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Henry James Robinson

Digital Visitors and digital residents

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Edited by Henry James Robinson, Monday, 13 Apr 2020, 07:50


Image: 'Digital literacy disciplines' Creative Commons

Digital Visitors and digital residents

I recall exploring the concept of ‘digital natives versus digital immigrants’ (Prensky 2001) in a previous iteration of my journey into open learning/teaching and education as a now quaint idea that digital technology belonged to the millennials who grew up as Web 2.0 was taking hold and those born to earlier generations were immigrants, needing to pass some kind of naturalisation procedure to gain residency or full digital-age citizenship.  The ageism aspect of it tended to go over our heads, as we realised that digital citizenship was more a matter of exposure and interest than age.  Bennett, Maton, and Kervin (2008) found as much difference in technological know-how between those born during the coming of the full-on digital age of the late 90s to early 21st century as between those born earlier. Take my students, born in conservative Central Asia.  My impression is there is a technology gap between girls and boys and between my students and western students of UK, US and Australia, as my region, emerges from its post-soviet isolation – very rapidly I might add. Kazakhstan ranks highest in terms of internet access of all Central Asian countries, however, behind Russia and much of the world. Internet only appeared in 1994 in Kazakhstan, but it ranks 61st place out of 177 countries for broadband Internet speed. 

The concept of ‘digital natives versus digital immigrants’ has since been modernised and now the terms ‘digital visitors’ and ‘digital residents’ (White and Le Cornu 2011) are in currency – those that only occasionally use a technology and who have not developed much expertise in its use and those who use a tech often and who developed some expertise in its use.  White on his website, and in an accompanying video describes his approach to mapping an individual’s level of acculturalisation to a technology, including the use of his openly licenced software.

I decided to map my own level of engagement with different technologies using White and Le Cornu’s ‘Visitors and Residents’ concept (e.g. including my use of, VLEs, blogs, Facebook, Skype, etc.), cross-referenced with my adaptation of their personal/institutional axis  (I break it into social, professional and educational) as well as the visitors/resident one. I used Miro, the online collaborative whiteboard platform to create my grid. Click on this link to see my visualisation:

Henry’s Visitors and Residents’ concept (public)

Henry’s Visitors and Residents’ concept (course members – editable)

If you can, feel free to adapt the model I created in any way you please and send me an image or link of your version of the model!

I found it a useful way to reflect on my current use and to consider other technologies I do not use, especially when comparing my grid with others’ on my course, whose were often very different, based on their jobs, experience etc.  

 


References

Prensky, M. (2001) ‘Digital natives, digital immigrants part 1’, On the horizon, 9(5), 1–6.

White, D. and Le Cornu, A. (2011) ‘Visitors and residents: a new typology for online engagement’, First Monday, vol. 16, no. 9, 5 September 2011 [Online]. Available at http://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/3171/3049 (Accessed 21 October 2019).


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Henry James Robinson

Student co-creation of wiki's and open textbooks (benefits)

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Edited by Henry James Robinson, Saturday, 4 Apr 2020, 08:21

Hello everyone

In this offering, I summarise my findings on the reading of DeRosa (2016), My open textbook: pedagogy and practice, which explores learning through the creation of open educational resources (e.g when students create a textbook and publish online for everyone and anyone to use and learn about the process) in reflecting on my own experience of OER on several MOOCS I've been a part of. 



Image Source: 
Opensourceway / CC BY-SA

DeRosa's (2016), 'My open textbook: pedagogy and practice' is an almost too good to be true example of open educational practice. The course I currently study on (the Open University H817 course, 'Openness and innovation in e-Learning') and other courses I've studied on have utilized open pedagogy, which is why I say 'too good to be true ' - almost. Open Pedagogy is defined by BC Campus (2020) as:

'the use of open educational resources ...with a goal of improving education...inviting ...students to be part of the teaching process, participating in the co-creation of knowledge.'

and my own experience of open pedagogy for me illustrates some of the potential benefits and drawbacks of open pedagogy for some.  But Rosa's experience doesn't surprise me.  It is simply an open pedagogical example of a perfect storm - a serendipitous coming together of the right ingredients - keen students who love their subject, who quickly form a cohesive team, ably aided by an adventurous, knowledgable teacher with a similar zest for exploration and collaboration.  Here are some of the pros and cons most mere mortals will encounter:

Potential drawbacks
if there is no consistent group to begin with (e.g. there is a rolling enrollment where new, uninitiated students keep popping up)
if 'training' is needed pre-task, such as how to use an app or an approach to learning only a few learners are unfamiliar or uncomfortable with.  Using an online platform, students may not be able to find what they are looking for to take part in a group task
if no one has time or opportunity - online courses involve people from all over the world, different time zones and often with previous commitments - unlike a group of college students whose main commitment is the course

Benefits
As DeRosa points out, the benefits of the approach far outweigh the potential drawbacks. It is worth facing the drawbacks because in many ways, even the embarrassing pitfalls (on many levels) aid learners in their search for rich, worthwhile ( you'll get there in the end) and meaningful (transferable realistic) learning experiences: students become independent doers and teachers what they need to be more often - learners.  As roles switch and educator/learner realise their roles are becoming more flexible, a new relationship between teacher/learners evolves and brings them closer together. At the same time, learners see each other more as companions on a learning journey that they need each other to complete.


In our little micro experience of open pedagogy (creating a group wiki) all of the drawbacks occurred. Nevertheless, groups did get it together to create a wiki page with links that each member had worked on to create the site. Some of us question whether the experience had come too early in the course.  Because of the insight it gave me in one vital area of the course content, I was very glad for what it gave me. We immediately felt a group responsibility to do our part or to let others know what we could contribute at the very least, in most cases.  This motivated a lot of us to go beyond to help the group and not lose group 'face'. 

Though some of us (me) had not built a wiki before, I am sure we will be even more interested and engaged the next time we are asked to do something like it again.  Thi sis an example of how a group task can motivate to learn more when working alone, it's possible to just hide and hope no one notices you, which works in many cases.   I am much more motivated as well to extol the benefits of wikis to my learners, asking them to open a free account and set up wikis of their own and of learning how to create open resources such as open textbooks.  


I end with a paraphrase of some of Rosa's tips about what can help  make open pedagogy a success:

  • Rome was not built in a day.  Look at the whole experience as a work-in-progress in one approach to more effective learning. Quote: 'it will continually improve as learners engage with it.'
  • If it connects with the course aims and / or more importantly, with students' own learning goals, it is worthwhile.
  • Nowadays there are resources for learning how to do anything - get with it.  In Rosa's class's case 'Learn how to openly license your book and learn how to get it online so folks can access and share it' (DeRosa 2016). 

Reference

DeRosa R. (2016) ‘My open textbook: pedagogy and practice’ [Online]. Available at: http://robinderosa.net/ uncategorized/ my-open-textbook-pedagogy-and-practice/ (Accessed 21 October 2019).


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