Three Things You Should Know Before You Ask People To Teach In Your Teacher Training

Let’s say that you’re running a teacher training.

And Marla, your friend who is also a yoga teacher, is killer at teaching the chakras. They are her jam. So you think, well, maybe Marla should come into my nifty new teacher training and take on some of the time? After all, the students get to hear from a passionate teacher, Marla gets some training time, doesn’t everyone win?

Maybe.

But before you invite a lot of people to come on board, there are some logistical considerations that you need to think about.

Copyright

If you create the lesson, you own it. If Marla creates it, she owns it. If Marla goes to Bali all of a sudden, you can’t use that material (unless Marla gives you the rights, or you’ve paid her for the usage). While this may not be a deal breaker for specialized subjects, keep it in mind if you’re thinking of having someone teach more than a few hours of your program.

Material

While it can be nice for someone to add their voice to specialized material, you need to beware if you’re thinking of having a teacher teach more of the core material (cuing, sequencing, teaching skills). Even if you love Marla, she may have a different teaching ideology from you. You need to protect your students from confusion by making sure that all your faculty have the same language and rules around key concepts.

Yoga Alliance, or your local supervising organization

If you have joined YA, or another registration organization, they will have requirements around your faculty and you will likely need to register your faculty with the organization to maintain your credentials. (Now, whether or not the organization has the manpower to actually follow up and enforce their mandate…well that’s another question. But if you want to be “above board,” in your training, your faculty will have to be eligible to teach. Check out their rules and restrictions regarding adding faculty so you can feel about adhering to the spirit of their standards.

Adding faculty is an excellent way to add a little diversity to your training, take the teaching burden off of your lead trainer, and make the most of an expert’s passion. Just do your due diligence first to make sure there are no surprises.

For a more in-depth look at adding faculty, take Course 1 of “Create Your Training” for free: everything you need to know.

Five things you must consider when choosing your yoga teacher training space

If you have decided to create and host a teacher training, where you host the training is vitally important. Not only will you have to take into account logistical considerations (ie: do they have bathrooms? do they have enough props?), but it’s also important to ensure that the feeling of the space aligns with your greater vision for your course.

Here are five things that you need to keep in mind:

1.The Feel

What does the space feel like? How do you want your training to feel?

Every training has a different flavor, and your training space should align with yours. Think about the adjectives that you’d like students to use when describing your training. For example, is the mood of your training “clear, compassionate, and calm,” or “challenging, engaging, rigorous?”  Does that space align with the mood and tenor of your teacher training program?

On a practical note, consider the cleanliness of the studio. Since you’re going to be practicing yoga, you will likely prefer hardwood or laminate floors that are kept swept. Ask about the studio cleaning schedule. There’s nothing worse than being in a sweaty, hairball infested yoga training room!

2. The Supplies

In a nutshell, does the space have what you need to run your training.

You can think about:

  • how many students will fit in the space comfortably
  • how many props/supplies are available
  • storage space
  • wifi
  • Chairs or sitbacks for sitting
  • projectors, projector screens, whiteboards, poster sheets – or do you bring your own?

3. Location

Location, location, location.  Is the training central to where your students will be coming from?

Also consider:

  • Is there nearby parking (for all-day)?
  • Nearby transit
  • Nearby food, parks, cafes

4. Amenities

We don’t always think about the amenities, but they will become very important if you’re doing a full day training.

  • proximity of bathrooms
  • showers
  • kitchen
  • air conditioning

5. Schedule

Finally, many rental spaces already have obligations. If it’s a working yoga studio, you may have to schedule yourself around their classes or events. Get the details on availability so you’re not caught by surprise.

Sign up below and get the full training checklist!

What you need to think about before you create a teacher training

So you’ve been teaching awhile, and you love yoga. You’d love to share the deeper aspects of the practice with your students. And maybe you’ve even been asked by your students when you’re going to be offering a teacher training.

Should you?

Here’s what you need to think about before you create a training.

Does education align with your personal mission?

Not everyone needs to offer a teacher training. There are many ways to contribute to your community, and you may be more passionate about offering retreats, classes, privates, or immersions. Step back and consider your big picture.

Does your community need a teacher training?

If you live in a community without a reputable, local training, then there may be a high calling to create an offering. But if there is already a lot of competition (and they are good programs), then perhaps there is a different yoga offering that could meet your student’s desires. An immersion, philosophy intensive, or asana progressive may be a better match.

Do you have the skills to be an educator?

Teaching people to teach requires a different set of skills than teaching a public class. As an educator, you need to be focused on structure, learning objectives, time management and meaningful assessment. You must become very clear about the “how” of good teaching, not just the “what” – this is, if you want to create a training that is effective rather than just a nice experience for your participants. There are resources you can use to develop these skills (my Create Your Training course, for example), but you’ll have to be willing to put on your left-brained hat for a good period of time.

Holding space

Running a teacher training isn’t just about teaching skills; it’s about holding space for people to move through a personal transformation. The teacher training room can become intense and emotional. As a trainer, you have to be willing to create a safe and compassionate space for your yoga trainees to be heard, held, and supported.

Time

Creating a 200 hour training takes a boatload of time and project management. Are you they kind of person who can set measurable and tangible goals? Do you have time now to set aside 5-10 hours a week to commit to this endeavour? Again, you can work step by step and complete your program at your own pace, but you’ll need to be a self-started and stay motivated to stay on track.

