CLMOOC 2017 Make Cycle #2

Postcards are interesting in that they can convey things and give us an image, an idea, data, connections, and they are often welcome, unlike ads or bills. 

This weeks postcards was a combination of ideas I had kicking around. One was to write half truth, half fictional newspaper articles that might resonant with people. I find that no matter how big the town, people have their share of quirky people living around them. This is a project to document some of those stories, and capture some interesting jump off points for stories and anecdotes. 

This group has turned my thinking around and while I know the type of content I want to include, I started this with template making and finding the right application to make this work for me. I tried a few different programs and apps, but landed on Publisher. Even though I don't love it, it worked for this layering of textboxes and other elements. 

Postcard #1 was about a screaming lady and while I don't love the content, I was more concerned with the entire look and size. During our Makers Hangout on 7/18/17 we considered the idea that the post card has two sides -- the content side and the address side. While these two sides may be different, they also may be connected - one showing part of the idea and the other the answer, or the reveal, or a clue. 

We also discussed the personal nature of writing and sending a unique correspondence to someone and what that means as a transaction of social or connective significance. When I was creating the back, I wanted to create an orientation to the article and project. But I also wanted to number them and personalize them like numbered prints or series collections so people would be excited about finding and reading a series or collection. (More in the collection here). 

Data Postcards

It sounded like the group had been working in data and using data cards to establish a connection. I have to say, thanks to Kevin, I was able to watch the data video Big Bang Data which really helped me understand the concepts and the connections. I really love this concept and idea. And I think it will be a fascinating connection to do with writers. How often to you think about your characters, novel, plot -- or how often did you write a poem. Part of collecting this kind of data for writers is not only for the collections of data, but to see productivity. Writers have a terrible self view and they always feel like their work is kept behind closed doors. This proves their worth, their working, and that they are constantly seeing the world through the lens of a writer. Fascinating and an evolving thought pattern in creating connections to writers. 

Writing Feedback and the Art of Wonder

by Ron Samul 
The power of information, understanding, and thinking is one of the most important skills I want students to understand in academics. Sure, they will have to write papers and do some grunt work for me, but in the end, I want diverse thinking based on thoughtful research. 

When I saw this article that suggests that feedback shouldn't be a directive, but an exploration, I realized that I wasn't fostering diverse thinking if I was telling them what I wanted them to change (make the teacher happy = good grade). But I realize now that perhaps this is not helping. Bill Ferriter posted this idea by Dylan Wiliam and it struck me that perhaps I needed to change the way I spoke to them between the lines. 

"It turns out that it isn't the giving of the feedback that causes learning gains, it is the acting on feedback that determines how much students learn"(1)

If feedback is given to college writers in terms of questions, places to look, or just leads... then students are given permission to explore and find their own learning moments. In the world of creative writing, I think there is more of an exploration of ideas rather than concrete direction and focus. 

The difference is the creative element. The choices writers make with creative writing is based on experience, not form or rhetoric. That being said, feedback does come in the way of questions and connections. Drawing in connections allows the writer to go back and consider relationships, allows them to see another writer moving around the same ideas. It is theirs to comprehend. My point is, when you look to a method of investigative feedback, we should look into the creative writing models and see how feedback is delivered. The biggest insult to a creative writer would be to tell them that their creative expression is wrong. But we do it constantly in academic writing because we are looking for specific benchmarks and rubric goals. In novel writing, sometimes we don't even realize what is happening in the novel to evaluate right and wrong. Recently, I've asked students to pre-read their novel before I commit to working with them on it. Not because they are not good writers, but perhaps I am not the writer to help you with the type of book you want to write? It is a big endeavor and not one to be taken lightly. 

Academic writing could take a few lessons from understanding the value of open-ended feedback. If the grade was secondary to the goal of better writing, we could change the thinking, the writing, and the vision of the paper. Maybe the equation is "challenge teacher = good grade" or "find a sense of voice = good grade" rather than the idea doing what the student is told. 

