Transnational relations

Olive and I spent a couple of hours together today.

Two women facing a challenge, with no clear cut solution, working together to save a virtual land. Marlboro Island in Second Life, where my TLVW class meets and works, suffered its first grief attack in years. A visitor set off the nuisance tetris script, which generates physical boxes, ad infinitum. Boxes that fill the island in three dimensions, boxes that push avatars off platforms, boxes that crash sims. Together Olive and I worked to report and ban the offending avatar, delete his objects (repeatedly), stop all scripts (unsuccessfully), stop this script. There was urgency. Keep the sim from crashing. Solve the problem before other students arrive. It took real time, real thinking, real effort, real collaboration. Finally Olive found the source and deleted it.

Two women talking. About our experiences, about our class, about what we've read and thought about. Two women who know very little about each other's "real lives," brought together in virtual space.  We have common experiences, like two people who have spent a lot of time together. One tells a story and it resonates for the other. One points out something funny and the other finds humor there too. We share emotions and insights. We are two women, one american, one egyptian who would not know each other if not for a virtual connection.

One month reflection on TLVW2012

One of the curiosities for me about my current Teaching and Learning in Virtual Worlds class is the question: What makes it easy for some students to work in Second Life and difficult for others?

This term 14 of 20 my active students have no previous experience in Second Life.  Of them only one identifies himself as a gamer who has played an MMORPG (in this case WoW). This is the extent of my objective knowledge of the group. What follows is anecdotal and wildly speculative. My speculations will I hope lead to questions and hypotheses that could be studied systematically.

Since this is the 5th group of students that I have had in this course, I have noticed some things about my students, the platform and my teaching that may be patterns.

Teachers as learners

In my 12 years of teaching teachers I have drawn the following (speculative) conclusions:

1. We tend to be people who have excelled in a traditional educational environment.
2. Those who have excelled in a traditional educational environment are used to getting A’s, expect to succeed, and have limited experience with failure and ambiguity.
3. Unlike gamers that are used to failing in order to succeed, we do not easily persevere in the face of failure. Frustration comes easily, especially when a computer is involved.

My learners

1. Teachers in a technology program are as a group somewhat braver, more innovative and non traditional than the average teacher.
2. While I get the exceptions, most of my students have excelled in a traditional educational environment.
3. My students approach SL with a range of curiosity and terror; and more often than not a combination of curiosity and terror.
4. Successful students get hooked on some aspect of the virtual world environment: the playfulness, the building, the self expression, the global community… They don’t necessarily become ongoing members of the VW community, but they are able to apply experiences they’ve had to their own teaching and learning and they seem better able to relate to their students about online lives.
5. I identify unsuccessful students as those who complete the course but never fully understand why it is necessary for educators to know about this medium. They go through the motions and are able to move, dress and teleport with their avatar, but they don’t feel any connection to their virtual representative. (4 people out of 46 student or 8.5% from the last four classes: 2 out of 16, 2 out of 14, 0 out of 12, 0 out of 4)
6. At the start, my successful students are as a group no less terrified or needy than my unsuccessful students. I do think there are differences but I don’t as yet know what they are.

The VW platform

1. There is way too much going on - on the screen in any virtual world but especially SL. Too many buttons, too many menus, too many popup windows - it is more complex than photoshop! On the other hand the basic interface in V2 was too basic. People who are used to exploring new pieces of software have a much easier time getting started.
2. The SL experience challenges people in a number of ways that differ from person to person.
   Avatar movement and view controls are the first and hardest to master. Once a user can maneuver their avatar and their perspective they have a much more comfortable experience. But they do not realize that this is the most important thing to practice in the beginning as it provides no immediate gratification. (Dressing one’s avatar is much more gratifying and ultimately less useful.)
   Multiple communication channels offer one of the most powerful aspects of VWs, but are way over stimulating in the beginning.  The open chat window helps you look back at missed discussion, but it takes up a lot of room on the screen. Starting an Instant Message takes several steps (people -> my friends -> double click) that are cumbersome and forgettable at first. Received IMs are easily missed until the learner is able to notice all of the varied buttons, windows and alerts on her screen. Voice seems to work right away for some people and for others it doesn’t come until they are SL experts in every other way.
   Getting back home is difficult and scary for new users. A learner can’t set the classroom as home until she has joined the university group.  4 Weeks in and I haven’t gotten all students to notice my (repeated) group invitations. So though they all now have a landmark to our classroom they have not all got it as there home landing point.
3. I am using three distinct platforms that add to the overall cognitive load: SL, Moodle and Email.  Because Email is ubiguitous, it may seem strange to mention it as a separate platform. I like to use email for things that are time sensitive - but find it doesn’t work.  I find that learners do not “get” as much from email as I expect. It is too much to manage that third source of information. 

