Yes, I am still here!

I apologize for not writing more. I have been beyond busy during the past 15 weeks writing up research findings for my study. My goal is to hand in the first draft of my dissertation to my advisor next week. The study identifies specific advantages and limitations within which teachers' learning might be supported online, so needless to say, I am anxious to share the results with an edublogging audience.

Once I've received the green light from my advising team, I will begin to post chapters in pdf form here in Eduspaces. I am also considering creating a wiki to house the final product to make the content more accessible to the public and open to social judgment and adjudication. There are scholars all over working on projects that could benefit more than their peers if they opened up their work to a larger audience using the freely available social media tools. I understand how funding for research and scholarship works and that you cannot always have your cake and eat it too. So in the spirit of seeking balance, I will do what I can to always make my scholarly efforts public.

 I have also been quite busy developing content for a course I am teaching this fall titled Integrating Technology into the Secondary Curriculum. I have two sections of 16 and 22 undergraduate education minors finishing up their careers in college. Some are truly gung-ho and interested in teaching and learning. Others less so, but are willing to play along in the name of learning something new about themselves. I was hoping to share more of what is going on in these classes in this space, but with course preparation and the dissertation, my attention is needed in the latter.

In the meantime, I have not completely fallen off the map. The wonderful bits of minutiae that I find in my travels I have been posting to my Tumblr blogs.  So in the spirit of Friday, I give you a literal translation of A-ha's famous pop fodder Take On Me. Cheers!

So you may have noticed things have been a bit quiet on this Eduspaces site as of late. I just came back from a much needed vacation and am feeling renewed, refreshed, and revived (the ocean air can do that for you).

I am starting out a new school year teaching two sections of an undergraduate education course titled Integrating Technology into the Secondary Curriculum. The course is a requirement for those students minoring in education and who are thinking about teaching students at the secondary level (US grades 6-12; ages 11-18). As I work through putting together a meaningful experience for all involved, I will be sharing ideas, observations and reflections about the course, the students, and other items as they arise.

One item I am keen on sharing is a new weblog I've been working on. I have always wanted to write a book about metaphors associated with learning and teaching. The catch is, I didn't want to write it in the conventional sense. I wanted "the book" to be a jumping off point, a picture book, designed to spark conversation, reflection, and debate. I wanted the book to be fluid, dynamic, editable on the fly, allowing me to add images as I find them. Perhaps a wiki might be a better option in terms of organizing content in a more user friendly way. On the other hand, I like the notion of simply browsing and viewing images at random. Please let me know what you think.

Finally, I am happy to announce that I have outlined my dissertation and have begun the blissful task of writing up the first complete draft. I should have this completed in about six week. I am standing here beside myself with happiness and cannot wait to share the results with you. Stay tuned!

 Image: play station

While conversation may indeed be king, meaningful conversation requires that we check to see whether the king is wearing any clothes.

In my research on using social or participatory media applications to support substantive educator knowledge development, it is clear conversation or professional talk is a powerful element or factor that can lead to deeper knowledge and understanding of one's practice (Hargreaves, A., 1994).

In my initial examination of participant posts and comments within an online professional learning community designed to support knowledge building among geographically separated participants, I have noticed that conversations fall into two general categories with some occasional subtle overlappings. In general conversations in the online learning community fall into two types: thin and thick.

Thin conversations are those that provide little in terms of reflection, feedback,  expansion and or examination of the initial ideas presented. Thin conversations suggest the emperor is threadbare and thus offers no redeeming substance or value (i.e., the conversation is powerless).

Thick conversations offer not only the thoughts and ideas of the participant but they build and expand upon thoughts shared from the initial post. Thick conversations also provide a sense of deeper reflection and emotional cues that offer insight into the participant's sense of self. Thick conversations are not necessarily verbose; they can be short, triggering statements that lend themselves to deeper reflection and deeper contemplation. Thick conversations are the robes and raiment that make conversation king.

In my initial analysis, where these two categories overlap is where conversation may be thin, but attached resources and artifacts associated with the thin conversation are thick and rich. There are multiple examples within my study that show participants offering little in terms of content-rich, back-and-forth dialogue and conversation, yet attach multiple rich resources or artifacts to their post that serve all participants in the community exceedingly well. The conversation is thin, but the knowledge and value associated with the post appears to outweigh the apparent veneer.

Perhaps, this requires a clearer definition of what conversation in a social media supported environment affords participants. Clearly, meaningful dialogue and written exchange can be valuable to knowledge development. Yet conversation can also trigger references to artifacts outside the immediate conversation that can also provide additional meaning and value. Given that the platform being used to serve and support conversation in this instance also allows the exchange of physical artifacts, conversations can be thin in initial substance and thick with associated attached resources.