If you love education and are committed, then dive on in! Creating a teacher training is an extraordinary learning experience to clarify your teaching style and become very clear about the skills required in teaching.

For help determining if teaching a training is right for you, check out my free course: What to Consider Before You Create A Teacher Training. 

The Biggest Mistake Teacher Trainers Make – and How You Can Avoid It

I call it the Great Mistake.

And I’ve made it. A lot.

Here it it:

As a teacher trainer and educator, it’s natural to want to give your students a lot of information. After all, we are content experts and we have a lot of great stuff to share. So when we’re creating trainings, we usually start by making a list of all the content we want to cover. What do we know, and how can we talk about it. As if the point of the training is to transfer what is in our heads into our students’.

This is the great mistake.

The great mistake is thinking that training is about what we teach.

It’s not.

Training is about what the student can do.

The great mistake is thinking that training is about what we teach.

It’s not.

Training is about what the student can do.

When you are creating your training, start with the end in mind. Rather than think about what you want to teach, sit back, have a latte, and really think about what you want the student to be able to do as a result of your time with them.

  • What new tasks can they perform, or perform better?
  • How will you know if they “get it?”

Even in a knowledge-centred training (where you want them to “know” or “understand” stuff), there is a way to evaluate your student’s performance by seeing something that they do.

When you switch your teaching focus from what you know to what your student can do, you may suddenly find that your in-class time needs to look radically different. You may not need to teach everything that’s in your head. In fact, you may teach a lot less content in some ways. And perhaps all of sudden you realize that, wow, you actually need to teach something entirely different than you originally thought to get the performance result from the student that you really want.

Ask: what do you want your student to be able to do as a result of the training?

By asking yourself this simple question, you are setting yourself miles ahead.

Put the student’s performance first, and create your training from there.

Book Review: Donna Farhi, Pathways To A Centered Body

What an accomplishment! Clearly written and beautifully illustrated, Pathways to a Centered Body is must read for yoga students and teachers seeking the understand the body’s most mysterious muscle, the psoas. With clarity, gentleness and thoroughness, Donna Farhi and Leila Stuart illuminate the psoas muscle’s central role in core stability, breathing, and functional movement.

Farhi is a long time contributor to the yoga community. Her first books, The Breathing Book and Body And Spirit have been on my bookshelf for more than fifteen years! I just love her work. She is approachable, knowledgeable, generous and humble. In her new book, she and Stark display a wonderful gift for making anatomy relevant and easy to understand (being an anatomy geek, this is something that I appreciate).
However, while Pathways to a Centered Body includes an abundance of fascinating anatomical information, the heart of this book is imminently practical. Their six-phase process for psoas rehabilitation is comprised of thoughtful exercises designed to improve the functionality and health of this key stabilizer. Each exercise is supported with photos and step by step explanations. Exercise sets are compiled into sequences that can be used for an at-home practice.
If you are interested in expanding your understanding of core connection from the inside out, consider checking out this lovely new work. A perfect blend of practice and theory, Pathways to a Centered Body will shift your relationship to your psoas –  and to yourself.

How to do crow pose (bakasana) safely

Crow pose (bakasana) is the entrance to more challenging arm balances. (Check out this video on my favorite way to get into the pose.)

When practicing crow pose, you need a few key elements:

  • aware and educated hands
  • cat back
  • core and inner legs squeezing
  • hip flexion

The combination of these four component parts will help you – and your students – get there!

Component Parts

Hands

I like to do a little hand education before doing an arm balance. Weight in the hand naturally falls to the outer wrist, so we need to get the weight more into the index mound. You can practice good hand engagement (aka “hasta bandha”) at any point in your sequence. Here’s my trick:

When you are on all fours, lift the heel of one hand up so just the knuckles are pressing down. Then use your other hand to grab onto that forearm and pull up. Against the resistance of the pull up, slowly lower the heel of the hand back down. This little manoeuvre will help you activate the forearms and distribute the weight evenly into the hands and fingers. It’s also a lot more work.

Try this “lift the heel of your hand” thing in other poses such as downward facing dog. It’s a great reminder for optimal hand weighting in bakasana.

Cat Back

Your back is not flat in crow pose, it’s rounded. Practice finding this shape in positions such as cat pose. Use the core to scoop in and up strongly.

Core and Inner Legs Squeezing

Squeezing the inner things activates the adductors, which are the mainline to activating the transverse abdominis, your deepest abdominal layer. Find the midline. Squeeze the feet together, the knees into the arms, and presto, the core will start to light up. Finding levity in the upper body starts with strength in the lower body.

Hip Flexion

Most people take this for granted, but to do crow, you have to get your knees outside your shoulders! This is some pretty serious hip flexion. Get the body used to this “snuggle action” through poses such as side angle (parsvakonasana), lizard, and squat (malasana).

Peak Tip

Any arm balance can be done in a different configuration to gravity that will make it easier. Turn bakasana upside and do it on your back. Sit on your bum and do it by trying bent kneed navasana. These alternative versions of bakasana will 1. educate your students on the actions they need to get the pose without weight-bearing in the hands and 2. give them something hard to try as a peak pose if they can’t put weight on their hands for any reason.

Check out this video on my favorite way to get into the pose.

Happy exploring! Let me know how it goes!

Space. And Intimacy.

