And that's a wrap!

And with that, module 3 is done. It's hard to believe I've completed all the modules and finished all the work... now to wait for the grades and graduation. :) I might still do some blogging and commenting and that sort of thing though, since it would be great to stay active in the community.

Congrats to all the other presenters yesterday and today! We did it!

Skype Analysis

We had another skype session Sunday. The morning session discussed analysis, and then we put together a definition for it. I hear the evening session discussed creativity, which sounds really fascinating! I'm going a bit meta here and analyzing the skypes themselves rather than analysis itself.

It's been quite interesting these last two sessions, as I've always been a part of the evening (UK time) sessions. Now due to scheduling I'm participating in the morning ones (aka middle of the night my time). It's been great to talk to people I didn't get a chance to before, but I also really miss talking to those who usually attend the evening sessions. The feeling is really different between the two skypes. There are usually lots of people on the evening call and hardly any in the morning. Before I rarely got a word in edgewise, and now I'm doing a significant portion of the talking. It seems like the golden amount of people is in that 5-7 range. If it's fewer, the discussion gets pressed into a specific concept and loses the lovely bouncing around of ideas that the bigger sessions have. But the bigger sessions, when too big, there just isn't enough time for everyone to speak.

I would love to return to everyone bringing their own conversation topic and probing deeper into those; I really miss that from the big sessions. But it would also be a really interesting experiment if instead of molding the conversation into something specific, we students picked one concept out of what we bring and just ran with it. Once people get really into the discussion, they tend to keep it going, but if it gets redirected, sometimes the conversation stalls out. That carries its own risks, but it might be interesting to see what happens.

I'd love to hear everyone else's thoughts. Have you switched back and forth between evening and morning? If so, what differences have you noticed?

Communicating Tangled Thoughts

Yesterday I was part of the earlier skype session, and there were only three of us students (Elissavet, Katya, and I) on there, which allowed for a much more detailed discussion than is normally possible! We started out as normal, discussing a miscellaneous thought or two, and then quickly moving into talking about our various modules--our research for Elissavet and I, and the most recent AOL for Katya. We all summarized our work, some more succinctly than others (aka, well done Elissavet and Katya, not so much me), and then got summaries and/or questions from the other two as to what was heard.

I found it quite interesting to attempt to summarize everything succinctly and clearly for several reasons. Attempt being the key word, as I don't think I succeeded. The first reason was obvious to me--I'm not a morning person, and I don't do well thinking in academic language at 4 in the morning! Another is that I've spent so much time recently figuring out how to explain things in the most basic, pared down language for quick conversations with those who aren't particularly interested in the academic minutiae of it all. That's been really fun to figure out, actually. It's made me think about what the absolute core of my inquiry is and how to express that in very plain language that's accessible to those not in my field (or who are very young). It was odd, though valuable, to switch back into academic minutiae.

But the other reason I spent some time thinking about yesterday, and I think it comes down to me struggling to express things verbally if I haven't written them down yet. I noticed the two areas I've written down in the draft thus far were the two areas I unintentionally focused on; the areas I haven't yet begun writing I found very hard to synthesize on the spot. For some reason, I'm having a very difficult time doing my analysis this time around unless I make myself write it out and form the sentences and paragraphs while I'm thinking. I've always been much better at written than oral communication, but this is another level.

It feels backward; shouldn't I have something to say before I say it? But that's not the process this time, and my thoughts are feeling very tangled. How does one communicate clearly when the thoughts behind the communication are not yet clear? It's one thing when you're in a 1-on-1 conversation with a friend or a colleague and they know you're processing verbally while you're talking to them. It's another thing, an embarrassing thing, when you need to have it all just so and instead the thoughts come out like spaghetti because they are, in fact, just like spaghetti.

I can only hope I can get them untangled in this weird, backward process of writing-analyzing-writing-analyzing soon. I would really love to hear others' thoughts on all this... do you find writing or speaking easier? Which helps you to untangle your thoughts better? And how have you worked at getting better at the harder one (because I'm totally stealing your tips, if you have any to offer)?

Contact Improv

It had been ages since I'd gone to a jam, and then this summer I went on tour with my old dance collective and got to do some CI. I used to not really get it, but I've changed a bit since freshman year (!!) and now really love it. Thank goodness for the tour reminding me of that! So I fished around online and found a semi-local group that offers biweekly jams, and I've started going.