The last few semesters, I have taken the high-stakes research project for freshman and positioned it in the middle of the semester. The reason behind it was to spend time after the initial writing to explore, deconstruct, and revalue what they added to their paper. Most of the papers that come in are cleaned up rough drafts, and I think spending some time thinking about their paper is valuable. 

The next step is to make them feel like they know something they didn't know before. I want to them to feel like they are knowledgeable about the content of their research. If they are not, then what did they gain? It isn't enough to read the research paper back to me, it must be something you understand. That is what makes good writing. A good creative writer understands what they are writing and knows the depth of their words. So should academics, and be leading them by way of discoverable feedback, the depth of their thinking increases. 

http://blog.williamferriter.com/2016/02/20/new-slide-turn-feedback-into-detective-work/?utm_content=bufferb5c39&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

Ron Samul is a writer and educator. For more information or to contact him, go to www.RonSamul.org 

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Unquestioning Writing - When Good Is Good Enough

by Ron Samul 

As writers, we are constantly thinking about the audience and the impact of our writing. It is a fundamental element of teaching, thinking, and writing. It made me think, when I saw this tweet by Maha Bali, when she mentioned this moment. 

This is gonna sound funny, but I think sometimes one can write something that is SO powerful that no one comments. Because it's that good!

— ℳąhą Bąℓi مها بالي (@Bali_Maha) December 15, 2015

This is a complex idea, and from a writing standpoint, it is also a brave idea. Writers as communicators and creative generators always seem to humble and diminish their craft. In this case, Maha is confident and sees that sometimes - no one comments because of the "powerful". I really admire the confidence and the realization that sometimes - that the power of writing can overwhelm. Why? 

Social Media 
The concept of finding something meaningful and important on social media is relevant to me. Online courses, MOOCs, connected learning, creative spaces -- all interact through social media. For me, learning, thinking, and listening to very smart and creative people comes from my interaction with social media. However, not everyone comes to social media to find that kind of connection. 

Some people are connecting with family and friends, some are just passing by while they watch their favorite TV show, some are broadcasting on Periscope as they walk to work. Why people use social media is tailored to each person. The depth of reading and interaction really comes down to the user. And it isn't happening in real time, it is happening along a timeline that could be shifting through time zones and cultures. Sometimes, the most important statements or blog posts don't get the attention I think they deserve, merely because I posted them on a Friday afternoon before a holiday (fail). 

But more importantly, people are looking for an interaction that is quick and reactive on social media. Things that make them stop, think, and experience deeper level thinking, (which relates to selective solitude, pausing, and deep reflection), may not fit into the "Like" or "+1" world of immediate reaction. This has spurred the age of important, meaningful quotes on stunning images. 

In this scan and click age, deep thinking and impactful ideas sometimes need a difference venue. It sometimes needs a blogpost, or some area where things can be expanded and slowly unpacked. And sometimes, the "Like" or the "Share" simply doesn't relate the importance of meaning at that moment. Sometimes, I see an image or a concept and I want to keep it. I want to hold on to it. But where would I keep it? Social media lets you keep it on social media terms. But when something is meaningful, we want to do more than just throw it on our timeline. Perhaps it is merely my personal need to embody ideas, art, and writing in tangible ways. Social media isn't going away and perhaps a thirty-year archive of my Facebook posts will allow me to go back and find that poem I recall so sweetly. But I want to make moments my own - outside of the screen. I want to print them out and save them. I want to fold them up and leave them in a book to discover them in a few years. 

Student Writing 
Being a writing teacher is a complex beast. Following syllabus standards, rubrics, college standards, your own vision, and the student's vision - we create a position where we are looking for the right answer to the assignment. Writing is subjective and I am looking at process, not the right order of words in a sentence. I am looking at critical thinking, how you cite sources, how you can create a document that convinces me. There is some excellent writing that comes by in terms of student writing, but I find that those elements are the product of good thinking, critical research, and planning. It comes from students who engage the learning process. And sometimes, compared to the whole class or the entire writing section, you have to acknowledge excellence as it comes to you. And sometimes, after two or three rewrites and a clear process of thinking and learning - there comes a moment when you don't need it better. They have learned - they have more than met your requirements, and they deserve to stand in that moment and feel the significance of their work. 