“Space, the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise…” – James Kirk

Yogis, we’re going on a fantastic voyage. A voyage that reveals the importance of inner space…

A famous study entitled “From Jerusalem to Jericho” was conducted in the 1970’s to analyze the good Samaritan story from the Bible. Researchers sought to determine what factors impacted a desire to act like a good neighbor towards someone else: did someone’s current thoughts affect kindness? Did feeling rushed?

To test their hypotheses, they gathered a group of seminary students and tasked half of them to give a talk on the Good Samaritan story (ostensibly to generating thoughts about helping someone else) and the other half to give a talk about religion and the work place. They then had the students walk from one building to another. The students were further divided so that one group was given a “high hurry” motivation (ie: you’re late!), another group a “medium hurry motivation” (they’re waiting), and a final group a “low hurry” motivation (you’ve got some time to get there). En route, the students encountered a person (an actor) pretending to be in distress.  Then researchers tallied up who see if they could discern any patterns in who stopped to help.

Turns out that degree of religious thoughts had no bearing on whether or not people stopped. (People given the good samaritan story stopped no more frequently than the others.) However, those who felt leisurely stopped far more than those who felt rushed by a ration of 6:1.*

The moral of our story? Compassion requires space.

Daily living is compressive. How often do we feel rushed? We hunch over our desks, rush to get the kids to school, fight against the traffic, and armour up to not get hurt. We are beset by obligations from peers, family, bosses, even friends. Our lives move at cyber-speed, and we frantically race to catch up with emails, texts, and skypes.

It’s time to slow the clocks.

When we go to yoga, or walk in nature, or write in our journals, our soul spreads its folded wings and stretches to full breadth. Without self-nurturing space, we default to our survival impulses. Caught in flight or flight, we react impulsively and can even become blind to what’s right in front of us (some students actually had to literally step over the stricken victim in the scenario). But when we create space in our lives, we then have the room to act ethically, considerately, and gracefully.

How can you create space for yourself? Through the yoga practice? Through breath? Through journalling?

Create space this week just for you.

Because when we create space for ourselves – even when it’s just starts with an extra breath – the world receives a better version of who we are. And that’s worth an extra breath.

*Ironically, the errand that students were tasked with was to go to the next building in order to deliver an impromptu speech on the passage of the Good Samaritan. The full study is entitled, “From Jerusalem to Jericho: A study of situational and dispositional variables in helping behaviour.”

Gay marriage. The subway. And a 7-year old.

Or, education happens in the darnedest places.

A seven year old sidles up next to me on the N train to Astoria. I’ve got my laptop flipped open, working on an article for EME 6414, my Web 2.0 course. He sits quietly for awhile and watches.

“You type fast,” he observes.

I look over at him. He’s got freckles everywhere, and big, earnest blue eyes.

“I took a course,” I say. “I learned how to do it.” That’s me, always one to beat the drum of education into young minds.

“Oh,” he says. “So.” He looks at my article again. “You disagree with your dad?”

He’s been reading over my shoulder.

I pause. I wonder briefly if his guardian is going to mind this conversation. “Yes.”

He considers this. “You fight with your dad?”

I think for a moment. “Well, my dad and I think different things politically,” I say slowly. “It’s not really fighting, we just have different opinions.”

“Your Dad doesn’t like gay marriage?”

“No.” I smile, “He doesn’t.”

“But you do?”

“Yes. I do.”

He sighs and tilts his head. “…Do you think it’s okay to be gay?”

I glance over towards his guardian, who turns out to be a matronly looking woman sitting three seats down from me. She is listening to us, but doesn’t seem to mind where the conversation is going.

“Yes,” I say, “I think it’s okay to be gay.”

“Even girl and girl?” He sounds pensive.

“Yes.”

“I hear that there’s girl and girl, but I’ve only seen boy and boy stuff.”

“Yes, there’s girl and girl, too. There’s a whole world out there.”

“But you think it’s okay.”

“Yes, I do.” I feel I should explain a bit more, “I have lots of friends who are gay.”

He frowns. He needs specifics, “Girl and girl, or boy and boy.”

“Both,” I say.

He looks impressed by this. “But your Dad doesn’t like gay people?”

“Well,” I consider this, “my dad doesn’t believe in gay marriage. But he likes gay people. We even have gay family members. But he doesn’t think that gay marriage should be legal.”

“It’s not legal?”

“Being gay is legal,” I clarify, “but until recently, being married wasn’t. Until recently, gay people could only get married some states, but not in others. But now the supreme court decided it was okay for everyone to get married, in all states. Which gives gay people legal rights that they didn’t have before.”

“Like what?”

“Like taking care of someone in the hospital, or taking care of their kids.”

“Oh, right!” He says. “Kids. So,” his nose wrinkles in consternation, “Can you have two dads?”

“Yep. Two dads.”

He looks out into the train car. “I’d like to have two moms,” he says decisively.  “But, wait!” he suddenly looks puzzled again, “How can two boys have a kid?”

I wonder again about that guardian. “Wellllll,” I say, “then you might need to get some help.”

“Oh,” he brightens, “like adopting.”

“Yes,” I say with a tinge of relief, “like adopting.” I didn’t want to get into a conversation about surrogacy and sperm donation. I glance up at his guardian. She has a small smile and shakes her head slightly as if to say, ‘Kids? what can you do.’

I decide that I love this seven year old.

“So,” I say to him, “What do you think?”

He looks up at me and considers. “I think it’s okay,” he says finally. And nods definitively.

And then I have to get off the train. It’s my stop.