About me and my part

I am becoming aware of some of my own qualities that aid in and detract from a smooth transition to the virtual.

1. I believe in the power of kindness and relationship in the art of teaching. I think this works for everyone.
2. I am in-world early and often to help and scaffold (invite phone calls and 1 on 1 appointments in SL). If I can get each learner to spend 5 hours in SL during the first two weeks I believe I can make it a successful experience.  People who don’t spend that much time or who don’t ask for help after the first two weeks sometimes slip through the cracks. It takes me a full month to know every one of my online students.
3. I am flexible as to what I expect from learners with different needs. While this is helpful for many, my flexibility is a double edged sword. Often the people who find SL disturbing also find my flexibility disturbing. They want to be told exactly what to do and what is expected without wiggle room.
4. I am unable to design a course before I know the participants. (This could be a much deeper psychological problem than I am willing to admit :) I am always redesigning. This is extremely disturbing to the same people who find my flexibility and SL’s other worldliness disconcerting. I cannot over emphasize this because it is a limitation of any study that might be done about my students in SL.  This will be a confounding variable that must be teased from the factors related to the platform and learners.

As I writing this I see some things that could be highlighted at the beginning of my next course. Avatar control, communication and getting home obviously need more explicit attention. And controlling my impulse to redesign may be worth the price of a couple of counseling sessions ;-)
A more gentle introduction to failure as a learning practice may be helpful too. And while I believe that as teachers we can reach everyone. It helps to know the different needs of learners.  I am still no clearer about the learner characteristics that may support more or less success.

Dear reader, as always I would love your comments, own reflections, and challenges to my speculations.

Modified Quest-Based Learning

Last month I participated in the three week Teacher Camp: 3DGamelab, run by Lisa Dawley and Chris Haskill. Quest-based pedagogy was the theme. Quest-based learning was the process. We went on quests, we used the 3DGamelab tools - a learning management system and guild site that facilitated good gaming practices in teaching and learning.

With my new term of Teaching and Learning in Virtual Worlds beginning soon, my mind exploded with the possibilities. I started to move my quests from Second Life to 3DGamelab. Then reality hit. Quest development is a craft that takes practice. And May 8th was on the next page of my virtual calendar.

So Teaching and Learning in Virtual Worlds 2012 has begun. I have made significant but manageable (haha) changes to the design. We have not moved to 3DGameLab but we are questing.

• First I have invited non-matriculated students to join from around the world (a mini MOOC of sorts with representation from seven countries)
• A thin but mostly relevant narrative ties the themes of the course and my quests together. Jane and Esme are leaders of a study abroad program, the participants are studying the cultural and pedagogical practices of the metaverse.
• Except for the first two weeks, the modules/quest-chains are independent. As long as a learner completes low level quests before higher level quests they can pick quests from different chains at different times.
• Not all quests need to be completed. Choice is built into each quest chain.
• Reward systems are clunky and manual (meaning that they aren't immediate) but learners level up based on experience points: roadie -> tourist -> traveler -> adventurer....
• Experience points are the number of points assigned in the Moodle grader. Who knew that you could use the grader to tally vs average and that there is no apparent cap on how many points you can assign. I give full credit (xp) or ask for the quest to be resubmitted with guidance.
• Some assignments pay Linden$ (and later copper in WoW) and various virtual goods that can be traded in the DUTY-Free Shopping Exchange (moodle forum).
• It's rough around the edges because I am developing as I go. But I always seem to be redesigning along the way so this is just me doing what I do - making learning and teaching messy.

If you would like to learn more about what we are doing please reply.
Esme and Jane

Dispositions and Virtual Collaboration

Image: cooldesign / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

As I prepare to meet a new group of students in two online classes I reflect on what will help them get started. I recently reread some of the thinking about habits of mind (see article by Describing 16 Habits of Mind). Costa and Kallick propose that there are discrete habits or disposition that, in concert, support thinking and problem solving.

1. Persisting
2. Communicating with clarity and precision
3. Managing impulsivity
4. Gathering data through all senses
5. Listening with understanding and empathy
6. Creating, imagining, innovating
7. Thinking flexibly
8. Responding with wonderment and awe
9. Metacognition
10. Taking responsible risks
11. Striving for accuracy and precision
12. Finding humor
13. Questioning and problem posing
14. Thinking interdependently
15. Applying past knowledge to new situations
16. Remaining open to continuous learning

With a bit of training, learners can develop these habits to improve their performance on learning tasks.

These habits of mind transfer to learning in online environments, and provide a basis for thinking about the unique challenges of learning and collaborating online. Because of the unique affordances of virtual learning spaces, it might be necessary to expand the definition of or add to the dispositions on this list.