Creative Writing 
Creative acts are a different beast. When you apply rubrics and grading schemes to a poem or a short story, it gets awkward and complex. The "powerful" concept that Maha tweets about can be emotional, formative, and change the way we see the world. That is what art does. And sometimes, from a creative writing mentor point-of-view, you have to judge something that isn't vetted through a rubric or a course guide. It comes from emotion, it comes from form and content magically aligning to make a moment (perhaps in time if read or spoken) that matches our time and space with the ideas of someone else. 

I always question my role in interfering with the creative process. It isn't my story to tell, it is my job to make the writer think about making the story better. That is complex. And my suggestions are never - "throw this out and start over," because I would be devastated if someone told me that. But this "powerful" part of writing and speaking is fascinating to me. And there has to be a moment when we realize that expression and time meet you when you need it. There are so many poems, books, and important things written all the time. When I need them (personally), they will be there. I don't always see them now because I am looking at different things that I need now. We are all on different paths and moving in different ways. We find those moments that are "powerful" because we are looking. We need to stop counting "likes" and stats, and imagine that if one person moved forward because of the power of our words, it is always... always worth it. 

I don't think I am done defining Maha's "powerful" because I think there is a lot to the creative elements here. There is an important conversation here in defining the "powerful" in our writing, in our expression, and in our ideas. We need to value them - make an earnest and important effort to value those words and ideas that can change lives. It may not make you famous or popular, but it is a rich and deeply thoughtful life, one without regrets. 

by Ron Samul -- want to know more about me... go here. 

Ron Samul is a writer and educator. For more information or to contact him, go to www.RonSamul.org 


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License

Capacity

Teaching a graphic novel course is always fun. The best part is the exploration: from different genres of comics, to artistic styles, and great stories. In defining what a graphic novel can do, to that of a comic story, I use the example of Capacity by Theo Ellsworth. This book brings about a visual and story based epic that captures some stunning philosophical ideas, creations, and connections. There are times in this graphic novel that I completely get lost in time and space.

Why is Capacity as an art form so estranged from the typical comic experience and so in tune to what we think and see in the real world?

Let's start with the minutia of the artistry. I don't mean that it is all about small things, but Ellsworth is creating a word that is complicated and hyper detailed. The complexity of character and image creates a complicated and sometimes complex matrix of ideas that aren't based in our reality, but in something more abstract and subconscious. The reader isn't defining the next panel or how the story is going to end, but how odd that figure is, or how long it takes to draw so many tiny scales. But when you pull back and see that inner workings, it makes a stunning and prolific universe. Not only is the narrative story (in this case I mean words) epic, it is interactive. Often the narrative accesses your vision and choice in a friendly banter. This is what draws the reader to the inside. It is there that we begin to ask ourselves, what is going on. The stories are filled with epic failures, uncertainty, and sometimes hubris. It switches from brilliant moments of understanding of the consciousness self and then shifts back to how he lived in his car. While it is about the commitment to art and the stories that he discovers in his mind, it is also about the reality between the outside world and the inside.

Capacity is a stunning imaginative wandering and it doesn't work without the symbiotic relationship between the images and the words that balance one another in the vision and scope of the ideas. In some ways, the artwork affords further into the mindscape that he creates than even the narrative suggests. It is a complicated and visual wandering.

When I passed this book out in class to share and let the students see the creativity and ideas in the book, most of them took some time. One girl stayed after class, not realizing that everyone was gone and she got lost in the poems, the stories, and the details. I didn't bother her for awhile because I had been lost in that same way. This is a powerful and very creative comic. 

#Rhizo15 / Where Did My Artifact Go? / Week 6

The metaphor has been a powerful tool for this experience. We search for metaphors when we have trouble understanding that intangible part of our experience. In this case, some of the metaphor is built into this experience. The metaphor is a very powerful resources for people searching for the intangible. Poetry is about the intangible: love, freedom, fear, and the spiritual. Those things are only brought to beauty by way of the function of figurative language.