 

Thriving as a networked individual

“People and institutions exist now in information and communication ecologies that are strikingly different from the ones that existed just a generation ago…It is not an either-in person OR online dichotomy; it is an in-person AND the internet AND mobile contact comprehensiveness.” – Lee Rainie & Barry Wellman, “Networked.”

Thank  God.

Reading this book is like a breath of fresh air. Of relief. You mean all this time stuck in my PDA or online doesn’t mean that I’m a misanthrope? Despite some outcries to the contrary (“it’s all ego,” “everyone’s detached these days!”), it is with a profound sense of relief that I place myself squarely in the Networked camp.

Social networking and creating relationships are not just for the in-person meet anymore. Staying face to face means missing out on the richness of interchange this is humming and thriving right past your keyboard. Social networking means tapping into Facebook, to Twitter, to blogs. And it also means calling your friend and arranging for an in-person meet.

Nine years ago I moved from New York City to Vancouver, Canada, leaving my entire world behind. Thank god we had cellphones. Now with Skype, I can easily video chat my family and friends. With my cheap North American calling plan, I can call my American peeps from the car when I’m commuting. Grabbing a five minute conversation on the go rather than having to wait for a landline at home and paying through the nose. I could also simply Skype the for free, if I weren’t so distracted by video when driving. In the interim, I can read my friends’ blogs, send them articles, like their Facebook postings, and stay tuned into their lives even through I’m far away. Then when I get on a plane and see them face to face, it’s as if we never really had a break.

I embrace my Networked identity. We reach out more, and we also become more autonomous, relying on 1-1 connections rather than more traditional in-person group identities. Each network a snowflake. No two networks alike.

And how three-dimensional will our wonderful webs become? Are we in store for the “Metaverse” (a “convergence of 1. virtually enhanced physical reality and 2. physically persistent virtual space”) or where part of our brain consists of an external hard drive that connects wirelessly to our organic matter (oh wait, that’s our smartphone, we’ve already got that). My grandmother was born without running water. Now she has an Ipad. What changes have been wrought in this life time! What changes are yet to come!

 

References

Rainie, L. & Wellman, B. Networked (2012).

 

Photo credit. 

Photo cropped from original.

Identity reflections

As my social media course winds to its conclusion, I am reflecting back on the first decision I made in the course: how much of myself do I reveal?

At the beginning of the course, I made the decision to post the educational blogs as myself, interwoven into the fabric of my current website. Deciding the my identity was not to be fractured, but yet would be revealed as a whole expression. Although the facets may not make sense (educator? yogi? romantic love guru? sugar free paleo experimenter?), altogether they are a shadowy expression of my own unique digital identity. Just a each thumbprint is unique, each person creates their own unique digital imprint in the world. Each personal learning network is unique – indeed, we are the hub of our own experience and learning – so why would I minimize or flatten this experience in order to placate my readers that I am easily one-dimensional? Knowing that we are all lovers, haters, humble monks, as well as arrogant sons of bitches, can we not expand our own minds to hold the beautiful contradiction and complexity of another human being?

Perhaps our editorializing of ourselves is safety. We fear to reveal our idiosyncrasies because we are afraid that our lack of neat edges speaks to loose ends and irresponsibility. Or that we are protecting our image from those who may be confused by our  speaks to our complexity or our humanity (“no, Mom, at the age of forty, I’ve never been drunk, I swear”). Or maybe we are revealed in our silly humanity, taking selfies and proclaiming our ill acts to the world when perhaps we should just let the moment live without a digital archive (are we afraid if we don’t record it that it will be gone forever?).

At any rate, I am well-pleased with my results. Rather than attempt to box my expression into narrow corridors of branding, I am satisfied by the new aspects of self that have been uncovered through this process. A sugar free nut. A budding educator. Why not? Is not the world wide web a glorious tool for self-expression and exploration?

When I was an actor, my teacher used to berate us when we made our characters logical. “Don’t dull the extremes,” she snapped, “it’s boring. We love the contradictions!” Linear organization and simplicity may be aesthetically pleasing, but there is an equal beauty in the complicated weave and dance of fractals.

Photo credit.

Boundaries, social media, and ethics, oh my!

Yoga students friend me on Facebook all the time.

See, as a yoga teacher, I work in an industry where personal connection is valued. I have the pleasure of working with some of my yoga students up to four times a week. I know their names, their injuries, their sense of humour. Before and after class, we share stories and connect about life happenings. Sometimes, these online connections lead to real-time meetings (coffee, sometimes evolving to friendships). In fact, one of my yoga mentors advised, “Treat your students like friends. No more. No less.” Also, my teaching personality is familiar and candid; though I never feel that they are exposing, my in-class anecdotes are frequently personal in nature and I often story tell about relationships and personal experiences.

Creating clear boundaries can be tricky when working in an industry that seems is so focused on “building community.” Also, social networking is the currency of private contractors; that is, the number of “friends” that I have on Facebook dictates my sphere of influence. If I have a workshop or training coming up, I want to have a robust community in order to create a successful event.  So yoga teachers are caught in an interesting bind: we want extensive communities that capitalize on our personal connections, yet at the same time, we need to have boundaries that respect our student’s privacy.

As an original attempt at separation, I had set up a professional Page and a personal profile. However, students searching for me frequently find my personal page first and initiate friendships. Given the warmth of the nature of our relationship, it feels rude to not be “friends.” So both my page and my profile are now public fodder. And even if I did have complete separation, posting anything personal to Facebook at all is risky since one’s posts can be seen on others’ timelines. As a result, I don’t post anything that I consider overly personal on Facebook at all.

