosen career.

Now, a college education signifies that, and much more. Students are often life-long learners. They have choices that they never had before. Without going as far as to say that a student is a customer, it’s possible to say that students can and will complain when their needs are not satisfied. Good relations are critical.

What do students expect of a high-quality education? Certainly, they expect flexibility with respect to delivery. They want to be able to take a class in a way that corresponds to their real-life situations – with work, family, and personal issues.

"Listening" to Students in an Online Course

"Listening" is vital in an online environment because it establishes "real" responsiveness - not the coerciveness or ego-crush of an automated response generated through artificial intelligence.

Play the Podcast.


Now, granted, if you're listening to me speak in an audio file, you're truly "listening." But the listening I'm talking about is something else. It is, in a nutshell, the moment in which real communication is reached - when the circuit boards light up because the electricity is flowing.

You can show that you're listening by

a) making substantive comments to the student's paper or discussion board comments. Don't just say"very good" - explain what it was that made you think a particular passage was effective;

b) respond to questions by answering them in a timely fashion and provide the information needed;

c) keeping your comments brief, but meaningful. If you write a page-long comment, the student will stop "listening' and start trying to defend herself.

How do you make sure that the learner is "listening?"

a) Set a good tone - start each communication with an affirmation;

b) Avoid "humor" - (it can come across as sarcasm);

c) Ask questions and connect issues to something in your own life and be willing to reveal something about yourself;

d) Avoid inflammatory or judgmental words. Imagine how you would react if you received an e-mail, or saw something posted in the discussion board;

e) Keep as neutral as possible in the discussion boards - encourage and react to students, but be careful not to exclude some, or target others.

Blogs of Note: December 2004

The year is drawing to an end, and I'd like to briefly list a few blogs that caught my eye this last month. They contribute to the burgeoning field of online education, and help organizations and individuals keep from constantly reinventing the wheel, and to establish productive, collaborative relationships.

Full Circle Associates: http://www.fullcirc.com/community/toolgrid.htm
Nancy White's Online Interaction Tools Resource Sheet is the best information sheet and checklist I've seen for analyzing web-based online interaction tools. It helps one evaluate platforms, and provides a rubric for trying to make order from the chaos of the open-source offerings.

Thoughts Mostly About Learning by Stephen Powell: http://slartibartfast.ultralab.net/~stephenp/blog/
Stephen Powell's post on Blackboard, Inc. had me cheering out loud (a very rare thing -- I'm a quiet person). Powell points out that Blackboard and the LMS providers absolutely DID NOT respond to the public's needs. In fact, the origins were murky at best -- how many of you remember, back in 1994 or 95, when fledgling local internet service providers (dial-up) often consisted of three or four servers in an office suite? Then, as they found they could not meet expenses, they started seeking value-add activities. Most started putting together little virtual shopping malls, or designing e-commerce sites or websites for local businesses. Others decided to offer information, directory information, recipes, e-books, dogfood, whatever -- fodder for an IPO and a subsequent dot.com boom-bust case study. The education market was always considered to be a perfect place for the "value-added" activity -- particularly as schools moved away from computer labs and static computer-based learning and more into a distance environment. The first attempts (Blackboard was definitely one of them) was designed to organize material -- and, all those who experience the first generation of all the learning management systems -- remembers how they privileged streaming media and the idea of "replicating the classroom environment." In fact, the big concern was bandwidth, as the more theatrical professors raced to buy a logitech minicam and tape their lectures. The platforms never integrated well with the types of databases that universities use (peoplesoft, oracle, banner, etc.), and never considered that faculty members might actually value their time. Learning management systems continue to be ridiculously inefficient -- an industrial engineer would have a field day with it -- what should take one or two keystrokes invariably takes 10 or 15, with potentially long, long waits as java-laden pages download over slow dial-up modems. I'm not advocating throwing out the learning management systems. They are a great place for integrated activities -- discussion boards, e-mail, content download, gradebook, roster, etc. But -- I'd like to see someone like Blogger take them on, and have an LMS that contains powerful blog elements, with a much truer type of interactivity, with wider scope of influence. Powell's post on Blackboard is welcome and important. I'd like to see him ask more questions --

