Not your mother's AV club: Women in ed tech

Leslie Madsen Brooks — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 01:01:49 -0500

No, this isn't another "where are the women in technology?" post. After all, we all know the answer to that question: here on BlogHer. :) Rather, this is a round-up of what some of my favorite women ed tech bloggers are thinking about these days. Some trends: reflections on their place in the profession and the technosphere, thoughts on the challenges faced by e-learners, and considerations of gaming.

Reflections

Janet Clarey wonders what she should call herself. Learning professional? Training Manager? Certainly there's something less. . .prosaic? We've had the same discussions at my workplace; some folks prefer "academic developer," while others of us simply use "teaching guru." ;)

Clarey also asks why women edubloggers aren't making people's "top edubloggers" lists. (Check out the comments on this post for some good discussion.)

Jen Jones at Injenuity confesses to some insecurities about the field of educational technology. An excerpt:

I’m starting to feel uncomfortable with the field of practice known as “educational technology.” I’m certainly not the first to bring this up and I’ve read some excellent arguments on either side. I’m approaching 10 years in this field and am finally wondering why we, the educational technologists, who are often the last people to access teachers, are the ones expected to influence them in such a way that they fundamentally change their entire concept of teaching and learning. By the time we get to them, it’s often too late. We are tasked with “infusing” technology in teaching that is inherently flawed. A technology bandaid is not the solution. Those of us who have an understanding of teaching and learning should have the first access to future teachers. If the teaching, if we should even use that label ( My new favorite label is “Sherpa!”), is appropriate, there’s no need for educational technologists.

Challenges faced by e-learners

Stephanie Sandifer writes about bridging the gap from e-learning theory to e-learning practice. I particularly enjoyed her reflections on the literacies that e-learning professionals and others need to help students develop:

if we REALLY believe that online learning is a major aspect of the “future of education”, then we better get much more serious about LITERACY education at all levels across all borders. By literacy I mean reading, writing, listening, speaking, and thinking - but especially reading & writing at a highly proficient level that enables the learner to be able to read & write fluently, intelligently, and critically. Those skills will determine the ability of any learner to be successful in a 100% online learning experience.

Jen Jones considers how best to introduce people to personal digital learning. I'm quoting from her blog at length because her assessment is, I think, very insightful:

Maybe I would have a better understanding of the issues if I approach immersion in personal learning as a job. Here’s where I see parallels:

* Building a personal learning network is work.
* Not everyone is qualified to do it.
* Not everyone wants to do it.
* Basic soft skills, such as customer service, communications, and feedback fundamentals, are required.
* There is a learning period before mastery, and this period is a different length for everyone.
* Mentor relationships allow for faster immersion and sustained growth.
* Mastery of tools enables more accurate work, efficiency and better decision-making.
* The physical (digital) environment affects perception and attitude and influences productivity.
* Knowledge sticks when learning is situated.

When I look at it as a job, I can see why introducing it to groups en masse doesn’t lead to successful adoption. It’s almost like assigning everyone the same job after graduation. Somehow, the introduction of the PLN must take into account individual and self. This makes me wonder if it’s possible to develop a prior learning assessment that will help identify whether or not people are prepared to participate in personal learning in digital environments. I’m not sure what this would look like, but I think we could start by examining those we know who have either not been successful, despite valiant attempts, or who have rejected the concept upon introduction.

I think we are at the point where we can admit that this is not something that will work for everyone. To make the experience valuable, participants need technical skills, social maturity, emotional stability, self-control, professionalism, empathy, critical thinking ability, and common sense. They need a conceptual understanding of social media the ability to select appropriate tools for individual situations. Not everything on this list is teachable or even something that can be mediated.

Click through to Jen's post to read her cautions about pitfalls and her recommended interventions.

Barbara Ganley once again reflects on the utility of slow blogging and other creative digital media at this moment in time:

I’m thinking about the future today not only because I am all a-jitter about the election next week but because something is going on with my former students. Malaise. Over the past week my mailbox, my email box, Facebook, phone have been awash in contacts from my old students. They’re nervous, uneasy, confused. The ones still in school are restless, missing the wild cycles of disruption and repair we experienced together in class. Why aren’t their courses electrifying, they ask. Why isn’t there the sense of community they now crave? Creativity? Risk-taking in the classroom? What do traditional disciplines taught in traditional ways have to do with the world exploding around them? The ones outside of school are reporting back with examples of digital creativity, and with questions about how to find or create spaces for creativity, for connection, for collaboration that will help change the world.

Thoughts on gaming

Mimi Ito writes on how gaming influences civic engagement among youth. An excerpt:

Overall, the study found that teens who have high levels of civic gaming experiences also tend to have high levels of civic and political engagement. They also found that teens who tend to play with others in real life also have higher rates of civic and political engagement than teens who primarily play alone, and that the same was true for teens who have social interaction around the game, such as commenting on web sites or contributing to online discussion groups. One of the more surprising findings was that the link to civic and political engagement did not hold for teens who played with others online. Included in this category are both more casual “pick-up” forms of online play as well as more intensive forms, such as in MMO guilds. This deserves further investigation; my guess is that the different forms of online play would have different relationships to civic engagement measures. In our observations of youth gaming practice, we’ve found certain forms of engagement that are highly social, but much more focused on competition and performance than what you would think of as a more expansive civic orientation, while other forms of gaming have more explicitly civic and political agendas. The more we can get specific about these different dimensions of practice, the more we can begin to untangle the threads that tie together gaming activity with different dimensions of kids’ lives.

Laura Blankenship asks her fellow game players to get a grip:

The thing is, those that take the game seriously often give those of us that don't a hard time. I've been in PvP battlegrounds where people have asked me to leave cause I'm going to bring the rest of the "team" down. They've yelled at everyone for "sucking." I've called people out for this behavior before, reminding them specifically that they're playing a video game and to chill out. If someone wants to run a battleground before their character is ready and die all the time, who cares? Does it really matter that much? Isn't it just about having fun? I've also seen people so focused on getting the right gear that they pretty much ignore other parts of the game. Of course, the things I focus on--exploring new areas, raising my professions--are things that would immediately get called "gay" (that's the most common epithet I've seen for disapproval of gameplay).

These questions about and reflections on gaming are important ones. Will gaming invigorate civic (and civil) discourse, or will gendered differences in the use of ubiquitous technologies lead to more disturbing, and decidedly uncivil, experiences like that experienced by Sarah Robbins in an airport?

What's going on with you? Are you slow blogging, gaming, reflecting on your place in your profession or the blogosphere? And how, where, and why do you learn online?

Leslie Madsen-Brooks develops learning experiences for K-12, university, and museum clients. She blogs at The Clutter Museum, Museum Blogging, and The Multicultural Toybox.

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Not your mother's AV club: Women in ed tech