In thinking about creating an artifact, I thought about poetry because of the impact that the metaphor can play in explaining this process: a whimsical poem about Dave, a serious poem about being lost, a passionate poem about the power of finding your own learning path. I thought about my novella about a student who attends class that isn't happening and finds out she is in the rhizome (a bit Black Orphan inspired I'm afraid. Those two came about together. Sorry.) But I thought about all the blog posts and how they might connect and how important his space has been to me. I thought about all the other blogs out there where people challenged my thinking, my way of teaching, and even made me ask those tough questions like what are we really doing? 

What artifact would show people what happened at Rhizo15? What would give people the insight? Something concrete?  I was drifting for awhile. Then, it hit me. 

Ron looking for his Rhizo15 artifact.

It wasn't what I wrote or said - it is what I did. Two students were cut loose from my class on the last two weeks. They were sent out to do something - learn something, and come back. Those two students took the risk and the challenge - which was far more work than writing my last paper, and they defined themselves. My artifacts are the two potentially new members of the rhizome community. They went out and defined their own path, they went out, sought answers that weren't for a grade but for themselves. They were driven, passionate, and they got it. We have always been in the rhizome. We have always been thinking this way. The best way to foster a community: sustain it, and these two students went beyond my hope and they went from students to scholars. They are my artifacts, not as something left behind to pick up and referenced, that is what the blog is for, but people actively walking around looking for answers, asking questions, and getting lost so they can be found. I will leave you with this comment from one of the students, "I do plan to be a professor someday and have been analyzing teaching styles and class participation throughout my college experience. I will definitely be taking what I have learned from your posts and teaching, into my whole life, my learning, my leading, my parenting, and my teaching." 

_________________________________________________

P.S. Thank you all for your support and vision. It was amazing. I am up for any collaboration or projects. Please keep me in the loop. 

#Rhizo15 / Benchmarks in the Study of "Nomadology"

It is strange being a writer. If you are an academic you have very specific points to start and stop. You have first day of the semester, you midterm, you have finals, and then it is over. Sometimes you have other benchmarks like submission of your project or thesis or senior presentation week. All these elements signal different markers. However, if we consider the rhizome path, or what Aaron Johannes-Rosenberg coins "nomadology" - there needs to be these markers around us to shape the experience and give us a chance to reflect and commemorate the work.

Working with writers for a long time, I've seen the burn-out of writers who never celebrate, who never take stock, and appreciate what they are doing. They work like dogs and just keep sludging along. These students immersed in the idea of "nomadology" need to refine the art of marking their work, finishing a rough draft, completing a long project. We don't need traditional benchmarks. We don't need grades. But we need moments to shift from action to reflection and prepare for more action. It is not a midterm exam or anything academic, a place to stand for a moment and see where you are. Even looking up through a gorge can be stunning and inspiring.

Oddly, I feel like we are coming to one of those benchmarks soon with the official close of #rhizo15 looming on the horizon, I feel that we need to move into that moment. I hope it goes on and this vibrant community of thinkers, writers, educators, and creative people continue to interact. But it also gives us a chance to think about what just happened and is still happening. I never thought I would fall into such a collectively amazing, thoughtful, and educationally necessary (for me personally) group. Not only did I find my own way of thinking validated, I also thought of so many things I am just wrapping my brain around. I really liked the respect, the humor, and the depth of thought in this group. And for some reason, I am amazed that I did so much on Twitter (which had not really been my go to social media outlet).

Rhizo15 is something that changed the way I think about a lot of things. It confirmed a lot of my personal scholarship, and it opened my eyes to how and why I should be setting more students out into their own vision of the rhizome. If we are destined to "nomadology" and the rhizome of learning, we should find new ways to connect the path, the purpose, and the vision into a something that will help choose the next path, purpose, and vision.

A few things I learned this month: I've been in the rhizomatic learning system all along. I should stay in that learning system, and never come out. I also learned that I should lure people in with whatever means I can and tell them that it will be okay, look at me (ha!). And lastly, I was finally able to put a name and a loose metaphor to this world of learning, giving it purpose and distinction even when it feels like it is drifting or lost. Knowing the name of the thing you've always known but couldn't say is like finding the magic words to unlock a language, or a whole new way of seeing something. For that alone, I am grateful and so optimistic. Perhaps that is my benchmark - my moment on the vista. Now, I must go back and see what kind of artifact I can make for Dave. I do have a half backed novella cooking somewhere... maybe I should pull open the oven door and see if it will rise. 

