online session

There are several comparations between online and offline communities in the "six degree" article.

"At the top of the expertise scale Amazon tries to mimic offline mechanisms of accreditation by ranking the top reviewers and giving them visual indication of their status as top–reviewers."

This reminds me that Professor Kinzer said in the SecondLife, classrooms have walls which is totally unneccesary in that virtual world. Is the online community always the reflection of the offline one.

"...we are not claiming that plagiarism and copying do not take place in the offline world — clearly they do — it is just that in the online world copying becomes even easier."

These stuff such as plagiarism and copying are amplified online. People get used to the system quickly and then begin to 'game' the system.

The cycle may be like:

the technology mimic the offline mechanism;
and then the new problem or the amplified problems emerged;
and then the technology system changed to solve the problems;
and then there are new problems emaerged.. ...

final project

I have two ideas of my final project.

One is lit review. The topic might be how the on-line community will affect the school culture in the k-12 schools, i.e. the off-line community.

I'd lilke find some articles about
1) the communication among teachers and students and how these communications affect the school culture;
2) how do the students think about using ICTs in the school and among peers and with teachers;
3) how the school culture affect the students learning outcome.

Another option is to do a mini-study. I may find some k-12 students to discribe their experiences of using ICTs in school for formal and informal communication among peers and with instructors. The study is to explore the students' expectation of using ICTs in k-12 schools, especially for the communication with teachers.

I haven't decided to choose which option. After reading some paper, I may make up my mind.

Pay attention

The video clip showed in the class is touching although there is various opinions. To me, it's not just about whether it will be more effective for teaching in the classroom. But the more important, what's the relationship should be between the student and the teachers. Be in the two 'worlds'?

Teachers to the students, should not merely for teaching and learning, but also education, relationship and cultivation. One of my teachers learned how to send text message using the mobile phone from her students and then use it to communicate with the students sometimes. She is always the best 'friend' of the students and know more, understand better of the kids. Therefore the students love her, respect her and would like take her classes more.

There is a Chinese saying that, 'the more intimacy, the more trust for the teacher."

Interaction

"Although social networks became visible in new ways, the new relational structure created social juxtapositions without context and created problematic social borders that people otherwise negotiated with relative ease. Teachers, for example, are required to separate their personal and political lives from their educational roles.

--None of this is Real-Identity and participation in Friendster"

Just yesterday, I found that one student leave a message in myspace. Although it's just simple as "hehe, sofa.", it really scared me. I do not know this student and I do not know how she got to myspace either. I must be cautious about my words in myspace as well!

creat on-line community to help the off-line community in the International School

Creat on-line community to help the off-line community in the International School.

This may be my fianl topic. I'm not sure whether I should narrow it down to the community among teachers and students, or just leave it to be a whole community as a whole school.

The international School has students, teachers, administrators with all kinds of culture background. What the on-line community will be and will work in such context?

Thanks to Sarah's comment. It stops me to wonder around.

discussion about community

Does community come from the word communication? Is communication a must to be a community? If so, what kind of communication should be counted in? How frequently the communication should occur?

The off-line communication relates to the others' perspective. You may not claim that you are in the community of Columbia University or Teachers College while the outsiders or the others in the University or College regard you are. You can come into the buildings and the town hall meeting while the others without the ID cannot.

Comparing to that, the on-line community relies more on the individuals feeling and the communication.

Community

Actually not just from the reading of this week, but from all the readings I have ever read... it seems that research is about 'category'. For example, the on-line community, it should be considered separately regarding to whether it relates to the real world. there is salient difference between real-world-related cyberspace and the non-related one. I think so. And these two types should be analysed respectively?

also a general question in my mind recently... can we achieve the same goal without using the tech and net? such as, what if we do not have the blogs for this course, can we find out another way to help the communication among the students and instructor? can we have a 'community' as now? how about using a notes-board to post everyone's idea weekly and each can go to the board to check, reflect and chat...

look back my questions,
1. whether it will affect the communication among the staff if the administrators use ICTs in the school?
2. whether it will affect the relationship between the students and teachers if they use ICTs to communicate with each other?
3. Will the tech. and ICTs make education change or not?

The first two, or all the three questions relates to the online community among the real world communication. What people can do those cannot be achieved without ICTs? How it will help the real world with ICTs? How to use the ICTs to help those students who have addictions in ICT? especially in the culture back ground of Asia. Asia people, the students, are not as active to have face to face communication and are found to be active on-line. How these features can help in school education?

(Similar concern is that how to use the computer game to help those students who are indulged in the computer games?)