Where do I start?

I'm struggling with decision anxiety these days.

It's as if I've never done this before, but I have. It's as if I've never had these issues before, but I have. I'm opening up a Domain of One's Own through Reclaim Hosting - it's a gift of ownership and agency from eCampus Ontario. It's an opportunity to start over, begin anew, build my persona with care and intention. Be at the helm of it all - push and pull, flip the switch, start the engines. It's a surprisingly scary place to be for someone who's been blogging, tweeting and building course sites for many years.

BUT WHERE DO I START?

This is probably what every newbie shouts when they first start blogging, or join twitter, or connect through Facebook, or any of those other social media spaces. I thought it would be easier than it is - each decision hinges on the one before. Each layer builds on the level already created. I'm reluctant to start or shift things around, but I know I will. I just need to figure out where to start. Which dial or lever needs my attention first.

In reflection on this in relation to my own teaching practice and my learning in the open, I'm wondering how to re-build courses under my new domain, or even if I should. I'm wondering how my previous domain can be disconnected or even if it should. Once you've got a digital footprint, or tattoo, how do you go about shifting it when you want to reclaim and revise the image or impression. In this digital world that doesn't forget, how do you reshape the space you call your own? I'm about to find out.

I've started with the 'splash page' where it's very basic info about me. From there, I created a new blog and connected it to a subdomain. Now I'm looking at the design and structure of my MAIN blog site as a representation of me. From there, I'll see how my previous WordPress blog site - Five Flames 4 Learning - can be integrated into the domain architecture and nestled into the cPanel space. Little steps, exploring the dials for now. More tinkering and playing to come.

Putting it in the Bank

Part of the Extend East activities includes adding ideas and thoughts to the 'bank' of information available to other extenders. For each module, there are a variety of activities or teaching & learning tasks to select from - it'll become a rich repository of great ideas, crowd sourced from extending participants.

The six modules follow the framework set up by this graphic [CC licensed] that outline mindsets and actions required by educators in current higher education contexts. These include

• Teacher for learning
• Curator
• Technologist
• Collaborator
• Scholar
• Experimenter

These are not new to me, but I'm engaging with them as an experienced educator who has more to learn. Since there are many opportunities in these modules to enrich my perspectives and reframe my understanding, I'm engaging as much as I can. I'll continue to contribute to the bank and keep a record of my 'deposits' to track my 'return on investments'.

My first four 'deposits' include

• Misunderstood

  Analogy for Learning

  https://extend-bank.ecampusontario.ca/examples/analogy-for-learning/

• Concept Map

  Mapping it out

  https://extend-bank.ecampusontario.ca/examples/mapping-it-out/

• Cornell Notes

  Combining strategies

  https://extend-bank.ecampusontario.ca/examples/combining-strategies-cornell-and-sketching/

• Driving a Car

  Lesson Plans

  https://extend-bank.ecampusontario.ca/examples/lesson-plans-are-like-learning-how-to-drive-a-car/

The first one, a blog post, caught the attention of Doug Peterson, who talked about this with Stephen Hurley on VoicEd Canada in their weekly podcast This Week in Ontario Edublogs. I happened to see the notification on Twitter and caught the live radio show, but will now go back and link in the 'banked' recording. I'm always excited when my blogs extend beyond and catch other's attention. I'm humbled by the power and potential of sharing my words and what they may mean to others.