I'm totally hooked. I'd be up there every day if I could. There's something special about the feeling one gets when one is totally nonverbal and listening physically rather than aurally. The intimacy that just dancing and exploring together creates is not like anything else I've ever experienced. Touch, trust, dance, it's like the perfect combination. I'm going again on Sunday and bringing a fellow dancer this time, plus I've introduced it to two different (other) people in the last few months. I'm doing my best to spread the word, ha!

Anyone want to share their own experiences with contact improv? Love it? Hate it?

Thought Threads

Entering week five of the module and week three of my research. I'm halfway done with both the classroom and the interview portions. As I'm progressing in my research, I'm seeing a wealth of connections between the different areas of inquiry. For example, it's fascinating to analyze the similarities and differences between my interviewee responses, especially in regards to musicality definitions. It's also quite fun to see how the different classes I'm teaching respond to the exercises I'm giving. Everyone seems to be enjoying themselves, but the classes as wholes have very different personalities, so to speak.

Unsurprisingly my research is taking its own twists and turns, however, and I feel like with the classroom exercises I'm winding around a bit. I figured out after the first class that my original approach was rather too ambitious in terms of *how* it was structured, so I quickly restructured and have been finding the restructuring largely successful. Nevertheless, it's a bit tricky figuring out how to reorder and reorient concepts so they're still introduced in a logical fashion, and in a way that offers the same experience (more or less) to every class--regardless of their technique level, age, time in class, or dance style (ballet vs. modern).

With every class I teach, though, I keep seeing thought threads wind their way through the research. They twist through my own head, through the interviews, out into the classroom, and back in from the classroom. I'm absolutely loving making all these connections and can't wait to sit down at the "end" of the research and analyze them more thoroughly. What's also been encouraging is how supportive those I've interviewed have been. One said how excited they were that I was doing this and they thought it would be a valuable contribution to the field. That's so encouraging to hear!

Fellow module 1s and 2s, how are you getting on? And fellow module 3s, what has surprised you or delighted you about the process thus far?

Week Four Thoughts

Today is week four, day two (not that I'm counting or anything!) and things are progressing. I've completed the first week of my research. Looks like I've got something like 20 students participating, of which 13 completed the pre-test survey. Not too shabby! I also completed my first interview yesterday, and it was a great conversation as well as being very helpful research-wise.

I've done quite a lot of restructuring of my original research schedule for the classroom exercises. Some of my (new to me) classes wound up very much on the beginner end in terms of technique level, and I had planned themes for more of an advanced intermediate level class. So I've restructured pretty heavily, and I think this newest iteration should be a good fit and easily tailored to all my classes.

But that's been making me think about artistry in general. I remember when I was younger (probably 13 or 14) getting really frustrated with teachers who wanted me to incorporate a lot of artistry when I was so overwhelmed technically that I couldn't do both at once. Looking back, I was actually pretty technically advanced, dancing six days a week at a serious pre-pro school. I finally hit the point where I could incorporate both several years later... maybe 16? 17?

I'd love to hear thoughts on if you felt similarly when you were young or notice a similar issue in your students. I do wonder how well some of my students are going to be able to incorporate this musicality training, as when you're struggling with very basic steps it's difficult to think past the immediacy of the exercise and turn it into art, as it were. There's just only so much one can handle at once. Thoughts?

Research Week 1...

And waking up yesterday morning began week 3, day 1 of module three, which means the first week of research! Tonight is my first class of four research classes. All the other research pieces in terms of having enough classes to teach have fallen into place, which is a wonderful thing, so I'm good to go there.

Unfortunately, I'm seeing my survey section fall apart, as I've only gotten one response back with deadlines of tonight and tomorrow night for the students who got it last week. It's a pity, since I was really hoping to hear more of my students' thoughts surrounding musicality. At least the one response I got was very illuminating.

So that's that for research specifics. Yesterday we had our first monthly skype in which we talked a lot about building trust between researcher and student as well as the ins and outs of the assessment process. I think I phrased my original discussion point on trust rather poorly--I got very helpful advice (thank you to all who commented!) on building trust with my students, but I was actually thinking more along the lines of how research requires us, the researcher, to trust others.

Having to find places last minute, waiting for survey results, asking people to interview (who so far all have said yes, but of course they didn't have to), and so on all highlights how much of the process is out of my control. I can do my best on this project, but ultimately, if none of my students consent to being part of the research when I arrive in class tonight and tomorrow, there goes half my project in smoke! So I'm trying not to think about it too much, since I can't do anything about it. It really does require a lot of trust in people's general goodness and willingness to help out. In that sense, research is quite frightening. But it's also quite exciting, since it is a real collaboration with others, which can only enrich the process.