Stephen's Web and Stephen Downes' OLDaily http://www.downes.ca
I was delighted to read Stephen Downes' article about the dangers of predicting trends in the e-learning world, and how it distracts from the big picture by making one get caught up in the effluvium of absurd detail. He's right -- who cares if blogs are "peaking" and what of spam volumes? I have a rather jaundiced view, too, of the techie soothsayers... what is rather tragic is that, like the Saturday Night Live parody, "Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handy," most people just can't tell when there's a spoof being launched. They also can't tell when there's the techie equivalent of a carnival barker or a faith healer selling immortality and fame in the form of specious "open source." I'm not saying that one should be philistine and culturally tone-deaf -- just to ignore trends or new developments. I'm also not saying one should not make a reasonable assessment of the market, the audience, and the technology employed. What I like about Stephen Downes' approach is that he foregrounds the discussion by talking about functionality and user needs: real people trying to do real tasks. This is a great approach and the secret to staying grounded.

eLearnspace http://www.elearnspace.org/
George Siemens is one of my favorite authors, and his articles are timely and timeless. The principles are sound, regardless of the technological ephemera that may surround him, and he makes the readers think, not only about specific problems, but about the world at large. An example is the work he posted on the open source movement in March 2003. His latest post -- which more or less eviscerates learning management systems, http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/lms.htm, points to the fundamental misunderstanding about learning management systems -- that the content will teach itself, and that the faculty member will have the flexibility to engage students so that they really care about learning. It's a great article. That said, elearnspace.org is a great resource, the blog side of it frustrates me. It takes a hundred clicks to get to any meat, and by the time you get there, you've forgotten what on earth it was that drew you there in the first place. Elearnspace's main website is fantastic -- it reminds me of a sketch for an earthwork by Robert Smithson. Believe it or not, that is high praise. The Spiral Jetty is conceptual art at its finest. http://www.robertsmithson.com/earthworks/spiral_jetty.htm By the way, Siemen's site is one of the few that is accessible to individuals with low vision who use the most common screen readers.

The Distant Librarian: http://distlib.blogs.com/distlib/
This is a clean, straightforward, and eminently helpful distance library blog. For those of you who have tried navigating the average academic / university online library portal, the experience can be, in a word, a blood-letting. Most library portals assume that everyone is a librarian and that everyone understand how to navigate in a cyberworld that has no breadcrumbs, no indications of what lies beyond the click or below the fold, or what the cryptic line of letters indicating electronic databases could possibly mean. If navigating those sites is tough, information retrieval is even worse. I suppose that anything worth having is worth suffering for. (That is the correlary to the adage that anything worth joining has its hazing phase.) The Distant Librarian is the compassionate alternative, with engaging and timely articles, and a nice blend of technical resources as well as practical ones.

The Shifted Librarian: http://www.theshiftedlibrarian.com/
The Shifted Librarian has the best blogroll I've seen for edu-resources that will make one's life a bit easier, and avoid what I like to think of as the "cottage industry problem" in e-learning. The articles deal with how information can be easily accessed and shared in useful ways -- a task which, in less adept hands, leads to facile overgeneralizations without any true rigor. This is valuable -- applicable for individuals in knowledge industries of all sorts -- universities, colleges, and schools being just one sort. A heroic, valuable site.

James Farmer's Incorporated Subversion: http://incsub.org/blog/
The results of a study / survey to determine how individuals really use OLE's (online learning environments) to achieve learning outcome objectives is presented here. The results are not exactly what one might have expected. Instead of a focus on interaction, there seems to be a focus on web "presence" -- which points to a looming problem of passive rather than active learning. It also resonates with the surge of complaints these days that Learning Management Systems encourage faculty and institutions to assume that the content teaches itself, and (worse) that content mastery is a skill that is even the least bit useful in today's world. Situated learning, and a cold, hard look at EBL (experience based learning) is something that James Farmer encourages. The fact that LMS platforms are rigid and actually discourage experience based learning is another thing altogether. Farmer suggests it is something that needs to be addressed -- urgently.

