Learning With Ben

Category: EDCI 339

Week 5

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On August 6, 2024

In EDCI 339

Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash

Quality in OERs

When it comes to open educational resources (OERs), Khan Academy is one of the most famous and widely used—and for good reason: most of their educational content is videos, and the instruction in them is fairly universally appealing for its efficiency, clarity, and freedom from condescension. I really think Khan constitutes something of a gold standard in quality for OERs.

As alluded to in the articles assigned this week, consistent quality is far from universal in OERs. Of the dozen or so online university courses I’ve taken over the past 10 years, two or three have used free online textbooks published by BCcampus OpenEd. Now, I should first say, it was great that they were free—wonderful, really—and convenient (sort of) that they were online. But their quality was inconsistent, to say the least. These textbooks were at best poorly proofread, and in the most egregious case, riddled with errors. And while many of these errors were, individually, relatively harmless typos to be sure, many others partially or completely obfuscated the author’s intended meaning. In aggregate, they placed a definite burden on students in terms of added time, attention, and confusion associated with readings.

Will more mean better?

Bronwyn Hegarty (author of the article “Attributes of Open Pedagogy: A Model for Using Open Educational Resources”) seems to believe that a greater number of people participating in the creation and sharing of OERs will result in more critical responses to resources shared, thus improving the overall quality of OERs in the long run. Maybe (and I hope so!). But increased participation in social media, for example, does not seem to me to have resulted in greater overall accuracy of statements made. I just don’t see the mechanism for improvement that greater participation is supposed to bring with it.

In moving on to the question of how to increase the kind of ‘openness’ implied in ‘OER’ and ‘open pedagogy’ (that we hope will lead to higher quality materials), Hegarty mentions a researcher’s finding from one case study: “the use of mobile learning and social media within a learning community encouraged not only connectivity and sharing of resources and knowledge, but also the development of content by students” (p.9, emphasis mine). A thought struck me as I read that: What if the phrase “within a learning community” is quietly doing a lot of heavy lifting in that statement? What if a sense of community is a crucial pre-requisite to the flourishing of voluntary, meaningful, high-quality participation in any space?

People want to feel like they’re contributing to something—to some sort of central identity, however vague. Wikipedia contributors are contributing to Wikipedia and Reddit contributors to Reddit, and as soon as they do, they are rewarded with a sense of belonging. They’re in the club. And every club has an inside and an outside, even one that’s open to view from the outside. Inclusion and exclusion are two sides of the same activity—the establishment of a boundary. The best clubs have bouncers. I’m beginning to wonder about the sustainability of ‘open’.

Photo by K. Mitch Hodge on Unsplash

The university’s last stand

On the other hand, if ‘open’ does turn out to be sustainable and even (with AI assistance) self-improvable, then, surely, ‘closed’ is on its way out. Universities for the most part remain very much ‘closed’, and I wonder about their sustainability. As institutions of higher learning they certainly seem less and less necessary.

Khan Academy is “a nonprofit with the mission of providing a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere.” I do not know if Khan can fulfill this mission on its own, but, with help, the goal does seem achievable. Students enrolled in the most prestigious universities already rely on resources like Khan to understand assigned material. So what besides learning do they have to offer?

Degrees, obviously, but universities can’t hold their monopoly on those forever. Degrees have been an efficient representation of competence for a long time now, but surely we can come up with equally efficient and much more accurate representations, no? Better direct assessments of competence in any given field would mean that, after freely learning (from Khan Academy, etc.) all necessary material outside of institutions, one could test right into one’s job of choice.

Besides degrees, though, there is one other thing universities still have to offer young adults: embodied community. I suspect that is the main, underlying reason for universities’ continued existence thus far, and their only hope of survival into the future.

Week #4

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On July 27, 2024

In EDCI 339

UDL: More than I can chew?

Reflection on the UDL (Universal Design for Learning) framework: It’s a big framework; just reading through the overview takes a while. None of the ideas strike me as bad and most strike me as good; it just seems like a lot to consider for a teacher who only has so much paid time to plan and needs to do something with the kids everyday, regardless of how UDL it is. But then I suppose an unwritten rule of teaching (that as a recovering perfectionist I’m still getting comfortable with in my life in general) is that improvement and learning require mistakes—from teachers as from students. I will not be able to implement the UDL framework wholesale in my teaching, but I can accept its principles as good-sounding guides to keep in mind, come back to, and continue learning from, and I can and will fail to exemplify its principles often. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad framework or that I’m a bad teacher; it just means there will always be room to do better.