#Rhizo15 / Week Four / Writers Write To "Know"

There have been some very interesting and insightful conversations and connections out there this week in Rizo15.

The best way to connect to a writer is to give them other writers, give them other ideas, and let them refine their vision. By introducing a writer to another writer (living or dead) is to move them into new relationships with their own ideas and work. But maybe I'm getting ahead of myself.

I've been in the business of subjective measurement for some time. How do you value a poem or a piece of fiction? Simply put: you don't. You measure their intent, you measure their access to the past, you measure their understanding of aesthetic quality. In the end, you measure their expectations, their visions, and their end product. Sometimes, I say simply: I didn't understand this part. Or, it reminds me of something you wrote earlier. When it works - I explain how it works in terms of my own reading. For example, "I like this poem because it presents two different ideas that oppose one another. Seeing those two forces might be similar to magnets or opposites and this is where your word choice could be considered polarizing." While I am making judgments on their work, I am merely telling them my thought process as I read. Not because it has more value than their own, but because it might illuminate an area for development. This could be a type of subjective conversation that leads to more inquiry or understanding.

Writing and thinking about creating new writing is always about connecting people together. Albeit, the people might be dead, but writers are experts in recommending a voice to interact with. Sometimes, it is a "one and done" kind of experience (a writer doesn't like a suggestion). Other times, reading becomes an obsession and writers will consume everything that a famous or noted writer produces. Personally, I think it is more effective when the writer is dead. That's not to say that living writers aren't important, but if we believe that people are content, then their life, their work, and anything else becomes the subjective understanding of that life, that work, and that experience in intellectual thinking. We know reading and thinking is complex. You can never read a great book for the first time - again. There is only one first and then there is again and again, in different ways and constructs. Writers are the network other writers study. They are the community, the content, and the ability to change something in the future. We are creating and building upon those who wrote before us. And we have the opportunity to commune with them, from Whitman to Carver at any time. This communion of ideas and connectivity is rhizomatic, and it is constantly evolving.

So, a writer then becomes the content by way of art, the subject or aesthetics by living, and the subjective learning group all at once. They can be mentors, teachers, students, and building blocks all at once - or at different times in the writing life of someone else. Why would someone become a Melville expert? Why would someone dissect every Whitman poem? Why would someone go to the place where a writer committed suicide? Because they want to "know". By that "knowing" we define the essence of subjective learning. We bring it to just that - to "know" we mean anything, everything, what we need, what we want, what we must find in order to create and add to the world. It is a brilliant and complex community residing on the pages of the rhizome. How it is accessed and interfaced is forever an exploration of form and creative endeavor. The hope is that we will never know its completion, but merely its possibilities. We need a new model - we need to define the path of creativity, and foster the infinite journey to be had there.

P.S. It is fascinating to connect some of the inspirations and conversations that writers had with one another. For example, Coleridge and Wordsworth inspired some fascinating writing. When you find and see some of the connection writers have with their contemporaries, the rhizome grows. The pathway augments and shifts. It has always been a connected group of thinking, we just haven't realized its relevance or power in our thinking process. Maybe now is the time. (Hope this makes sense).

#Rhizo15 / What I've Been Missing

It has been an interesting week and some really fascinating and creative ideas have been swirling around #Rhizo15. I can say that I am truly inspired and amazed at how powerful and connected this has been for me as an educator and a thinker.