Perhaps the publicity of Facebook will lead to an elevation in communication. In other words, there is no such thing as “speaking behind someone’s back” because someone can turn around at any second. Even private messages could be screenshot and emailed. Anything written can – and could be – used against you in a court of public opinion, if not of law.

In this light, perhaps we can view the dissolution of privacy as an opportunity to step up, rather than scurry underground. If all our behaviour can be exposed, maybe we’ll just behave better. Rather than lament the lack of privacy, let’s embrace behaving in a way that is always fit for public consumption. Let’s act and speak in ways that won’t later make us cringe. And perhaps in this light, we can be more tolerant and compassionate about behaviour that’s outed that may not be ideal.

Because that virtual stone that gets cast on Facebook may just come back around and bite our bums on Twitter.

 

References

Burner, K. & Dennen, V. (2013). Boundaries, privacy and social media use in higher education: What do students think, want, and do? Selected Papers of Internet Research 14. 

Burner, K. & Dennen, V. Friending and Footprints: Privacy and ethical issues of Facebook use in higher education.

Photo credit.

Politics and Social Media

My Dad’s a Republican who lives in Texas.

I’m a Democrat who lives in Vancouver, Canada.

When I used to go home for holidays, we never talked politics. Fox News would play in the background of the family room while I surreptitiously trolled through BBC online on my laptop.

Facebook, however, has sometimes exposed these unspoken differences.

“I disagree,” read one of his FB comments. It appeared on a post supporting the recent decision to uphold gay marriage nationwide. “I agree,” I typed in, contradicting.

Facebook is just one form of social media in which divergent opinions between groups of people may become unexpectedly explicit. And not just between family members, but between friends, co-workers, and acquaintances.

“I never knew she had such strong feelings about taxes!” a friend confided to me in chagrin, after an exchange online grew heated. Whether it’s about vaccinations, veganism, politics, or charities, sometimes a well-placed prompt can incite a litany of inflamed discourse.

“Discussion with non-like-minded people and exposure to diverse viewpoints is linked not only to facilitating the deliberative process and enhancing the quality of opinions but it is also closely linked to active citizenship by allowing individuals to express their view points and become accustomed to encountering dissimilar opinions.” – Hsu, S. et al (2013)

Like usually attracts like, and “people selectively seek out information congruent with their own disposition and beliefs” (Hsu, S. et al, 2013). On social media, we tend to cluster with those who validate our point of view. However, given the wide net of social media (which can encompass friends, family, and peers), sometimes a surprise slips through the gaps. It’s not rare to be startled out of a Facebook surfing reverie by a dislocating remark. While I may not agree with the opinions that I see expressed, I’ve started to pause in my the discomfort. Can I hear that point of view?

Sometimes there’s no compromise. “Let’s agree to disagree,” as my dad might say. But other times the comments have allowed me to see a bridge to another side of things – even if it’s just a glimpse. While I may decide to come back to my own shore, it’s illuminating to have traveled. My F2F interactions with my Dad have shifted.  I ask him questions occasionally about his politics – not to prove him wrong, but to actually listen to his concerns and his thoughts.

Being “right” will never win us friends –  or arguments. An unexpected gift of social media’s reach is that it may provide us with a bit more of the exposure and empathy that we need to bridge our divides.

And have peaceful Thanksgiving dinners at home.

References

Hsu, S., Kim, Y. & Zuniga, H. (2013). Influence of social media use on discussion network heterogeneity and civic engagement: The moderating role of personality traits. Journal of Communication (63), 498-516. DOI: 10.1111/jcom.12034

Then end of 9 to 5

A Facebook private message happens at 8:57 pm, “out of working hours” (Casey et al., 2014), which leads to a work call and work discussion in the late evening. With the advent of social media as a resource for professional communication, the boundary between work and play is fuzzier than ever. Friends on Facebook are also colleagues. Professional communities of practice lead to personal affiliations. While we’ve always had conflation of professional and personal space, the prevalent use of social media is merging our relationships further. Attempts to “list” people (Twitter and Facebook) or “circle” people (google plus) are a nod to attempted boundaries, but culling lists can become time consuming and even political.

This intersection of personal and professional is leading to new quandaries and rules around interactions. For example, on Facebook, do I like their personal page or their professional page? Both? Which is appropriate? Is it rude if I don’t friend someone? What if they only have a personal page?

Complicating matters, choices of boundaries are individually driven: some individuals may have strong divisions in their networks, while others are comfortable with a degree of murkiness. And while some may opt out of the social media quandary entirely, they then may be missing valuable extra-work opportunities for connection and support.

As we move increasingly into a world of asynchronous, geographically open communication, our traditional boundaries are shifting dramatically and heralding a call for increased worker autonomy (Harvard Business Review Article).  When a professional can easily do their work from home, calling them to be at their desk at prescribed times seems mistrustful. Social media can fill the void created by physical absence by providing an extra-work space for communication.

Perhaps personal and professional boundaries will rest less with social media technology or innovations, but simply remain a personal choice in how an individual engages in their networks and uses their tools. Individuals with boundaries will have move overlap in their social media use, while those with firm boundaries will make clear divisions in their networks between work and play spaces. Social media exposes the greater question: how much of a boundary do we need between our work/ play selves?