Accessibility not everything

Not only can UDL seem overwhelming as a guiding framework, practical applications of the priority of student accessibility it enshrines have sometimes been suggested to me in less-than-winning ways. For example, a guest speaker in another EdTech class who was brought in to teach the importance of accessibility once opined that no field trip should take place that isn’t wheelchair accessible. As someone for whom remote outdoor field trips were one of the few consolations of my school life, this seemed a heartless punishment in the spirit of “if one person can’t have it, no one can.” I realize this stance is not a necessary outcome in the general pursuit of broader accessibility; it just clarified for me that a univariate fixation on universality as the summum bonum would be wrongheaded.

Positive application in a math lesson

That said, I have already seen clearly positive applications of UDL principles, both as a “teacher candidate” (student teacher) and as a student myself. As part of a 3-week teaching practicum this spring I taught a 5-lesson grade 4/5 math unit on the concepts of perimeter and area. While feedback from my mentor teacher was overwhelmingly positive, she did helpfully point out to me after the first of these lessons that in working one-on-one with a class-member whose math comprehension was still emerging, she had found herself pulling out manipulatives (math toys) to represent the principles I was teaching in a more tactile manner. With reference to the UDL framework, she suggested making such manipulatives available to students in the middle of every group’s table for use not only by singled-out “struggling” students but by whomever might find them a benefit. I readily agreed and this proved to be a clear and positive example of “designing to the edges“—making a probable benefit to some universally available as a potential benefit to all.

More than one way to show my work

I myself have also benefited, as a student. from applications of one of the basic ideas in UDL—providing multiple means of representation. My first attempt at completing a university degree was over ten years now and ended in failure. My big problem was finishing essays. The material was intellectually stimulating, my knowledge of English was probably above average, and I would dive deep into research and reflection, but a single sentence could easily balloon in my mind to an overwhelming problem—insoluble because it had innumerable solutions, but none of them quite right. Professors and fellow students would often remind me these were undergraduate assignments that I should just “get done,” but I truly didn’t know how. One day I showed up to an anthropology class on the due date of an incomplete assignment. I waited my turn to speak to the professor and make my confession of failure, but when I told him the situation (I had researched my chosen topic fairly thoroughly and come to some interesting conclusions, but sadly had nothing to show for my work) he simply invited me to share what I’d learned in a sit-down conversation with him after class. I took him up on his offer, he asked me about my topic, I told him all about it, he asked questions, I addressed them—it was lovely and easy and interesting and unlike any “showing my work” I’d ever done before. While at the time this was an anomaly, my most recent year of university courses has provided me with a few separate opportunities to show my work in video (oral) form, and all have resulted in work that both I and my professors have been very happy with.

More efficient learning

A related UDL-inspired boon to my post-secondary experience has been the occasional use of video or audio recordings for either direct teaching or other course content. My reading (as my writing) pace has always been relatively slow and careful, but taking in learning through audio is much more efficient. My consumption of books of all kinds has easily quintupled since subscribing to Audible, where (as on podcasts I also take in) listening speed can be adjusted. When course content is made available in other forms, school immediately feels less restrictive, difficult, and boring, and this is seen in the comparative ease with which my related work is done.

Onward

From these few examples from my own experience, I can extrapolate that many students could be benefited in countless other ways by educators thinking creatively from UDL principles and instituting applications as they come to them. In my own work as an educator I certainly look forward to doing so.

Photo by AndrĂ©s Dallimonti on Unsplash

Week 3!

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On July 23, 2024

In EDCI 339

In reflecting on this week’s resources and prompts, it strikes me that a huge factor affecting our experience of any individual interaction or participation in a community—whether mediated by digital technology or not—is our perception of the longevity of connections made.

How likely am I to run into you again?

For example, if I’m introduced to someone in person, my best guess as to the probability of us ever meeting again will impact how much I care about the relationship and even how I allow myself to behave within it; it will affect how real the relationship is to me—and perhaps even how real the other person is to me. If I meet someone in the flesh on a university campus where both of us are full-time students, the likelihood of us crossing paths again is relatively high compared with someone I might randomly meet in a part of town I’m rarely in. Still, the likelihood goes way up if I find we’re in the same program, interested in the same sorts of courses, and in the same year. If this is the case, my interlocutor is immediately more important to me, and the way I behave with them is also more important to me. It is in my own felt interest to maintain openness, cordiality and even a basic friendliness toward this person, as it could become awkward over time if I didn’t. However dull the intensity of our connection may be, this relationship (and who I am within it) will immediately matter more to me than many others.

And I doubt this is some personal quirk of mine; I think, however consciously, it plays into all of our interactions—again, whether mediated by digital technologies or not.