Hmmmm....

Your thoughts and feedback are clearly warranted!

Reference:
Hargreaves, A. (1994). Changing teachers, changing times: Teachers' work and culture in the post-modern age. New York: Teachers College Press.

Below are the notes for a 15 minute presentation about my research in social software and teacher professional development. Please let me know if you have any questions or areas you would like clarified. -c-

Student Alliance of Graduates in Education Presentation

06 June 2008

Christopher D. Sessums
Adjunct Faculty/PhD candidate in Curriculum & Instruction with an emphasis in Educational Technology
School of Teaching and Learning/Educational Technology
email: csessums@coe.ufl.edu

Using social software to support teacher professional development

Keywords: social software, school-based professional development, inquiry, action research, professional learning communities, online learning communities, professional networks, teacher professional development, educational technology, weblogs, Read/Write Web, networking

1. The Problem: Given the promise of action research to transform educators’ practices and improve schools, coupled with advances in thinking about professional learning communities, it is reasonable to wonder about the role of a facilitated, computer-mediated learning environment and how participation in such a focused community fosters educators’ critical understandings of their practice.

2. Study Objectives: Design a case study to better understand how an online learning community supports a network of practitioners coaching action research. The three main questions that guide this research examine the ways in which an online learning community, as an organizational structure, facilitates participants ability to (1) deepen their understanding of the action research process; (2) deepen their understanding of coaching action research; and (3) deepen their understanding of their own evolving stance toward their professional practice.

3. Perspectives: A phenomenological approach is used in this study focusing on the meaning participants make of their own experiences as revealed by their speaking, writing, and behaviors.

4. Modes of Inquiry: An exploratory case study approach is used to examine participant activity associated with the online learning community over a nine month period. A modified social network analysis protocol will be used to analyze the relationships between participants, and narrative analysis will be used to examine site postings and participant interviews.

5. Data Sources: (1) Facilitator generated prompts and participant responses, (2) participant initiated discussion, (3) technical data associated with facilitator and participant activity in the online learning community site, (4) participant interviews, and (5) field notes.

6. The Workshop: The CSI PDC workshop consisted of three face-to-face meetings (September, November, January) before the final Showcase in May 2008 with the majority of communication and interaction occuring online through the CSI blog site. Participants were provided a text and instructional protocols for coaching action research. During the face-to-face meetings participants were shown how to employ textual materials and protocols as a means of coaching other teachers through the teacher inquiry/action research process. In the online learning community, the facilitator created an organizational structure to provide spaces for both her and the coaches to share coaching experiences, strategies, critical reflections, and receive updates and announcements associated with organizing the Showcase. The facilitator posted regularly to the site modeling an inquiry stance prompting other participants to reply or post in kind. As such it was our hopes that through such prompting, the coaches would be able to develop a sense of community and share experiences, tools, ideas, lessons, rubrics, protocols, recruiting letters, and other specific documentation in supporting both the coaching of and the teacher inquiry process.

7. Participants: This study focuses on the experiences of 11 educators, one facilitator/workshop coordinator, and one technical support person. Educators' experience ranged from 3 to 19 years in the classroom full-time, 180 days a year. All participants had at least one year's experience conducting formal action research/teacher inquiry projects. Not all participants considered themselves technically savvy, but they all could use email and access World Wide Web pages either at home or at work via an Internet connection.

8. Results/Conclusions: My goal was to examine the ways in which an online learning community, as an organizational structure, facilitates participants ability to (1) deepen their understanding of the action research process; (2) deepen their understanding of coaching action research; and (3) deepen their understanding of their own evolving stance toward their professional practice.

While analysis of the interviews, site postings and interactions, and technical site data is still ongoing, preliminary findings include:

• recognition that time, effort, and attention are clear costs of participation
• the desire for emotional commitment by participants
• evidence of legitimate peripheral participation and a community of practice ontology which aided newcomers in entering and acquiring the sociocultural practices of the community
• the recognition of a participant epistemological stance and its impact on levels of participation
• participants valued the ability to post questions and receive responses from peers and facilitator
• participants spent more time observing each other online than actually interacting online i.e., writing back and forth, posting, commenting.
• all participants report that the site allowed them to deepen heir understanding of the AR process, coaching AR, and their own evolving stance by allowing them to observe their peers and make comparisons of their own responses and activity to that of their peers.

9. Educational import of the study: This study provides an exploration of ways school-based professionals can participate, enhance, and expand their professional learning, work toward school improvement goals, and tap in to extended professional networks afforded by social software adoption and use.

10. Intended audience: Education professionals, educational technologists, teacher educators, professional learning communities, educational leadership and administration.