"Cover it live" .... it is so cool!

I was reading a commentary by a medical professional/writer, Abraham Verghese, whose essays I have read and even used in my classes. An example, you ask? How about this one?
Wait, this is about teaching/learning/discussing online.... Just hang in for a few more sentences :-)

So, I was reading Verghese's comments on the health care reform issues, and in that he referred the reader to kevinmd.com for "an excellent discussion". The nerdy reader that I am, I faithfully followed that link.

And, this is where the technological aspect kicks in. At kevinmd.com I noticed an option to replay a live Q&A on health care reform. And at the bottom of that window were the letters "Cover it live". That was enough to trigger my curiosity, and hence this blog post.

The demo of how Cover it live works is simply too good to believe. And check out their complete demo library. It seems to be so easy to integrate real-time blogging with chat with Twitter with web-search with youtube .... The more I started exploring it, the more I can see how in a few years I could even have "real time" classes while sitting at home.
I did a quick search for whether it has been adopted in academic contexts. This blog (Classroom 2.0) has some recent (April/May 2009) discussions on it.

The speed at which all these technologies are coming up .... simply mind-boggling!!!

PS: BTW, if you read until here, you will be all the more interested to note that Abraham Verghese is, also, from India. His book on treating HIV patients in a remote corner of Tennessee was way too honest .... A wonderful read. Now, of course, it might seem dated, even though it is about the late eighties!

Using Blogs Instead of Course Management Systems

In my academic life, I have always marched to my own drum beat, and I get knocked down quite a bit for that. Add to this the researcher in me who constantly worries that I might not be correct after all. I tell you, contrary to appearances, there is a lot going on in my head. All the time :-)

My own drum beat in online teaching is perhaps best seen in how I have continued to refine my usage of blogger.com and reliance on emails for class interactions. Ideally I would have liked my students to also be ready and willing to discuss their understanding in an open environment--a transparent classroom. But, at least one student formally requested that our class interactions be private, as much as a "regular" class is behind closed doors. Fair enough, I thought, even though my preference is for openness.

I am, therefore, immensely pleased with this piece in the Chronicle. Way too pleased because it is about a day-long meeting to improve CUNY's online classes, in which a key idea was whether the free blogging software can take the place of course management software:

The meeting's focus was an idea that is catching on at a handful of colleges and universities around the country: Instead of using a course-management system to distribute materials and run class discussions, why not use free blogging software — the same kind that popular gadflies use for entertainment sites?

The approach can save colleges money, for one thing. And true believers like Mr. Groom argue that by using blogs, professors can open their students' work to the public, not just to those in the class who have a login and password to a campus course-management system. Open-source blog software, supporters say, also gives professors more ability to customize their online classrooms than most commercial course-management software does.

So, I am not alone.
You know what a relief that is? More than anything, it is impossible for every faculty to teach the same way--we differ in our teaching styles as much as, or even more than, how we differ in our learning styles. However, it feels good to know that there are at least a few others who are experimenting with, and finding success, in the same kind of things that I am trying. (Here is my blog for the online class that is coming to an end this spring term.)

The Chronicle piece also has an example:

To demonstrate how a blog might be used in a course, Zoë Sheehan-Saldaña, an assistant professor of art at CUNY's Baruch College, showed off the blog for her course "Designing With Computer Animation." Students posted their assignments on the blog so that other students — and people outside the class — could see them. Students were encouraged to post comments on one another's work as well.

Although new versions of Blackboard include a bloglike feature, Ms. Sheehan-Saldaña said there are benefits in teaching students to create blogs using systems they might encounter in future jobs.

Maybe soon I will be able to convince everybody registered in one of my classes about the sheer joy of working in this transparent classroom. But, as long as even one student has reservations about it, well, I need to treat online classes on par with regular classes and cannot impose openness. Once before, I tried partial openness--by including blogging as a requirement, as an assignment. But, that is not the same as a truly open classroom.

Now, I have even less of an incentive to experiment with Moodle :-)

I am not the only one who loves online teaching

I have fallen in love with this method of teaching. I feel more connected to my students than I ever have, and I feel needed and appreciated daily.

That is how the author of this opinion piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education concludes his essay. And, that is how I feel more and more with my online classes and students. So much so that next week I am lunching with a few online students who said "yes" to my suggestion that we meet and eat in the real world :-)

And how did that opinion piece start?

"Impersonal, disconnected, and unfulfilling." That is how I would have answered if you asked me 10 years ago what I thought of online teaching. As a teacher, I feed off the energy of the crowd and thrive on exciting and entertaining my students to the point of drawing even the most resistant into attending class. When the economy and my growing family necessitated that I teach online as well as in the classroom, I couldn't have been more surprised by the satisfaction and joy that could come from a distance-learning program.

Teaching online can be rewarding, but ...

Here is a relatively fair and balanced take on teaching online. Of course, there are a few places where I disagree with the author. But, by and large, a balanced piece.

This term, I am realizing how technological glitches can affect stuff .... (Bill, you do not need to do anything here; things are happening, but a tad slowly. That is all.)

The good news is that I got a new laptop. I asked for a built-in webcam, so that I would not have to use an external camera to record my video clips and, yes, the new laptop has that. The relatively bad news is that ever since I got the new laptop--was it four or five weeks ago--things started unraveling, and finally I lost all access to the network drives, printers and, worst of all, the computer wants to connect to the H: drive even when I am home!

