Comments on: Yes you ARE a role model!

By: Kim Flintoff

Kim Flintoff — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 09:08:17 +0000

Hi Kerry, I think I know the conference. I think many of aspire to be role models – and sometimes we get caught out and do it all wrong despite the good intentions. I know – I think I was presenting at the same conference and I have very intention of running a practical session from the beginning, but I got caught up talking… and the practical stuff was relegated to the end when there was too little time. As soon as I finished I knew what I should have done… I should have started by diving into the practical activity and explained the purpose only if it wasn’t apparent to the participants… that’s the great thing about being a reflective practitioner… we learn from our experience… especially when someone takes the time to considerately guide our thinking…

SNAFU can happen to us all.

The good thing about learning is that when it goes awry we can still learn… sometimes we learn about what not to do, other times we discover an inventiveness in ourselves that seeks to solve the problem creatively – I think you’ve demonstrated in the “What If” questions you posed.

Everyone is at different stages of learning and I don’t think there is a commonly agreed upon lexicon for new technology use… when I say social network is it the same as what you think?

We’re all role models… just modelling difference…

By: Kerry

Kerry — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 04:09:22 +0000

What can we do as educators then to model the behaviours we discuss? Cuz’ it’s not just Second Life conferences where we can find these ironic situations of one sage talking about the “wisdom of the crowds”….

By: Dean groom

Dean groom — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 03:54:45 +0000

Motivation to be in any mmo is to interact and participate. Sadly two decades of office automation leads to numb discussions. I’ve been to SL events with the ‘big’ US shift advocates, who routinely only interact with existing friend networks and ignore the crowd. I like to ask students to use tinychat to comment on what I’m saying, so I can answer their questions as I go. The three Rs: realism, relevence and retention. Powerpoint is none of these. Designed by techies so that they didn’t have to talk to the suits at mircosoft. Ironic the anti-meeting too became the bohemoth it is today.

Learning to deal with the backchannel means thinking on your feet, dealing with a crowd. Some can’t deal with it. Some thrive on it. Me, I’m too tight to upload slides to Linden. That’s my excuse.

By: Kerry

Kerry — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 03:46:19 +0000

Thanks for that Sarah! Another dimension of my frustration this morning that I’ll save for a future blog post is that I fear academia needs to be change or we’ll end up with a society incredibly skilled at and focused on justifying their opinions and preconceptions at the expense of debate and learning.

By: Sarah Stewart

Sarah Stewart — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 03:30:57 +0000

Thanks for this post, Kerry, and for challenging as I am getting into ‘teaching’ people about social networking. In fact, your thoughts are relevant to teaching of any topic. Cheers, Sarah