Blogging for Finals

Blogging/wiki final starts Monday, the 25th!

A Toolbox of TC Theory! (Week 7)

If we, as rhetoricians, can't agree on a cause, then how can we reach a collaborative solution to our educational short comings. We, and many of our authors, agree that 1.) collaborative learning is a valuable pedagogy, and 2.) our general educational system is deficient in some ways. However, Bruffee, Trimbur, Harris and others can not completely agree on the etiologies of our educational struggles. Brooke's comments on the changing 'underlives' that we implore for power of identity. Bruffee identifies immediate social discourse and each participant's interpretation of those interactions, while Trimbur compares and contrasts Bruffee's narrowed view of 'situation' and Myers shotgun view of 'society' (734). Rorty examines 'communities' and the joining and re-joining of them, a notion that suits Bruffee (Timbur 737). While a treatise on the various ideologies of our concepts today, and that of the Norton author's concepts of yesterday, is beyond the scope of a blog, I wonder if each theory, or if any theory, should be accepted has broad-sweeping. Instead, I would like to see each author's criteria applied, and tested, against a specific field of study or expertise.

For example, Bruffee's social-constructivist ideals, more narrowly focused on a given situation, is best applied to medical learning in a traditional problem-based setting, while Harris' discourse communities, where words with opposing and antagonistic foes garner more meaning, might be better suited to legal venues. Brooke's theories, of course, would likely fit well within the educational system's discourse, and Myers (through Trimbur's description) may better analyze the world of politics.

Perhaps using the proper analytical tool to study and evaluate each profession's nuances may expand our inquiry in different, further reaching directions, while at the same time focusing more tightly on specific fields of study. Just a thought!-R

Staying Organized

Sixth blog, Fri. 7-15 -Status: On-Time

Sixth comments: 7-22 -Status: On-Time

Comments were to: Melanie, Dan :) , and Steve.

Underlives and Staging Will Become One! (Week 6)

I have seen several blog postings in recent weeks pertaining to collaborative learning, and although our class discussions on this methodology have not reached the crescendo that Shaugnessy's did, it appears to be a debatable topic. As such, Bruffee certainly comes to mind, but I discussed him several blog postings ago. Therefore, I have chosen to highlight a wonderful manuscript on collaborative learning in medicine.

Eleni Kaldoudi and a few of her 'School of Medicine' colleagues in Greece authored the 2010 book chapter Web 2.0 Approaches for Active, Collaborative Learning in Medicine and Health. Their work is special in that it is one of the more recent works within medical informatics and Web 2.0 educational pedagogy. Unlike other similar works, they acknowledge the shrinking of the web, as opposed to what most would categorize as a growing web. The overwhelming dissemination of mass information to a society-at-large is being replaced with a "knowledge society" (2) seeking specifically-needed, and more valuable, knowledge. While their definitions and applications of telemedical Web 2.0 affordances are accurate, this is one work among many that actually discusses active peer-to-peer learning at the "point of care" (11). Until recently medical learning, and even PBL, have experienced a delay, delays anchored in technological problems. Teams would leave to discuss patients in what Barton would call a "back stage", and then re-present themselves to the patient with answers in a manner consistent with the "front staging". This changing of roles reminded me of Brooke's "underlife" variations.

However, with real-time, collaborative learning via newer mobile devices, a merging of these different personality genres is experienced, and patients feel more included and talked "to" and not "about". They conclude their work by recounting the ways in which technological advancements are also advancing learning paradigms.

Being Organized

Fifth blog, Fri. 7-08 -Status: On-Time

Fifth comments, Fri. 7-15 -Status: On-Time

Comments were to: Debbie and Russell.

Same Ole' PBL, New World (Week 5 Posting)

Erik Nelson's article Elements of Problem-Based Learning: Suggestions for Implementation in the Asynchronous Environment is both an interesting read and germane to my work. Problem-Based Learning (PBL) is the offspring of the longer established constructivist model of learning, and is based on poorly-structured, student driven motivation. At first glance, this may seem ill-conceived, while continued thought may induce a deeper analysis of its' many variables, and lead the average skeptic to predict a worsened prognosis for these students. Thankfully, using the right carrot for bait, can catch any rabbit; this is how America's physicians have been trained for decades.