Tell me your stories of trusting other people and the process in the comments!

Hello, Module 3

Today marks the official start of module 3. Really hard to believe I'm on the last module already. Friday we had our welcome back skype, in which we got a tour of myunihub. SO helpful. I WISH I'd had that last year when I came on board... it look me literally months to sort through some of the stuff that Adesola was showing us. Practically speaking, I still find myunihub very confusing for nontraditional international students, but with only one more semester to go I'm not all that motivated to do more than I need to do with it to finish.

Today might be the first week, but it's coming after several weeks worth of prep for me. A week and a half ago I had a major snafu threaten to hijack the ballet part of the research process. My ballet class was cancelled due to lack of enrollment (a common problem in the rural area where I live). Luckily my network of fellow teachers have kindly found offered a few of their own classes to allow me to complete my research... Now I have to hammer out the details and timing, but it looks promising.

I know the writing process will be long, but in some ways I can't wait to "finish" research and get into writing and presenting. I've always found the writing process much easier than the research process, especially since performing my own research with the corresponding ethics and consent paperwork is totally new for me, and thus more stressful.

How are others, especially module 3s, feeling about the coming work?

Goodbye, Module 2

And wow, there goes another module! Only one left to go. How did everyone else fare at the end of the semester? I'm feeling good about what I turned in but am definitely ready for summer. Hope everyone has a great summer (and congrats to all the graduates)!

Thoughts Percolating

A few weeks ago I wrote about rest for bodies, but I've noticed that thoughts need rest too. There's a lot of topics I open up for consideration, think through them a little, and then let them sit half open on the computer, as it were, of my mind. After a few months, I suddenly find I have all new thoughts springing up in that area.

There's some learning, I think, that doesn't happen until we're ready. On one hand, that's all learning, and that's an obvious thing to say. But on the other hand, I think sometimes we don't realize just how true it is across the board. Like, it doesn't matter how urgent a matter is that we're thinking through. We might not have found the piece of the puzzle yet from some totally unrelated topic that will help us understand this one. Sometimes things that seem like totally unrelated topics wind up being intertwined and growing up together, each dependent on the other's process.

Has anyone found this to be accurate in their own lives? And if so, any neat examples to share?

When you have a thought but not a name for the thought...

That's been me this module. It's been an odd process realizing that I have pretty developed processes of thinking, but not having names for them. Here's a snippet of my reflection paper draft dealing with it.

When I began this module several months ago, I looked at the module’s research and assignments in two different wings. The first wing was that of philosophical research. What theories underpin my teaching practice? The second wing was that of academic investigation to find and subsequently develop my research topic. Since the whole idea of identifying my methodological outlook intimidated me, I instead eagerly leapt into researching my broad original topic, teaching ballet and modern dancers how to think.

The unfortunate irony was that despite procrastinating thinking about philosophy, my entire topic was philosophically based, in the sense I assumed dancers understanding how to think and create was a skill both important to their careers and valuable in its own right, the latter a potentially debatable topic. I soon found this pedagogical style had a name—feminist pedagogy. Horton Fraleigh writes (1999: 8), ‘Meaning depends on the contextualized whole. Context is the weaving or joining together of elements to produce a whole.’ By giving myself a broader scholarly context for my framework, I was able to make greater meaning of it, not only in the immediate sense of more fully understanding my own thoughts, but also of understanding them in relation to other scholars’ work.

A similar process occurred while reading Suzanne Sullivan’s Living Across and Through Skins, which crafts a concept of feminist pragmatism. Sullivan (2001: 5) elaborates as follows: ‘Pragmatism emphasizes praxis and the value of theory for praxis… It sees knowledge as a tool for enriching experience.’ I have been a pragmatist for some time, but again without realizing its name. Both in my general practice and this project specifically, I do emphasize the pursuit of knowledge as a helpful tool for enhancing dancers’ experiences rather than (usually) a pursuit in and of itself.

Helen recommended the Sullivan book in a skype call a while back, and I immediately ordered it. It's been great. When I was in college, I used to feel really stupid for not wanting to go down all the bunny trails of theory, theory, loads of abstract theory. My question was all, "Sure, but what's the point?" Now I look back and realize I just have a different theoretical framework, is all, and it's a perfectly valid one. Always nice to realize those sorts of things!

Phew! The nail-biting wait for feedback begins...

