My ONL 192 trip with the PBL Group 11, i.e. „The Eleveners“, comes to an end. When I think about what impressed me the most and what I will take with me from this experience for my future work as an educator and enabler of learning processes, I would like to mention the following two points:

• First, online learning can be just as much a social experience as a face-to-face course. That means: my biggest concern that I had at the beginning has disappeared into thin air. One decisive moment for this development was, when I was once unable to attend one of the two weekly zoom meetings of our problem-based learning group and then – rather as an observer – watched the recording of the meeting. I realized that I was emotionally moved to watch my fellow students small talk as they entered the zoom room. I noticed how they were really interested in each other’s lives and what they were going through professionally or privately at the time. It was also touching to see how this background knowledge about the peculiarities of individual colleagues appeared again and again in conversations throughout the sessions. However, I do not believe that this feeling of familiarity and openness can establish itself in any case. This requires facilitation right from the start, one that e.g. triggers the creation of a group collaborative learning agreement and that reminds learners of this agreement from time to time. I found the following two points particularly interesting in our learning agreement: „give the other the benefit of the doubt in cases of possible misunderstandings, but ask if you’re not sure what was meant or intended“ and „always assume benevolence“. Especially in situations where you can perceive your group members only visually twice a week as a two-dimensional torso on a screen, these two rules seem to me to be particularly valuable.

• Secondly, in my examination of literature on online pedagogy, I came across topics that – as I see it – are also crucial in face-to-face pedagogy, but in my perception are not discussed there as needed. These include, for example, the idea of the Personal Learning Network (PLN, ONL-Topic 3, see my blog) or the meaning of emotions in learning (ONL-Topic 4). Acknowledging emotional aspects of learning has led to concrete changes in my current course. In a reflection lesson, several students said that they would simply feel very uncomfortable in the weekly discussions on two scientific articles and that they were therefore somewhat frustrated because they could not even show that they had studied the articles. In order to deal with this feedback in a constructive and learning-oriented way, my co-teacher and I decided that from now on personal contributions could also be submitted as written reflections. I was thrilled to see that many students who had previously made little contributions in the discussion started to regularly participate in writing. I hope that the elimination of emotional pressure among these students will lead them to a more enjoyable and motivated approach to the subject matter. 

The last weeks in the ONL 192 course were a very intense, instructive and in every respect enriching experience that I warmly recommend to anyone who wants to develop as an educator and enabler of learning processes.

Many thanks to all who designed and organized this course! Many thanks to Miriam, who introduced and accompanied us throughout the course in Zurich and Winterthur with such commitment. Many thanks to the facilitators of the Eleveners: Annika, Grant, Gregor and Thashmee. Facilitating is extremely important in online courses and you did a fantastic job! And of course: Many thanks to all my co-learners in the PBL-Group: Anya, Donna, Joanne, Katarina and Saad – learning with and from you was really a great experience. Hope we carry on with our Personal Learning Network.

If I may give an advice to forthcoming ONL course participants, it’s this one: „Be as lucky as I was with my PBL group members!“