Blogsperiment: http://possibleworlds.blogs.com/blogsperiment/
There is a great article that reflects on the fact that there have been some highly publicized cases of bloggers getting book contracts based on their popularity. In many ways, this is reminiscent of the old mp3 sites where high-traffic downloads would, in theory, translate to CDs (not just impromptu raves in "lily pad" party houses). The article raises a great point -- does the e-world (esp such an interactive one, so highly reliant on posting, comments, interactivity, blogrolling) really make the leap to paper? I suspect that in some cases, the answer is "yes," particularly if the blog has achieved a brand image, a presence -- something individuals would like to be associated with. Of course, this starts to look a lot like consumer culture, pop culture fad -- probably okay -- but there is a real danger in chasing sensation. One can run the risk of being the always one beat behind hanger-on, seeker of an identity, rather than trying to express one's ideas within the realm of community. After all, it's community that's missing from the book you buy at amazon or borders (unless you plan to discuss it in a forum -- virtual, face-to-face, or both). Blogs make it worse, in a way -- since most (including myself) am using a packaged template (after having mangled the modified template I created for myself ... weeks of work evaporated!! grrr!!) ... Blogs have a lot to be desired, too, in terms of easy indexibility... so -- the things that might differentiate a person are not quite there. If anything, blogging is an exercise in publicity, marketing, and public relations -- in addition to being a place of community building, sharing of ideas, and developing a self or presence through the power of one's creative elan.

E-Learning Acupuncture: http://erictremblay.blogspot.com/
A very intriguingly named blog that has very valuable information. The article on Macromedia's Captivate is useful. I recently saw a demonstration of it at this year's Sloan-C conference in Orlando -- I have to say that the blog article and demo were equally useful -- perhaps even more accessible than the live demo. There is a useful article that links to resources in edu-blogging that I found extremely helpful. There is also an article I wish that every university administrator would read and take to heart: "Faculty Do Not Receive Enough Training To Teach Online" with a link to the original article: http://www.thejournal.com/magazine/vault/A5010A.cfm. Intelligent commentary, good selections.

e-Literate: http://mfeldstein.com/
I thought I was imagining things ... (!) ... thankfully no -- in fact, Bloglines HAS been malfunctioning lately!! I was wondering what was up!! Even before I mutilated this blog & messed up all the settings, there were some signs that things were not right in the happy land of feeds & syndications. The latest posts and results of competitions were interesting. It's hard to feel very confident in elections and voting -- but, I think that they are a great thing to have. At the very least, readership goes up and people are curious about the nominees. I am very grateful to this -- I had not had the chance to fully investigate Crooked Timber, http://www.crookedtimber.org/, and I am glad I was introduced to it and encouraged to peruse it at length. Great stuff.

E-Learning Design Challenge: http://www.clickcraft.com/eldeschallenge/
One of these days, when my confidence is restored, I'm going to submit a topic to the challenge. In the meantime, I'll be an admiring onlooker. Is there something you've found difficult to teach online? Submit it to E-Learning Design Challenge.

Blogoehlert: http://blogoehlert.typepad.com/eclippings/
This is one of my favorite blogs -- well-designed, always lively, and has useful materials that I find helpful and useable. A discussion of Newsgator was informative -- the fact that the University of Phoenix has started incorporating Sims and Serious Games is BIG news & more or less overlooked by most edublogs. This bears checking out -- it is great to see a powerhouse like U of Phoenix opening that door.

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

Online Writing Instruction in a Post-Derridean World

Although many students would prefer to think of good writing as something innate – or, better, as bad writing as something they have been inoculated against -- the reality is that writing is a skill developed over time.

Writing is not simply a series of talented moves or gestures. To write well requires one to think well. The writer must organize his or her argument and, on a more fundamental level, he or she must be able to simultaneously consider all the factors that go into constructing a good essay, report, article, or paper. Not only does the learner need to be able to analyze and organize facts and figures, he or she must also consider the purpose of the activity.