I spend too long creating things in a vacuum. If I am creating a syllabus, a course schedule, resources, a blog, something to offer the students when they walk in the door, I have only met my own perception of what I think is going to happen in the classroom. What I've realized in thinking about content this week is that it means nothing until the students fill the class. I use to think I was a terrible teacher because after a few weeks, the syllabus, my ideas, and my connections to that "thing" I created before class was just thrown out like a piece of roadside trash. I would adapt the learning level of the class, I would spend more time on skills and conversation that I thought important. And those weeks of careful building would start to crumble.  By midterm, I was often in a state of chaos because I was the one at odds with my own content. Conversations, ideas, experiences - all coming from the students replaced my vision of the class. For a long time, I blamed myself for being caught between what I thought would and should happen and what was really happening in the classroom. And for the first time, this year, I feel like I can articulate this feeling of conflict with the content and the students. The more they infused ideas and good conversation - the more I grew frustrated that I couldn't pursue it, that I had to go back to those ideas that were created in a vacuum. 

What is and was missing was the fact that the students will be the content and the assessment, they will be the coffee, the cream, the everything - and I need to contain it (the cup). This has brought about a sense of relief and a sense of shifting into a new paradigm. 

#Rhizo15 / Week 3 / Content - Morning Coffee

This is a fascinating topic and I think it begins the root of one of my difficulties as a writing teacher. But before I ramble about that -- it is important to remember that we are the content, and what we say and what we think are diverse and complicated packets of thought. If we are the curriculum, we are also the content. We've been filling this space with content, but how it connects and how it all moves us through our learning paths and root systems, is not content but the result of the content and the curriculum moving in orchestra.

Course content to me is a dream. During my writing courses and working with graduate students, there is the content - which I always discuss in terms of coffee (content), and the cup which is everything else (form, ethos, pathos, logos, audience, time, place). I've been asked to teach courses with no coffee and all cup - and all coffee and just the mention of a cup. So, what is more important and why?

In the end, I need to give the students a cup of coffee. An empty cup doesn't serve them because they need the coffee, the caffeine, and something warm to ingest. On the flip side coffee can't happen without putting it into something or it will be a complete mess. And so the connection of these ideas have to come together. Form and content together. And let's face it - it is not all that exciting discussing comparative essays with no content. And writing about gun control without understanding how an argument works is mentally exhausting as well.

And if I might complicate matters a bit more, what if the coffee is the form and the cup is the content? What if I am the coffee and the writing is the cup? Sorry, I just get caught up in Rhizo fits of thinking.

Do I need content to talk about writing? No. But the difficulty is to explain "form" in a vacuum without content. And then explaining that it doesn't matter what goes into the cup or what the content is, as long as you understand the form and what it can do. It gets more complex when we get into creative writing.

Creative writing is about telling stories and creating emotions. Story is content developed through the writer. I don't feel like my role is to change content in creative writing unless I have a reason based in form and function. To say, I just don't like this has to be based in reason, not just my own subjective taste. My job is to ground my comments in the function of form - and sometimes that is difficult to do. That is where I need to be a better teacher and mentor. I need to study narratology, I need to study form and rhetoric in fiction and linguistic. Their content is subjective which speaks to their story and ideas. And frankly, it bothers me when people judged my creative work without a functional purpose for change. How do I make creative writers produce better writing - I talk to them about everything but their content. I even make them write journals about why they are doing what they are doing and mapping out how they work. Shaping their form and aesthetic well-being will give the best fertile ground for growing something brilliant.

Having said that - isn't it ironic that I've been hired to teach "subjects" - content and not teach in an area where I can be effective in all modes of written expression. Perhaps that is a place in our academic world that we should subvert. We are all so much bigger than the content we teach. Perhaps that would go on our subjective portfolios and resumes - the place where all the really important things are listed and never realized. 

Confessions of a College Educator: Why I did what I didn't do...

In my previous post, I discussed the decision I made to let a few students who were doing well in the class, be cut free from the last few weeks of programmed course work so that they could do some rhizomatic exploration - or what is now being termed "free-range-learning". I discussed some of the student reactions, ideas, and the impressions they had moving into this new place of learning.

Dave Cormier mentioned in the Facebook group, "there must be at least one person in that room that you're worried about. Maybe someone who is overly passive yet a good student? Someone else who might not be all that self driven?" And it got me thinking.

The reason I selected the two students came about because they were safe. I knew they were academically sound and if they didn't do another stitch of work this semester they would be in great shape. They were proven to be motivated and focused, their research papers were focused and well executed. So, I knew that they would understand the idea and run with it.

