NPDF Domain 2
This post will be a reflection on a workshop I attended, one that I relate to Domain element 2.4 of the Professional Development Framework.
I was very fortunate to be able to attend a very interesting workshop called Student as Partner, Producer and Assessor: Exploring Domain of One’s Own, led by instructional technologist Jim Groom. I learned a lot about some teaching technologies that I wasn’t aware of, including the A Domain of One’s Own project, which gives undergraduates a domain and web hosting account. We also discussed eportfolios, and more. Driving the examination and exploration of these technologies was a discussion of open pedagogy, what it means to be teaching and learning ‘in the open’ and different ways of proceeding with that.
An ongoing thread of conversation throughout the day was one involving the ethics of open pedagogy, and this is why I connect the day and how I engaged wih it with domain 2.4. There was a certain amount of back and forth about the enthusiasm, or non-enthusiasm, of students in terms of actually doing their learning out in the open, i.e., by means of conducting assignments consisting of blog posts that are accessible by the public, for instance. Different people had different experiences with this, with some stating that students are enthusiastic about this, while others saying that their students hated the idea and refused to do it. This leads to ethical questions. If a student finds open-learning objectionable, can we demand that they do assignments that are out in the open? What is our responsibility in terms of outlining the risks involved for students whether or not they initially like the idea? Is it ethical to conduct any kind of assessment ‘out in the open’ -- to public a grade, or even critical comments about open work?
My own experience with open pedagogy is not substantial. I did, however, engage with a faculty partner while I was finishing library school in an assignment that would, I think, be considered open pedagogy. It involved a website that I was designing for a web design course that I was completing, a website tied in with a course on Chaucer being taught by my faculty partner. Students were asked to submit a piece of their own writing, with the content of the website in its entirety to consist of student writing.
I never met the students, but my faculty partner asked for signed, written permission from students to include their work in the website -- they were free to decline if they wanted to. As far as I remember, every student, or nearly every student, was happy to give consent, and my faculty partner said that there was actually quite a lot of enthusiasm expressed for the project.
As an instructor of information literacy, I think the theme of ‘open’ versus ‘private’ discourse, and all the shades of grey in between, is an important one. It’s important to make students aware of who has access to what they say in what circumstances, and how things said in different scenarios can work out to their advantage; or, the reverse. I’m not sure I believe that students ought to be forced point blank to participate in open discourse if they don’t want to. Yet, as an educator of information literacy, I think it is important to coax students out of their comfort zones when it comes to communicating out in the open in ways that they might not be used to. I think it’s going to be more and more an essential skill, and the value in being able to deftly and creatively manage the channels of one’s communication should be brought to the attention of students, and those skills developed through their academic work.