Some of the questions that should be invoked include the following: What is the ultimate aim? Who is the intended audience, and what characteristics to they have? In addition the writer must envision the writing task from the point of view of the author’s motives, the audience, and social context. Further, in a larger frame, it is important to understand what is often referred to as the “rhetorical situation,” a term first coined by Lloyd Bitzer, a professor of rhetoric whose research interests focused on strategies used in persuasive discourse and the construction of effective arguments. According to Bitzer, a rhetorical situation occurs when an author, audience, and a social context converge to create a rhetorical act, such as an act of writing or speaking.

The rhetorical situation is commonly depicted in the rhetorical triangle. The discourse that is being produced is considered the “medium,” because it is through this that the author, audience, and social context come together, each with a potentially mediating influence. In this case, “mediation” refers to the power it exerts to subtly change or overtly co-opt meaning.

Please keep in mind that the rhetorical triangle changes shape depending upon the kind of discourse being produced. For example, academic writing will be depicted in a different way than advertising.

In the 1970s and 80s, numerous articles were written about the “rhetorical situation,” and it achieved almost mythical status in terms of its efficacy to explain how the dynamics of persuasion work in the phenomenal world. The discussions were expanded with the notions of Jacques Derrida, who, with the concept of “differance,” (discussed in his 1981 essay, “Semiology and Grammatology”) interjects the interplay of psychology and social context, to demonstrate how internalized notions of authority further exert influence on how meaning(s) are generated. Foregrounding the act of interpretation, either conscious or unconscious, Derrida emphasizes that there are numerous factors that bear upon how the idea of the humanistic subject comes into being. That subject becomes deconstructed once its ontological pillars are undermined, and as Derrida points out, there are many ways to collapse those ontological moorings.

With the approach of “differance” in mind, as texts are produced and interpreted, it is useful to look at the activities that take place on the edges of the rhetorical triangle, and how relationships are forged. For example, the notion of identity is destabilized once we realize how it is not an absolute, but it protean, metamorphosing element, which changes in response to dreams or fantasies, social pressure, which can create tensions between the ideal and the real, the flawed original and its perfect simulacra. The subject, which in this case, would be writing and speech, are likewise destabilized by “differance.”

In 2004, with e-mail, the Internet, text-messaging via pdas and cell phones, the model continues to be useful. What tends to add variables are sub-categories of context and author. For example, the context may be synchronous, asynchronous, or a combination of both. What this means is that the realm of academic writing has expanded and that it is more vital than ever for the writer to understand the conventions of the particular genre or occasion, and how they shape reader expectations.

Writing for college is a fairly complex task and the conventions are not always expressed as clearly as one might hope. For that reason, it is vital for a learner to have taken at least one course that focuses exclusively on academic writing. This will form the core for skills, knowledge, and analytical thinking which will be expanded and built upon as the student progresses. Although there is wide latitude in the degree of formality found in writing for college, the boundaries for a particular writing occasion can be very narrowly constrained. This can cause frustration for the learner who has not acquired the conceptual, analytical, or problem-solving skills to able to successfully negotiate the situation.

That said, there is no reason to fear academic writing. The same basic building blocks reappear in many places and are applied in many situations, with modifications made in accordance with the writing occasion.

For example, the basic building block, the paragraph, is used not only in constructing essays and research papers, but is also required in essay exams that require expository writing. The ability to shape an argument: present a clear thesis statement, with supporting evidence requires processing and understanding the system of logic that underpins the argument.

Writing for college may seem a bit daunting at first, but ultimately it is one of the most satisfying experiences one can have. Not only is it a self-esteem builder to be able to structure an argument, it is deeply affirming to be able to communicate with others who have similar goals and interests, that is to say an affinity group.

In addition to writing essays for example and communicating with other learners, it is also important to be able to successfully produce academic essays. There are a number of genres or “modes” to manage. These are either presented as stand-alone essays or they constitute components of a larger work, such as a research paper, thesis, or dissertation. The forms most frequently encountered in academic writing are the following:

Extended Definition: In addition to definitions and descriptions of the thing under consideration, this essay explores how it is that we know. Evidence is critical, as well as clear sentences. Although essays are often “stand-alones,” many times this is section of a larger paper.

