“openness as a primary condition for the progress and protection of civilisation”
Bohr 1945
I am all in for open learning. Open learning means that more people get the chance to get educated when they can and to what degree they want. However, I struggle with doing the very same thing I believe in – opening up and sharing. Why? Well, I think it is about the confidence, the self-confidence (Cottey 2016). What if people – students and colleagues – realise and see that I am incompetent, that I don’t know how to use the latest and best technology to make good movies and presentations, that my pedagogical skills are lacking, and that I can’t teach. I will be without a job in no-time…
Another concerns of mine is connected to the reuse of other people’s resources. During the online seminar today (20th of Oct.) it was mentioned that there are so many resources to be used in teaching. Should we maybe just compile a set of videos for the students to watch and thereafter lead the discussion. What does that mean in the long run? I mean, I use TedTalks and interesting speeches I find on Youtube and other resources, but doesn’t that mean that I deliberately reduce my own possibilities to create innovative and interesting content. I also take away possibilities to advance as a teacher in terms of pedagogical skills and the like. It is always easier to find a really good TedTalk than to make a new video that includes the knowledge that this particular group that I am teaching should take part of. Maybe this particular group of students would benefit from something else but a TedTalk. And maybe I will get lazy and just use other people’s presentations to be able to do other “more important” things.
Instead of getting more people to think about different subject we let the people with the best rethorics or entertainment capabilities tell their “story”. We will do exactly what the big social media players are doing according to the Wired (2018) “Here’s how this golden age of speech actually works: In the 21st century, the capacity to spread ideas and reach an audience is no longer limited by access to expensive, centralized broadcasting infrastructure. It’s limited instead by one’s ability to garner and distribute attention. And right now, the flow of the world’s attention is structured, to a vast and overwhelming degree, by just a few digital platforms: Facebook, Google (which owns YouTube), and, to a lesser extent, Twitter. ” If I, as a teacher, don’t have the ability to garner and distribute attention, should I just use other people’s “productions”? Might there be a chance that things will be missed? Will the courses be streamlined with little differences and new insights? Will the attention drawing people “kidnap” my (and others) courses?
Again, I am all in for opening up because I think there is so much to be gained. I guess I am not mature enough in my teaching, nor have the confidence, in order to clearly see all the advantages for the students yet, and for me 🙂 I believe this course I helping me to mature and reflect upon, and pinpoint, what I need to work on and advance.
References:
Cottey, A.: Openness and stability. AI Soc. 31, 319–325 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-015-0592-9
Wired 2018 https://www.wired.com/story/free-speech-issue-tech-turmoil-new-censorship/
Lena's reflections on ONL202 
I feel the same way about my confidence levels, or the lack thereof. I wonder if I will ever feel totally ready. I reckon the way forward might just be for me to plunge in and see how it goes, whether or not I feel ready. Let’s see!
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Brave to mention one obstacle for being open that I don’t think many people are being open about – low self-confidence and the fear of being criticized. When it comes to using lectures/speeches by others I don’t think that this means becoming more narrow, “mainstream” and uncritical.It is not the lectures that makes a course – it is the course structure, your pedagogical methods and the way you support active learning and critical thinking. Teaching statistical analyses I use a lot of Youtube videos which show how to perform statistical tests (beautifully done by e.g. Field and others), but it is what I demand of students regarding applications and how valid these are that really matters.
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I very much share you concerns. There are a lot of threats lurking underneath the shiny blanket of open learning. I guess to some extent it just means that we have to move out of our comfort zone and expose ourselves. And although there might be some criticism towards our teaching then, I think (hope at least) that most of it will be in a friendly, constructive manner.
But you also address another important subject. If we want to open our teaching it won’t be enough to get “digitally literate”. We also need new teaching methods. In one of my previous pedagogical courses I was introduced to an astonishingly wide spectrum of different teaching method. Which also made me realize how one-sided my own studies were back in the days. Basically just very traditional lectures: professor talks, you take note, learn by heart, try to pass the exam, forget most of it. I hope that during the remaining weeks and topics we will also get to know a few teaching methods that are adapted for online and distance learning.
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I thought the same about sharing openly my lectures – that this is the question of being self-confident. And so we are coming back to the first topic somehow.
This is interesting you mention about creating new content in the opposite of using already existed, even if it’s really worth to share. Probably this also partly the problem with self-confidence in a way, becouse you don’t believe you can create a content that would be competitive with already existing one.
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