Reflections and Self Diagnosis

A. I am your friend. I don’t work in education. You are talking to me about the idea that we all learn from each other, in all kinds of contexts, and that this can often be richer than more formal classroom based learning. I am sceptical. Tell me about an informal learning experience you have had online in which collaboration was involved, show me a concrete example to help me to see what you mean.
Creative Writing and Mandarin Chinese informal learning: skills exchange.
An informal situation where I collaborated on line was after a friend of my daughter’s came to stay from America. They were learning Chinese and I also wanted to learn. Before my class started I spent time each day on instant messenger with the friend who had gone to China for a year, learning a little each day through basic conversation. I was also learning from some on line resources and I would try them out through Instant Messaging. My duaghter’s friend was very patient correcting me and giving me more to learn. We then started sending emails in Chinese. I spent a lot of time with a dictionary because they were much further ahead than me.
When they broke their ankle and were stuck in the university for a half term and needed distraction beyond learning Chinese, I played some spontaneity games via Instant Messaging ,which allows one person, in this case myself to lead the other through a creative story writing exercise.
This exercise is based on the improvisation work of Keith Johnstone, but normally done orally rather in written from, but it allows hours to pass by in creating a story. Instant Messaging really lends itself to this. One person asks open ended questions which takes the other person on an adventure, almost entirely led by their own imagination . The skill of the leader is to free up the imagination. “You are in a darkened room how many doors are there and what do they look like? Which door do you go up to and listen at? What can you hear….open the door a crack what can you see….you slip into the space…etc etc..”


B. Tell us about that new tool, or set of tools, you have just discovered that really excites you, talk about the potential it has to change your work. What do you want to do with it?
I am currently developing a teen SL island with a production company as a virtual summer school for collaborative creative projects. The reason for starting this is to try to combat the difficulties of gifted and talented learners together from across the county.
I have been exploring different ways that you can bring learners together, which started with some Honeycomb software which enable learners to share and comment on each other’s work on line. We currently have a project with three schools in year 7 after a pilot project with KS1 learners. The year 7’s are using the game Myst as a stimulus for creative writing.
The Honeycomb software allows the students to go home and continue their school work if they want to , show their parents and the assessment for learning comments of their teachers.


C. Do you see yourself as a pioneer? Do you think you are more innovative than others in your organization? Do you think your organization is lagging behind? Tell us how you feel about this.

I have been asked to come to the LA IT conference to talk about the work we are pioneering particularly the Teen SL project. I consider this to be an indicator that I must be pioneering as I advise in the filed of Gifted and Talented Education. But I am also involved in the National training of practitioners teaching on the new Creative and Media Diploma and I can see immediate links. I consider staying ahead with technology and virtual worlds as essential if I am to represent The Creative and Media Industry.

I have always tried to be at the forefront in school as a teacher in terms of technology developing websites with the whole year’s schemes of work for non-specialists and revision websites for learners in my subject Drama, where such things did not exist. I was using projection in performance work 30 years ago at university, before digital projectors existed and computers filled whole rooms. This has been inspired by my husband who has had endless patience helping me when I can’t make things do what I want them to! I did however lock myself in a room for a few days and I asked him not to come even if I screamed for help in my determination to learn Frontpage all by myself nearly 10 years ago.

Working for an LA creates constant frustration with the filtering of all the resources I need such as Youtube, SL, Teen SL, Hotmail, Facebook, Instant Messaging and so on. I have to work on my own equipment most of the time in the pioneering work. However many advisers are aware that we need these tools at the very least to access the world of the young people we teach.