Well, I just turned in my draft proposal and lit review; it's still a draft of course but I hope I'm on the right track. We'll see. I'm having especial difficulty with the proposal appendices. I don't see anything in the handbook about them other than that they exist. Does anyone see anything I missed? I tried googling the employer support form and ethics rationale and form but I didn't find anything that seemed relevant. There's a ton of sample participant consent forms out there but I'd like to see some university guidelines before I craft it, if there are any.

Despite the whirlwind of the last few days getting this proposal together, it wasn't as bad as I thought. I kept thinking how little research I'd done, but I had way, way more sources than I thought when I finally put together a complete bibliography. It took me an hour and a half just to do the bibliography! So that was really encouraging.

This coming week I've got to get that reflective essay draft nailed down and turned in by Friday's deadline. How are everyone's projects going?

The Brain and Learning

This week in our skype call I brought up how dancers seem to come back from breaks better than before they left, which started all sorts of interesting conversations on the plasticity of the brain, augmented rest, and the importance of rest overall. The general consensus is that rest is crucial for things to gel and for muscles to relax, which helps explain the uptick in coordination after a break.

The brain is really a fascinating thing, and it's something I'd like to investigate at some point, especially as it relates to learning and teaching. I know there's been a ton of research done on how the brain correlates to learning. Right now I need to keep focusing on my research topic, but I'm filing it away mentally for future research. Has anyone found any interesting tidbits or articles about the brain's role in learning or anything related that might be a good entry point for this sort of study?

Coffee Break

Well, not a coffee break exactly, but spring break! This week has been spring break for a few of my normal commitments, including two of my classes, and it's been so nice to have time to breathe (and research, ahem).

I was just talking to someone recently about how breaks seem to allow ideas and technique to "gel" in some odd way. It was really great to talk to someone else who understood that; as a kid I was always so confused when my teachers would talk about how we shouldn't take breaks, ever, because we'd lose our technique. I always felt--and still feel--like I actually get better when I take a break, like I come back stronger and better in different ways. My leg might be a bit lower, if the break is long enough, but coordination gets better.

I might have felt like the lone one out as a kid, but now I think I was right. Not just for myself, but for people in general, because I'm now noticing that my students come back more coordinated after breaks. It's like things seem to click for them technically. For my modern class, we had classes cancelled two weeks in a row (once for snow and once pre-planned), and this past week I noticed some real differences in how they were dancing. Things like parallel position were suddenly more settled and not as much of a struggle.

Has anyone else noticed this in themselves or their students? Do you know what the science is behind it?

Pilots in Musicality

Now that I'm spending time researching musicality, I'm also doing a lot of thinking about how I'm already teaching it. This week I tried some new tactics with my students, some of which seemed to help and some of which flopped. I've noticed with all of my young students thus far (granted, a small sample) that they seem to struggle with simple rhythm and counts the most. Technique they learn, class etiquette they learn, but they really struggle with just something as simple as counting only four tendus and not five or six in each direction. If they were really young, 4 or 5, I could well understand that, but they're 7-10, and I would have thought that counting would be the easy part! So I tried a few clapping exercises and such, and I think if I pursue that vein of exercise, it may help.

On another note, I'm rereading/reskimming through Researching Dance and loving it, especially taking the time to read chapters I hadn't read before. I'd forgotten what a useful book it is. I found chapter 4 especially helpful on the differences between positivist and postpositivist research helpful, since the terms themselves weren't really ones I was familiar with. Hearing the terms elaborated was quite nice and I understood better how they fit into my research framework, which was already quite postpositivist--I just didn't know it was called that! I've struggled with getting all the -ologies and -ists straight in my head, so I'm very much appreciating reading about them in a way that makes sense to me and helps me get them straight.

Questions for the comments--1) have you found that your young students struggle with musicality, and if so, what ages does it start to mesh for them? Have you done any exercises for it, and if so, what? 2) How would you frame your own research thoughts in terms of -ologies and -ists?

Musicality Mind Map (and other thoughts)

So research is progressing into the concept of musicality, and I'm still finding very little in the field of dance. Yesterday I read a couple of articles by music teachers; there's more information available for musicians, perhaps unsurprisingly. My concept map thus far looks like this, in text form:

Musicality--what is it? Is it innate, taught, or both?
     HOW can it be taught (including in different fields and styles)? In different age groups?
         Do teachers actively strive to teach it, and if so, how?
             What and how do dancers think about it and practice it?
What are its boundaries, in terms of spillover into feminist pedagogy re: dancers learning to make choices and the general nebulous concept of artistry?

