When I signed up for the ONL-course, globalization was taken for granted and online learning was embraced by a smaller portion of my colleagues. When the course started, it was nice to meet so many people who share the same interests as I do related to digital tools, online learning environments etc. Now, facing the new Corona virus/Covid-19 we suddently experience a significantly modified way of living (understatement?). Teachers at our university had to switch to online learning with one day notice (!). Our present experiences in these challenging time make the topics of this course extremely relevant and I can’t wait to see the results of research about the giant steps into the world of online teaching & learning that were taken within education all over the world.
But life goes on, in spite of Corona-on-the-agenda, so I want to dedicate some lines to my experiences of the last couple of weeks with ONL201. For Topic 1 (Online participation & digital literacies), our PBL group decided to focus on different aspects of building trust in online learning environments – a fascinating topic!
Photo: Neal Sanches (creative common license)
Having taught intercultural communication for many years, I consider trust to be one of those phenomena that carry a heavy load of culturally bound significance. Trust is universal, but the ways in which trust is created, manifested, maintained and/or broken, are determined, to a high degree, by culture.
It was also interesting to elaborate on the issues and concepts that David White introduced. Reflecting on my own use of media – in both professional and private contexts – gave lots of “food for new thoughts”.
We have already started working on Topic 2 (Open learning – sharing and openness). Also this topic embraces many interesting aspects. I only wish I had more time and energy to dive deeper into all the various ideas.