Will the intention behind our work/ play boundaries – exemplified by the traditional 9-5 workday – serve us in this multi-layered world of identity and interaction?

References

Casey, A., Goodyear, V. & Kirk, D. (2014): Tweet me, message me, like me: Using social media to facilitate pedagogical change within an emerging community of practice. Sport, Education and Society, 1-18. DOI: 10.1080/13573322.2013.858624

Photo credit, used courtesy of Creative Commons. Revision: photo added to grey background.

Who owns my “A”?

With social learning on the rise, group learning and collaboration is becoming increasingly common in the classroom. Students can use google docs, wikis, and powerpoints to create their group projects, and connect across distance to produce their work. Researchers are watching the trend, wondering if this “collective intelligence” will result in increased “creativity, innovation, and invention” (Gray et al., 2013).

While “there is strong evidence that social media can facilitate the creation of Personal Learning Networks that help learners aggregate and share the results of learning achievement, participate in collective knowledge generation, and manage their own meaning making” (Dabbagh, 2012), implementing these tools effectively into the traditional classroom environment is proving tricky. While social media tools work quite well for informal, personal connections, scholastic use has generated an array of challenges around issues such as identity, motivation, and assessment.

America was built upon the ideals of individualism: work hard enough and you can make something of yourself. We pride ourselves on self-reliance, entrepreneurship, and tell tales of dedicated underdogs achieving the American Dream. Not surprisingly, our culture fosters a spirit of competition where individual achievement is valued and prized over the gains of the community. In this context, collaborative learning seems to contradict our fundamental values. How, for example, does one feel invested in a group project when participants don’t contribute uniformly? How do we reward students appropriately for their work? Who “owns” the A?

These scholastic issues are representative of the tensions around privacy and ownership that pervade the greater online community. While Creative Commons has stepped in the bridge the significant grey area between copyright and public domain, ownership is still fuzzy. If I take a screenshot, is it mine? If I tweet without acknowledging the source, is that ethical?

To step back and take a larger view: collaboration, information sharing, and interdependence are essential for progress. When people work together, our communities become stronger and smarter. But as more tools for information sharing are created, we need to cultivate the ethical wherewithal to give credit where it’s due. Taking information for free is still too easy: illegal downloading, plagiarism, and copyright infringement are rife. Our technology has outpaced our ethics and our policing. So until we have the protocols worked out, we need to take personal responsibility for the information that we appropriate and curate. We can start by questioning our use of information as well as attributing credit diligently.

Collective learning is providing us with an opportunity to question our culture’s dogged adherence to individualism. Acknowledging the power of collaboration liberates us from the idea that we need to “do it all” ourselves. Freeing ourselves from our usual short-sighted competitiveness permits us to attribute generously without being afraid that we’ll somehow undercut our own personal worth.

And when we trust others to honour our contributions, then we won’t cling to our own work out of fear that it will be inappropriately stolen or copied.

Who owns the “A?”

Maybe, eventually, we all do.

References

Clerehan, T., Hamilton, M., Gray, K., Richardson, J., Sheard, J., Thompson, C. & Waycott, J. (2012). Worth it? Findings from a study of how academics assess students’ Web 2.0 activities. Research in Learning Technology (20). 1-15. doi: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/16153

Dabbagh, N. & Kitsantas, A. (2012). Personal Learning Environments, social media and self-regulated learning: A natural formula for connecting formal and informal learning. Internet and Higher Education (15). 3-8. doi:10.1016/j.iheduc.2011.06.002

Gray, K., Kim, H. & Thompson, C. (2014). How social are social media technologies (SMTs)? A linguistic analysis of university students’ experiences of using SMTs for learning. Internet and Higher Education (21), 31-40. doi: 10.1016/j.iheduc.2013.12.001

 

Photo courtesy of Creative Commons.

 

Media, meditation, and monkeys, oh my!

People, my mind has gone full jumping monkey.
As I’ve plunged more fully into social media (with a vengeance, tally ho!) during my Web 2.0 course, my mind has become hyperactive, jumpy, and just a wee bit obsessive. The instantaneous and fractal nature of working online is seductive; I’ve followed so many rabbits down so many holes that I’ve created an underground bunny kingdom.

The virtual world is addictive; it fires up our reward centres and keeping us clicking along. I may check the clock at 9 pm, think vaguely that I should stop blogging/ tweeting/ networking/ surfing  – and when I look up again it’s 10:30. My brain then stays jacked on for at least another 90 minutes, too giddy to unwind from all that stimulation.

I usually sleep like a rock. The last month? Insomniac.*

“Networking,” “plugging-in,” and “multi-tasking” titillate the monkey that is waiting to swing in our mind trees. As we all engage in the virtual worlds of our choosing (twitter, Facebook, surfing, second life, video games, etc.), we need meditation and embodiment practices more than ever before. While it the virtual world is just as “real” a forum for social interaction as face-to-face, participating in these worlds removes us from the sensations and experiences of our physical body and immediate environment. Virtual worlds are an increasingly common, culturally sanctioned out-of-body experience that occurs from the dubious comfort of sitting in a chair in front of a computer.

Full health requires embodiment. We need to retain our capacity to sense, to taste, to touch, to hear. The more we are in our heads, the more we need to come back to our bodies.

