This connectivism keeps messing with my time management aspirations.
Prodded by Alec Couros’ tweet referencing Kevin Stranack’s “Guerrilla Connectivism“, and inspired by Roy Beasley’s “Confessions of a MOOC Dropout“, I posted the following “Reply All” last evening in response to a college-wide email promoting Coursera’s Aboriginal Worldviews & Education:
“Would any Aurora College staff be interested in going through it together as a cohort? With our shared northern context, we could add value to our own learning by meeting for online or teleconference discussions and/or discussion forums. Sort of build our own support structure around the free Coursera course.”
Only 24 hours later, I have four takers from four different campuses! And that’s just from the diehards who check work email on weekends. In the MOOC world where “massive” is measured in 3 to 6 figures, it’s a speck; in my world where two talking is a success, it’s overwhelming. Looks like it’s time to put my money where my mouth is (no wait – “invest my time where my typing fingers have made promises” ?? – more accurate, but just doesn’t have the same ring to it.) Once again, ideas from a MOOC launch me into an activity that takes away time I’d like to spend actively participating in the MOOC that launched me. This time I’ll blame/credit #etmooc. Well, I have wondered about all the hype/trash-talk about xMOOCs. Guess I’ll see. Aboriginal Worldview is certainly a relevant topic for me. Maybe I’ll even have time to blog it.
Did I mention that our college President is second among the respondents? I wonder if the domain name “connectivistevangelist” is taken… or maybe “outonalimb”.
I laughed out loud when I read “in my world, where two are talking its a success” so like NAC. Please do blog about the coursera course. I am really interested in hearing how that goes for you folks at Aurora college.
There is hope. We’re up to 16 who want to be part of cohort. I keep meeting people who encourage me. I was hoping to introduce G+ as we went along. Now that you’ve invited us to your community, I will encourage our group, at least those who feel safe in the open and have or are willing to start Gmail, to share our learning in Connected Arctic Educators.