Remixing - it's not obvious

Serendipity led me to Bryan Mather's blog post on the OER18 conference website this morning [It's Obvious].
From there I took a turn on remixing his images in a way that made meaningful connections for me.
The remixed image:

Here's the link to the remixed image in the Sandbox Gallery.

Then, I tweeted out to others to extend their interactions.

Followed by an addition of this item to the Ontario Extend 'make one' - this was a first time for me.
Openly creating and making, code breaking (with hex colour codes for fun) and connecting.

Your Inner Superhero Awaits

The eCampus Ontario THE CATCH is a newsletter that is published in the open and shares ideas, tips, and resources for anyone in higher education, but these can also be applied to teaching and learning in K-12 contexts in some way. This week's Catch included a couple of little items that I had shared - another way to curate and collect in open digital spaces.

The Open Source Super Hero Characters, which are recognized to be open source and in the public domain, caught my eye. I immediately found one on the main page listing, that I'll weave into my course in the coming weeks - Storyteller. Once on the page for the character, there is an image, their origin story, and a description of their powers & abilities. At the bottom of the page is this note: "Storyteller is an open source character created specifically for use by anyone. Feel free to use it any way you wish, author citations are not necessary."

Following the links for the image, I was able to download a full sized version for use in my course context, with a proviso to include the following statement when using the image: "The character of (Character Name) is available for use by anyone, with only one condition. This paragraph must be included in any publication involving (Character Name), in order that others may use this property as they wish. All rights reversed."

So for educators working on opening their pedagogical practices, there is a need for conversations about how to weave this type of resource into their course as a mechanism to engage students. I plan to use this character as a catalyst for the student's digital storytelling project and provide the link so students can find their own superhero, read their origin story and perhaps build a storyline with  classmates about their superhero's journey.

For educators working on opening their pedagogical practices, there is a need for a curated set of open source, public domain, Creative Commons licensed resources, such as the superhero characters. The challenge is finding the right resource at the right time. That's why newsletters and mail lists are an invaluable tool for teachers, educators and designers if they are openly shared.

Finding it in my stream

"Every metaphor does four things: 

It creates something new; it obsoletes something old; 

it rekindles something from the past, and it sets the stage for its own reversal."

Marshall McLuhan

This morning I received an email. This led to a twitter search for one of the people included in the email chain, someone new to my networks who has similar interests (@sam_bruzzese). This lead to looking at the twitter stream from this other individual to examine interests and activities. Which led me to an insightful tweet with a link. This link was to a document written by Marshall McLuhan in 1957 titled Classrooms Without Walls.

After reading this, I immediately returned to twitter and re-tweeted to send it out to others, tagging some individuals who may find it interesting, along with hashtags to extend the conversation. In the world of open, connected learning, this is how ideas and knowledge is built and disseminated. Over time, one share or one conversation at a time. The importance is to tag people in your network who may be interested in seeing the document or information. AND THAT is the challenge! Knowing your 'audience' in media terms. Knowing your network in connected learning terms. Responsive PLNing in digital circles.

With this one event, it heightens my awareness of the responsibility I have to share to people, not just circles or networks, but to individuals in my particular spheres of influence. This takes time, but it also requires me to dig a little deeper to find the connections when algorithms fail to find them. I rechecked twitter handles and hashtags, revisited email links, and even back checked the original site where the document was found in order to verify it's source. This led me to the Thornburg Center and a collection of other handouts from David Thornburg's collection of notes and presentations.

The 'feedback' from sharing the tweet continued, with some people sharing a quote that was meaningful (making meaning).

SoTL - what is it ... really?

Just reading a bit more about what this action research project is and how I should conduct this work. A colleague in the faculty shared her reflection on the process and outcomes of some work she had done while quilt making. She wrote "I kept a journal of my reflections while quilt-making. I analyzed my journal entries and developed themes that communicate what I think are important about the process and outcomes". I'll need to talk to her further about this project and how she conducted the analysis of her journal entries. (analyzying - interrogating, selecting, deconstructing). 

Reading about the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL), I came across a description that clarifies the difference between good teaching, scholarly teaching and the scholarship of teaching & learning (see reference below, page 38). This one statement caught my attention "Teachers engaged in SoTL projects frame research questions, systematically gather and explore evidence, reflect on and refine new ideas, and craft the results in a form that is suitable for public presentation and peer review (Cambridge, 2001; Christensen Hughes, 2005)." This helps me reframe my thinking about what I'm going to do, but I need to carefully rethink the research question to make sure it leads my data gathering, not the other way around. This particular document is a good one to come back to for re-reading. Lots of great information here. (analyzing - interrogating; meaning making - reading)

I'm also reading and locating resources about research methodologies to clarify the steps I'll need to take in this action research project. Since I want to focus on my own teaching practice, I'll need to be aware of data management and analysis methodologies that will apply to this form of research. The document linked below has some descriptions as well as links to resources and books that can be helpful.

Reference:

Elgie, S., Childs, R., Fenton, N., Levy, B. A., Lopes, V., Szala-Meneok, K., & Wiggers, R. D. (2012). Researching Teaching and Student Outcomes in Postsecondary Education: A Guide. Toronto: Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario. Retrieved from http://www.heqco.ca/SiteCollectionDocuments/HEQCO%20Researching_Student_Outcomes%20ENG.pdf