H817 Block 2 Activity 19: A 'connectivist' course.
Monday, 4 Apr 2016, 17:32
Visible to anyone in the world
Edited by Steve Bamlett, Monday, 4 Apr 2016, 17:35
In the Social Work partnership between Coketown University
and Coketown Health Alliance (a body comprising members from the statutory,
private and third sectors), a partner raised the idea that the connectivist
thinking he had learned on a MOOC he took resembled the work done to cement a
support or discharge plan in multi-disciplinary teams participating with stakeholders
capable of support across a number of formal and informal (family, partners, friends
etc.).
They all had to come together to provide support where the
links between them all were known and shared. He proposed this ‘taster’ course
for people beginning to form ‘circles of support’ in the community, which would
be planned on a connectivist metaphor.
The course would involve role-play of persons and objects in
the circle of support – for instance, the Asian male older service user and his
younger (44) male partner both used the internet. The service user visited the
mosque with a friend but he wanted that support too (his partner was a white
British atheist), although not at any cost to the latter.
What patterns of connectivity are necessary to build
support?
The situation as the course pictured it is above. The
particles in it, don’t appear to make any obvious pattern. But they will have
to, won’t they, if a circle of support is to be sustainable.
The course then:
Has an orienteering week, icebreakers, group
formation exercises, including unthreatening role-play.
The group talked about the persons, objects and
institutions. In three weeks, we wanted them all available to the Synchronic
Forum we were holding. How would they be represented / symbolised at the Forum –
done as a game.
A-Synchronic forum runs over 2 nights (2 x daily
visits per person). From 2nd day each person in the group would be
in role (the 1st day could help finalise negotiation. Roles
included:
Laptop
Service-User,
Partner
Mosque, Community Liaison Friend
Nurse
Consultant.
Social Worker
Etc.
In this a-synchronic forum, people would be
asked to express the views the people would honestly have knowing that your
views led to active commitments. The particular perspective (including
knowledge, skill and value base of each person would need to be imagined in a
way that could be realised in the discussion).
We would need to support the service-user in
activities including his needs and wishes and would need to establish these and
set them up as object roles if necessary. For instance he wants to continue
learning and teaching.
We would need to
decide a schedule of decisions that would need
to be made.
Anticipate any issues, problems, (‘what ifs’)
Make preliminary decisions
Represent the process of our decision-making
Devise a communication system for the circle of
support
Represent the outcomes of each decision in a way
that allowed for revisions if changes occurred
Anticipate goal / outcomes (perhaps first).
The course would be peer-assessed in terms of
the success of the process,
learning about the process including how need to
change process(es) can be recognised and executed,
the functional value of the products.
The assessment would be qualitative but
quantitative scores could be used to express achievement on a continuum of
possible efficacy and to set targets.
We
achieved 42%.
What
might be a reasonable improvement to aim for?
When?
Strengths of this model
It is about how a chaotic picture of multiple
factors can form patterns with which to work
It depends on and uses connections / links as a
process and a product
It needs to find ways of becoming self-aware as
a network as a whole
It combines concepts and fields and objects
(social, material, psychological)
It focuses on decisions, revisions in a
potentially never-ending cycle.
Weaknesses of this model
At present this proposal is for a small number
of people who already have a potential; common goal
If all community support is going to need to be
like this we have to imagine ways of incremental growth in the size of
populations entering the process – a ‘massive’ and heavily mu;tiple possibility.
The role-play element requires a notion of
presence.
But: is the latter a weakness the presence of bodies (especially
ones no longer under the same conscious control by persons) are a major object
in discharge decisions.
H817 Block 2 Activity 19: A 'connectivist' course.
In the Social Work partnership between Coketown University and Coketown Health Alliance (a body comprising members from the statutory, private and third sectors), a partner raised the idea that the connectivist thinking he had learned on a MOOC he took resembled the work done to cement a support or discharge plan in multi-disciplinary teams participating with stakeholders capable of support across a number of formal and informal (family, partners, friends etc.).
They all had to come together to provide support where the links between them all were known and shared. He proposed this ‘taster’ course for people beginning to form ‘circles of support’ in the community, which would be planned on a connectivist metaphor.
The course would involve role-play of persons and objects in the circle of support – for instance, the Asian male older service user and his younger (44) male partner both used the internet. The service user visited the mosque with a friend but he wanted that support too (his partner was a white British atheist), although not at any cost to the latter.
What patterns of connectivity are necessary to build support?
The situation as the course pictured it is above. The particles in it, don’t appear to make any obvious pattern. But they will have to, won’t they, if a circle of support is to be sustainable.
The course then:
Has an orienteering week, icebreakers, group formation exercises, including unthreatening role-play.
The group talked about the persons, objects and institutions. In three weeks, we wanted them all available to the Synchronic Forum we were holding. How would they be represented / symbolised at the Forum – done as a game.
A-Synchronic forum runs over 2 nights (2 x daily visits per person). From 2nd day each person in the group would be in role (the 1st day could help finalise negotiation. Roles included:
Laptop
Service-User,
Partner
Mosque, Community Liaison Friend
Nurse
Consultant.
Social Worker
Etc.
In this a-synchronic forum, people would be asked to express the views the people would honestly have knowing that your views led to active commitments. The particular perspective (including knowledge, skill and value base of each person would need to be imagined in a way that could be realised in the discussion).
We would need to support the service-user in activities including his needs and wishes and would need to establish these and set them up as object roles if necessary. For instance he wants to continue learning and teaching.
We would need to
decide a schedule of decisions that would need to be made.
Anticipate any issues, problems, (‘what ifs’)
Make preliminary decisions
Represent the process of our decision-making
Devise a communication system for the circle of support
Represent the outcomes of each decision in a way that allowed for revisions if changes occurred
Anticipate goal / outcomes (perhaps first).
The course would be peer-assessed in terms of
the success of the process,
learning about the process including how need to change process(es) can be recognised and executed,
the functional value of the products.
The assessment would be qualitative but quantitative scores could be used to express achievement on a continuum of possible efficacy and to set targets.
We achieved 42%.
What might be a reasonable improvement to aim for?
When?
Strengths of this model
It is about how a chaotic picture of multiple factors can form patterns with which to work
It depends on and uses connections / links as a process and a product
It needs to find ways of becoming self-aware as a network as a whole
It combines concepts and fields and objects (social, material, psychological)
It focuses on decisions, revisions in a potentially never-ending cycle.
Weaknesses of this model
At present this proposal is for a small number of people who already have a potential; common goal
If all community support is going to need to be like this we have to imagine ways of incremental growth in the size of populations entering the process – a ‘massive’ and heavily mu;tiple possibility.
The role-play element requires a notion of presence.
But: is the latter a weakness the presence of bodies (especially ones no longer under the same conscious control by persons) are a major object in discharge decisions.
So there it is!
Steve