Chronological Narrative: While creative non-fiction utilizes this mode in the construction of memoirs or histories, it is also important to be able to write this type of essay. These are used in histories (in history, international relations, political science, sociology), as well as in presenting biographical background and a notion of the provenance and evolution of an idea within a research paper or thesis.

Compare-Contrast Essay: While it is hard to imagine a research paper or thesis centered on comparison-contrast, the ability to write a well-formed essay is important, particularly for essay tests.

Taking a Position: One can argue that all expository writing is a variation of this, or at least incorporates some of the structure. Argumentation and persuasive writing involve careful planning, not only in gathering research, but also in bringing together evidence and constructing the logic that will help support one’s position.

Process: This is an essay which includes how to do something or tell how something happens. It is very important for individuals who will take technical writing courses.

Cause and Effect: Cause and effect essays are widely-found, and they provide an excellent opportunity to look for logical fallacies and inadequate evidence.

Here it is useful to emphasize again that there exists a close connection between writing and thinking. To write well requires one to be able to think flexibly and about the various aspects of the rhetorical triangle. The more cynical writer may dismiss this as a call to generate clichés, and that academic writing merely asks the student to subjugate individual difference in order to conform to a rigid pattern. This is most often presented as an objection when students are asked to submit their writing to automated grading systems such as MyAccess.com, or when they are writing for a standardized test such as the SAT that utilizes similar artificial intelligence-fired programs.

However, instead of generating clichés, writing in a mode or genre can be profoundly stimulating, even liberating, inasmuch as it allows self-expression and the construction of possibility, new ways of looking at, perceiving, or conceptualizing the world.

Much, of course, depends on the rhetorical situation. This means considering all the factors mentioned earlier, and more. The following questions resurface, but rephrased in ways that allow conscious deconstruction of the argument, subjectivity, and relationships between the sides of the rhetorical triangle: Why did the author write the piece? What were the conditions under which it was produced? What was the context? What was the goal of the writer vis-à-vis the readers? How was language employed? How is the writing intended to function within the world? What are the assumptions and beliefs of the audience? How does the social context in which it is read and produced influence the production and interpretation of the text?

To appreciate this task, the learner must learn how to conduct what is often referred to as a “close reading” of the text. This does not mean simply capturing the denotative content of the argument, but instead, requires readers to become active interrogators, and to be able to ask questions that begin to reveal the issues surrounding the rhetorical triangle: intended audience, perceived social context, conditions under which one anticipates the text will be read.

At the same time, such questioning will also begin to allow elements to surface, even though they may begin as disguised or submerged. For example, underlying assumptions within the argument that include beliefs, ontological positions with respect to the validity of “evidence,” cultural constructions, notions about how it is that we know (tests of the “real”), and when and how something is considered to have meaning, and/or be meaningful. However abstruse or perversely recondite these concepts seem at first encounter, it is definitely worthwhile to go to the effort to understand them and their implications. Awareness, self-consciousness, an ability to construct effective questions, and highly-evolved analytical skills are as vital for learners in college courses as for instructors, guides, and general inhabitants of the planet.

Recently, literary analysis, close reading, and the writing process have begun to preoccupy themselves with understanding how it is that learners become motivated to write essays. Instead of looking only at form and engaging in a close reading of the text(s), there has been a fervent focus on “situated learning,” and “embodied experience.” First developed by J. Lave in 1998, the concept of “situated learning” suggests that “learning as it normally occurs is a function of the activity, context and culture in which it occurs (i.e. it is situated)” (Lave 192) and “contrasts with traditional classroom learning activities which involve knowledge which is often presented in an abstract form and out of context” (Lave 193).