In a recent presentation to the #Change11 course, Howard Rheingold talked about Attention as a digital literacy (see also this article in the Educause Review).  With the abundance of information and opportunities to connect on the internet, our attention is constantly being redirected.  It was refreshing to hear him address attention not as a behavior that is either present or absent, good or bad. Like Costa and Kallick, Rheingold sees Attention as a set of skills and attitudes that can taught and developed. He advocates the development of mindfullness regarding where a learner is directing her attention, and strategies for making what he calls "micro decisions" when ones attention is interrupted.

Together habits of mind and Rheingold's literacies will offer my incoming students a good start to online learning. Yet there are other dispositions that I believe are critical to success in virtual learning environments. 

As I write three come to mind:

Norming. Making explicit what the norms will be for communication, behavior, timeliness, appearance. If it is a synchronous meeting, are multiple threads managable by the participants.  Do I type while another is "talking" or wait and allow pauses between each contribution. Under what conditions do I use the mic or type my contribution. How to we notice when some people are not getting "airtime". Because we CAN work from home in our pajamas, does that mean we agree that during a Skype conference, it is ok to be dressed informally. If we represent ourselves with avatars, are there expectations about what those avatars will and will not look like.

Preparing. Some people and some environments demand a period of time to switch realities from the physical to the virtual. For instance the transition from sitting in my solitary office to being in a group of people in a Collaborate (formerly Elluminate) session or a virtual meeting in Second Life is instant. Without the time to drive to a physical meeting, adjust my clothing when I get out of my car and walk to the meeting room, I may find myself disoriented and unprepared to get right to work.

Sharing. Online learning environments are often collaborative spaces where learners may be called upon to participate in ways they are not used to. When I attend a physical conference session, I may be invited to ask questions at the end. When I attend a virtual conference, I often participate in "back chat" through the text channel while the presenter is speaking. As a presenter and learner the ability to engage in back channel discussions involves a willingness to share and a set of skills for handling multiple forms of communication.

These may be a start.  Help me tease out the habits/disposition of online learning and collaboration.  Comment below either to elaborate on these three or to expand my list.

Self Assessment

Today I read Jeffrey Keefer's post "Check in on Change11 goals and expectations" in which he reviews the 3 goals he set at the start of the Change11 MOOC and asks himself how he is doing. I am challenged to do the same. Thanks Jeffrey.

On September 30 I wrote:

"Today I've decided that I will spend less time on instructor generated material and more on participant generated. I want to understand the connections [learners make], follow some ideas, see how others embrace/struggle with/modify/define the process. "

This is no behaviorally written object but it was a good starting point for an emerging set of questions and learning goals.

1. I will spend less time on instructor generated material and more on participant generated.

My participation has been sporadic

• I read the Monday daily all the way through as it gives me a sense of the talk in the blogs.
• I have dipped into some of the other dailys.
• I have attempted to attend synchronous sessions
• Besides the daily and the synchronous sessions I have successfully avoided reading/watching an facilitator content. I have decided that I don't want to see the content through the facilitators eyes I want to see how others make meaning of it (or how I make meaning of what they say about their meaning making :).
• When I read learner posts I dig deeply, read the posts and any comments, reflect in my journal, often comment and follow links to the author's other posts or links to referenced writers (unless they are facilitators).

2. I want to understand the connections [learners make], follow some ideas, see how others embrace/struggle with/modify/define the process.

This is harder to answer in one sitting. Some initial thoughts and the next questions I want to explore.

• There really is a diversity of opinion here. I cannot say we are are a fully heterogeneous group. There is a high degree of education and computer facility. But I expected more agreement, more indoctrination perhaps. I am finding debate refreshing. What are the ways that we as a group diverge? How do facilitators handle difference. (I saw one very welcoming response to disagreement from George.)
• Some people are grappling with the challenge of so much content and so little direction. This too is refreshing. I wonder if practice is all that is needed to take control of learning. Or does it take specific regulatory skills, or a certain temperament? What happens to people between their first and second MOOC? Or is three the charm? What makes a learner go on to their second MOOC, if the first was frustrating.
• Some are openly reveling in the smorgasbord of knowledge. How do they stay engaged and resist the traditional expectations to do it all?
• MOOC researchers and MOOC learners have overlapping but different needs (researchers are also learners but learners are not necessarily researchers).

More reflection to come.  Would love to hear from anyone who has written or seen a post that would lead me toward answers or more questions.
#change11

Complexity, Cognitive Load and MOOCs

I've just read two posts by Michael Gallagher Complexity, self-organization, and #Change11: reactions to Siemen's presentation(1) and Multiple interfaces, cognitive load and learning design: My appartment in Seoul (2). In the former Gallagher discusses the pattern making process we use to make sense from the chaotic stuff of life (and learning in a MOOC).  In the latter he takes us on a fanciful tour of his high tech Korean apartment,  a device to explore interface design and cognitive load.