For another example, if I’m in an online course with people I have never met and have no expectation of ever meeting in person or elsewhere online, then the quality of my investment in the relationships formed, and my hope of finding a sense of belonging in the specific online community, will necessarily be relatively low. Yes, I’ll want to put my best foot forward and get along with everyone so as to facilitate harmonious collaborations, but my presence in the community will be qualitatively diminished in some way, because the entire community will exist in the compartment of my mind labeled “this one class I’m taking.” Of course this compartment could possibly open up to the rest of my life through some chance in-person meeting down the road, but it’s unlikely. For the time being, getting through the course remains the clear goal overarching all interactions within said compartment.

Presence, online and off

Now, my knee-jerk reaction to considering presence (social presence anyway) within online learning is that it is fundamentally less real simply by virtue of being online. And, to an extent, I hold with that reaction even after sober consideration. Embodiment makes a difference to humans—it just does and always will. I have been email penpals for years now with a fellow musician I admire and adore. But my adoration is necessarily tempered by the fact that he is not entirely real to me as a person, as we have never met, seen one another’s lips move in real time, or hugged. And yet, our friendship, such as it is, has proved durable. It is not enclosed within the mental compartment of any specific, short-term goal (such as completing this course). It is, in this sense, part of my real life.

So, how does this meditation on the significance of expected longevity in relationships speak to questions of online education? Well, for one thing it describes an important aspect of the student experience within online courses. That is, the nature of social stimulation within the course will differ from that found in in-person experiences. [Group work and even commenting on others’ work in this course, for example, will exist within what otherwise would be a social vacuum. And this is not a criticism!] So for teachers approaching online education, it is not merely a matter of replicating group experiences and their benefits online; it is a qualitatively different student experience from the start. Accordingly, the nature of their teaching presence in the course will be qualitatively different, whether they like it or not.

I think many teachers probably sense this truth, however they may articulate it, and this explains their reticence to approach online education as part of their professional activity. It is not teaching as they know it—not at all. It is, to many of them, a fundamentally different profession. And they’re not wrong.

Feature photo by Jan Huber on Unsplash

Week 2

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On July 15, 2024

In EDCI 339

Super-brief reading reflection: the two readings for this week were both well-written and interesting—I enjoyed them!

For the rest of this post I’ll be exploring a few technological innovations and their present and prospective impacts on education.

Google, Wikipedia, and knowledge acquisition

Wikipedia, in combination with powerful and popular search engines (most notably Google), has changed the learning landscape drastically. Not actually everything, but so many things, can so readily be learned with a simple search, and by searchers of any age with reading ability and access to the internet. As a consequence, teachers’ value as knowledge repositories and knowledge authorities has sunk drastically. In today’s learning environments, teachers are more easily seen for what has always been their primary role—group babysitters. As such, teachers still serve to keep students occupied and direct their learning (often away from more interesting topics and toward less interesting ones—but then almost everything becomes less interesting as soon as it is made obligatory), and many thrive in more of an overseer than an explainer role anyway. School tasks involving greater self-direction have also become more common, wherein teachers often serve as (besides babysitters) arbiters of information sources. In this capacity the first thing they do is rule out Wikipedia and un-cited Google search results.

YouTube and skills acquisition

Of course one could argue that school is more about learning skills than facts anyway, but here another set of technological developments has swooped in to supplement, and in many cases supplant, the role of a teacher as overseer of skills development: YouTube, and the proliferation of video processing, uploading, and viewing capability. For just about anything one doesn’t know how to do, some YouTuber can not only tell you but show you how to do it, explaining exactly what they’re doing while doing it. Also, for any class teacher a student ends up with, a clearer, funnier, and more efficient teacher is probably available for free on YouTube—and their lessons and explanations can be paused, slowed down, sped up, or replayed as needed. For anyone interested in learning how to, this is where it’s at. At institutions of higher learning, where students typically have unlimited internet access, professors’ explanations of anything other than their own Brightspace organization, class requirements, and grading rubrics are routinely superfluous. Taking a math class? Let Sal Khan teach you the entire course content for free and at your leisure.

Ubiquitous video capabilities also make possible new ways for students to demonstrate learning. Many classes are still writing-heavy, but more and more allow for video submissions where in the past an essay would have been required. For my personal preference this is still too rare: I’m a rather slow, plodding reader and writer, but a comparatively good listener and comfortable speaker, and any opportunity to both take in and show my learning in video form results in massive time savings.

AI and teacher obsolescence

The pervasive adoption of AI tools such as ChatGPT has recently introduced confounding problems to the educational enterprise. Chat can read and write, and so fulfill most academic tasks, giving original results every time. And it, too, is free. This virtually ensures its continual use by many, and disrupts professors’ ability to accurately evaluate and compare all students’ learning and efforts. Other applications of AI, such as those outlined in this TED talk will soon replace the need for teachers as learning assistants or aids. When AI tools that can train on any user’s preferred learning method, use of language, and current comprehension level are made freely available, they will be the world’s tutors.

