Cronin comes into focus

I'm reading (meaning making) and deconstructing (analyzing) Catherine Cronin's article Open Education, Open Questions in order to better understand the layers and levels she describes for open "individuals seek to balance privacy and openness in their use of social and participatory technologies at four levels (see figure 3): macro (global level), meso (community/network level), micro (individual level), and nano (interaction level)."

C. Cronin, CC SA

The graphic clarifies the negotiations that individuals (me, my students) continually make when teaching and learning with/about digital literacies. This is compounded by the pressures all educators face as they venture into the public eye of the profession. Teachers candidates who are new to the profession are negotiating through even tougher decisions as their persona as a student shifts to one of being a public teacher. Their decisions are based on multiple levels of emotional responses beyond the course requirements I may establish for them to shift into public, digital spaces. For example, I don't require my students to sign up and use Twitter but I do require them to sign up and use a blog as part of the course assignments. In creating their blog space, I do not require the students to make their blog public so many keep their settings on private or turn of search optimizations. I invite the students at two points in the course to allow me to link their blog sites to the course site - once at mid point and again at the end of the course. I don't assign specific topics for their blog responses but do require four submissions over the duration of the course. Many will post extensively and build the blog as a learning repository, while others may only do the required posts. For me, blogging allows the students to model and experience identity building, reputation management and digital participation, all elements of the critical digital literacy of persona.

Maybe I should include this graphic into my teaching - it may help students understand that everyone is in the practice of negotiating many layers within digital spaces. Something to consider.

NOTES:

Cronin, C. (2017, October 17). Open education, open questions. Educause Review. Retrieved from https://er.educause.edu/articles/2017/10/open-education-open-questions  

The graphic is licensed under Creative Commons and openly available at https://www.slideshare.net/cicronin/open-culture-open-education-open-questions/24