I'm just going to put this here...
Teachers, Students, Education Lovers....ZOOM -- What it was, was ZOOM.
In 2017 I was part of a pedagogical and technological experiment through the Consortium of Public Liberal Arts Colleges (COPLAC) in which I co-taught a public history course focusing on local history. Six pairs of students from liberal arts colleges in MN, NH, TX, NC, MA, and MO met via ZOOM - a distance-learning platform mainly unheard of then but today a ubiquitous teaching tool with which millions have experience.
My students did research in the local archives and wrote about and created public websites that told a story of migration and immigration where they lived. Their work ranged from Congolese immigration to Missouri in the present to late 19th century Finnish migration to New Hampshire. Two of my students focused on how the building of The Blue Ridge Parkway was a factor in forcing, as well as facilitating migration in #WesternNorthCarolina. (#WNC). The pair of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts students zeroed in on the Irish who came to build the Hoosac Tunnel in the 1850s. The Texas focus was on the forced out-migration of The Wichita American Indians and in Minnesota a comparison of the migratory experiences of European Apostolics and Mexicans brought to light important data.
You can access the project and the amazing work that the students did at this link:
Cultural Crossroads: Migration and Community Transformation – A COPLACDigital Project, Fall 2017 (Only “The Finns of Newport” appears to have endured as an individual website:
The Finns of Newport )
Distance-learning is now a hot button topic and that continues to heat up. Of course technologies like Zoom, Google Meet, and FaceTime greatly aided society to continue to function during the Global Pandemic. Some people have very strong feelings that those modalities should now be shelved - shoved back into the closet until such time - hopefully never - that they are needed once again. Some people just don’t like the platform. Others, how many is unclear, find them useful and for some things, even superior, to face-to-face meetings. For some others, again how many is unclear, find that these technologies make the otherwise impossible - because of time, distance, work or caregiver demands, disability, health compromises, or simply finances - possible.
Perhaps because of my own early experience with the COPLAC students and their coursework I support Distance-Learning options. In my own case, making the impossible - optimizing my time with my family - is also made possible by this way of teaching. With imaginative use of chat, break-out rooms, and debate formats I have managed to make ZOOM at least as interactive an experience as a brick-and-mortar classroom one. If I had one wish it would be that I could more strongly urge “Cameras On” during class time. Students who do engage with that simplest piece of the technology do better I would argue. But then so too do students that take advantage of office hours options.
Don’t get me wrong - I don’t prefer one over the other. I’m still the teacher in the classroom known for ranging back and forth and up and down through the aisles, using all the whiteboard space available, and prone to the occasional dramatic moment. But I try and bring that same spirit to the ZOOM room. Every teacher has good days and bad, or lesson plans that work or don’t, but that does not have to be tied to the model of delivery. I get it that Distance-Learning (or Teaching) is not for every person but for those with need and commitment this technology is a ready solution. The Article linked below is from 2023.
Read more at this link (And if you can’t access the article message me and I will share):
https://www.chronicle.com/article/m...-Today_date_20230606&cid=at&source=&sourceid=
https://www.chronicle.com/article/m...-Today_date_20230606&cid=at&source=&sourceid=