Thus, to be most effective, it is important to structure activities so that they have a grounding in something that is perceived as ontologically tangible. That can be a person’s experience, current events, current perceptions and beliefs, or a set of activities centered on a community of practice. “Anchored instruction” occurs in a setting when an instructor deliberately “anchors” or “situates” the activity. It follows, then, that college writing learning and teaching activities should be designed around a `anchor' (or situation) which could be some sort of case-study or problem situation. In preparing for the writing activity, the readings, discussion materials, settings to analyze should allow exploration within the essay or text produced.

By establishing a point of contact, the activities are perceived as relevant to one’s life, and also useful in helping explain the world at large. The motivating aspects of this cannot be overstated. Instead of simply checking a box and satisfying a requirement, the students find that their activities help them untangle and understand their world. It invokes Kenneth Burke’s notion that literature (and by extension, writing) is “equipment for living.”



Useful Additional Readings:

Baudrillard, Jean. The Gulf War Did Not Take Place. Trans. and Introduction by Paul Patton. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1995. The Gulf War was presented like some star wars video game, a simulation of a war. Jean Baudrillard, a French sociologist, wrote an essay that the Gulf War did not happen. Many critics miss the point and assume that he means that it did not literally happen. That was not his point. His real criticism was the way that the conflict was presented. The media was not allowed to really report the war.

Perhaps the American military learned from Vietnam. Vietnam was presented on television many times in an unedited manner to the American public. The American public turned against the war.

Thus to Baudrillard, never was there a true conflict during the Gulf War. America won before the first bullet was shot. The video presentation of the war only demonstrated the constructed nature of the war. War is hell and should never be edited. If it is allowed to be edited, the true lessons are lost. Baudrillard commented that even the idea of peace was a simulation. Saddam Hussein was allowed to stay in power. (Now we return). Having spoken to Gulf War veterans, they emphasize the true horror of that conflict. They are beginning to write about the battles that were not told. – Wayne Stein http://www.libarts.ucok.edu/english/faculty/stein/vietnam/notes/gulfwar.htm

---. Simulacra and Simulation. Trans. Sheila Faria Glaser. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 1994.

Biesecker, Barbara A. "Rethinking the Rhetorical Situation from Within the Thematic of Diffé rance." Philosophy and Rhetoric, 22.2 (1989): 110-30. http://www.mcgees.net/fragments/essays/guests/rethinki.htm

Bitzer, Lloyd. "The Rhetorical Situation." Philosophy and Rhetoric, 1 (January, 1968), 1-14.

Bransford, J.D. et al. Anchored instruction: Why we need it and how technology can help. In D. Nix & R. Sprio (Eds), Cognition, education and multimedia. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum Associates, 1990.

Burke, Kenneth. A Rhetoric of Motives. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1950.

----. (1945). A Grammar of Motives. New York: Prentice-Hall, 1945.

----. (1941). Philosophy of Literary Form: Studies in Symbolic Action. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1941.

Derrida, Jacques. Glas. Trans. John P. Leavey, Jr. and Richard Rand. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1986.

----. 'Freud and the Scene of Writing," Writing and Difference. Trans. Alan Bass. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978: 195-231.

-----. "Semiology and Grammatology," Positions. Trans. Alan Bass. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1981: 26-33.

Kaufer, David S. "Point of View in Rhetorical Situations: Classical and Romantic Contrasts and Contemporary Implications." Quarterly Journal of Speech 65 (1979): 171-186.

K-B Journal. (Kenneth Burke Journal). http://www.kbjournal.org/ Accessed November 7, 2004.

Kenneth Burke Society Homepage. http://www.home.duq.edu/~thames/kennethburke/parlor.htm Accessed November 7, 2004.

Lave, J. Cognition in Practice: Mind, mathematics, and culture in everyday life. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1988.

Lave, J., & Wenger, E. Situated Learning: Legitimate Periperal Participation. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1990.

McLellan, H. Situated Learning Perspectives. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educational Technology Publications, 1995.

Miller, Arthur B. "Rhetorical Exigence." Philosophy and Rhetoric 5 (1972): 111-118.

Smith, Craig R., and Scott Lybarger. "Bitzer's Model Reconstructed. Communication Quarterly 44 (1996): 197-213.