As the days of CI597C come to an end, I started to think about our community that has been created over the last several weeks. For some of us, I think that the end of class could evoke some strong feelings. For others, the impact could be quite a different experience. I’m thinking that the strength of emotions parallels engagement in a community – the more engaged, the greater the feeling of belonging, the stronger the feelings are towards the community, and when the community changes or disintegrates, the greater the emotional feelings. Our physical meeting space will exist no more, but for some of us, the virtual component of the class will provide a forum for conversation and potential sustainability for some of our community. It will be interesting to see how the CI597C community evolves over time. Many of us have discussed the need for face-to-face contact at some point. A completely virtual environment would not be ideal for a course (for some of us). I wonder what the rules will be for our virtual community. Since this component has largely existed online, without the support of the physical contact, what will the impact be on our online environment?
dmd340 says
Twitter meet-ups rock!!! I am going to do a Ning Net Meet-up in May for my horse social network. Need those shared experiences to build affilation in the community and keep that emotional link going. I too will miss this weekly community meet-up. Probably the best experience I ever had in a class, I I have had a LOT of classes in many venues. The community we have built has taught me so much about what is important in being an educator, and taught much about the shift of the power base that is so critical in classrooms.
Shared learning is true social constructivist learning, and the teachers being students in the dialectic looping is crucial to the process.
I would love to help faculty experience what we have in this class. i feel as if I am an evangelist for community building. As I return to practice this fall, I will strive to replicate the experiences from CI597 for both students and teachers.
Thanks to the collective intelligence of my classmates, I have learned more about how to be a good teacher and community member in my own life…Not just talk the talk but actually walking the walk. Emotional, yes. Sad, yes. Hopeful, yes.
ELISEBETH CONNOLLY BOYER says
um yeah! We better still meet up!!!!!! This baby is getting older and I am going to NEED some grown-up contact over the summer!
bsr11 says
Will the Pligg site be deactivated? Will we lose this virtual meeting space, particularly since some of us are leaving PSU and will lose access to the system?
COLE W. CAMPLESE says
We’ll keep it running!
bsr11 says
Is it possible to switch my blog source to my new site, http://www.rubywahoo.com, since I may lose access to the PSU blog at some point in the near future. By the way, everyone, check out and subscribe to rubywahoo.com!!!