All Annotations of To facilitate or to teach « Learn Online[Preview]

saved by12 people, first byJennifer Maddrell on 2007-11-04, last byShane Roberts on 2008-08-11

• peneli m

  • As I teach and facilitate various online courses this year, a lot of the theories and concepts I subscribe to are getting some hard testing. The biggest challenge I am finding is the expectation for a teacher or instructor while everyone talks about a facilitator. I don’t think someone can be both, primarily because a teacher inherits a significant amount of power and traditional roles that counter act the more neutral and passive presence of a facilitator. This post will be a series of thoughts about this tension, and some ideas on how I can better manage my attempts at online learning community facilitation.

    
    

    There’s a teacher at the party

• Illya Arnet
  • The biggest challenge I am finding is the expectation for a teacher or instructor while everyone talks about a facilitator. I don’t think someone can be both, primarily because a teacher inherits a significant amount of power and traditional roles that counter act the more neutral and passive presence of a facilitator.
  • That’s when I realized that losing the teacherly voice has nothing to do with losing the voice of an expert. You see, I’d thought that, in order to be a co-participant and a co-learner, I had to learn along with my students. Nonsense. I discovered that they need a figure of authority, someone who knows the topic well, who is an expert and can offer advice, support, and assist them as they engage with the material. The facilitator still needs to be the content expert. That is why people come to us - because they want to learn from us, not with us.
• Gabriela Sellart
  • find the answers more quickly and efficiently
  • Ultimately they are unprepared for the facilitated and individually responsible and self motivated learning environment I try to encourage
  • The teach and instruct methods are a safe bet.
  • My view is that probably too much is expected of learners that are new to a participatory approach to learning. They need time to get to a decent level of understanding of the subject matter and to a new way of learning.
• Shane Roberts
  • difficult to adopt and maintain the role of facilitator to a group studying your field
  • expert