Complexity and cognitive load - two of my favorite topics.

Complexity
I love complexity. I love to slosh about in it.  But it isn't easy.  My training compels me to approach problems with a linear logic.  I learned to create a lovely 3x3x3 outline (three points on each of  three levels I, 1, a. b. c. ) in 6th grade.  I loved the rules of grammar.  How shocked I was to learn that poetry was not always composed in iambic pentameter. I learned well.

When I fight the compulsion I am thrilled by the meandering journey from hyperlink to hyperlink, the "collision of actors, agents, feedback, waste, noise, and then, ideally, pattern, understanding." (Gallagher, 1) 

I cannot even set goals until I muck about in the complexity of a topic.  I absorb a shallow Gestalt of a problem.  I see the problem through lenses I didn't know existed.  My interests are assaulted and piqued. Then I am able to dig deeply into an aspect of the problem, to which I think I have a chance of contributing.

When I am able the resist the temptation to take a prescribed set of steps toward a goal,  I remember that I don't fully understand the learning, sense making process. One does not get there from here simply by following these steps.  The collision of ideas and patterns is currently unpredictable.

Cognitive load.
Cognitive load: This term, coined by John Sweller, explains the ability or inability of a novice to process information - based on the mental demands required by germane, intrinsic and extraneous load. It attempts to reduce complexity so that learners do not apply all their cognitive resources to achieving a goal or making a "means-end analysis."

I have long balked at the idea of cognitive load. Even though I recognize it all around me and employ techniques both for coping with it and designing instruction to control for it.

Cognitive load theory is like iambic pentameter (well maybe not, but let's see how far I can go with the analogy).  It is a perfectly reasonable approach to instructional design. (Ok, so far. Iambic pentameter is a reasonable approach to poetry.)  Cognitive load theory works. You want someone to be able to tell you the process involved in solving a three step math problem with a known solution.  Providing a worked example reduces the load involved in solving the problem and enables the learner to see and repeat the solution.  (If you want to produce a catchy verse that can be quickly learned and repeated to spread a bawdy joke or the news of the kings heroism in battle, or to get a rapping gig, iambic pentameter is for you.)  But it isn't the only approach teaching or learning (or poetry).

I'm not sure about this yet but I think the strategies that Sweller offers have led instructional designers and educational policy makers to focus on a means-end analysis of the "problem" of education.  Means-end analyses are not bad analyses for experts, but for novices (if I understand Sweller) they lead to a narrow expedient approach to achieving a goal that misses the important aspects of learning. Cognitive load reduction leads to complexity reduction which leads to the ability to move quickly from one topic to the next, which leads to efficient memorization of factual information, with leads to high achievement on standardized test.  It does not lead to deep understanding or the ability to handle complexity in life.

Novices can develop without narrowly defining their responsibilities, without controlling for "extraneous" cognitive load (that's where the sparks of clashing ideas happen).  Watch any pre-schooler (and I mean any person who has not been to school).  It is messy.  It is hard to assess, because the assessor's goals and accomplishments the learner makes are often not aligned.   Deep understanding and understanding within complexity takes time, it requires the opportunity to observe, to see the decisions and outcomes of experts and developing novices.  It requires the opportunity to act and fail.

MOOCing
My experience being a novice in the complex learning environment of a MOOC has been messy.  In my first MOOC, PLENK2010, I often felt lost.  If only they would tell me what to do (whine, whine, whine).  They were not providing me the scaffolding I needed. (Sorry George and Stephen, they is you.)  I loved it.  I learned a lot.  But I wasn't sure what I was learning because the goal was not clear, and that was unnerving.  This time around, in my second MOOC, #Change11, I feel like my limitations have fallen away.  I don't feel compelled to do it all.  As I've said elsewhere, I don't feel compelled to do instructor promoted reading.  I'm still a novice MOOCer, but a developing one.  Complexity, collisions among actors, agents, feedback, waste, noise. Bring it on. My 3D pattern-finding glasses are on.

Making Change11 My Own

Dave, George and Stephen have emphasized that one of the defining characteristics of a MOOC is the source of the goals. While the instructors/facilitators have a plan, (and personal goals) they do not determine the learning goals for the course. Each participant set her own goals. I think this is not just rhetoric. Not a variation on the "learner centered" model. MOOC and open learning in general has the potential to redefine what we mean by learning. I imagine that for some the goals may be clear cut from the start. For others they will emerge and morph. Like others, I am juggling many goals and all the possible content. Today I've decided that I will spend less time on instructor generated material and more on participant generated. I want to understand the connections, follow some ideas, see how others embrace/struggle with/modify/define the process. #change11