More thoughts will come, but that's how things are developing thus far. My mind is clicking with various ideas of teaching tools and project ideas, so I take that as a very good sign. Comment with thoughts on musicality, especially if you have anything to add to the mind map, and/or talk about how your own project is going!

The First Research Gap

Tonight, as my brain was shutting down from exhaustion and I was just about to put my reading down, I found my first research gap, and it was a totally different direction than what I was expecting. I've been reading Paula Salosaari's dissertation Multiple Embodiment in Classical Ballet, and she discusses the three choreographic options in ballet. You've got narrative content backed by form (form roughly equaling technique), form without content (think variations, that sort of thing, although I'd say this is arguably the third category already), and the third option, form as content. She goes on to say the following:

If only narrative intention and content is recognised, the ballet classroom work from an expressive point of view becomes problematic. The technical execution of the vocabulary can often be clearly defined, while the expression in it is elusive. Teaching needs concepts and words for the qualities inherent in the vocabulary. If the classroom work is emphasising learning the vocabulary as a basic technique on which the later artistic intention (probably dramatic) is added, the dancer may not become aware of the potential expressiveness in the vocabulary itself. The lack of qualitative intentionality in the classroom practice leads to the attitude that formal dance material is to be performed ‘impeccably’, and that the range of choices is narrow (Salosaari 2001: 31).

When I read that, I realized that's exactly what's happened with many of my students. I'm working diligently with one of them to help them understand how to play with musical nuances, and I can tell I'm only getting through to them sporadically. Then I realized just how often I've heard teachers call for musicality, and how little I've heard about how to actually accomplish that (and even more so, how to teach it). A couple quick searches on Summon reveal an astonishing lack of results for "ballet musicality" or "dance musicality." There's some magazine articles and a handful of academic pieces on musicality in other disciplines, but only a single one for ballet (about Cuban dancers' musicality). There surely must be more to it, and I'll keep researching it, but it does so far appear to be a gap.

What I find rather amusing is this is a topic quite dear to my heart. There's a definite fitting-ness, so to speak, to my studying this. I've always been the musical one, the dancer who plays with the music and finds working with the music to be one of the most interesting parts of dancing. That being said, how I hear music has always been slightly different than most of my teachers' ideas, and I have only found one person who hears it the same way I do--one professor, in university. Now, as a teacher, I'm firmly convinced that a mainstay of what we call artistry has to do with this idea of form as content, how a dancer uses the simplicity of technique in conjunction with music (or other sounds/silence), but it's a very difficult concept to teach and to communicate its important to students who, in my experience thus far, seem mainly focused on form as form.

I've already got some ideas percolating about how to move forward with this, but it will have to wait until I've gotten some sleep! In the meantime, I would love to hear any thoughts from others on anything surrounding this topic, even if tangentially related.

Skype Followup

Yesterday we had our monthly skype meeting, and I found it very useful and refreshing. It was great to chat with classmates on topics that we're all dealing with despite our huge differences in age and work situations and home cultures.

One of the things that I brought up was how to find the sweet spot in research topics between something that has been researched enough that you can find sources on it and something that is still new enough that you as researcher are contributing something to the field and aren't just reinventing the wheel. I've been struggling with that as I thought there wasn't much research yet on this topic (feminist pedagogy in the ballet classroom/teaching dancers to think and contribute) but there very much is. That's a good thing, of course! But I don't want to reinvent the wheel in my research. On the other hand, I know that whatever research is being done has not yet translated into an awful lot of ballet classrooms, and that is still an area which needs a lot of work. Too many classrooms are still like some of the ones I was in growing up--authoritarian, harsh, and with little regard for the dancer's physical and mental health. I thankfully had mostly good teachers, but the few I had that weren't have left lasting scars. I don't want any dancer to grow up with scars like that, and so there is still work to be done.

Anyways, Brandon mentioned that the farther into research one gets, the more gaps will appear, even if seems like everything has already been researched to death. It hasn't, of course, and the further in one gets, the more holes will crop up in the literature. I'm hoping that as I go farther into my research, those gaps will appear.

How have you found those gaps in your own reading?

The Reading Continues!

Well, we're another week into the module and progress is happening. I've finished Bell's book, which is something I can tell I'll return to during the process, and I'm about a third of the way through with Decolonizing Methodologies. It's a fascinating read, not only for the intended content, but also for the history. I know very little about the history of indigenous peoples of New Zealand--all of my schooling focused on indigenous peoples of North America--so it's interesting, though obviously troubling, to compare the process of colonization and decolonization between the two places. A lot to process through and a lot to sit with, and I'm looking forward to seeing how the book continues.

