AT1

 A connected learning environment is a community of active learners who share, curate and produce resources and co-create knowledge on a topic of common interest (Lupton 2018).

2 years ago…

Introduction:

I have been concerned for many years about the level of engagement from senior students when learning about space science.  Students seem to be polar opposites when it comes to this topic: they either absolutely Love it or they are completely underwhelmed and disengaged.  I wanted to make the unit more accessible for those students who didn’t care about Hubble, red shift and worm holes so I started analysing their learning styles and their preferred method of presentation.  I consulted Blooms Revised Taxonomy (see Fig 1 below:)  and talked to the students, and spent many hours researching.

Fig 1.  Blooms Revised Taxonomy

I formulated a plan, however, it was top secret! As my AP doesn’t really like my ideas. I Looking at the Victorian curriculum, the category ‘ Creative and Critical thinking’ and the subsection called Meta Cognition confirmed my that my idea was indeed feasible.  The indicator suggested to: “Consider a range of strategies to represent ideas and explain and justify thinking processes to others(VCCCTM040) ”  I was ecstatic when it clicked (in my Brian) that higher order thinking also creating.  About this time, I was following astronaut Scott Kelly who was posting on Istagram from the International Space Station (ISS).  His images were mind blowing, beautiful and I wanted to recreate them.

So, I needed to skill up…

1 year ago…

I looked at Scott Kelly’s posts on Instagram and I shared them with the class, I even requested special permission to get Instagram unblocked.  I encouraged the students to look at the images, to see and be amazed.  We would have awesome conversations and discussions and deep and meaningful research occurred.

Still, I hadn’t reached a girl called Lily, she was a doodler, drawer and artist.  I knew what I needed to do but I didn’t have the skills, by this time I had worked out that Nasa had created a unit of work called Art and the cosmic connection.  The specialists had created stunning sculptures and mixed media pieces that were complex and required a lot of time and money- so not for me.   I created and documented a one week unit that used pastels, oils and water colour paint- I called it ‘Art in the Cosmos’.   The students loved it, and the products were great- it was good, but not good enough!

One day on Facebook I saw a friends comment she had made on a artist’s page, it was an alcohol ink media and it looked like the universe- you can imagine my excitement.  I followed the artist and googled Universe art and persisted, and then I found resin!

My learning journey:

I spent all my spare time learning. I used Google search, built connections and joined global groups on digital platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, Pinterest and I followed blogs. It certainly rings true that: “As the boundaries between technology and social media have decreased, the potential for creative production or participatory practices have increased” (Brown et al 2016 p140).  Whenever I saw an inspirational image I added to my Pinterest account, and researched how to recreate it.  I followed others, I joined Etsy and I followed sellers Instagram feeds,  I read, researched and finally I bought some equipment to dabble with (If my husband asks- its all tax deductible 😬). For this assignment I will discuss my favourite group Resin Art Worldwide, as they are global and very supportive and interactive.

My chosen community has significant links to the ideas and concepts such as connected leaning principles, core properties and design principles which are described further in this document by Ito et al (2013),  the majority of critical commentary about the Connected Learning environment (CLE) occurs in Part B, post the development of my ideas and concept maps.

PART A:

The following mind maps were created to map a Connected Learning environment, the focus of which is Resin Art Worldwide.  Fig 2. below shows the initial brainstorm and links between CLE and Resin Art, as illustrated by the author.

Fig 2.  Initial Brainstorm

Author Created

As my knowledge developed I remapped the CLE to show links and connections, this can be seen in Fig 3. below.  Connections between ideas are shown in orange, I chose this colour as it is associated with learning.

Fig 3. Developed to show links.

Author Created

This visual representation of this Connect Learning environment fails to fully describe all connections and links.  In order to fully develop the map, annotations and notes were added, thus creating v3 which can be found in Fig 4.

Fig 4.  Annotated Mind Map

Author created

Please click here if you would like to download the interactive file.  (There hyperlinks embedded, utilise fully please download a free app called SimpleMind.)

As previously indicated analysis of Fig 4, will be based on Ito et al CL Framework 2013, For example Peer- supported, Interest Powered and Academically orientated are identified as the “three crucial contexts for learning”.

“Traditional theories of learning and construction of knowledge have not taken into account the revolution that has occurred in recent decades due to the emergence of ICT. Connectivism refers to the knowledge in the network that arises from the interaction within a group of knowledge construction” (Martínez and Hernández de Frutos p21 2018).

Further; “learning as the processes of making connections and making use of those connections” (p137 Smith et al 2017).  This is a significant change in the educational physiology of teachers educated before 2004…

Interest powered- is this the key to education?  It certainly was the emphasis for me. I believe that this concept is multifaceted, in that initially I was desperate for students to show more interest in their learning, I wanted to see their passion and share their wonder about the universe, however, I knew that I needed to reach them via another pathway.  As a consequence my interest and passion grew as I found out more information.  As a result I owe a dept of gratitude to ‘Lily’ as she provided the kick start I needed to travel down my learning pathway to join my CLE and to increase my knowledge.

Academically oriented or Learning orientated.  Why would you join a Connected Learning Environment if you didn’t search for something? This was my need, and most of the others post to learn, share technique, get advice or to give feedback on products.  Indeed, we all learn every time we log on, whether we like it or not we gain knowledge.  This was why I joined initially as I needed to be able to recreate universe images, I needed to be able to share this knowledge with my students in my class.  And I have the knowledge now, its been hard, as you can see from the mind map, there is specific technique, vocabulary, product info, mixed media, I have been learning for over 1 year- but I’m getting better.  This year will be my first trial with students.  My aim: to create a full ceiling of the universe for my year 8 area.  Achievable? who knows.  My peers think so.