The Social Media To-Do List for Fall 2014

Here's what's on the desk: Twitter, Voicethread, Wikis, Forums as workspaces
Here's what's in the circular bin this time around: Blogs

After four short weeks of trying a few things out, I've got one month to get my online class in gear for Fall. I'll be teaching ninety (90) students of various levels in a GE course that just about everyone at MPC takes before they move on: History 17, U.S. History to 1877. It's a class I love, and my face-to-face version of the course is often the most lively and interesting in my schedule. Students face content they think they know and get introduced to a discipline they have no idea about. It's great. The online class has always been disappointing to me, however. Students often take it because they hate history and think online will be less of an annoyance. They are all about points and grades and getting everything done rather than learning. It is far more difficult to get online students to discover that they know little history and nothing about the discipline. It takes them a long time, if it happens at all, to give up their preconceived notions of the subject and try something new. In other words, I've found it next to impossible to create any kind of online community. I'm hopeful that with a few new social media tools I can inspire students to leave their comfort zone and think more analytically about what they are reading and learning. I'm hoping that these tools might also offer my face-to-face class more opportunities to learn for more shy students who are not about to talk in small or large group discussions (the basic organization of my courses). So here's what I plan to do:  

1. Twitter: rather than relying on group emails only to communicate with students I'll use Twitter for class announcements and direct them to new posts in a workspace forum on MPC Online. I'll keep the group emails, of course, but use Twitter as a tickertape of reminders and announcements to keep in touch. Each of my online courses has a Twitterfeed section embedded at the top of the course site. Twitter can also be a way to introduce students to the larger world of the history discipline. I'll tweet announcements about blogs, conferences and articles on subjects related to our course and loosely history-related to keep students expanding their idea of history as a discipline. 
2.  Voicethread: I think I've said enough about this before trying it. My last blog post went into detail about my plans for how to teach analysis of primary sources in an online format. I'm hopeful to say the least.  
3. Wikis: The COTL5 course taught me by example that wikis can serve as community builders. When students build knowledge together(something I associate with good discussions) then learning takes off. I'm thinking that there should be a few wikis in my course that students add to during the course of the semester on key questions that then become related to essay assignments or other evaluated activities. What if we had a wiki with key terms that students defined and analyzed for each unit of the course (there are four)? Or a wiki on a key question like What caused the Civil War? Is it enough to ask for extra credit or could I make this their writing assignment for each week?  
4. Forums as Workspaces: EconSteve brought up the possibility of making a blog a workspace for students to puzzle together to understand an assignment. I think the forum tool in MPC Online might work well for this. I want to call it the Work Table or 24/7 Study Group or something physical about all gathering in one place to work. With each new assignment I could post a new forum and invite students to start figuring out their assignments together. These would be ungraded, but a resource. Would students use them? I could also post answers to questions I get via email there to allow all students the benefit of the answer (but keep student confidentiality). 

 I think I can set that all up in a month. I think I can....

For the circular bin...blogs. I love the idea of students writing weekly and sharing ideas with one another. But here's the practical reality: Ninety students. And that's just my online students. I teach 220 students each semester who all deserve proper attention! There is no way I can sleep, eat and read everything without becoming a very unhappy person who only works (won't do that again, thanks). For a lower enrollment course it would be perfect-20-25 students maximum. And I'll keep it in mind when I start teaching some newer, non-GE courses in Mexican History and Latin American history, but for now I need to put it aside and leave it for others to enjoy. Thanks Jon and MPC colleagues for making this course meaningful. My to-do list is set!

Online Document Days! Is Voicethread the answer?

    It took me about three seconds to recognize Voicethread as what I've been looking for. I'm a primary document fiend. I love primary sources and the mysteries that they are. By working from primary documents I find that history comes alive with all the ingredients of a good learning experience. Students become curious, learn to ask questions, and discover why the historical narrative has (or hasn't) followed a certain arc.
   In a face to face class, I teach analysis of primary source materials in class in a format called "Document Days." Students walk in the door and the desks are in groups of five; there are folders with five copies of a document and perhaps a key or glossary to help decode it. I do a little introduction about the context of the document or key question we are going to answer by the end of class (usually "What does this source tell us about the time it was created?") Finally, I turn them loose into a variety of questions:
1. What do you notice? Write at least six observations you have about your source (repeating themes, tone, etc.)
2. Write at least three questions. Make sure that one or two of the questions are something you're sure you can't answer but help you think about your source in a creative way.
3. What is the historical context of the document? What was happening at the time it was created? Who created it and for what purpose?
4. Re-read your source and come up with a list of new observations/questions.