On another note, I'm in a different place job-wise than I was last week. I've had some unexpected but very welcome opportunities fall into my lap, and it looks like I'll have more available directions to go in with my research than I expected, which is very exciting! That means I can really start looking into the research as such this weekend now that I can relax a bit on the job front.

And on yet another note, I've been reminded in the last week or two just how much teaching is a process of learning. I mean duh, of course it is, but I've had several moments in the last few weeks of trying to help students with this or that and figuring out to explain it as they were learning how to do it. I'm sure at a certain point, teachers see certain issues over and over again, an FAQ of sorts. I'm beginning to amass those things too (hyperextension, so much hyperextension with young students). But on the other hand, since every student is different, it's fun to think that there will never be an end to interesting challenges in this career.

What has happened in class lately that has surprised you? Perhaps something a student has done, or a new way of explaining things?

The Reading Begins...

I'm finishing up a flurry of administration details still, which is a pain, but I'm enjoying the start of research, which is decidedly not a pain. I've been tackling Judith Bell's Doing Your Research Project  and am about halfway through. It's a great read.

I've also been starting to let thoughts percolate about my project in general. I've known since I started module one what direction I wanted to take it in generally, but I do mean generally. I want to do something with dancers learning how to think, collaborate, and take responsibility for their own learning--so in the vein of how does one teach dancers to think? What does that mean? What is the value of it?

One of the papers that I did for my graduate pedagogy class several years back was about the authority structures in the classroom and the differences between ballet (authoritarian, usually) and modern (more collaborative) class atmospheres. It was absolutely fascinating research, and ever since then I've had it on my radar as something I want to look into more, as one of my key goals as a teacher is teaching my students how to think and evaluate their own technique and artistry and learn how to grow themselves forward.

Currently the first problem I'm running into that all the ballet lessons I'm teaching right now are private lessons and my modern class is the group class. So if I wanted to do any kind of research on ballet classrooms, my sample size is really too small. That means hunting for more classes to teach next year, a time-consuming process, but one that is going to affect which way I can take my research.

How is everyone else's week going? For module twos, what thoughts are beginning to percolate about your project? And for module ones and threes, how is the start of the module going? I'd also love to chat about teaching thinking skills in the classroom, so by all means comment on that too!

Hello, Module 2!

As of Monday, we're officially in the new term, which means starting Module 2 for me. I'm taking this first week to pour over the handbooks and orient myself into the semester as a whole. From my first glance through the handbook, I'm getting very excited. When I did three semesters towards my MFA a few years back, one of my favorite courses was called Research and Writing for Dance. It was one of the courses that has been most useful for me long-term. This module sounds very much in the same vein--looking at philosophical frameworks, orienting ourselves in current and historical research, ways of researching and ethics thereof, etc. My old textbook is even on the recommended reading list! So it's very exciting to have the opportunity to dive into all this material again, hopefully on a much different and hopefully deeper way now that I'm further into my professional practice than I was then.

One of my priorities for this module is fully participating in the MAPP communities--blogs, LinkedIn, skypes, etc. I feel like I still have barely scratched the surface of communication with my classmates. Last module I was hoping to get a slack group going, which Adesola kindly created, but I'd like to see that become active and useful to us. 

In the skype this past weekend I discussed attempting to find a more efficient way to interact with others' blogs. There's a lot of us, and so a lot of blogs to keep up with. It's not feasible to check out each blog every week, but if I even tackle a third (a third! so that's what, a dozen blogs?) each week, then I still only interact with each person/blog four times this entire module. Hm. Last semester I managed tackling 4-6 blogs each week, in part because not everyone was posting something every week, so it meant only 2-3 substantial responses. I'm trying to imagine more than doubling that. It's a daunting prospect, but I'd really like to be as active as I can. We'll see how that plays out though as the semester heats up. ;)

I'm going to keep chewing through this and investigating some technology options (like, is there a way to set up automatic notifications of new blog posts? That would save the time of checking but even more so ensure that things don't slip through the cracks) to see if there are things that would help. Perhaps something I find might even be applicable to the group as a whole and make things easier for others too.

When I reread this, I'm afraid my enthusiasm is leaping off the page... well, guilty as charged. I can't wait to get started on the module and get to know those of you I haven't yet interacted with much, and get to know those of you I have interacted with better.