“You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes every day. Unless you’re too busy; then you should sit for an hour.” – Zen adage

For every hour that we spend surfing, can we spend just five deliberate minutes mindfully feeling, stretching, walking? Being with kids is a wonderful way to get back into reality (they won’t let us be otherwise – um, unless they’re on your IPad). And let’s not just tend to our bodies, but let’s calm down that crazy monkey in our heads as well. Sitting in meditation for even just five minutes will help us find a little space for our thoughts. Otherwise the minds can become infatuated by its own agenda, forgetting that it rests in the greater space of our being-ness.

I am loving every moment of my Web 2.0 course. Participating more fully in social media is dynamic, fun, collaborative, and exciting. But this work has also exposed some of the consequences that come with playing online. Now that almost everyone in our culture is hooked in, more and more of our educational and recreational activities are become virtual. And in this tidal shift, it is becoming far too easy to leave our bodies, senses, and feelings behind. You know, like Neo in the Matrix.

It’s an exciting new frontier. And by all means, let us all go “to there,” as Liz Lemon might say.

But let’s make sure we’ve got some happy bodies and spacious minds waiting for us when we get back home.

Photo courtesy of Creative Commons.

*(Another reason paleo friends are becoming close to my heart; they emphasize our need for sleep.)

Google Maps just blew my mind

Okay okay, so it’s been awhile since I’ve checked out Google Maps. The last time I did anything resembling this kind of exploration was a few years ago when I did a cursory check of Google Earth and visited the usual hangouts. You know, like typing in “Titanic,” getting zoomed around, flying into the ocean, and seeing a few nice photos of the great sunken ship.

When I went back to check out Google Maps, I was shocked. First of all, the revolution of street view seems to have happened without my noticing. What is this strange new world? High-definition reality displayed for all to see. Who needs to travel? Now everything is revealed with an address and a click. Although one of my friends, a locations director for film, had shared with me that he uses street view for his work, I hadn’t understood the magnitude and depth of the technology.

I have entered a real world video game.

I immediately went back to view the houses I grew up in, my old schools, my old apartment in New York City, and my best friends newly bought home. All displayed in shockingly high definition.

And here, yet again the issue looms: privacy. Someone is caught on the camera. While their face may be ruefully smudged out, Google Maps exposes the question of our right to our own image.  Does it belong to us?  To the photographer? Although we’re taking in the sites from “street view” (and these views are therefore public), I felt like a peeping Tomasina. This is legal? Staring into people’s homes?  Although I couldn’t exactly walk down the driveway, I felt as if I had been given magic binoculars to peer into a secret life halfway around the world.

Having just checked out Second Life (a virtual online world created by users), I couldn’t help but be startled by the eerie similarity between my experiences. In both worlds my computer screen is a portal to a new world; one in which we can fly through space, go wherever we want, and explore the limits of a digitally enhanced virtual world. Although Second Life is programmed rather than captured by photographs, they both seem to be caught in a grey world between real and unreal.

What will be next, I wonder. Video enhancement? Real-time interaction with other people using Google Maps – or – god forbid – with the residents of the buildings we are perusing? Maybe checking in through google maps virtually will become our next way of paying house calls. Just walk in and click to ring the doorbell.

 

Photo: Screenshot of a capture of a street view of BC Place.

Sugar-free: why all the desserts!?

So I decided to do a Pinterest board to celebrate and share the love of being sugar-free this month. To add to my board, I do a search for “sugarfree”, and lo and behold, my search returns….

…desserts.

They’re sugar-free, grant you. But they’re all desserts.

So I add “paleo” to the description. After all, I’m being paleo inspired this month as well. Surely that will return some more robust food options.

What do I get? Still desserts.

Add “vegan.” Desserts.

Add “grainfree.” Desserts.

What is going on?!

It’s like our decision to go sugar-free has created this gaping hole that can only be filled by replicating the very ingredient we’re avoiding!

Okay, people, let’s buck up together. I’m a fan of a good sugar-free brownie just like the rest of us. But the point in going sugar-free for a few weeks or a month isn’t to be constantly substituting for our “deprivation.” Our goal is to re-sensitize our overly-sugared tastebuds to the subtle and delicious possibilities of our palate.

Let’s take the plunge. Let’s go sugar-free for real.

So rather than adding non-caloric sweetener to make a faux blueberry crumble, let’s dare to take a step back and jump into a different diet altogether. We are not depriving ourselves; we are nourishing ourselves. This isn’t a pity party or a diet, it’s a festival of culinary possibility.

Let’s embrace the sugar free! Embrace real food! Embrace no additives, no sweeteners, no corn syrup, no calorie-free substitutions! (Except the best hot cocoa ever. You get one gimmee :))

I’m three weeks in and I gotta say, it’s not a hardship. I’m gonna keep the ship going.

Jump on in. The sugar-free water is just fine.

 

And PS: Check out my Pinterest board!

Second Life: more than just Batman with a phallus.

Alright, alright. So I have seen “Second Life” in a bunch of academic, peer-reviewed articles in reference to supporting learning activities. As in, “the post graduate course used a range of social media technologies including Facebook, Delicious, blogs, wikis, and Second Life (a virtual world) to support a variety of learning activities” (Dabbagh, 2012). So I figure, okay, in the interest of higher education, let’s see what this is all about.

Oh my goodness gracious.

It’s like my beloved video game Myst had a baby. Or a bunch of babies. And then they all became programmers and started writing themselves. (For those born after 1990, Myst is an early puzzle game that provided hours of obsession for those who wanted a virtual world experience with awesome graphics – but no bloodshed, guns, or zombies.)

