The main reason for me being here is to find out if a Virtual Exchange can give the same personal growth that a physical student/teacher exchange can give. As we all know, no growth without growing pains and in a physical exchange a lot of that pain comes from homesickness.
When we look at the aspects in exchanges that we intuitively know are beneficial, but hard to measure it comes down to how we have matured due to the experience. We hope that in addition to aquiring measurable skills, students and teachers also develop more initiative, resilience, patience, tolerance, confidence and adaptability. But is this possible in a virtual environment? The key factor in a physical exchange, immersion is after-all, not a component in virtual exchanges.
Let’s take a look at two theories to see if they have anything to offer. First, let’s see what Doug Belshaw has to say about digitial literacies. Belshaw has defined eight elements of digital literacy: Cultural, Creative, Constructive, and Communicative. The mindsets are: Confident, Cognitive, Critical, and Civic. Belshaw sees these elements as being context-dependent and co-created. With my «international coordinator» specs on the latter rings all kinds of bells in my head.
If you have ever been on an exchange you know that your adjustment to the new environment goes in starts and jerks – somethings go smoothly for months – like getting used to a different diet – and then can suddenly stop up. Other things are challenging, and never stop being challenging – like different ideas about personal space.
If we design a virtual exchange with Belshaw’s eight elements in mind – and view them metaphorically as the country in which the exchange will take place, we can perhaps create a learning situation that not only teaches skills – like how to draw perspective or how to code – but perhaps also creates a situation that suprises a student with something unknown that needs to be navigated. Exactly how this can be done, I am not sure, but maybe David White’s theories about residents and visitors can give me some ideas.
White likes to put our digital behavior on a grid of four quadrants with resident/vistor making up one pole and institutional/personal making the other. Our digital lives are played out in these four sectors, and sometimes we exist in all four quadrants at once. For example, I use Microsoft teams, email and canvas in my professional life, while I use Facebook and my private email in my personal life. I use Facetime, Zoom and Skype in both. Since I create text and activity on Teams – since I leave a trace of myself there – I am a «resident», just as the posts I leave on Facebook give me «resident» status there. I use YouTube, both professionally and personally, but only to view. I do not create YouTube videos, nor do I comment on them. I am a «visitor» on YouTube, both personally and professionally.
In the ONL202 course we are required to create a blog, and to use Twitter. We are being forced into «residency». The discomfort I feel in using Twitter, in cracking Twitter’s «code» is akin to the feeling of stepping into unknown territory. It is uncomfortable, and I feel vulnerable. Having to use Twitter makes me feel «homesick».
Could the way forward then, be to create a virtual exchange where requiring «residency» in Belshaw’s eight elements provides the underlying structure for the subject matter being taught? What would this look like? Among the challenges I imagine is creating an environment where the discomfort and vulnerability participants experience can be explored as a learning experience of equal value to the other, more obvious learning experiences in the course. There is a fairly low threshold for students to knock on my door and say they are feeling homesick. I think the threshold is far higher to talk about digital homesickness, especially for younger people, who supposedly are natives.
