Tag: Social Discourse

Categories
Education life

Biography

This is slightly related to the reflection that I talked about in Back on Track but it also comes out of thinking from my Social Computing Class. Our readings have talked about the trajectory that is reflected in systems of interaction. One of the sub-concepts of trajectory is “biography” or personal trajectories.

As I thought about this concept I began to recognize the trajectories in my life. As a student in high school I could easily have imagined myself getting a PhD, but when I started college it soon became much harder to imagine that scenario, yet here I am. Although there were forces that would discourage my pursuit of this advanced degree, the trajectory and the impetus to continue with my education were stronger than the discouragement.

Professionally, I thought that I would be studying design of instruction, but due to changes in my life I took courses in assessment and I discovered an interest in that area of study that I would have not expected to have any interest. I now have a trajectory that appears likely to last a lifetime which I would not have predicted even one year ago.

Categories
Education

Leaving Our Universe(s)

Strauss talks about “the difficulty [for people] of standing outside their own symbolic universes, of totally transcending them.” (Strauss 1993 p. 155) I have to agree that this is a monumental task, but I wonder if it is really necessary to undertake this task fully, or if it would be equally well to merely make ourselves fully aware of our own symbolic universes and recognize where they differ from the symbolic universes of others.

Categories
Education

Implications of an Assumption

I tried to connect a thought to an assumption and failed before, but now I have a question that arose whole considering one of Strauss’ assumptions (#15)

“[A] joint action cannot be resolved into a common or same type of behavior on the part of participants. Each . . . necessarily occupies a different position, acts from that position, and engages in a separate and distinctive act.” (Blumer 1969, p. 70 as quoted in Strauss 1993 p. 40)

From an instructional standpoint that leads me to question when it is appropriate or necessary to distinguish between the learning of different participants in a social learning environment and how that distinction could best be made.

Categories
Education

Intuition

I was having a conversation about interface design with Matt Schmidt who quoted Steve Jobs saying that if the interface is not intuitive it is not right. That took me back to my interface design class as a computer science undergrad. We were often told that right handed control was more intuitive to users – unfortunately I can no longer cite the research that was based on. They complained that the web was wrong because web pages overwhelmingly have lefthand navigation.

If the righthand navigation is really more intuitive, why is it confusing to navigate a web page with righthand navigation (if you ever come up against one of those rare pages). The truth is that we have socially accepted the idea that – at least on the web – navigation is generally on the left of the page. This is social negotiation.

When I had the thought I believed that it connected to one of the underlying assumptions in the Strauss book, but upon looking into it I find that it does not directly connect to any one assumption.

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Uncategorized

Blah, Blah, Blog

I found the same problem as Randy documents in The long pause.

I found that I soon lost interest in all the blogging about blogging and how lbogs were a perfect fit for improving learning. I still value blogging, but I do it for myself. I try to say the things on my blog that I want to say, not the things that will get other people blogging with me.

I am ready to leave blogs and blogging as a tool that teachers may use rather than as the tool for the future of teaching. In other words – if the blog fits, use it.

Categories
Education

META

As a longtime fan of recursion (from my computer science days) I love observing the meta-cognition that is so prevalent when studying in this field. We learn about learning, teach about teaching and think about thinking.

It was fun to begin to see the book taking shape as Strauss illustrates the interaction of ideas and people that lead to this book about a theory of action and interaction. (Mostly in the introduction of Strauss)

Categories
Education

Connection

I was suffering from a deplorable lack of interest in the text until I finally connected with the author as he described himself as a “graduate student, terribly naive about most of the world and its happenings, but resonating in [his favorite theories of his field].” (Strauss p. 6) Suddenly I knew how he felt and I have been much more interested in his narrative since then.

Categories
Education life

Social Computing Class

I get to take a doc seminar on Social Computing this semester to give me fodder for this blog. I am excited to share my insights on the readings and class discussions here. I hope to see a good number of my classmates commenting on these postings.

Categories
Education

ITI Conclusion

The conference was very good from my perspective. I have requested (on my evaluation form) that they should post lecture notes or powerpoint presentations so that I could review sessions I went to or get some information on sessions I was interested in which I could not go to. If that information gets posted I will post it for anyone who is interested.

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Uncategorized

Thoughts Raised by Giants

I have a hard time blogging about what Brian Lamb or Stephen Downes spoke about because I’m sure that everything they talked about are available – through them – online. What I will say is that it was very enjoyable meeting them, listening to them and talking to them.

I will pretend that there may be a person who actually reads my blog that does not read Brian already (or to assist my memory) and put a link to his presetation which is available on the web. He gave it from the web, but it is a wiki so it will have changed a little bit by the time anyone can visit it from here.

I also want to thank Brian for posting a list of blogs by bloggers who were at this conference.

I guess I do have a few ideas that I would like to post which came through the combination of the two presentations.

It is a natural event to copy the workings of the previous technology (Stephen discussed this idea). Brian says “Lets move on beyond that replication.” I don’t think we should avoid that, but that we should recognize that in that stage there is more growth to come, but in replicating the previous technology we get to come to understand the new technology and the old technology and what is better about each. This is how we find the relative strengths of each technology and that is how we have a chance to place them in their proper relative balance. By “proper” I mean the balance that best meets our needs or creates the best complement between the technologies. I don’t agree with Stephen that the new technology always obliterates the old technology. New technology displaces old technology unless the new technology essentially outperforms the old technology on a point by point basis.