Second Life was born at Linden Labs, a cyber tank specializing in creating virtual experiences. Although they’ve got a mysterious “Project Sansar” brewing that is slated to herald the next-generation of virtual creation, Second Life is currently the “internet’s largest user-generated 3-d world.”  I’ve only just begun to explore this strange new world and I can see the obsession. Who doesn’t want to fly around an island and chat up people nearby? Apparently you can listen to music, buy and sell goods, and converse with people from all over the globe.

I gave myself five minutes of playing and then cut myself off. (I have spent hours playing Myst I, II, III, IV, and V and I know how quickly one can enter the wormhole.) However, out of curiosity, I googled screenshots to see what further adventures the world might hold. Most of the images that I found were sexual: a Second Life Batman with an erect penis, avatars having sex with each other, avatars dressed in gear that would make a music festival blush. Apparently, Second Life is an excellent forum for all kinds of fantasy. I also found a number of interesting images showing real-life photos of users with their uncannily twin like avatars. This world, no doubt, has become much more than just a game to many of its players.

But how one turns Second Life into a learning experience, I have to yet to discover. That exploration might require more than five minutes of screen time to find out.

I will tread cautiously. And bring a timer.

References

Dabbagh, N. & Kitsantas, A. (2011). Personal Learning Environments, social media, and self-regulated learning: A natural formula for connecting formal and informal learning. Internet and Higher Education (15), 3-8. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2011.06.002

Image courtesy of Creative Commons.

 

Periscope Down! Streaming video from Twitter.

I tried Periscope this week. It’s a Twitter creation that streams live video to whoever happens to tune into the feed at the time.

“Let’s just try it,” I say to my boyfriend, while we’re eating breakfast at local restaurant.

“Periscope?” He raises an eyebrow.

“It does live video. Like a mini-broadcast, I suppose.” I open my newly downloaded Periscope app. “Here, I’ll broadcast you, eating.” I  hit the red button, and presto! Begin transmitting. He looks at the camera and shakes his head.

“I pity whoever is watching this,” he says dryly.

I roll my eyes, “Oh come on, who would actually watch this.” I stop suddenly in horror. Someone has joined the live feed. Then another person. “Oh my god.”

“Boring, boring, boring,” he is saying, poking at his eggs.

I fumble with my phone, trying to turn the camera off, “They’re actually watching! People are watching!”

I finally get the camera to turn off and start laughing. “Oh my god, that was insane. Look, look…”I point at my periscope update. “Five people tuned into watch.” I sit back, “Wow, that’s so weird! They didn’t even know what they were going to get.”

He is still shaking his head at me. “Worst broadcast ever.”

“You know what I should’ve done, I should’ve periscoped my class this morning.” I had taught a public class in Whistler outside. “Now that would have been thinking. What could this be good for?” I’m musing.

On my recent visit to Toronto, I stayed at an AirBnB of a hairstylist. Amongst our pleasantries and how-do-you-do’s, she had mentioned that she was planning on using periscope to transmit her live classes. Periscope could be useful in many learning situations, where an immediate live feed could provide visuals for psychomotor skills to the public. You could publicize it on twitter, similar to a Twitter chat. “Live Periscope Feed at 5 pm!” Or the like. The video could then be saved and perhaps more artfully curated for video distribution. The issue that could rise from impromptu video screenings: privacy, privacy, privacy.

“Huh.” I say. My boyfriend again raises his eyebrows and shakes his head.

“Okay,” I say, “I’m almost done with the phone.” The eggs look great.  And I’m going to eat them – right after I instagram them for posterity.

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

First Twitter Chat!

Baby’s first Twitter chat!

132 tweets, 12 participants.

I think we can safely say that it wasn’t a rousing affair (especially as it began with 20 minutes of meditation and breathing), but it was geographically remarkable in that the chat influencers were from Idaho and California. Mostly the chat consisted of the hosts posting inspirational quotes and everyone commiserating about how busy our minds are. The irony of meditating while on Twitter did not escape us.

 

Chat participation

Chatting on twitter is a little like group texting. People have time to compose their thoughts (as quickly or as slowly as they like), ideas and links can easily be shared, and people can participate as much or as little as they like. Although 12 people (a low number, I grant you) participated in this chat, only 3-4 people really voiced opinions. The rest preferred to observe.

I can see why people like Twitter chats. They are a great way to have a collaborative Q&A, sideline private conversations, meet experts, and share resources. I didn’t find this chat particularly useful, beyond an interest in seeing who participated and from where. Well, and to note that “computer brain” and “meditation brain” are on opposite ends of the spectrum. The more I engage in social media, the harder it becomes for me to switch into a meditative mind state.

Finding your Chat

I stumbled onto this chat quite by accident  – and only because the chat time and hashtag were listed in this user’s twitter profile. Finding a chat seems a little right now like finding the “in” club through an unmarked door. They’re out there, but hard to find unless you know someone who knows someone. I did find a few online resources that list upcoming Twitter chats, although I feel like they are not comprehensive. Gnosis Arts lists them via a wiki, and someone (who?) has created a Google Sheet.

For my next chatting adventure, I’d like to engage in an established chat that has more than 12 people involved in order to see what kind of information maelstrom ensues. Let the chatting continue!

PS: Interesting privacy/ ownership issue. If I take a screenshot, is it “mine?” Photo courtesy of my Mac and my screenshot.