As usual, here are my reflections for each discussion topic to share with you and to help you to conclude our Lesson 5 discussions.
KEY-1-OCoP-Instructor's Reflection: Hard & Soft Online Technology
OCoP is more challenging than FTF CoP. Agree?
Some educators asked. We must integrate group work into OCoP to reach effective interaction. Do you agree or disagree?
OCoP has two important parts: Hard technology and Soft technology
Online communication technologies are able to deliver social interactions and are; therefore, a viable means to foster and nurture OCoPs. Providing hard technologies, such as online forum, online collaborative tools, and online chats, is not enough to generate ideal social interaction within OCoPs.
Ideal social interaction relies upon soft technologies, such as engaging positive social relationships and deepening trust between/among community members. If trust and mutual recognition of competence are not developed over time CoP development may be inhibited.
Online technologies enable OCoP members to maximize the exchange of ideas and insight. When the organizations value OCoPs and determine to apply electronic technologies to support them, both hard technologies and soft technologies must be implemented to build and nurture healthy CoPs. Simply providing hard technologies does not result in healthy communities. In fact, soft technologies inspire community members and enable them to grow and share. In other words, developing OCoPs is closer to husbandry than architecture.
KEY-2-Blended-Instructor's Reflection: Wide Range of Skills/Knowledge
When it comes to learning and teaching delivery format, it is hard to determine which format is the most effective one, complete online, FTF, or blended.
Based on our discussion, there is no surprise that many of us in favor of blended learning because we can pick and choose different instructional designs and activities.
Often, we have to be practical because our design and teaching contexts may be predetermined. As the experts and leaders in educational technology, we need to prepare ourselves with different teaching and design knowledge and skills, even we have our own personal preferences
No one teaching/learning delivery format is better than the other.
For instance, many ETC students couldn't complete their ETC degree, if ETC were not a completely online program. In this case, we must focus on how we can make online learning more effective.
Another example, international students are not allowed to take more than one online course each semester. In that case, we can consider FTF or blended learning.
Prepare ourselves with competent knowledge and skills in a wide range of different learning/teaching delivery formats. As a competent educational technology expert/leader, we need to learn each format's limitations, weakness, and strengths based on the teaching and learning context. Remember, frequently, we may not design for our own teaching.
KEY-3-Tagging-Instructor's Reflection: Tag to Build Community
Social tagging linkage/architecture is a new way of contributing, organizing, and sharing collaboratively the mass of information and resources available on network environments. To build effective collaborative and sharing communities demands that students be equipped with social tagging skills. The ability of learners to maneuver within social media does not necessarily mean they are capable of engaging in social collaboration through social media. You must teach learners new digital literacy skills in social tagging to apply social media in constructing effective learning community and community learning. It is your responsibility as an educators to prepare and engage learners to "tag to share," "tag to organize," and "tag to collaborate" by ensuring they possess competent social tagging linkage skills and allowing them to ascertain what to tag for sharing with different community learners collaboratively.
I think social tagging linkage/architecture is not just for teachers, or classroom only. In fact, any educational organization, institutions, learning community, network community should have their own Social tagging linkage/architecture to support them to strengthen their community resources, knowledge, and skills sharing and collaboration. Agree?!
KEY-4-Digital Lifelong Learning & OCoP
Both OCoP and Digital Lifelong Learning become very critical instructional design framework analysis and learning goals for learners. Educational institutions have been integrating OCoP for formal learning. Currently, educators have seen OCoP has more potentials for non-formal learning. Generally, it is harder for educators to facilitate informal learning since we don't know when it may happen. Educators believe we can extend OCoP to facilitate non-formal learning that would prolong lifelong learning cultures. In addition, with competent formal and non-formal learning skills and knowledge, learners' informal learning would thrive as well. What do you think?
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