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Designing a Course Worth Learning 1
Over the next few weeks or months, my goal is to reflect on what and how I think as I design (big and small, d/Design) UNIV 291 in the roles of an instructional designer and instructor. There are many design decisions to consider. But there are a few BIG questions I must address. Uppermost in my mind is a question I borrow from David Perkins, a scholar I greatly admire for his ideas on thinking, teaching/learning, and clarity of thought. With only 8 weeks for a summer online elective course,…
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Collaborative Learning Activity: Poetry Writing
We sat around a table with interesting objects we had brought from home. A community of poet wannabes. Or poetry machines, Randy Marshall our chief instigator cheekily called us. He led us to write poems inspired by the stories we shared about the items. A good activity that I could use one day with my students, if Randy doesn’t mind.Poetry writing sharpens our minds and writing. I like the opportunity it provides for us to be precise and playful with words. It is a great learning activity to try in…
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Reinventing Dissertation Writing for Sharing
On June 10, 2013, I successfully defended my dissertation and officially graduated from a doctoral program in instructional design, development and evaluation. I had grand visions (delusions?) of staging it as a play. Even as I was writing it, I had considered writing it as a play. My advisor finally let me organize it as different acts/scenes in a play but it wasn’t written like a play script or in a dialogue format. She asked me if I was ready to be non-conventional. I didn’t know what to think at…
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Speaking and Not Understanding
After 2 weeks of redoing a web presentation of VCU’s ECAR findings, I’m at Round 3 (or more, I forget, after trying to push some data up quickly by redoing charts over and over) — figuring out what is at the heart of this project, and what we want to show from these findings. I hear a number of words repeated over and over. Here’s my depiction of that situation. The problem is that the mental model I have about research and dissemination of research findings is sloshing around in the whirlpool…
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Photowalks
The above two photos were taken on July 30, 2014, on my first photo safari with my colleagues. The next 4 were taken on January 16, 2015 with my new colleagues, Emma and Max, with Tom leading. All photos were taken using my Samsung Galaxy phone. I find this throne-like chair that is blocking the doorway curious. I have a penchant for snapping pictures of trees — blooming, withered, snarling. They are easily symbols of life and death. Architecture is another fave subject. “Don’t they all look the same after…
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Mental Wonderland: Inspiring Hope & Greatness
Before you scratch your head in perplexity, let me say this, “Give this video a chance!” SEE. THINK. WONDER (Project Zero at Harvard Graduate School of Education). Two singers rendering a foreign language song can be helpful as an instructional strategy? Yes, please give yourself permission to wonder (three words I’m borrowing from Philip Yenawine’s book (2013) which my colleague Enoch Hale highlighted to me). Also, part of the effortful joy of learning new things involves the deployment of grit (Angela L. Duckworth, U Penn, has been conducting studies on…
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Thinking through Art: How Prior Knowledge Paralyzes
4th Figure Drawing Class. We warmed up with 10 gesture drawings. In one minute, I must capture the outline of the model. It is especially challenging when the model knows multiple unusual ways to contort himself/herself. I struggle to capture the essence of the gesture. The bodily muscles exert themselves in peculiar ways that I find difficult to sketch rapidly. Today, I also have to learn how to use new tools — it is Conte Pencils instead of the familiar charcoal pencil or vine to quickly build the “armature” that…
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The 4Ps of Co-Consulting
… subheading, The Promise and the Practice My colleague, Stan, and I have been working with two instructors to convert their face-to-face course to a blended course before it is fully delivered online. What makes this co-consulting distinctive in our case are the following key features: 1. People There are two consultants in this session interacting with two clients (at times 3!) in real time. This entails a negotiation of roles and the values, beliefs and behaviors that come with the enactment of those roles. I am an instructional designer…
