INTRODUCTION
– Beyond Information Overload
"I'll
be staying at home tomorrow – I really need to get some
work done." How
many times have you heard this from colleagues and friends
in the last year? How
many times have you said it yourself?
"We've been playing catch-up so long. Until recently, we always knew what we _had_ to do.
But now, the opportunities to make really bonehead
choices have multiplied enormously.
And we have even less time left over from our
ongoing routine responsibilities." – Phil Long,
MIT.
Do
you ever make a list of priorities in the morning for your
work, and then at the end of the day notice that you
haven’t begun the first item?
1. How can each of us, individually, avoid being both
overconnected and disconnected?
That is, how can we each find a reasonable balance
between taking advantage of the increasing variety of
brief, asynchronous communications without losing too many
opportunities for more meaningful face-to-face or direct
voice interaction?
2. How can information technology's new capabilities be used to
improve teaching and learning without impeding our efforts
to achieve the old educational values we cherish most?
·
Connected
Education: New
Options,
Pedagogical Consciousness, Safe Classrooms
|
3. What can be done to help faculty members who become
"pedagogically conscious" – aware of
pedagogical options and feeling responsible to make
conscious and conscientious choices about teaching and
learning? How
can they be rewarded for making such efforts?
[How can they at least avoid being punished for
acting on such concerns?]
4. What are the characteristics of face-to-face interactions
that we need to recognize and take advantage of as
educators? In what ways can electronic media be used to foster (the
same? other kinds of?) "human moments"?
There are certainly moments of intense human
connection that can be mediated: love letters being a
time-honored example. Should we reserve the term "human moment" for
instances that involve face-to-face interaction (even
across twenty rows of seats)?
See work of Edward Hallowell, e.g. at, http://www.tltgroup.org/OK/SessionMainPage.htm#_Toc528580883
5. How do we change the
classroom so that it becomes a connected, safe place,
where cynical behavior is not rewarded?
How can a faculty member maintain the rigor of
learning an academic discipline while developing an
environment that fosters connectedness?
Tom Marino of Temple University Medical School says:
"I have found that as we try to change the
classroom and try to foster collaboration, connectedness,
safety, that at least for many of my students, they
translate this to mean a weak, wishy-washy,
non-challenging classroom.
When you then ask them to work hard they are
surprised and angry."
6. How often do you hear colleagues say "I'll be staying at
home tomorrow because I really need to get some work
done"? What
conditions does that reflect?
Do you see anyone who is exempt from the rising
workload?
7. Are there people at your institution who have developed
effective ways of managing a large number of electronic
mail messages each day?
What are their secrets?
8. What existing services and expertise could help those who are
suffering from the consequences of an increasing workload,
changing conditions, and new expectations?
What new services or resources could you imagine
would help? Anything
via the Web? Anything
that might be developed and sustained by
inter-departmental collaboration?
Inter-institutional
collaboration?
9.
Are expectations about improving teaching and
learning with information technology rising rapidly at
your institution? Are
the resources and services available to faculty for this
purpose increasing as rapidly?
At all? Decreasing?
Can you describe some local symptoms of this
"Support Service Crisis"?
10.
What are some of the unique resources that might be
mobilized to combat this crisis?
Students (as technology and pedagogy assistants)?
Faculty who are able and willing to help their
colleagues ("Compassionate Pioneers")?
Expertise of academic support professionals?
Others?
11.
What might be done to help everyone see how to
match expectations more closely with available resources?
How can academic leaders more realistically
anticipate and prepare for the consequences of encouraging
more faculty members to become more deeply engaged with
instructional uses of information technology?
12.
In many institutions of higher education it seems
that a certain level of depersonalized disconnectedness is
essential for effective operation of the system.
Is this a mirage or an essential characteristic?
What can be done to enable more people to
participate more effectively with less fear and cynicism?
Excerpt
from Hallowell's book _Connect_:
"If an individual tries to create a connected
atmosphere in a disconnected workplace, he must be
prepared for the group to attack him.
The members of a disconnected workplace often have
hidden reasons for wanting the workplace to stay the way
it is. This
is why, early in my training, I was taught the adage. 'no
good deed goes unpunished.'"
13.
How and when can you enable more people to discuss
these questions and act on the implications of their
answers?
As
all this change continues,
14.
What do you most hope to gain?
15.
What do you cherish most and hope not to lose?
16.
How much can you work for these goals?