PBL specifically uses the student's environment to promote active learning, rather than allowing a professor to muddle through a power point slide deck. A shifting of traditional roles occurs within this new paradigm and the real world becomes the teacher, while the teacher plays the facilitator. I won't presume to bore you with a diatribe on PBL. I will, however, paraphrase Nelson and conclude that adaptations in PBL continually occur in an effort to strengthen critical thinking and problem solving skills in learners, while maintaining core values by remaining student-centered, collaborative, reflective, multi-disciplinary, and reflective (99). The transfer of knowledge across these new pedagogical highways can no longer be fully explained by Richards' traditional Rhetorical Triangle, but must be refocused within the ideology of Bob Johnson and an Expanded Rhetorical Triangle. [Brandt suddenly feels a needle-like sensation in the head as Kemp stabs his student's Voodoo doll repeatedly]. It is within an expanded analysis that we can better appreciate the user's needs and the additional dimensions of 'modality' and 'location.'

It is at this juncture that my newer work with tablet-based mobile medicine dissects the older PBL methodology. Collaborative learning can now be performed, facilitated, and analyzed between colleagues on-the-go and on different continents using affordable and ubiquitous technology. Of course this is a mere trailer for a more detailed movie yet to come (I thought Joe would enjoy the reference!). More detailed remarks and descriptions will be presented Monday in my formal proposal.--RB

Being Organized

Fourth blog, Fri. 7-1 -Status: On-Time

Fourth comments, Fri. 7-8 -Status: On-Time

Comments were to: Regina and Chalice.

What's Old is New! (Official Week 4 Posting)

It should come as no surprise that our recent Bruffee assignment on collaborative learning would be of interest to me. Although, not a seminal work in the field of collaborative learning, also commonly termed problem-based learning (PBL), Bruffee's 1984 article analysed the cultural peer acceptance that is instrumental in cementing the knowledge products acquired within a PBL environment. Such conclusions are essential to some of my current work in post-graduate, medically-based, problem-based learning. In short, the seemingly 'unofficial' discourse of like-mind peers, or friends, facilitates an acceptance of new facts within a knowledge community that later solidifies the 'official' acquisition of that knowledge.

I will not recount the details of his work given that we completed the assignment recently, but I will, instead, review the implications his work has on mine. As you will recall, he uses the typical medical student as an example, since the same constructivist-based, PBL theory has been utilized in medical training since the 1950's. I believe newer works (e.g. Norton), place the inception much earlier in time. In such collaborative learning environments, a problem, or patient case, is worked up, discussed, analyzed, and solved in small groups. If Bruffee's assertion that many students and faculty place a paramount importance on "class discussion" and regard it as one of the most effective teaching tools, then the value of concentrated collaboration via small groups is easily accepted. This somewhat abnormal discourse can take place at lunch, in elevators, in hallways, and at medical dorm rooms, owing to the fact that rules, as Bruffee says, are set aside. Abnormal discourse can not be taught, but it is this same abnormal discourse that is "necessary to [normal] learning."

My work is an extension of such a premise, the value of collaborative group exchange can be more focused with fewer people. Hence, small rotational medical student groups are easier to work in that a class numbering ninety. After formal, and "normal", learning formats cease to exist in the post-graduate era of one's professional career, even smaller and more informal knowledge communities are utilized. The ubiquitous acceptance of mobile technology, coupled with the simple establishment of peer-to-peer social networks, which is to say one-on-one conversations, easily facilitates quick, self-directed, and multi-directional knowledge transfer. Whether by design, necessity, or 'just because we can' motivation, medicine has developed, and will continue to design, new pedagogical teaching and learning platforms. Bruffee's article was written 26 years before the iPad's release, yet his work is still important to our understanding of collaborative learning and technology's facilitation of those evolutionary tendencies. With professor approval, and a formal proposal, I will expand on this brief introduction for my course project!

RB