Fire team chats again

Today the fire group had our second online collaborative chat to plan our discussion moderating assignment, and I think that it went really well. We made our decisions and chose 5 questions which each of us will monitor throughout the week, summarizing our findings, and collecting urls and resources as the week progresses. I worry a little bit about having too many questions....will it be overwhelming for the class?

In addition to the daily moderating of the discussion I need to have my content for the group website ready for Wednesday, work with Denise on our partner reading, and do an interview for our group project on Wednesday. It will be a busy week!

It will be interesting to be participants in the partner activity this week as I think Selia is trying to create a task where we need to work through exactly what the article suggests! Although Denise and I are ahead of the game with developing social presence since we know each other from another course and have been chatting on the phone, the idea of working through negotiations to create a project is appealing to me. Of course, being a proponent of project-based learning, makes me a believer already!

I'm a bit concerned about my ability to design my own website. It seems to take forever for me to make decisions about how it should look, and I'm rather non-linear in my thinking, so I worry about it looking disjointed and jumping all over the place. I'm not confident in my artistic abilities, so I'm going to have to really browse around and learn from others. I'm also considering a narrower focus...perhaps just project-based learning and constructivist uses of technology is an better focus.

CONNECTIONS! I GET IT!

I love my group! We are chugging away like troupers and I couldn't ask for a greater bunch of ladies to work with!

I've had a breakthrough today and have to thank Deborah for an article she sent me that gives me the big picture on Holistic Education and I'll provide the link here when I get it.

Jack Miller the holistic ed guru at OISE describes the polarity in education; competition versus compassion. Holistic education is a broader vision of education and human development together, focusing on:

• balance
• inclusion
  
• connection

Picture a complex set of sliders used for music mixing; there are so many sliders and the perfect music will be created with just the right balance on a lot of variables.

• individual learning and group learning
• analytic thinking and intuitive thinking
• content and process
• learning and assessment
• collaborative learning and passive learning
• exploration and guidance

The three foundational approaches to education (transmissive, transactional, and transformational) are not defended by holistic educators, but instead a balance between the approaches seems most suitable to meeting student needs.

It's a returning to the basics of what students need as human beings....do we want great test takers, or compassionate, mindful, healthy and socially responsible citizens?

Understanding this focus on connections will hopefully help with both discussion moderation next week and the group project on Community and Connections.