So, the first couple of weeks I did not do videos because I did not want to struggle with the old laptop that was wheezing like it would die any minute. And for almost three weeks now, totally different kinds of problems. Problems that are proving to be quite a challenge to our tech people.

So, this is what I think: I am relatively tech-okay. Perhaps significantly above average tech fluency compared to what might be the norm for a middle-aged university faculty! So, I have been dealing with the problems without harassing the tech people. (I wonder if they think that I am harassing them!!!) On the other hand, imagine if a less than tech-fluent faculty were teaching online, and such problems came up.

Which then makes me wonder whether there should be some kind of 'if you are below this height" metaphor that needs to be in place? What would be an example? When I am on campus, I could not connect to the "P:" drive, which is where my web pages are. So, what was my work around? Using our FTP (Filezilla) to connect to the drive from home. I just did not engage in web page editing when I was on campus. On the other hand, last term when a colleague told me how frustrating it was for him to go back and forth with a USB drive, and how he sometimes forgets it, I told him that he might be better off using Filezilla and demonstrated it. He was impressed, and commented that he wished he had known about it earlier.

Teaching online, the way I understand and practice it, requires a constant learning of new technology. I am all for learning new stuff--if I find something that fits with my teaching style, I use it. But, I don't ever use technology for the sake of using that fancy technology. I am not sure though whether non-users, and maybe even some users, understand how much such constant learning is required ..... or, am I using an incorrect framework?

The Sale of Waldorf--not the NY hotel!

In an earlier post, I referred to online education degrees being advertised in the Statesman Journal, and noted there that until then I hadn't heard of the provider--Ashford University. That mystery is solved now...when I read that:

It was novel a few years ago when Bridgepoint Education purchased the Franciscan University of the Prairies, also a small, religious Iowa college. Today the renamed Ashford University has both the former institution's campus (since improved), but also new online programs.

The same report notes that:

Many experts have been predicting -- just like Hanson -- that in the next few years more for-profit universities will buy financially struggling nonprofit colleges. And the model that Waldorf and Columbia Southern are following -- where the nonprofit institution retains some identity and a campus, even as it add programs linked to the larger for-profit interest -- appears to be growing.

I am not sure how much the two examples the story cites become a trend that "appears to be growing." Oh well .... :-)

Virus, schmirus! No cancellation of online classes

Yesterday, I commented to my online class students that

So, we realized one of the advantages of an online class: campus closure because of a virus does not affect this class in any way. Maybe you were thinking that is exactly the disadvantage, eh!
If a computer virus shuts down our computing systems down for a day or two, guess what? No class cancellations even then ..... :-)

And then this morning I am recipient of the following emails.
First from a colleague, who included a couple of us in the email to the dean and the division chair:

This is just to let you know that I am making back up plans in case of further WOU closures. I am informing students as to what they will need to do to take part or all of the rest of my courses in an online format. I emphasize that this would happen only in the event of further closures.

If I don't hear from you to the contrary, I will assume that this meets with your tentative approval, given the circumstances.

I would also like to volunteer my services to help out other faculty who may interested in forming such back up plans. While going online entails a tremendous amount of additional work for faculty, I see no other alternative in the scenario of additional closures. I also realize that some subjects are more suited to this form of learning than others. Please let me know if I can be of assistance.

I think we would be wise to have alternative plans as this flu has the potential to be extremely disruptive. The sooner such conversations happen, the better.

To which the dean replies:

I’m supportive of your planning…indeed, the more that faculty utilize web-based course management assistance (Moodle, et al.) the more seamless a campus closure/reopening would be.

I am glad that such sentiments are being expressed in different arenas, in support of online teaching and learning. But, and I know I will be repeating this for the gazillionth time, like here, I don't see any systematic campus conversations on online teaching and learning. Our task force has a limited charter, and maybe for all the right reasons. However, at some point though we will have to become obsolete .... I mean the task force, and not the individuals :-)

Happy Cinco de Mayo; isn't it awesome that it always falls on the 5th of May? ha ha ha

Do I overestimate how high-tech students are?

In my introductory class, while explaining how technological changes trigger significant changes to the economic landscape, I used video stores as an example. About how even a few years ago, going to the video stores to rent VHS tapes was the typical way we rented movies, and now those stores are fast disappearing.

It was then I made a comment that perhaps not even five freshmen at WOU own a VCR anymore. And boy was I mistaken when I asked the class to raise their hands if they owned a VCR. It seemed like more than half the class did. And right here in their dorm rooms. "I still watch those VHS movies from when I was a kid" said one girl.

I admitted to them that it was a revelation to me. I told them how it has been almost two years since I canceled my Blockbuster card. Increasingly, I even head to hulu.com, or the respective networks' websites to watch a few TV shows. I told them that maybe the last videotape I ever used in a class was a few terms ago, and that when I donated all my educational VHS tapes to the library, the librarian told me that they too might not use them!

I am, therefore, wondering whether this particular class was an exception, or whether WOU is an exception, or whether the stereotypical representation of the younger generation as into iPods and all-things-mobile is a complete exaggeration that misled me to hypothesizing that our students don't own a VCR anymore.

Do we have any surveyed information on the use/proficiency when it comes to our students and technology? I just think this is so strange a response from my class; I was so convinced that VHS had become prehistoric :-) Even if you folks don't have hard data, any anecdotal information?