Can Democracy Be Disembodied?
This is a new teaching format for me and is one that I resisted for some time before capitulating. My main objection initially was that I could not see how a democratic and constructivist environment could be created if we (students and teacher) could not interact with one another in a real-time setting. Once I was introduced to the synchronous possibilities of Adobe Connect, however, I started to become optimistic that my seminar-style, highly discussion-oriented class could happen even if students and teacher were all physically distant from one another.
I worked countless hours this summer and fall semester to prepare the virtual classroom environment, all the while having great fantasies about how well the class would go, how pleased the students would be to have a break from the normal online class experience of either just doing threaded discussion in an asynchronous setting or sitting and listening to a three-hour lecture with PowerPoint visuals in a synchronous setting. I thought that this class would be almost identical in nature to my in-person, F2F (face-to-face) classes, and was sort of excited to teach from the comfort of my office or from home.
Well, two weeks have passed now and my fantasies have yet to be fulfilled. Day one of class was really all about testing out equipment and making a few announcements. We experienced some glitches with the audio, but since we weren't getting into serious discussion that night, it wasn't particularly noticeable. Day two this past week was when things began to crumble, at least from a democratic teaching perspective.
In preparation for our second class meeting, I had asked the class to read an article of mine about democratic education (see page 50 of pdf that opens) and a rebuttal of those ideas by a former colleague (see page 20 of pdf that opens up). I wanted these articles to set the stage for us to discuss co-constructing aspects of the class.
Early on in class, we had been experiencing some problems with our audio, but with the help of two tech support people, had ironed them out. So, about midway into class, I divided the students into four breakout groups to discuss aspects of my proposed syllabus (e.g. the attendance policy, the assignments, the weighting of grades). I wanted the class to take my proposed syllabus and critically analyze it/determine if it was meaningful to them and if not, to propose alternatives.
I have the ability to "visit" in each different breakout "room" and listen into the conversations and the students can see when I enter and leave the room by way of the attendance list. As I listened into some group discussions, my heart began to sink. What I was hearing in some of the rooms was essentially a gripe session about how insulting it was for me to have an attendance policy.
After some time for discussion, I moved the students back into the main meeting room for us to have a whole-group discussion on the issues they found most important in their small group. Some individuals begin reiterating their concerns about the attendance policy. However, technology problems made it so that only some people's audio could be heard and that they then had to go to the written chat box to raise their concerns. Those whose audio had cut out a (for reasons still unknown to tech support ) felt that I had purposely denied the microphone rights (one student wrote, "you didn't give me back audio after the break out groups,") somehow assuming that the teacher/autocrat was controlling access to audio (I wasn't). And while I tried to limit my responses to the students' concerns, so as to let them all be aired first, I couldn't help feeling attacked because of how truncated many of the written postings were and how they were lacking in any context or softening that would come from body language (the irony is that I invited these attacks by opening up the democractic discussion).
What I had hoped would be a reasoned discussion of merits and demerits of course requirements had degenerated, I felt, into students ganging up on the teacher over a minor (in my opinion) administrative detail such as the attendance policy. In my fantasies about democratic co-constructing of courses, I keep forgetting about students' institutional histories within the conventional, more autocratic, education environment; histories that make students jump to conclusions about the rigidness of rules, the power of teachers, and so on.
Such institutional histories seem to be exacerbated within an online setting. In the past, in F2F classes, I've had students approach my introductions to democratic co-construction in the same way as these online students, complaining about some of my assignments and trying to minimize class requirements (essentially, seek negative freedom, freedom from).
But there was something different about the discussions in this online setting. The fact that we were each "disembodied" seemed to make the traditional student-teacher divisions and distrust more pronounced. It was almost like because they couldn't see me, the students assumed that I had the worst intentions. And because I couldn't see them, I perhaps made assumptions too about their intentions (were they really griping? Or were there legitimate concerns about the attendance policy?) Not being able to see smiles are hear laughter when discussing these issues, as we can in F2F classes, somehow made the atmosphere more tense (at least for me; and the technology issues also added a lot to my tension) and I ended the class in tears, which the students could hear in my voice.
This raises the question for me of the human-ness of democratic interaction -- must we be physically present with others to truly create a democratic community? It can't just be the visual or audio that makes for community, for, as we know, people with hearing and sight disabilities are certainly successful at being in community with others. Is it something about physical presence that is a prerequisite for democratic community? Maybe I'm just being too pessimistic after a bad class, and maybe things will improve. At least half the students emailed me after class this week giving me encouragement (I guess they took pity on their crying professor). Maybe my crying made me more present and human to them? Yet I don't want them to feel so sorry for me that they give up their democratic rights just to spare my feelings.
Dilemmas, dilemmas. Will keep you apprised of how things go over the next month.
Posted in DemEd in Real LifeTeaching on Feb 01, 2010 - 11:15 AM
This semester, I am teaching one section of my graduate-level foundations of education course as an online class. It is a synchronous class, meaning we use the Adobe Connect software to meet in a virtual classroom from 6-9 pm each Wednesday night. It is like a conference call on steroids -- we can hear one anothers' voices (assuming the technology is working for us, which, so far, has not always been the case), we can see visuals (such as documents I post, things I write on the whiteboard, videos, etc.), and we can do written chat.This is a new teaching format for me and is one that I resisted for some time before capitulating. My main objection initially was that I could not see how a democratic and constructivist environment could be created if we (students and teacher) could not interact with one another in a real-time setting. Once I was introduced to the synchronous possibilities of Adobe Connect, however, I started to become optimistic that my seminar-style, highly discussion-oriented class could happen even if students and teacher were all physically distant from one another.
