[Xmca-l] Re: Love in the time of corona

Tue Apr 14 12:45:08 PDT 2020

Hi Greg,

I think if you are looking to create online classes that can build community it is really important to differentiate between synchronous education and asynchronous education. We are used to and I think comfortable with synchronous communication which comes with a lot of oversight built in (e.g. you can see what people are doing with their hands and eyes in your place based classrooms, you can proctor exams). This has been really difficult at my university because it is difficult for people to think about education in different ways (really not that different, I believe asynchronous online communication may actually have a better opportunity of realizing some of Dewey’s ideas than face to face communication). So many professors are using zoom or some other meeting platform, but just because you can see students’ faces it does not mean you are recreating synchronous face-to-face education (an interesting factoid, meeting platforms originated precisely so people could do other things while in a meeting, like looking up an idea, so trying to have some control over what students do when on meeting platforms is probably a mugs game). I hear stories of how students are playing video games while they are online in education. Also I think there is pretty good research to suggest that it is difficult to maintain interest in a talking head for more than 7-minutes (I was initially interested in Quibi, but of course this is the U.S. so we have to corporative everything until it turns into much.

What asynchronous classes look to is discipline the way Dewey defined it. Students keep coming back because they are interested. This leads to the question of how to maintain interest in an asynchronous platform, because the discipline we are used to is external – what you should do not what you want to do – which I think Dewey would not call discipline at all but coercion. Students have a great deal more autonomy online than they do in face-to-face, if only because there is so much less surveillance. I think an important idea is rather than battling against this autonomy which can scare a lot of instructors (including me!!) to lean into it, really try and use it as an asset. Offer a lot of choice in the activities, thinking that when learners have a sense of agency they become more committed to their task. This is of course difficult in our subject oriented educational orientation, that students must know things and they will not know it unless we teach it to them in the right way. We must be rigorous in our education (lately I have been thinking there is a fine line between rigor and indoctrination wondering if the words can be used interchangeably).

So in order to develop “discipline” you must students set their own trajectory out of their interests. This is actually much easier to do online I think and there are a number of instances outside of formal education. Yet of course we cannot in current circumstances give students freedom to find their own subjects (as Dewey suggested) but we can offer our subjects as questions rather than answers, offering provocative information that is somehow relevant to their lives (these days I try and relate the subject I am teaching back to what is going on with the coronavirus). I think students, if they have not become too alienated from the entire educational process, are ready to respond, to have a voice, especially the current generation of students who grew up on this stuff (I think I disagree with Rob’s prior post, students are far more ready for this type of learning that we instructors). Given the opportunity they will find their own level of community, become interested in each other’s ideas. I think it takes time to get there, and there will be failures, but I think it is really beneficial is learners see their instructors looking for answers as much as they are.

There are no special tricks to make online education better. It is and will be a lot of hard work. We are paying a price for the fact that a lot of online education has tried to emulate our face to face, linear, synchronous place based education. It also means that the instructor needs to give up some control. We don’t create community, the best we can do is become part of the community as it evolves.

Michael

From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> On Behalf Of Greg Thompson
Sent: Monday, April 13, 2020 1:18 PM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Love in the time of corona

Lois and others,

Inspiring to see all that you and ESI are doing there in the midst of this whirlwind - and in the eye of the storm no less!

This comment of yours seemed to resonate with Liz' and Annalie's comments about mental health:
"people are realizing how they feel is not inside them".

That seems to me to be a revolutionary thought.

Also, I'd ask this to you but don't want to distract you from your important work, so perhaps others can talk about how activities can be transformed in these times to adapt to this new era (I'd like to call it a "moment" but it feels bigger than that).

What got me thinking of this were the Zoom sessions that Lois mentioned on Creating Connection and Building Community. The fact is that there will be new possibilities to do these things (e.g., the possibility of truly GLOBAL communities and connections - perhaps to Andy's world-perezhivanie), but the activities that enable these things will also need to be transformed and different.

[I'm a bit of an idiot about these things so I'm just realizing that online classes can't just be in-person activities that are taken online. They need online activities that can build connection and community among students. Still working on that.]

So I'm wondering if anyone has had any success or even just suggestions regarding how to create online activities that can realize the possibilities and potential for connection and community in online spaces?

[I'm thinking really practically/locally here in terms of what can be done in my classes to build connection and community in online spaces, but the answer will, of course, be relevant to forms of cross-national solidarity, granting that there may be other challenges as well - e.g., language].

-greg

On Mon, Apr 13, 2020 at 10:53 AM Lois Holzman <lholzman@eastsideinstitute.org<mailto:lholzman@eastsideinstitute.org>> wrote:
Hello All,

Following the lead of others, I'll jump in. While NYC and state are in serious crisis and all its cultural and economic conflicts even more glaring, the vibrancy and energy has not disappeared. It's just different.

As Vygotsky is purported to have said, "A revolution solves only those tasks raised by history..." History has thrown us a monster.

Different too are the forces working to shape this extraordinary historical moment. Much of that shaping by those who are in positions of political and economic, etc. authority—and the pandemic itself—are creating fear and despair, both for now and the future. At the same time, the shaping being done by so many thousands of people and organizations that inspire and organize people to exercise their power and creativity for connectedness are generating hope and possibility.
I feel that palpably all day long.

We in the global development community are re-tooling and/or stepping up our virtual activities, many of which involve play, performance and ensemble building, not to take people's minds off what's happening, but to involve them in some "non-knowing growing" and participation in creating positive responses to what's happening that have the possibility to continue to be transformative of individuals and communities. A few examples—
     establishing a Global Play Brigade working across borders of nation state, culture and economy (so far performance activists from about 40 countries involved)
     offering Creating Connection and Building Community <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/myemail.constantcontact.com/Play-Sessions-via-Zoom-Opened-Up--Free-online-social-gatherings.html?soid=1101246158194&aid=qweSrQdaUGo__;!!KGKeukY!mgVbhiBDaQFpktGOpqwtXO--stU4luc1rYfQBb_kcmWkynVl-saL_Q0ppKBj4D077ZdO9bff$> free play sessions via Zoom, each one originating in a different part of the world (about 150 people per session so far)
     taking our Creating Our Mental Health conversation/workshop series national and international in a moment when people are realizing how they feel is not inside them, not merely socially produced and organized, but social in its potential transformativity
      taking All Stars Project programs for poor youth and their communities in NYC, NJ, Dallas, Chicago and the Bay Area virtual

If you're interested in any of this and more, let me know. And you can always check out the social media listed in my signature.

Stay safe,
Lois

--
Access my latest article—Why be Half-Human? How Play, Performance and Practical Philosophy Make Us Whole (written with Cathy Salit)—and read the rest of this marvelous book, Social Construction in Action<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/www.taosinstitute.net/product/social-construction-in-action-contributions-from-the-taos-institutes-25th-anniversary-conference__;!!KGKeukY!mgVbhiBDaQFpktGOpqwtXO--stU4luc1rYfQBb_kcmWkynVl-saL_Q0ppKBj4D077Vp7N3re$>, which you can download for free!

Lois Holzman
Director, East Side Institute for Group & Short Term Psychotherapy
Chair, Global Outreach, All Stars Project, UX
Distinguished Visiting Fellow in Vygotskian Practice and Performance, Lloyd International Honors College at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Address: East Side Institute, Attn:Lois Holzman
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New York, NY 10011
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--
Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
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