But to get to the heart of the matter, why didn't I ask someone less accomplished, someone not doing well? Part of it was not being able to see that perhaps the method was the issue. If I am being honest, perhaps I thought lazy, lack of motivation, and lack of perseverance was a "student" problem, not a "design of the course" problem. Now, it might seem evident that a student allowed to "free range learn" might prove all of those assumptions on my part as false.

At this point, I should sit on this idea. Part of my thinking process wants to set up a basic engagement process - a student must understand what I am asking them to do; the student must be able to work independently; the students must be.... Yeah, that is where it gets conflicted - why shouldn't they have the same experience, the same opportunity, the same possibility to learn?

Taking the best students sets up better rate of success, but it doesn't gives us a true vision of what is possible. I was never the A student - but I was the person who would have really benefited from doing things differently, thinking differently. And when it came down to it - and no one gave me those options, I created them myself. I wrote a novel in my junior year of high school because I wasn't being challenged, I made my teachers read it and talk to me about it, and that was my own rhizome learning exploration. I wasn't in the honors society, or the top of my class. But, I knew the value of work and refining what was important to me as learner. I can't believe I missed that in bringing this concept to the classroom.

Week #2 Rhizo15 - Assessment Principles

Looking back at how a mentor relationship works, particularly in writing, it really does depend on how much effort is put in by both sides of the equation. The more invested the mentor is - the more the writer (student) will engage, learn, and push to have continued interactions. Part of it is motivation by both sides, but it also has to be measured in - does this kind of effort (on both sides) produce some writing that is fruitful? Otherwise, why would you foster a relationship that doesn't equate to a goal or success?

This brings about the next idea. If we can evaluate and try to find defined ways to measure effort rather than outcome, don't we also have to measure the effort of the guide (educator, teacher, ect) to see if that effort is equally engaged in the investment of learning? That isn't to say the volume or hours of work put in - but that the effort of the teacher is accountable to the effort of the student. Am I suggesting that this doesn't work unless both sides shows equal or grater effort than the other? Perhaps it is like a math equation:  if student effort is less than the teacher than effort values will return as failing. If student effort equals or is greater than the teacher's effort to facilitate learning, then the student will return a grade of passing or satisfactory.

But what the hell am I counting or grading. Effort? Did they do enough? How do I know? How can I measure if the path they took was valid or worth the journey?

In Tom Bourner's article Assessing Reflective Learning, he describes creating a self assessing learning. Someone who can measure the planned learning and the unplanned learning. The process or skill developed in some courses - are not foundation skills, but the ability to refine how and why they are learning and reflect on that value.

If reflective learning is not assessed it is most likely to be neglected. Assessment has been described as ‘the tail that wags the dog’. Attention follows assessment and behaviour follows attention. Most students pay most attention to what is assessed. That which is not assessed is most likely to be most neglected (Bourner).

Furthermore, in this section, he goes on to discuss how there will never be validity or legitimacy in reflective learning "until the assessment of reflective learning is secure." This is evident in some of the online courses and MOOC certifications that are in the world. Understanding the subjective nature of learning has value that needs to be assessed and developed into credits or some objective assessment of skill or ability.

He goes on to point out that subjective learning is only valuable to the learner who goes through it and that it is too subjective to quantify. He also explains that reflective learning has no foundation in past objectives achieved by others, so when learning occurs, it is not only a new subjective, but it is also always changing in relevance and importance. "In the absence of planned learning outcomes there is nothing against which to assess the learning"(Bourner).

The last important element of this article that I think is a great resources in thinking about how to assess learning that is subjective is Table 2: Questions as tools for reflective thinking. These are really good entry points into thinking about the learning process and how to make it work.

While my intention was to discuss counting and evaluation - I also began thinking, with the help of this resources, how and why subjective learning needs to be valued, given legitimacy, and made to refine the process of education and work. It might solve some our most pressing issues in higher education, like critical thinking, perseverance, motivation, and valuing the learning process.

Online learning: Are subjective perceptions of instructional context related toacademic success?