At that point, not only will teachers no longer be needed for holding and imparting knowledge, skills, or even helpful advice, but their capacity to assess students’ learning will be increasingly compromised. And this may be just as well: truly student-centred learning may require the elimination of teaching. Consider Neo in the original Matrix movie. He is the student and kung fu is the subject. Does anyone feel sorry for him as he instantly downloads full theoretical and practical knowledge of his domain of choice? Is anyone feeling bad about the absence of a living, human teacher in this scenario? No, and as well they shouldn’t. A teacher would only impede learning.

But what about emotional support? Maybe teachers’ future roles are more like that of counsellors and child psychologists. Maybe, but in that case they should be trained in counselling, child psychology, and relationship building, not education. As for the prospect of AI making serious inroads into these professions, this too may be a matter of time—and years, not decades. For me, the most interesting meditation on this topic is still Spike Jonze’s movie Her. It is imaginative, speculative, mesmerizingly well acted, and in many ways almost certainly prescient.

One strong piece of evidence for the progressive, and very possibly positive, side-lining of teachers is the increasing popularity of online courses, which provide (to varying degrees) increased freedom and efficiency for those who want to learn. Online courses are also less likely to be disrupted by pesky pandemics, and all of these factors probably explain the results of a 2022 survey of American university applicants, in which 32% of respondents rated “the availability of online courses” as the most important or second most important consideration when looking at potential universities. While, for the moment, human professors design courses and prepare and manage their contents, existing and already well-functioning courses should require very little upkeep. If a course is complete and fully functional, any number of students should, in principle, be able to take it with little further effort required of the professor. This is already incentivizing teachers to teach less—or at least to repeat themselves less, which, as any babysitter will tell you, adds up to the same thing.

In summary, the robots are coming and teachers everywhere can safely look forward to having more than just summers off.

Week 1 in Distributed & Open Learning: EDCI 339 (A02)

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On July 11, 2024

In EDCI 339

Hi there. My name is Ben Vaughan and I’m going into my third year of the Bachelor of Education (Primary) program.

This is my very first blog post for EDCI 339! At this particular time, all links to the course website are giving me a “service unavailable” notice, and I don’t remember if there was a specific prompt for this particular post giving direction as to what to write about (although I’m sure I read a list of suggestions somewhere). So I will start by reflecting on my feelings about the course topic and content so far—and add to this later if that seems necessary.

My interest in the topic of distributed and open learning is relatively low (particularly at the moment—I just proposed and my fiancĂ©e and I are now planning our wedding for the end of next month); this particular course just happened to fit with my schedule and seemed less distateful than other courses. I’m in the Education program simply because I love working directly with kids, with a strong preference for outdoor, in-person education. I have a brother and a close friend who have always been interested in developments in technology and by contrast I can tell I just don’t have the same interest. On the contrary, I’ve always been something of a Luddite. I didn’t own a phone until my mid-thirties, when the job of summer camp director required me to.

Concerning digital identity cultivation, one of the best decisions I’ve made in recent years has been to discontinue use of all social media platforms. As an educator I would strongly recommend this to most students. The business of cultivating an online identity at all seems fraught. Over the past year I worked in after-school care and every day there watched kids becoming quickly and progressively addicted to their electronic devices, diving further into virtuality, fully embracing the systems of attention reward designed to keep them there. Would teaching them about the importance of not posting things rashly on social media so as to protect their future job prospects (etc.) be worthwhile? Perhaps it would. But it seems far from a crucial issue—making, on the whole, relatively little contact with questions of personal fulfillment and happiness.

All that said, I myself have made use of open learning in ways I’m grateful for. The most obvious example has been completing my first year classes for the current university program online, over the course of nine years, through the open learning department of Thompson Rivers University. So I cannot entirely be a negative Nancy on the subject. Online tools can certainly be used beneficially, and maintaining positive and active online profiles and presences can play an important role in job acquisition (etc.) and, by extension, a part in a modern life well lived.

But again, for anyone who can do without them, I would suggest eschewing digital identities as much as possible.

Brief reflection on this week’s readings: the articles were dry, jargon-y and in the case of the one on “socially being real and present on digital networks” poorly written, but I did read them through. The main takeaway from all of them is a frustration with the authors’ getting away with using words like “should” in the normative sense, without any further ethical inquiry. As I have suggested, it may be that in relation to well-being, one will be generally better off carefully avoiding rather than carefully curating digital identities. Whether my hunch is right or not, failure to address the question just seems careless, rendering the articles’ contents potentially irrelevant at best to concerned educators.

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