For the last step I pair students together who worked with different sources and have them share their findings. We come back together and brainstorm the answer to the big question: What does this source tell us about the time in which it was created? What does it tell us about how history about this time period is written?
     Document Days are often students' favorite days in class. Students struggle and learn, breakthrough, get frustrated, try again, get lost, get overwhelmed, try again. It's magic. And as a teacher I get to model the big thing I have to offer - an enthusiasm for the discipline and a model of analytical thinking. Heretofore, I have felt a sense of doom for my online students. Assigning a primary source reading and then hosting a forum to discuss it is a far cry from all gathering around tables to puzzle it out together and then analyze it in its context. Enter Voicethread, the online tool to make a table to gather around and free up students to write or speak their comments.
   To access Voicethread, students only need to click on the link and submit their comments via writing, audio only or video. Using the doodle tool, we can draw on the document bringing our attention to different sections of the source, pose questions and generally share our ideas meaningfully (and how we choose to do so). Enthusiasm can be better communicated, student feedback will be immediate and the feeling of all working on something together will be much more possible. I'm hopeful that Voicethread can be the stand in for document day.
     So try it! The Voicethread below is one of my favorites, usually the opening exercise for the class on the Revolutionary Era in U.S. Women's History and U.S. History I. It's a cartoon made in England before the Revolution (or the American Rebellion, as it is sometimes called in English History).

Privacy in Online Writing

     I am fortunate to carpool with three other MPC faculty to school most days. The four of us, sometimes joined by others, each represent distinct disciplines with varied strengths. We jokingly refer to ourselves as "The Superheroes." Among the Superheroes I have had many, many conversations about internet privacy. We seem to represent the spectrum of American views on internet privacy. One of us is wholeheartedly against any internet presence outside the walls of MPC Online (and even within it's not her favorite). Two of us are ambivalent, we have Facebook accounts, linkedIn accounts, we are loudmouths (I'm one of them), we have pictures that come up if you search for us, but we don't like the idea that we're easy to find, but want to be found by "the right people." The fourth could care less; privacy is no longer a choice and she accepts this as a reality. I think the Superheroes, to some extent, represent most Americans at the moment. We are in a time of social change about what privacy means and what we are willing to let go of or keep to ourselves to access a convenient way to connect. I think our responsibility as teachers, is to notify and engage with our students about what choices they do have in this moment as well as what kind of a world they want to live in. We are making our futures with our choices today.
     In gearing up for students to use social media, I think it's imperative that we counsel students to understand that by using these tools they are engaging in a facet of the economy and society we live in.  This class is part of their digital footprint. One way to teach students their options might take the form of the introductory "syllabus quiz." I use the feedback feature to gauge students' apprehension or lack of understanding of the risks invovled in using social media. For example I could ask the question: "How concerned are you about how someone might learn about you from your digital footprint?"
 a. not very much at all
b. a little concerned
c. very concerned
d. I want to avoid leaving behind any trace of myself online.

For each one of these responses I could provide a list of what is possible and not possible to control in the given programs we will use. I would counsel those most concerned to accept that there is no chance of a zero digital footprint with the class and those with no concern that they should have some concerns that they address by choosing their level of sharing.

I think it also might be useful to brainstorm a list of pros and cons as a class so that students can understand that the benefits of using social media in the class will most likely outweigh the concerns. I want to stress to students that we have choices. I want to use the news story about the teacher at Apalatchee High School to start the discussion. In think it is a great topic in which to begin to talk about analysis!

What do people think? Is there a spectrum or a right answer? What responsibilities do we have to warn our students about the future use of  what they publish online as part of their class? What repsonsibilities do we have as instructors to manage our online presence?

Searching for the Holy Grail of Analytical Writing (or just a shard will do)
    
     More than teaching history my job is to teach writing. In order to learn history, a written discipline, students must learn how to read and think critically and then translate those thinking skills into written expression to share with one another. This is no small potatoes for anyone, let alone students with as many pressures as my students seem to have. In my experience my best teachers were those who taught me something without me knowing, sometimes, so deftly that I thought I did it all myself. They they just set up the room in a way that I had to learn something new before I left. So how do I teach writing history in a way that might put students more at ease, make them more inclined to write with more depth and try out new skills, in an environment that they feel at home in? I'm thinking that social media might be the logical place to expand what I already do in the classroom and help deepen my evolving online course. How can the confines of 140 characters make for succinct, clear writing? How can blog posts fit in to encourage students to pre-write their essays? How might timelines help students organize their thoughts before writing? How can bookmarking tools help students with research? How can informal writing help to introduce students to academic inquiry, help instill curiosity, make students take their thoughts to a new place?
     For the next four weeks, as a member of an online class of community college faculty looking at the pedagogical uses of social media, I'll evaluate how well-established web-based tools that connect people in various ways, might be used to help students learn how to analyze and write history.
     Before I begin, I want to say that I'm skeptical. The technology that supports social media does not create analytical thinkers. It's a "garbage in, garbage out" kind of situation, but my skepticism does not keep me from getting pretty excited about the potential. I'm looking forward to taking a look at the structures of writing and connecting that social media tools offer and applying them directly into the teaching of historical writing. We'll see what we get!