I worked countless hours this summer and fall semester to prepare the virtual classroom environment, all the while having great fantasies about how well the class would go, how pleased the students would be to have a break from the normal online class experience of either just doing threaded discussion in an asynchronous setting or sitting and listening to a three-hour lecture with PowerPoint visuals in a synchronous setting. I thought that this class would be almost identical in nature to my in-person, F2F (face-to-face) classes, and was sort of excited to teach from the comfort of my office or from home.
Well, two weeks have passed now and my fantasies have yet to be fulfilled. Day one of class was really all about testing out equipment and making a few announcements. We experienced some glitches with the audio, but since we weren't getting into serious discussion that night, it wasn't particularly noticeable. Day two this past week was when things began to crumble, at least from a democratic teaching perspective.
In preparation for our second class meeting, I had asked the class to read an article of mine about democratic education (see page 50 of pdf that opens) and a rebuttal of those ideas by a former colleague (see page 20 of pdf that opens up). I wanted these articles to set the stage for us to discuss co-constructing aspects of the class.
Early on in class, we had been experiencing some problems with our audio, but with the help of two tech support people, had ironed them out. So, about midway into class, I divided the students into four breakout groups to discuss aspects of my proposed syllabus (e.g. the attendance policy, the assignments, the weighting of grades). I wanted the class to take my proposed syllabus and critically analyze it/determine if it was meaningful to them and if not, to propose alternatives.
I have the ability to "visit" in each different breakout "room" and listen into the conversations and the students can see when I enter and leave the room by way of the attendance list. As I listened into some group discussions, my heart began to sink. What I was hearing in some of the rooms was essentially a gripe session about how insulting it was for me to have an attendance policy.
After some time for discussion, I moved the students back into the main meeting room for us to have a whole-group discussion on the issues they found most important in their small group. Some individuals begin reiterating their concerns about the attendance policy. However, technology problems made it so that only some people's audio could be heard and that they then had to go to the written chat box to raise their concerns. Those whose audio had cut out a (for reasons still unknown to tech support ) felt that I had purposely denied the microphone rights (one student wrote, "you didn't give me back audio after the break out groups,") somehow assuming that the teacher/autocrat was controlling access to audio (I wasn't). And while I tried to limit my responses to the students' concerns, so as to let them all be aired first, I couldn't help feeling attacked because of how truncated many of the written postings were and how they were lacking in any context or softening that would come from body language (the irony is that I invited these attacks by opening up the democractic discussion).
What I had hoped would be a reasoned discussion of merits and demerits of course requirements had degenerated, I felt, into students ganging up on the teacher over a minor (in my opinion) administrative detail such as the attendance policy. In my fantasies about democratic co-constructing of courses, I keep forgetting about students' institutional histories within the conventional, more autocratic, education environment; histories that make students jump to conclusions about the rigidness of rules, the power of teachers, and so on.
Such institutional histories seem to be exacerbated within an online setting. In the past, in F2F classes, I've had students approach my introductions to democratic co-construction in the same way as these online students, complaining about some of my assignments and trying to minimize class requirements (essentially, seek negative freedom, freedom from).
But there was something different about the discussions in this online setting. The fact that we were each "disembodied" seemed to make the traditional student-teacher divisions and distrust more pronounced. It was almost like because they couldn't see me, the students assumed that I had the worst intentions. And because I couldn't see them, I perhaps made assumptions too about their intentions (were they really griping? Or were there legitimate concerns about the attendance policy?) Not being able to see smiles are hear laughter when discussing these issues, as we can in F2F classes, somehow made the atmosphere more tense (at least for me; and the technology issues also added a lot to my tension) and I ended the class in tears, which the students could hear in my voice.
This raises the question for me of the human-ness of democratic interaction -- must we be physically present with others to truly create a democratic community? It can't just be the visual or audio that makes for community, for, as we know, people with hearing and sight disabilities are certainly successful at being in community with others. Is it something about physical presence that is a prerequisite for democratic community? Maybe I'm just being too pessimistic after a bad class, and maybe things will improve. At least half the students emailed me after class this week giving me encouragement (I guess they took pity on their crying professor). Maybe my crying made me more present and human to them? Yet I don't want them to feel so sorry for me that they give up their democratic rights just to spare my feelings.
Dilemmas, dilemmas. Will keep you apprised of how things go over the next month.
Tags for this entry:
technology,
higher education,
teacher-student roles,
requirements,
virtual classroom,
distance learning
Comments
Jun 20, 2010 - 01:09 PM
Starting a democratic school in the Fall here in Phoenix, Arizona. Please visir our website at: phoenixrisingschools.org. Our group of teachers are meeting on Skype and meeting each week to come up with new ideas about our school. Would like to here from other members on advise on starting a democratic free school here in Phoenix, Arizona. .
Melia Dicker
Feb 02, 2010 - 02:05 AM
Kristan, thank you for sharing such a personal account of your foray into online teaching. My heart went out to you as I read it. I could see how much effort you put into trying to make sure that the class ran smoothly online and that it embodied your democratic ideals. I would have felt the same way as you did when some of them reacted critically. In fact, I felt that way several times when working with middle school students, who gave direct and sometimes harsh feedback straight to my face! It was rough when the didn’t get what I was trying to do.
Do try again! The technical difficulties got in the way, I’m sure, and the format was new to you. Perhaps you can ask the students to be constructive with their feedback, especially because online feedback isn’t very nuanced or softened by tone of voice. “If you wouldn’t say it in person, don’t say it online” is a good guideline.
You raise an interesting question about whether democratic communities have to meet in person to work properly. I haven’t had much experience with online communities aiming to be democratic, but I tend to think that democracy works better when participants have to look each other in the eye and stand behind what they say.